Today in Chickamauga History - October 17
1861, October 17: On this date, John ROSS signed loyalty of the Cherokee Nation to the Confederate States of America. By this time the Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole had allied themselves with the Confederacy. Now it was the C.S.A. who promised to protect the people and property of these five nations; it also said it would continue the trust fund payments previously made by the federal government. The tribes agreed to supply troops to defend the South from Union attacks, but the treaties said these soldiers would not be ordered to fight outside Indian Territory. Yet such agreements could not ensure that all the members of the Five Civilized Tribes would support the Confederacy. Many Creeks and some Seminole, for example, formed a band of 6,000 men, women, and children sympathetic to the Union who decided to flee north towards Kansas. The first fight of the Civil War in Indian Territory occurred on November 19, 1861, when a Confederate force commanded by a former federal Indian agent attacked this group. After two more battles they finally made it to Kansas, but only after many had died from exposure and starvation.
After the “trans-Mississippi West Campaign”, John ROSS decided to switch loyalty to the Union, all the while leaving Native Warriors to fight on and die on the battlefield until September 19, 1864. ROSS’ signing a pledge of loyalty to the Confederate States of America will be mentioned and dealt with under the Treaty of 1866 by the United States government. Oddly enough, ROSS apparently forgot how the Cherokee Nation was protected by the United States of America and were “bound to hold no treaty with any foreign power.”