With the death of Chief John Ross, Acting Chief Lewis Downing became Acting Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Downing, a "full blood" Baptist minister educated under Evan Jones at the Baptist Mission, had succeeded Jesse Bushyhead to the pastorate of the Peavine Baptist Church in the Goingsnake District. Speaking little English, he was one of the founding members of the Keetoowah Society and had been both a Confederate Cherokee and a member of the United States Volunteers. With the rise of Lewis Downing to the position of Chief of the Cherokee Nation, the Keetoowah Society had all but achieved its initial plans. Few of those men who gathered in Peavine Baptist Church on that April day in 1858 would ever have expected that they could come so far.
In early May of 1866, John B. Jones and Smith Christie had left the Cherokee delegation in Washington for a few days to attend the Annual Meeting of the Baptist Home Mission Board. At this meeting, the final transfer of the Indian missions from the Foreign to the Home Mission Board was accomplished. John Jones was appointed "General Missionary for Indian Territory" and given responsibility for all Northern Baptist missions in the Indian Territory. In addition, he was given responsibility for developing missions and religious outreach to the Freedmen within Indian Territory. To do so, he asked for funding to support the ministries of two new Cherokee and of two new Creek preachers. Jones also notified the board that he had written a provision into the Treaty of 1866 that would provide funding for the continuing Baptist mission in the Indian Territory.118
As the delegation returned to the Cherokee Nation in August of 1866, the nation was as divided as it had ever been. The Southern delegation felt betrayed by the Federal government and refused to assent to the treaty of the Keetoowah delegation. William Penn Adair stated that the treaty "is not binding upon the Southern Cherokees, as we refused to sign it, and fought it to the last and are still fighting it."119
A critical issue for the Southern delegation was the very same issue that had split John Ross and John Jones, that is, the status of the "black Cherokee" in the new Cherokee Nation. Though the Treaty of 1866 had made provisions for the liberation and citizenship of African-Americans within the Cherokee Nation, the issue would be troublesome. 120 Elias Boudinot wrote to Stand Watie that the resolution of the "negro difficulties" as well as the plight of the African-Americans in the Nation was to be the responsibility of the Keetoowah: "They shoulder all the responsibility of the negro matter."121
With the return of both parties to the Cherokee Nation in August of 1866, all eyes turned to the General Council meeting that would be held in the upcoming days. The Council would meet to make an attempt at "binding up the Nation's wounds" by electing new leadership, by amending the Cherokee Constitution to incorporate the principles of the newly signed treaty, and by rebuilding the political and social structure of the Nation. The returning African-American Cherokee, both from Kansas to the north and Texas to the south, looked to the council to see if what had been promised in Washington would be fulfilled in Tahlequah.122 Considering the losses on both sides during the Civil War, and with the nation still bitterly divided, reconstruction in the Cherokee Nation seemed quite difficult.
Chief Lewis Downing was confident that he would be reelected the Principal Chief in the upcoming elections and that he would be able to continue the Keetoowah program for the rebuilding of the Cherokee Nation. However, much to the shock of the Keetoowah, the Cherokee Council on October 19, 1866, chose William Potter Ross (Cherokee Lodge #21) to succeed his uncle as Principal Chief. Although it was Cherokee tradition for worthy nephews to succeed their uncles as chief, the choice of Ross over Downing struck a serious blow against the designs of the Keetoowah for national unity.123 Though Reverend Downing had personal prestige and political experience, he overestimated the influence of one so closely associated with the "ignorant and but slightly progressed in moral and intellectual improvement."124
William Potter Ross, a well educated, mixed-blood lawyer and merchant, seemed the perfect choice because he articulated the best of both possible worlds in the Cherokee Nation. Though closely affiliated with John Ross and the Keetoowah, he was educated at Princeton, was a former slaveholder, and was committed to the rapid acculturation of the Cherokee into white society. However, he had little in common with the Keetoowah except for the support of his uncle's policies: he did not speak, write, or read Cherokee, and had little rapport with the conservatives who made up the core of the Keetoowah. Though closely associated with the Keetoowah, William P. Ross would prove to be cut from a different cloth.125
However, Ross did have an ace up his sleeve. One of the founding members of Cherokee Lodge #21, he was to go on to become the Worshipful Master of the lodge in 1851 -- a time before the lodge would split over the issues that ultimately led to the Civil War. In addition, William P. Ross had been the leader of the reconciliation of the Cherokee Nation following the Treaty of 1846, "He (Ross) and the other headmen of the Cherokee nation were at the capital to arrange a treaty made necessary by the late enforced removal of their tribe from Georgia to the Indian Territory. These headmen were arrayed in two hostile factions, and the negotiations were at a standstill. But at one of the meetings of Federal Lodge (Federal Lodge #1, Washington, D.C.), the rival leaders, all Freemasons, were brought together by the exertions of Worshipful Master S. Yorke and other members, and the treaty was successfully completed." 126
In spite of their political, social, and party differences, one of the key elements that had brought together the disparate elements of Cherokee Society had been the interest in and promotion of brotherhood by the Freemasonic lodges in the Cherokee Nation. Ross used this background to his advantage.
Many of the leaders of the Keetoowah Society and the Knights of the Golden Circle were former Freemasons in the lodges of the Indian Territory. Many of the government agents, military officials, religious authorities, and influential citizens of the Indian Territory were also Freemasons. Without a doubt, some of the African-Americans living in the Cherokee Nation were made Freemasons in Indian Territory, Kansas, Missouri, New Orleans, or places farther east. That William P. Ross was a power broker and a conciliatory force in the Cherokee Nation under the auspices of the Freemasonic brotherhood is a factor that cannot be ignored.127
Unfortunately, if the Cherokee Nation elected William Ross because they believed that he would, once again, be able to heal the breach that severed the Nation, they made a mistake. They underestimated the depth of both the impasse within the Nation and Ross's deep contempt for the Knights of the Golden Circle.128 It had not been so long since the spectacle at Fort Smith, and William P. Ross would not soon forget the infamy heaped upon the family name and the role that such a characterization had played upon the physical health of his uncle. In addition to the family feud that existed between the Ross and Ridge factions, William P. Ross held the Southern Cherokee responsible for the plight of the Nation and its terrible destruction in the Civil War. Little did he know that if it were not for the pleadings of Sarah Watie that he, himself, would never have lived to assume the responsibility of leadership in the Cherokee Nation.129
Immediately upon assuming office, Chief Ross appointed "two suitable persons whose duty shall be to translate into the Cherokee Language the report of the Committee... and also to translate the aforesaid treaty into the Cherokee Language."130 Amendments to the Cherokee Constitution were made which would reflect the agreements of the Treaty of 1866. Difficult as they may have been for the Cherokee to accept, the amendments reflected "the most favorable terms they could."131 Knowing that the times ahead would be difficult and the changes to the Cherokee Constitution would demand his personal involvement in their implementation, Chief Ross personally took part in the design and structure of the amendments.132
The first amendment to the Cherokee Constitution proposed by the Council committee struck at the very heart of that which had divided the Nation into Keetoowah and Knights of the Golden Circle. All references to the institution of slavery that had been written into the Cherokee Constitution since 1827 were stricken. The second amendment granted enfranchisement rights to all former Cherokee slaves who returned to the Nation by January 17, 1867.133 Other acts nullified and repealed the confiscation laws and also nullified all purchases of confiscated property, established a quasi-sovereign area within the Canadian district where the Southern Cherokee could exercise their political autonomy, and spelled out some small electoral and political reforms. Chief Ross called a "General Meeting of the People" at Tahlequah on November 26, 1866 to ratify the amendments and to hear the new treaty read. 134
Chief William P. Ross, in spite of his personal animosity towards the Southern Cherokee, sought to reconstitute and reunify the Cherokee Nation. Though not necessarily as a Keetoowah, he spoke the Keetoowah message of unity:
For the first time for more than five years the people are assembled in general convention. For the first time since the war have you all met as friends and brothers. I most devoutly thank the Great Ruler of the Universe that it is my privilege to address you as one people. I thank him that amidst the carnage, the horror, and the desolation of those long dark years of conflict, we have not been entirely swept off the face of the earth...
Cherokees! If you firmly resolve to become one people... We are all possessors of a common inheritance so let us enjoy it... Let us not look back upon the dark valley of the past, with its lost friends, blighted hopes and sad and fearful associations... Never did we have more to live for, to labor for, and to gain.135
At this meeting, Riley Keys (Cherokee Lodge #21), Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, was chosen President of the Council. Under the guidance of the General Secretary, the Reverend Budd Gritts, the amendments to the Constitution "were read, considered, and severally approved, and adopted by the Cherokee people." On December 7, 1866, Chief William P. Ross issued a proclamation declaring the amendments to be part of the Constitution.136
For the first time since the Cherokee Constitution disenfranchised blacks in 1827, African-American Cherokees were made citizens of the Cherokee Nation by the National Council's actions. At the time of the Treaty of 1866, there were seventeen thousand residents of the Cherokee Nation; estimates of the number of Aframerindians in the Cherokee Nation following the Civil War set the number at slightly above two thousand.137 More than half of the African-Americans in the Cherokee Nation had fled or lost their lives in the Civil War.138 If one-third of the Cherokee women were widows and one-fourth of the children orphans, one can contemplate the status of African-American Cherokee following the war. If the Cherokee Nation suffered greatly as a result of the Civil War, then the Aframerindian Cherokee made their sacrifices to the effort as well.
The Treaty of 1866 and the amendments made by the Cherokee Nation also remembered those others who had been a significant part of the struggle:
All native born Cherokees, all Indians, and whites legally members of the Nation by adoption, and all freedmen who have been liberated by voluntary act of their former owners or by law, as well as free colored persons who were in the country at the commencement of the rebellion, and are now residents therein, or who may return within six months from the 19th day of July 1866, and their descendants, who reside within the limits of the Cherokee Nation, shall be taken and deemed to be, citizens of the Cherokee Nation.139
The war being over and the battle won; the Cherokee Nation had come full circle. Thus the new Cherokee Nation came to reflect the old Cherokee Nation, and the ideal of the "beloved community" that had been at the heart of the Keetoowah message came to be a guiding principle of this Nation once again risen from the ashes.
Many of the freedmen returned to their homes and attempted to settle among the families with whom they had lived before the war. Some of the freedmen stayed with their plantations even though they had been abandoned.140 Many of those who had fled returned to land that had been made barren at the hands of the internecine war that was no respecter of person nor property.141 The ex-slaves resettled along the river bottomland and among those whom had always been their friends, as "none but the poorest and lowest of the Indians will live among the Freedmen."142 Within a few years, the Aframerindian Cherokee had returned to the status they had attained before the Cherokee Nation had become "civilized":
...freedmen are the most industrious, economical, and in may respects, the more intelligent of the population of the Cherokee Nation... Most of these freedmen have oxteams, and among them blacksmiths, carpenters, wheelwrights, etc...I have the honor to report that the existing relations between the freedmen of the Indian Territory and their former masters are generally satisfactory. The rights of the freedmen are acknowledged by all; fair compensation for labor is paid; a fair proportion of crops to be raised on the old plantations is allowed; labor for the freedmen to perform is abundant, and nearly all are self-supporting.143
Within several years, African-American Cherokee were elected to Cherokee Council where they served as representatives for their people.
One of the most difficult issues to resolve was the status of Cherokee freedmen who arrived in the nation following the six-month deadline. The African-American Cherokee diaspora following the outbreak of the Civil War had left them in the far-flung regions of Kansas, Arkansas, Texas, and even into Mexico. That many of the black Cherokee were unable to return to their home until after the deadline presented a significant problem for those who arrived too late to receive anything except a hard time. In addition, some blacks fled to the Cherokee Nation seeking freedom and status never granted in other parts of the United States even though they had never been resident in the Nation prior to the Civil War. Those who arrived late were considers "intruders." This created a great deal of resentment among many Cherokee and was a continuing source of trouble for some forty years. 144
A New Mission
On October 31, 1866, the Cherokee Council followed up on Article 14 of the Treaty of 1866 by authorizing the Northern Baptists "to remove their mission station from the Baptist Mission in the Nation to some other locality." The Council appointed a committee led by Lewis Downing and Benjamin Snell that was authorized "to erect buildings thereon and other improvements for the purposes of prosecuting their missionary work, and the free use of timber and other building material and fuel is hereby granted."145 As the Knights of the Golden Circle had burned the Baptist Mission, the Council appropriated three thousand dollars for the construction of a new mission.
There was a debate as to whether the new mission should be located in Tahlequah or at Fort Gibson, but the Joneses, under the guidance of Dr. Elisha Taylor of the Home Mission Board, decided upon Fort Gibson.146 Fort Gibson was within a few miles of the old Ebenezer Baptist Church, the first Baptist Church in Indian Territory that had also been the center of the Keetoowah mission to the Creek Nation. It was also the area in which the greatest concentration of freed slaves resided.147 John Jones's school was located in Fort Gibson, so it was decided that the new Baptist mission would begin there. His father being advanced in age, John Jones assumed responsibility for the new mission.
The native ministers, as had been in all of its previous missions, would lead the Baptist's new mission. Smith Christie and Toostoo -- being the core of the missionary outreach of the Keetoowah Society after Downing and Gritts had assumed new political responsibilities -- began their mission at Fort Gibson in early October. Toostoo, chosen Speaker of the House by the Keetoowah Council in January 1863, would be perfect for the new mission to the Freedmen. John Jones wrote to the Home Mission Board of Toostoo (Spring Frog) in October 1866:
Toostoo is a full Indian and does not speak English. For many years he has been one of our best and most reliable and efficient helpers in the good work. At the beginning of the rebellion, he was much persecuted for his anti-slavery principles. In the summer of 1862 he came to the Union line [picket line] with a large party of men, entered into the service [Second Indian Home Guard] as a captain, and served to the end of the war in the same company as myself. In garrison, in camp, or in field, I have always found him ready to speak and to work for that dear Saviour whose gospel he is now preaching. His prayers by the side of dying soldiers were subjects of frequent remark by white officers.148
Having no places to meet, the Baptist churches once again resorted to the brush arbors, the camp meetings, and the riverside baptisms that had been at the core of the gospel message in the Indian Territory from their very beginnings. Having rebuilt and reconstituted their churches following removal, the Cherokee churches were once again facing the same task. John Jones, Smith Christie, and Spring Frog -- as Cherokee Baptist circuit riders -- made their routes from their homes in the Flint District in the East to deep within the Creek Nation. Soon the Baptist mission would employ four more native ministers, including two who had long served the Baptist mission in the Creek Nation.
One of the new Creek missionaries, James Perryman, had been an associate of John Davise of the Ebenezer Baptist Church, and was a contemporary of Monday Durant and Harry Islands in the Creek Baptist Church before the war.149 Perryman had for some thirty years been translating the Baptist gospel message into the Creek language under the tutelage of Samuel Worcester. His publication I stutsi in Naktsokv (The Child's Book) in 1835 was the first publication in what was to become the state of Oklahoma. Perryman's son, Joseph, would in later years be chosen Chief of the Creek Nation following the Green Peach War.150 With the establishment of Baptist missionaries within the Creek Nation, the core constituency of the Keetoowah Society in the Creek Nation had been reestablished.
The Keetoowah Society flourished in the midst of what seemed to be the hardest time for the new Baptist churches. With no church structures to hold their congregations, the Baptist ministers moved their mission into the fields and meeting places of their constituency. The lines between the Baptist missions and the Keetoowah Society, as if they had ever been that clear, became increasingly blurred. With six new Baptist ministers, Jones and the Keetoowah Society carried the Keetoowah message throughout the Indian Territory.
The Keetoowah Society, having been victorious in its ascendancy to political power, could now come out of secret and begin the restoration of the Cherokee Nation in public. Its meetings, which were now public gatherings, served as the focal point for traditional religious and political activity within the Nation. Stomp dances were held, ball-play returned following its long sleep during the Civil War, and women and children were allowed to participate in its meetings. Many times, these meetings served as gathering places at which the gadugi, or labor cooperatives, worked collectively to rebuild homes and farms destroyed by the war. The Cherokee Nation was once again those "who loved and lived as free people and had never surrendered to anybody....They loved one another for they were just like one family, just as if they had been raised from one family. They all came as a unit to their fire to smoke, to aid one another and to protect their government with what little powder and lead they had to use in protecting it." 151
In 1866, the Keetoowah Society attempted to reorganize following the destruction and dissipation of the lodges during the Civil War years. If the lodges had been meeting during the Civil War at all, they had been doing so in relative isolation and independence of each other, except in the resettlement areas at Neosho, Kansas and Fort Gibson, Indian Territory. New amendments were made to the Keetoowah laws that dealt with their new circumstances. Article 32, a new provision added to the Keetoowah Constitution in 1866, read:
Be it resolved by the Keetoowah Convention, as soon as this law is enacted and shall become a law it will be the duty according to law to visit all the lodges in their respective districts and explain the Keetoowah laws.
Be it further resolved by the Keetoowah convention, that each district captain shall name a small lodge and make up a roll of names of the members of that lodge and report same to the head captains at first meeting held by Keetoowah Convention. The District Captain, or the Secretary, shall call the names on the roll.152
The effect of such amendment was to reconstitute and reorganize the Society following the destruction and diaspora of the Keetoowah Society during the turbulent years of the Civil War. With the enemy no longer a threat and the Keetoowah in political power, an effort could be made to rebuild the Keetoowah Society through public effort.
In late 1866, there was an important meeting of the Keetoowah in the Saline District (about forty miles north of Fort Gibson) to decide what the future of the organization would be. John Smith, son of one of the founders of the Ancient Keetoowah, described the meeting: "All the people camped out there. All the old men were seers. They kept themselves clean with medicine. The medicine men investigated the future of the Keetoowahs."153 The prophecy of the seers foretold difficult times to come and of future leaders but it focused on an immediate necessity, that of healing the Nation by rebuilding the Keetoowah, "When they get together, they going to make a strong organization. They gonna get ready to get together."154
William P. Ross, however, was less than receptive to the idea of reconciliation with his former enemies. When it came time to appoint a delegation to Washington to negotiate relations and further settlements with the Federal government, he refused to appoint any representatives from the Southern delegation. In addition to his personal contempt for the "Treaty Party," he was suspicious of certain delegates among the Southern delegation whom he believed were in alliance with railroad companies and white interests to undermine Cherokee sovereignty.155 At a convention held in the southern part of the Canadian District in late December, the Knights of the Golden Circle met to discuss their political disenfranchisement under the auspices of the Ross leadership. Realizing that Ross had no intention of granting their membership any political status, the Knights once again sent their own delegation to Washington to negotiate for political power.156
The Keetoowah began to realize that, as long as Ross was in a leadership position within the Cherokee Nation, there would be no real reconciliation and no progress as a nation. He was, after all, a Ross. The Knights of the Golden Circle hated him as much as he hated them for the things they had done to his uncle and, as Ross perceived it, to his nation. To the Keetoowah, Ross lacked the spirit of the "traditional harmony ethic" which was at the core of the traditional belief system.157 His personal hatred upset the balance and order of the community critical to the perpetuation of the "old way":
Balance, harmony, inclusiveness, cooperation -- life regenerating within a parameter of order. The pattern repeats the deepest heart of Mother Nature, where the atom -- with its predictable parameter -- freely makes its rounds to create new life. Continuance in the midsts of change, cardinal dynamics that sustain the universe...The Cherokee have used these poetics for survival.158
Having been through the negotiations in Washington earlier in the year, the Keetoowah knew that the political officials and white interests would use the continuing factionalism against the Cherokee Nation in an attempt to ultimately destroy it. If the Cherokee Nation were to survive the onslaught of white settlers, railroads, and other commercial interests and land speculators, they would have to be united.159 They knew that the only way to survive the upcoming years was to respect the power of the prophecy from the Saline meeting that, "when they get together, they going to make a strong organization." 160
The problem was not with the people of the Cherokee Nation; they had come to learn to live with each other and to exhibit a generosity of spirit and willingness to forgive that is one of the unique characteristics of the Cherokee people. Many of the Southern Cherokee who had fled into Texas, Arkansas, and the Choctaw Nation began to return to the Cherokee Nation and take up residence in their old homes, even if it meant removing those who had obtained the property under the now repealed Confiscation Act. The new Federal agent, John Humphreys, wrote at the beginning of 1867 of the new spirit that had seemed to take hold of the Nation; he found a remarkable "disposition to forget the past and unite as one people."161
If the problem was not with the people but with the leadership of the new Cherokee Nation, then the people must set about to change that leadership if they wished to build a new Nation. In early 1867, Lewis Downing, John B. Jones, and Evan Jones set about crafting a policy in order to change the leadership of the Nation. They sought to forge a new political party based upon the principles of the "old way" and to promote national unity.
The reorganization of the Keetoowah Society following the Civil War provided a potent new force for change. The forces of the Keetoowah Society were set in motion towards the defeat of William P. Ross in the national elections coming in August. If that defeat were to be accomplished, the Joneses believed a coalition party uniting the various political forces in the Cherokee Nation would be needed. In addition, a candidate who spoke openly of reconciliation and reunification would be required to head that party. In order to provide a new way, there would have to be a return to the "old way."
In the spring of 1867, Evan Jones approached Lewis Downing about breaking with the Ross party and initiating his own candidacy for the Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Downing shared the Joneses' belief that Ross's vindictiveness had no place in the political effort to reunite the Cherokee Nation.162 Downing was opposed to any discriminatory policies towards any part of the Cherokee Nation, and the idea of national unity became a political force with the formation of the coalition party that was to become known as the Downing Party.163 The breakaway party, led by Downing and the conservatives, would place their faith in the ethic of harmony that was at the center of the "Kituwah spirit."
Downing, a Baptist minister, knew that the conservatives and the African Americans of the Cherokee Nation would support the Downing Party's candidacy for Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. The strength of the Downing Party's candidacy lay with those people who had been at the heart of the Baptist missionary outreach within the Cherokee Nation -- those people "who as a body were always swayed by impulses rather than by reason."164 Downing, though not biologically himself a "fullblood," was a fullblood in the cultural sense and represented the conservative aims and interests in political affairs. As Head Captain of the Keetoowah Society, especially considering the recent reorganization under Article 32, he had a large and potent political organization behind him.165
Downing used his associations and contacts within the Baptist Churches to make an outreach to the African-American members of the Cherokee Nation.166 That Lewis Downing had presided over the National Council that had become the first Southern state to end slavery in 1863 was a fact that would not be lost among the Aframerindian Cherokee. As many African Americans had seen Lewis Downing in the pulpit at their churches during the many long years since removal was also something not soon forgotten.
Yet, to win, Downing needed the support of those who had been his enemy. Knowing this, the Keetoowah set out on a policy of reconciliation with those who had for so long been their bitter enemy and against whom so much innocent blood had been spilled. In spring of 1867, Lewis Downing was sent to Washington as a member of Ross's council to negotiate with the Federal government. In Washington, Downing met instead with delegates of the Southern Party and discussed his plans to displace Ross as Principal Chief of the Cherokee. The Southern Party, by no means charmed by Lewis Downing and the Keetoowah Society, realized that they now had the opportunity to replace Ross. They knew that they had no political opportunities with Ross, but Downing, who was now reaching out to them, offered them the opportunity for real political power.
In his meetings with the Southern delegation, Downing made several overtures to those who had for so long been out of power in the Cherokee government. The first concession was to merge the two delegations from the Cherokee Nation into one and to present a united front to the Federal government. The second was an agreement to appoint members of the Knights of the Golden Circle to positions of power within the Cherokee Nation should Downing be elected Principal Chief. In return, an agreement was reached that the nominee for the Principal Chief would be a conservative.167
Elias Boudinot, who supported a territorial government as defined by the Harlan Bill and who was himself a lobbyist for the railroads, would have no part in the negotiations with the Keetoowah.168 However, William Penn Adair (Flint Lodge #74) and James Scales were receptive to the reconciliation attempts because they were offered positions as delegates to Washington should Downing be elected. All deals aside, Adair and Scales must have known that only through unity would there be the strength to defeat the constant flow of congressional action such as the Harlan Bill that would attempt to open up the Indian Territory for white exploitation.
In early April, William P. Boudinot wrote to his uncle Stand Watie, who was by this time more interested in rebuilding his farm than in the political affairs of the Nation. He described the upcoming election, "The Pins are going it pretty lively on the Head right question pro or con. Downing expected to win next August on that hobby in a canter over Ross... The Pin ticket for Chiefs next election is Bill Ross and Jim Beam (Csomana-tah) on one side -- Louis Downing and Crabgrass (Captain James Vann) on the other. The offices are worth a little now and with Jones and Ross in the foreground to intrigue, backbite, and blarney, the race is expected with some interest by Southern Lookers on."169
No doubt in conversation with his brother, Boudinot also wrote to Watie of the reconciliation effort, "If you proceed [to Washington], give my respects to Cornelius, Adair, and Scales. It is reported that the latter are likely to be bought off and that they will be paid a handsome sum by way of `compromise' with the other delegation so that the latter may swindle without further opposition."170 However, in spite of his animosity, even Boudinot was forced to admit that the Keetoowah Society was beginning to prevail, "The Pins are generally friendly but are organized in each District with a fair supply of arms, ammunition, and speeches."171
John Jones was facing one of the most difficult tasks of his career in the ministry. Even though Downing was Head Captain of the Keetoowah and a leader in the Baptist Church, many in his flock were reticent to break with the Ross family whom for so many years had been the leadership of the Cherokee Nation. Combined with the fact that they would have to join hands with the very ones who had wrought such destruction in their personal lives, this presented the Keetoowah with troublesome issues. Soon enough, there was a break within the ranks:
Among the Cherokees an opposition is arising to our religion. A Cherokee, who was distinguished for his Loyalty to the U.S. Government during the war has led the opposition. The Baptists are the special object of his hatred because they appear to be more prosperous. He tells the people that the Christian religion was devised by white men for the purpose of deceiving the Indians and getting their lands; that the white men have a fixed reward for every one they baptised, and this is the reason why they are so zealous. He says that Christianity has a great deal about God which is true, but it has just enough falsehood to make it dangerous. That if the Baptists prevail, the whites will extend a territorial government over the Cherokees in a short time. Many wicked men who know better, have taken up this story and are circulating it for political effect because Colonel Downing, a prominent Baptist, is a candidate for Chieftancy.172
John Jones, in spite of dissension within the ranks, continued to press the issue. Even though the Keetoowah were making deals with the enemy, it was in the interest of the unity of Cherokee society and the preservation of the "old way." The "Downing Party" was the party of national unity and inclusion, bringing together Freedmen, full blood, and mixed blood in a way that had not been known since before removal. Though many Keetoowah clung to the Ross family, the prospect for ending four decades of dissension within the Cherokee Nation offered real promise.
The work of John B. Jones during the summer of 1867 to seal the breach that had for so long rendered it asunder is seen as one of the Baptist missionary's greatest efforts and his most lasting contribution to the Cherokee Nation. John Barlett Meserve notes that "Faithful John Buttrick Jones rendered no greater service to the Cherokees than he did during the summer and fall of 1867."173 William G. McLoughlin, in Champions of the Cherokees, states, "...On the whole the Joneses' efforts to bring about a reconciliation, even though it split the Ross Party and alienated some fullbloods, was a success -- perhaps one of their more dramatic successes in Cherokee politics."174
Soon, even the Southern delegation began to believe that there was hope for this new nation, "At this time I think our prospects in Washington are much better than they have ever been, provided we can beat Bill Ross for Chief which I feel assured can be done with proper management... Should the opposition to Ross act in concert and defeat him, I feel confident in our success in closing out Cherokee business in Washington." Whether the Knights of the Golden Circle believed that the war was over or simply sought to remove, conclusively, the Ross family from their dominance in the political affairs in the Nation, we may never know. What we do know is that even Stand Watie believed in the promise of a new Cherokee Nation enough to cast his lot with the Downing Party.175
The election of August 1867 was a tightly contested battle in which tempers flared. According to Chuweska Fodder, an eyewitness, fights -- participated in by both men and women -- were the order of the day. When it was announced the Lewis Downing had defeated William Ross, sporadic fighting broke out in all nine districts between "Downing men" and "Ross men."176 When all was said and done, Lewis Downing had become the first "fullblood" to be elected to the position of Principal Chief since the Constitution of the Cherokee Nation was written in 1827.177 The long war was over; peace had come to the nation.
From all over the Indian Territory, the Southern Cherokee returned to their homes. Even Stand Watie, the former Confederate General, returned to the Nation and settled near Webber's Falls in the Canadian District. Sarah Watie, who had once said, "I don't believe I could live one year longer if I knew that we could not be settled...I am so perfectly sick of the world,"178 now found something to live for in this new land. Saladin Watie wrote to his father of her late in 1867, "I think we have got along very well so far... better than all mama has grown stout and healthy. She steps about like some sixteen year old girl."179
In 1858, a small group of men gathered at the Peavine Baptist Church and committed themselves to the following creed:
Few members of men of the society met secretly and discussed the condition of the country where they lived. The name Cherokee was in danger. The Cherokee Nation was about to disintegrate. It seemed intended to drown our Cherokee Nation and destroy it. For that reason, we resolve to stop it from scattering or forever lose the name Cherokee. We must love each other and abide by treaties made with the Federal government. We must cherish them in our hearts. Second, we must abide by the treaties made with other races of people. Third, we must abide by our constitution and laws and uphold the name of the Cherokee Nation. Right here we must endeavor to strengthen our society. Our society must be called Keetoowah.180
In the nearly ten years that had passed, this loyal group of dedicated partisans gave all for the preservation of their Nation. Dedicated to the idea of the "old way" and its importance to the "Kituwah spirit," the members of the Keetoowah Society struggled, fought, and even died to protect these ideals that had so long been a part of the national consciousness.
When Lewis Downing approached the National Council for the first time in November of 1867, he did so as the Head Captain of the Keetoowah Society, Baptist minister, and incredibly -- the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. In his first address, he called upon the Council to restore the "beloved community" and to establish "thorough harmony" within the Nation:
The very great importance of the entire unity of our Nation cannot have escaped your attention. Our laws should be uniform, the jurisdiction of our Courts should be the same over every part of our Nation and over every individual citizen. It is for the interest of the people of Canadian District as well as for the interests of the people of other Districts, that every line of distinction be blotted out. That we should be one in our laws, one in our institutions, one in feeling, and one in destiny. I, therefore recommend that the Council adopt immediate measures for bringing about the removal of such distinctions.181
In assessing the contributions of the Keetoowah Society from 1855-1867, William McLoughlin stated in The Cherokees and Christianity that, "Its original objectives had been achieved. The fullblood majority was in control of the Nation. The institution of slavery had been abolished. The gap between the wealthy slaveholders with their large plantations and the non-slaveholding farmers with one horse and a plough had been substantially narrowed."182 All of this is true and, indeed, the Keetoowah Society had attained its goals. However, let us turn to Rochelle Ward, the daughter of a slave from the Flint District in the Cherokee Nation, to poignantly sum up what is perhaps one of their more significant contributions: "Chief Downing ... was a big man after the Civil War when the Indians stopped fighting among themselves."183 Though the Cherokee had hardly stopped fighting among themselves, the Keetoowah had reunited the Cherokee Nation and reestablished a community in accordance with the "old ways." Its legacy would impact the Cherokee Nation until this very day.
118 McLoughlin, Champions of the Cherokees, 427. 119 Wardell, 206. 120 John Bartlett Meserve, "Chief Lewis Downing and Chief Charles Thompson" Chronicles of Oklahoma 16, (September 1938): 318. 121 Dale and Litton, Cherokee Cavaliers, 247. 122 Daniel Littlefield, The Cherokee Freedmen: from Emancipation to American Citizenship (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1978), 25-29. 123 McLoughlin, After the Trail of Tears, 229. 124 Pierce Butler to A.B.C.F.M., American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, Papers of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions [microform] (Woodbridge, Conn.: Research Publications, 1982), 454. 125 McLoughlin, Champions of the Cherokees, 427. 126 "History of Federal Lodge #1," quoted in Denslow, 183. William Potter Ross was raised to the Third Degree on April 25, 1848 in Federal Lodge #1 in Washington, D.C. [Denslow, 183]. 127 William R. Denslow, in his work Freemasonry and the American Indian, describes Ross's influence, "In later years, passions broke all bounds and some of the darkest pages of Cherokee history were written. In retrospect, the influence and principles of Freemasonry can be seen as the greatest healer of these old wounds within the Cherokee family. This fact is emphasized by the thought of Chief William P. Ross, presiding in the East over a Cherokee lodge, while the men around the altar would have thought it a patriotic duty to slay him only a short time before. The roster of the Cherokee lodge is a revelation to the student of the times, and, if it were not for its undisputed authority, it would hardly be believed in this generation." (Denslow, 69). 128 Hanna R. Warren, "Reconstruction In The Cherokee Nation." Chronicles of Oklahoma 1967 45(2): 180-189. 129 Dale and Litton, 144. 130 Wardell, 206. 131 Mrs. William Potter Ross, ed. The Life and Times of Honorable William Potter Ross of the Cherokee Nation,(Fort Smith, n.p., 1893), 2ff. 132 ibid. 133 Because of this amendment, the Southern Cherokee referred to this treaty as "the Dark Treaty." (Wardell, 206). 134 Wardell, 206-207. 135 Mrs. William P. Ross, 55-57. 136 Wardell, 207. 137 Littlefield, Cherokee Freedmen, 28; Thornton, 102. 138 The number following the war is to be compared with four thousand African American members of the Cherokee Nation at the beginning of the Civil War. (National Archives, Indian Division, Report Book, Dale to Smith, March 17, 1862, No. 12, 335). 139 Cherokee Nation quoted in Roethler, 227. In mentioning "whites legally members of the Nation by adoption," the provision specifically granted citizenship in the Cherokee Nation to Evan And John Jones, their families and their descendants. As whites that married into the Nation were granted membership according to the dictates of traditional culture, this law was not particularly referenced towards them. The Joneses were granted citizenship and voting privileges as members of the Cherokee Nation. 140 Joe Bean, United States Works Progress Administration, Arkansas Writers Project, Aframerindian Ex-Slave Narratives, ( http://www.columbia.edu/~pm47/afram/Harrison.htm), November 5, 2000. 141 Roethler, 229. 142 John Hanson Beadle, The Undeveloped West, or Five Years in the Territory (Philadelphia, National Publishing Company, 1873), 37. 143 United States of America, Report of the Commissioner for Indian Affairs (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1866), 383-384; Sue Hammond, "Socioeconomic Reconstruction In The Cherokee Nation, 1865-1870," Chronicles of Oklahoma 1978 56(2): 158-170; Patricia Cleland Tracey, "Cherokee Reconstruction In Indian Territory." Journal of the West 1996 35(3): 81-85. 144 (Littlefield, 29-30). 145 Cherokee Nation, Records, October 31,1866, Oklahoma Historical Society Archives, Oklahoma City, OK. 146 These are the locations of the first two Freemasonic lodges within the Cherokee Nation. 147 Littlefield,Cherokee Freedmen, 28. 148 American Baptist Home Mission Board, The Macedonian 34 (October 1866): 39. 149 C.W. West, Missions and Missionaries in the Indian Territory (Muskogee, OK.: Muskogee Publishing Company, 1990), 64. 150 Debo, The Road to Disappearance, 280-283; Janey Hendrix, Redbird Smith and the Nighthawk Keetoowahs (Park Hill, OK: Cross-Cultural Education Center, 1983), 25-28. Interestingly enough, in the Creek Nation, the Loyal League was actually closed associated and affiliated with the Keetoowah and the Pins were the mixed blood party. The Loyal League arose within the Illinois District near Fort Gibson and was deeply committed to the enfranchisement of African American Creeks. As in the Cherokee Nation, the Loyal League were full blood traditionalists. The Loyal League had a profound effect upon Redbird Smith, future leader of the Keetoowah Society. (Hendrix, 25). 151 "Keetoowah Laws - April 29, 1859" in Howard Tyner, The Keetoowah Society in Cherokee History, (MA, University of Tulsa, 1949), Appendix A. In the long run, it would be the fact that the Keetoowah Society was able to come out of secret and become a public phenomenon that would lead to a split between the Baptists and the Keetoowah. The competition between the public services of the Baptists and the public services of the Keetoowah would create somewhat of a conflict between the traditionalists and the Christians. Emmet Starr described the split thus: "In all this period the Keetoowahs were either Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and a few Quakers, and a part of them worshipped according to the rituals of the ancient Keetoowah, but all got along harmoniously. Dissension came only after the White Missionaries objected to and condemned what they termed "the Pagan Form of worship" of the ancient Keetoowahs, and designated it as "The work of the Devil." A split occurred between the Christian Keetoowahs and the Ancient Keetoowahs. However, this scenario would not play out until the latter half of the nineteenth century following the death of Evan and John Jones. Today, this split is roughly between the Nighthawk Keetoowahs and the United Keetoowah Band. (Starr, 480). 152 "Keetoowah Laws - April 29, 1859" in Howard Tyner, The Keetoowah Society in Cherokee History. (MA, University of Tulsa, 1949), Appendix A. 153 John Smith quoted in Janey Hendrix, Redbird Smith and the Nighthawk Keetoowahs, 11. 154 Comes Flying quoted in Hendrix, 11. 155 In all probability, he was right. Elias Boudinot was a lobbyist for the railroad company and James Bell and James Lynch were eager to promote denationalization and the establishment of a territorial government. 156 Wardell, 208-209. 157 McLoughlin, After the Trail of Tears, 246. 158 Marilou Awiatka, Selu: Seeking the Corn-Mother's Wisdom (Golden, CO.: Fulcrum Publishing, 1993), 181. 159 Wardell, 209; Foreman, A History of Oklahoma, 150. 160 Comes Flying, quoted in Hendrix, 11. 161 John Humphreys to William Byers, January 18, 1867, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Record Group 75, Reel M-234, National Archives, Washington, D.C. 162 Wardell, 210. 163 John Bartlett Meserve, "Chief Lewis Downing and Chief Charles Thompson, Chronicles of Oklahoma 16 (September 1938): 320. 164 Starr, 257. 165 Tyner, 58. 166 ibid. 167 Wardell, 210. The next three elected Chiefs would be Keetoowah representatives of the Downing Party, followed by Joel Mayes (Cherokee Lodge #10). From the late 1880s until 1907, almost all of the Principal Chiefs of the Cherokee Nation came from the Downing Party. (Mankiller, 1993). 168 Thomas Burnell Colbert, "Visionary Or Rogue? The Life And Legacy Of Elias Cornelius Boudinot," Chronicles of Oklahoma 1987 65(3): 268-281. 169 Boudinot to Watie, in Dale and Litton, 249. 170 Boudinot to Watie, in Wardell, 211. 171 Boudinot to Watie, in Dale and Litton, 250. 172 John B. Jones, The Macedonian 35 (September, 1867): 38. In all probability, this person was Pig Smith, leader of ultraconservative Ancient Keetoowah who by this time were beginning to splinter from the Christian Keetoowah over a variety of issues, the greatest being the influence of Christianity within the Keetoowah. William McLoughlin, in his last work The Cherokees and Christianity, describes this movement within the Keetoowah as a "Ghost Dance Movement" and relates to similar movements which swept the Cherokee Nation whenever it encountered great duress. McLoughlin cites as evidence of this movement a letter from W.L. Gordon Miller, Downing's executive secretary detailing "wild and visionary" speeches and insurrectionary activities by James Vann, Little Pig, and Lewis McNair. (McLoughlin, The Cherokees and Christianity, 285-305). This "Ghost Dance Movement" could have been the product of the prophetic Keetoowah conventions in the Saline District in 1866, which ultimately led to the reorganization of the Keetoowah Society in 1876 along more traditionalist lines. (Hendrix, 11; Starr 480; Tyner, 80, 90-91). 173 Meserve, 320. 174 McLoughlin, Champions of the Cherokees, 443. 175 Wardell, 211. 176 Chuweska Fodder, quoted in Woodward, 309. 177 McLoughlin, The Cherokees and Christianity, 279. 178 Sarah Watie quoted in Theda Perdue, Slavery and the Evolution of Cherokee Society 1540-1866 (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1979), 75. 179 Saladin Watie to Stand Watie, in Dale and Litton, 254. 180 "Keetoowah Laws - April 29, 1859" in Howard Tyner, The Keetoowah Society in Cherokee History. (MA, University of Tulsa, 1949), Appendix A. 181 Lewis Downing, quoted in Meserve, 320. 182 McLoughlin, The Cherokees and Christianity, 279. 183 Rochelle Ward, in Baker and Baker, 445.