USA > Oklahoma > A standard history of Oklahoma; an authentic narrative of its development from the date of the first European exploration down to the present time, including accounts of the Indian tribes, both civilized and wild, of the cattle range, of the land openings and the achievements of the most recent period, Vol. I > Part 43
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5 "Kansas Historical Society's Collections," Vol. VI, pp. 45-6.
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then asked, 'Where is my husband ?' I told her he was at Hays recovering from his wounds. Next question: 'Where is my brother ?' I told her he was in camp but did not tell her that he was under guard to keep him from marring all by shooting the first In- dian he saw. Miss White asked no questions about her people. She knew they were dead before she was carried away. Custer had an 'A' tent, which he brought along for headquarters, and this he turned over to the women.
"On the trip, a scouting party chased an Indian who got away from them, but he lost a bundle, which was thrown into one of the wagons. On examination, it proved to be some stuff that he had bought of some of the traders at the fort. It contained calico, needles, thread, beads and a variety of things. The bundle was given to the women and in a surprisingly short time they had a new calico dress apiece. The story the women told us of their hard- ships, the cruelty of the squaws, the slavery to which they were subjected, their suffering through the long flight of the Indians to escape the troops, ought to cure all the humanitarians in the world. The women told us the Indians had been killing their dogs and living on the flesh for the last six weeks. · "At the retreat that night, while the women stood in front of their tent to see the guard mounted, the band played 'Home Sweet Home.' The command marched the next morning for the rendez- vous on the Washita. It was a couple of days' march, but when the end came, there was coffee, bacon, hard bread and canned goods. Any one of them was a feast for a king. From Washita to Supply, Supply to Dodge, Dodge to Hays, where the women were sent home to Minneapolis and the Nineteenth was mustered out of the service." The Indian prisoners were sent to Sill and soon after the Cheyennes reported there and went onto their reser- vation."
In writing afterward of the rescue of the two captives, General Custer made the following statement : 7
6 It is worthy of note that the captain of Company H, of the Nineteenth Kansas Regiment was none other than David L. Payne, who became the leader of the Oklahoma "boomer" movement a dozen years later. Several of the officers of this regiment have since been citizens of Oklahoma-Capt. George B. Jenness, of Company F, who lived at Kingfisher; first lieutenant, Charles H. Hallett, of Company K, who lived in Kiowa County; and second lieutenant, Winfield S. Tilton, of Company L, who is editor and publisher of the Anadarko Tribune.
7 "Life on the Plains," pp. 320-5. .
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"Men whom I have seen face death without quailing found their eyes filled with tears, unable to restrain the emotion produced by this joyful event. The appearance of the two girls was sufficient to excite our deepest sympathy. Mis; White, the younger of the two, though not beautiful, possessed a most interesting face. Her companion would have been pronounced beautiful by the most crit- ical judge, being of such a type as one might imagine Maud Muller to be.
"Their joy at deliverance, however, could not hide the evidences of privation and suffering to which they had been subjected by their captors. They were clothed in dresses made from flour sacks, the brand of the mills being plainly seen on each dress; showing that the Indians who had held them in captivity had obtained their provisions from the Government at some agency.8 The entire dress of the two girls was as nearly like the Indian mode as possible; both wore leggings and moccasins; both wore their hair in two long braids and, as if to propitiate us, the Indians, before releasing them, had added to the wardrobe of the two girls various rude ornaments such as are worn by squaws. About their wrists were coils of brass wire; on their fingers had been placed numerous rings, and, about their necks, strings of variously colored beads. About the first remark I heard young Brewster make after the arrival of the two girls was, 'Sister, do take those hateful things off.' *
"Upon our arrival at Fort Hays we were met by the husband of young Brewster's sister, who had learned of her restoration to liberty from the published dispatches which had preceded us to Fort Hays. He was still lame from the effects of the bullet wound received at the time the Indians had carried off his bride, whom he had given up as dead or lost to him forever. The joy of their meet- ing went far to smooth over their late sorrow. They could not find language to express their gratitude to the troops for their efforts in restoring them to each other. As the Indians had robbed them of everything at the time of the attack, a collection was taken up among the troops for their benefit, which resulted in the accumula- tion of several hundred dollars, to be divided between the two cap- tives. The time came for our guests to leave us and rejoin their people, or such of them as had survived the attack of the Indians. Good-byes were spoken and the two girls, so lately victims of the most heartless and cruel captivity, departed with husband, brother
8 The hostile Indians could and did also obtain flour sacks by robbing frontier ranches and stores and by looting wagon trains.
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and friends for their frontier homes, bearing with them the warm sympathies and cordial good wishes of every soldier in the com- mand."
As soon as the two white captives were released, the three chiefs who had been seized and held as hostages demanded their liberty also and a delegation from the Cheyennes came into camp from the village to urge that the three be turned loose. But General Custer informed them that but one of the two conditions had been complied with and that the tribe would have to return to the reser- vation before their captive chiefs could hope for freedom. Their people thereupon promised to move to Camp Supply as soon as pos- sible and abandon the war path forever. The three chiefs, Big Head, Dull Knife and Fat Bear were taken to Fort Hays, Kansas, for safekeeping until their people should come in and submit to the military at Camp Supply. There, when an attempt was made to transfer them from the camp of other Indian prisoners, they did not understand, apparently thinking that they were to be taken out for execution, so they determined to die then and there, if necd be, so they attacked the guard with knives which they car- ried beneath their blankets. The sergeant of the guard received a stab in the back that almost proved fatal. Big Head, the younger of the three chiefs, was shot by the guard, Dull Knife, who was an old man, was fatally wounded by a bayonet thrust. Fat Bear was disabled but not seriously injured.9
9 "Life on the Plains, " p. 326.
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CHAPTER XLIX
THE FIRST RAILWAYS
As stated in previous chapters the building of a railroad across the Indian Territory was first suggested as early as 1849, and the survey of one of the lines for the proposed Pacific Railway was made, under Government auspices, westward from Fort Smith, across the Indian Territory, toward Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1854; also that, previous to the outbreak of the Civil war, two lines of railway, namely, the Little Rock & Fort Smith having a gener- ally westerly course, and the Southern Pacific, having its eastern terminus at St. Louis and following a generally southwesterly course, had been projected into if not across the Indian Territory; also that, in all of the treaties made with the five civilized tribes in 1866, there were stipulations providing that certain lines of railway might be built across the lands of the several Indian reservations. During the course of the Civil war, while most of the people of the loyal states were intent upon the struggle for the preservation of the Federal Union, certain professional railway promoters were busily engaged securing bounties and subsidies (usually under the guise of military necessity) through the medium of state and na- tional legislation. The national domain was vast, almost beyond computation, and the public lands were so cheap as to appear almost valueless at the time. Under such circumstances, it was compara- tively easy to secure the passage of an act by Congress, granting to certain corporations extensive subsidies in the form of land in consideration of the building of a railway line through a region which was as yet unsettled.
A railway company to be known as the Union Pacific Railway Company, Southern Branch, was duly incorporated in Kansas on the 20th of September, 1865. Its proposed line of railway was to extend from Junction City, near the Fort Riley military reserva- tion down the valley of the Neosho River to the southern boundary of Kansas and thence across the Indian Territory to the Town of Preston (now Denison), in the State of Texas. Nine months later, in accordance with the act of Congress approved July 26, 1866,
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a land grant subsidy of each alternate section in a strip of land five miles wide on either side of the right-of-way of the proposed line of railroad and providing that similar grants of land should be made to the corporation along its proposed line in the Indian Territory in event that such lands should ever become a part of the public lands of the United States. Section 8 of the act of July 26, 1866, was as follows:
"That said Union Pacific Railroad Company, Southern Branch, its successors and assigns, is hereby authorized and empowered to extend and construct its railroad from the southern boundary of Kansas, south through the Indian Territory, with the consent of the Indians and not otherwise, along the valleys of the Grand and Arkansas rivers to Fort Smith, in the state of Arkansas."
The fact that this act, passed and approved only a little more than a year after the end of the Civil war, provided that the pro- posed railway line should begin at a point adjacent to the Fort Riley military reservation, that it should virtually, by its stipula- tions, pass through that of Fort Gibson and terminate at Fort Smith, all three of which were garrisoned stations at that time, and that it should transport free of charge any troops or munitions of war would seem to indicate that an apparent zeal for military preparedness could be made to cloak shrewd business maneuvers, even at that remote period. The possibility of building down the valley of the Arkansas River from Fort Gibson to Fort Smith may not have been desired or intended by the promoters who secured the passage of the bill, but its real purpose was to put a cloak of patriotism over the selfish desire for a subsidy in the form of a land grant.
Two other railway lines had been projected by corporations formed under the laws of the State of Kansas, cach of which was desirous of building across the Indian Territory to the Red River. One of these was the Kansas & Neosho Valley Road, which it was planned to build from Kansas City south through the counties of the eastern border (and was therefore locally known as the "Border Tier Road") with a view to its extension southward from the Kan- sas boundary to a junction at the Red River with a railroad line then being constructed northward from Galveston to the Red River ; the other line was the one which was proposed to be built by the Leavenworth, Lawrence and Fort Gibson Railroad Company. As the new treaties just negotiated or being negotiated with the civi- lized Indian tribes did not contain provision for the construction of more than one railroad from north to south across the Indian
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Territory, it was obvious that not all three of these projected lines could be built. To arbitrarily grant an exclusive privilege to one of the three would be to invite a charge of favoritism on the part of Congress. Therefore, in order to forestall any unpleasant com- plications on such account, a provision contained in section 11 of the act of July 25, 1866, by which the privilege of constructing a line of railway from the Kansas boundary south to the Red River should be conferred on the corporation whose line should be the first to reach the boundary at the designated point. This act was the one by which the grant of a subsidy of lands from the public domain was conferred upon the Kansas & Neosho Valley Railroad Company: The clause in section 11, thereof, reads as follows:
"And provided, further, that, should the Leavenworth, Law- rence and Fort Gibson Railroad Company, or the Union Pacific Railroad Company, Southern Branch, construct and complete its road to that point on the southern boundary of the state of Kan- sas where the line of the said Kansas and Neosho Valley Railroad shall cross the same, before the said Kansas and Neosho Valley Rail- road Company shall have constructed and completed its said road to said point, then and in that event the company so first reaching in completion the said point on the southern boundary of the state of Kansas shall be authorized, upon obtaining the written approval of the President of the United States, to construct and operate its line of railroad from said point to a point at or near Preston, in tlie state of Texas, with grants of land according to the provisions of this act, but upon the further special condition, nevertheless, that said railroad company shall have commenced in good faith the con- struction thereof before the said Kansas and Neosho Valley Rail- road Company shall have completed its said railroad to said point : and provided, further, that said other railroad company, so having commenced said work in good faith, shall continue to prosecute the same with sufficient energy to insure the completion of the same within a reasonable length of time, subject to the approval of the President of the United States."
None of the proposed railway lines were built immediately and it was not until nearly four years after the passage of the act so quoted that any of the railway tracks were laid to points near the northern boundary of Oklahoma. The rivalry grew very spirited, however, when the goal was in sight. The race became very excit- ing as it drew to a finish. One of the contesting companies became so keenly interested in winning the coveted prize that it was said to have laid its ties and rails over several stretches of level prairie
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land without stopping to construct a road-bed. The Kansas and
route originally projected, so that, instead of crossing the boundary · Neosho Valley Railroad Company had changed its line from the
line in the valley of the Neosho as first proposed, it would cross the border at Baxter Springs, fifteen miles east of the Neosho, to which corporation, by the way, had had its name changed February The line of the Union Pacific Railroad Company, Southern Branch, which point its line was completed on the 30th day of April, 1870.1
3, 1870, to the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad Company, fol- lowed the valley of the Neosho River from the source of that stream
to the southern boundary line of Kansas, which was reached by the track layers at the hour of noon, on the 6th day of June, 1870. Al- though it was thus five weeks behind the Kansas and Neosho Valley Railroad Company, the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad Com-
pany promptly asserted its claim to priority for the reason that it had been the first to reach the boundary line at the point desig- nated in the conditional stipulations of the Congressional act of July 25, 1866, namely, "that point on the southern boundary of the state of Kansas where the line of the said Kansas and Neosho Valley Railroad shall cross the same," which, as originally pro- jected, was in the immediate valley of the Neosho River. The Kan- sas and Neosho Valley Railroad Company, on the other hand, con- tended that it had reached the boundary line at a point in the valley of Spring River, which was a tributary of the Neosho and, conse- quently, within the scope of the Neosho Valley, and that, there- fore, it had fully complied with the requirements set forth in the act of Congress and was entitled to the privilege of extending its line across the boundary line and on to the Red River. Each of the contending corporations had powerful friends in Congress. The act of Congress approved July 25, 1866, which had stipulated the conditions under which the permission should be granted to build across the boundary line and through the Indian Territory, had placed the final decision in the matter in the hands of the Presi- dent of the United States. When the Kansas and Neosho Valley line was completed to the boundary line at Baxter Springs, the company which had built it promptly notified the President of the United States, to whom the secretary of the interior (Jacob D. Cox) reported, under date of May 21, 1870, that none of the con-
1 Brief in the Supreme Court of the United States, the State of Kansas (in behalf of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Com- pany) vs. the United States of America, Ethan Allen Hitchcock, Secretary of the Interior, et al., October term, 1905, pp. 55-6.
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tending companies had as yet complied with the required condi- tions.2 In part, his findings and recommendations were as follows : "I find that Mr. Joy, one of the principal stockholders and di- rectors of the Kansas and Neosho Valley Railroad Company, in the year following the acts and the ratification of the treaties which have been mentioned, procured possession, by purchase, of the tract of land in Southeastern Kansas, immediately north of the boundary of the Indian Territory, known as the 'Cherokee Neutral Lands,' and that, soon after this purchase, the line of said railway company was located due north and south through the greater part of said Cherokee lands, and nearly, if not exactly, upon the line dividing the land so purchased into two equal eastern and western parts; that the construction of the road upon this line, which I believe to have been made for the purpose of giving, as nearly as possible, equally increased values to the lands so purchased, in all their parts has taken this road off the line necessary to intersect the Indian boundary line, 'at the Neosho River or near the same,' and that the road has, in fact, been constructed to a point on the Indian boundary-line about ten or more miles east of the said Neosho River, touching the reservation of the Quapaws, through which no power to pass has been granted by treaty or consent of the Indians hold- ing that and several other small reservations in the northeastern corner of the Territory. I find, further that the point where the said Kansas and Neosho Railroad Company has touched the south- ern boundary of Kansas and the northern boundary of the Indian Territory, is not one reasonably within the meaning and purpose of the general scheme which I have found to have been fixed by the legislation and treaties referred to. In addition to these considera- tions I would submit that it would be manifestly unfair and inequit- able if one company were allowed, at its own will, to change the plan of route so as to shorten its own line to the common point, and lengthen that of its competitors by a distance which might be twenty-five miles, or equal to that, from the Neosho River to the Missouri boundary-line. I therefore find that the Kansas and Neosho Railroad Company is not authorized, under present legisla- tion, to enter the Indian Territory and build the trunk line afore- said, and that to complete its right at this time to do so, it would have been necessary for the said road to have been completely con-
2 Brief in the Supreme Court of the United States, the State of Kansas (in behalf of the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Com- pany) vs. the United States of America, Ethan Allen Hitchcock, Secretary of the Interior, et al., October Term, 1905, pp. 38-54. Vol 1-29
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structed to a point in the Neosho Valley at or near the erossing of the boundary-line by the Neosho, and where it could enter the Cherokee country without erossing the reservation of any other In- dian tribe. This, the said company has not done.3
"As to the Southern Braneh Union Pacific Railroad Company, I find that its line of road is in substantial aceord with the seheme fixed by the legislation and treaties, but that said company has not built a completed line of railroad, up to this date, to the erossing of the Indian boundary line. I find, further, that the said Rail- road Company, without completing its said road to the aforesaid common point of erossing the Indian boundary, has gone on in advanee to grade within the Indian Territory, and is, therefore, an intruder within said Territory, and that the complaint of the Cherokee Nation in regard to them is well founded.
"As to the Leavenworth, Lawrenee and Fort Gibson road, it is not averred on its behalf that it is now in a condition to elaim the right of entry to the Indian Territory.
"As to the Atlantic and Pacific Company approaching the In- dian Territory upon the east, I do not find that its elaim to eross the Cherokee eountry is disputed by any other corporation authorized to build a road in that direction; but not having had fully before me the faets requisite to determine whether said company has ful- filled all the conditions precedent to entering the Territory, and it being admitted that the road has not yet reached the neighborhood
3 Under the terms of the (Cherokee) Treaty of 1866, Secretary (of the Interior) Harlan made a contraet with a Conneetieut eor- poration-the American Emigrant Company-by which the whole of the (Cherokee) Neutral Lands (800,000 aeres in Southeastern Kansas) was to be disposed of for a very nominal sum. His sue- eessor, O. H. Browning, deelared the contraet void, because the pur- chase money had not been paid down, and then, with strange ineon- sisteney, negotiated one with James F. Joy, president of the Kansas City, Fort Seott and Gulf Railway (i. e., the Kansas and Neosho Valley Railroad Company), that was open to the same objection. A supplement to the Cherokee Treaty of 1866 tried to prevent litiga- tion and to harmonize conflicting interests by arranging that the American Emigrant Company should transfer its contraet to Joy, and that the latter should assume all the obligations of the former. Eugene F. Ware says that this treaty was ratified while only three senators were present, and that it was a gross infringement upon the preemption rights of the settlers inasmuch as it related baek to the Harlan sale and eut off the intermediate oeeupants of the land .- Extinetion of Reservation Titles, by Anna Heloise Abel, "Kansas Historieal Society Collections," Vol. VIII, pp. 106-7.
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of the eastern boundary-line of the Territory, it is not necessary now to pass finally upon its rights."
At the suggestion of Secretary Cox, Gen. William B. Hazen, su- perintendent of Indian affairs for the southern superintendency, and Enoch Hoag, superintendent of Indian affairs for the central superintendency, were designated as commissioners to personally investigate and report upon the merits of the claims of the respective railroad companies which were seeking for the privilege of build- ing a line across the Indian Territory. Upon the report of these commissioners, together with the certification of Governor James M. Harvey, the final recommendations of Secretary Cox, dated July 12, 1870, were based. The recommendations thus submitted to the president were by him duly approved on July 20th, thus authoriz-
RAILWAY STATION (ATLANTIC & PACIFIC) AT VINITA
ing the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railway Company to enter the Indian Territory and build its proposed line to and across the Red River and into Texas. The road was completed to the Arkansas River in the autumn of 1871 and crossed the Canadian in the spring of 1872; the end of the last mentioned year found it in operation across Red River into Texas. The Atlantic and Pacific line, her- alded as a realization of the old dream of the "Thirty-fifth Parallel Road," was built to a junction with the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Line at Vinita,4 in 1872. Nearly a decade and a half were destined to elapse before any more railway lines were to enter Oklahoma.
4 Vinita was laid out at the junction of the two railroads by Col. E. C. Boudinot, who named it in honor of Miss Vinnie Ream, the sculptress, of whom he was said to be an ardent admirer. Colonel Boudinot was an attorney of the Atlantic & Pacific Railway at the time.
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THE END OF THE TRACK
During the course of the construction of these first railways into the Indian Territory there was generally at each temporary ter- minus a settlement of tents, shacks and shanties, where the vicious element of the frontier country congregated just as it did in the new towns that sprang suddenly into existence along the lines of other western railways which were built during that period, with this difference, that the Indian Territory "towns" were even less permanent than those which grew up in a single day and then as quickly all but disappeared on the lines which were built across the Great Plains in Kansas and Nebraska.
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