USA > Texas > History of Texas : from 1685 to 1892, volume 2 > Part 12
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In October occurred also what is known as the Surveyor's fight in Navarro County. From nine o'clock in the morning till twelve o'clock at night twenty-three men, from a ravine in the prairie, fought several hundred Indians. Seventeen Texians were killed and six escaped, three being severely wounded.
These and other similar events occurred within a short time before the assembling of the third Congress. Others equally harrowing occurred during its sitting or immediately after its adjournment. Among these, in January, 1839, was the killing of an entire party of thirteen men, escorting the family of a Mr. Webster to their intended home in what is now William- son County. Mrs. Webster and child were carried into captivity. In February Mrs. Coleman and son were killed about midway between Bastrop and Austin and one little son carried off. In the pursuit, first by Jacob Burleson and party, Burleson was defeated and his brother Jonathan killed. Re- inforced by Colonel Edward Burleson (brother to the other two ), a second fight occurred, resulting in a drawn battle and the death of three men, Edward Blakey, Rev. M. Gilleland and John Walters. All of these men were citizens of Bastrop and vicinity. As Congress had adjourned on the 24th of January, it will be seen that Colonel Burleson, a senator, had scarcely reached home when he was summoned, as on so
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many previous and subsequent occasions, to lead his fellow- citizens in defense of their homes.
On the night of January 1st, 1839, while Congress was in session, Indians surprised portions of two or three families in the house of John Morgan, six miles above the present town of Marlin. George Morgan, Sr., and wife, Jackson Morgan's wife, Jackson Jones and Miss Adelaide Marlin were killed. Mrs. William Morgan was left as dead, but survived. Three children escaped.
Ten days later seventy Indians attacked the house (a few miles below) of John and Benjamin Marlin, who, aided by Jarett and Thomas Menefee (father and son), killed seven Indians and forced the others to retire. Citizens assembled to the number of forty-eight, under Captain Benjamin Bry- ant and pursued the Indians. Near Morgan's Point above Marlin, a fight took place in which Bryant was defeated with a loss of ten killed and five wounded. A disorderly retreat was the result.
It will be seen under what calamities the third Congress met and sat for two months and nineteen days. It, however, not- withstanding these distractions, kept diligently at work and accomplished much. It provided rangers for frontier defense ; for the permanent location of the seat of government, (as a result Austin was selected as the site and the seat of govern- ment was removed to that place in 1839), for a more efficient navy; set apart fifty leagues of land for a university, and lands for each county for school purposes ; invited friendly trade with northern Mexico; improved the land, judiciary and probate laws ; extended land grants to encourage immi- gration and paved the way to the recognition of Texian inde- pendence by Great Britain, France and Belgium, or rather supplemented by additional efforts what had been done dur- ing Houston's administration towards that end.
Under instructions from President Houston, Dr. Anson
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Jones, who had succeeded Mr. Hunt as Minister to the United States, formally withdrew the proposition for annexation to that country. The French blockade, attack on Vera Cruz and capture of the famed fort of San Juan de Ulloa, still further engaged the Mexicans at home and relieved Texas of further apprehensions in that direction. It was in the siege of San Juan de Ulloa that Santa Anna lost his leg.
A regiment of regular troops was provided for by Congress and soon raised, with Edward Burleson as colonel, Wm. S. Fisher as lieutenant-colonel, and Lysander Wells as major. Most of the measures enumerated were adopted after the induction of the new president ( Lamar ) into office.
On the 10th of December a committee, composed of Messrs. Baker, Jenkins, Menefee, Holmes and Muse, was appointed to wait upon President Houston and inform him that the two houses of Congress would meet him on the portico of the capitol, at 12 o'clock, to hear his farewell address. Messrs. Swift, Butler, Caldwell, Hill and Jones were appointed to invite the President and Vice-President elect to meet the two houses at the same time and place, and be inducted into office. The place chosen was to afford room for a great crowd of spectators. It has been charged that the inauguration com- mittee made no arrangements on their programme for the delivery of President Houston's valedictory address. The fact is that Congress had adjourned from the 5th to the morn- ing of the 10th. On assembling at 9 a. m. on the 10th, but three hours remained before the ceremonies were to begin. There was no inauguration committee, precisely the same invitation was given to and provision made for President Houston as for the incoming President and Vice-President, as shown by the official journals, page 155.
The retiring President delivered a long and eloquent address, reviewing the past and present and expressing his views and hopes of the future. It abounded in sentiments of exalted
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patriotism and was received with every evidence of gratifica- tion.
The new President, Mirabeau B. Lamar, was too much in- disposed to appear. His inaugural, beautiful in diction, and fervid in patriotism, was read by his secretary.
Vice-President Burnet delivered an address worthy of his reputation as a scholar, a patriot and a statesman. The entire ceremonies were creditable to all concerned and gave great satisfaction to the Congress, the spectators and the country.
President Lamar, on the 14th, sent to the Senate his cabinet nominations, all of whom were confirmed, as follows :
Bernard E. Bee, Secretary of State.
Albert Sidney Johnston, Secretary of War.
Memucan Hunt, Secretary of the Navy.
Richard G. Dunlap, Secretary of the Treasury.
Charles Watrous, Attorney-General.
The Congress, in joint session, elected General Thomas J. Rusk, Chief Justice of the Republic, in place of James Collins- worth, deceased. President Houston had temporarily con- ferred the position upon Mr. John Birdsall. During the summer Peter W. Grayson, who was prominently mentioned in connection with the presidency, came to an untimely death, while on a visit to the United States. His death was regarded as a public loss.
The country, at this period, was called upon to mourn the loss of one of its most gifted, talented and eloquent sons. Colonel John A. Wharton, Adjutant-General at San Jacinto, whose voice, when his chief was severely wounded, cheered his comrades on to victory. The public sorrow was appropri- ately expressed by both houses of Congress. John A. Whar- ton died on the 17th of December, 1838, while a representa- tive from Brazoria, whose people had so often honored him. A few months later he was followed by his distinguished and only brother, William H. Wharton, senator from Brazoria,
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mortally wounded by the accidental discharge of his own gun while mounting his horse to start out with a hunting party. William H. Wharton died in March, 1839. For thirteen years he had been a prominent actor and leader in public af- fairs. The names of these noble brothers are indissolubly connected with the infancy and revolutionary glory of Texas.
CHAPTER XIV.
Lamar's eloquent first message - Noble utterances in behalf of general education - His plea for frontier protection and our relations with the Cherokees - Finance and the Navy.
The third Congress enacted numerous wise and salutary laws. In his first message to it, a few days after his inaugu- ration, President Lamar dwelt at length upon the condition of the country, recommending such measures as he believed were calculated to promote the general welfare. On the subject of laying a foundation for a general system of popular education based on the public domain, he said :
" If we desire to establish a republican government upon a broad and permanent basis, it will become our duty to adopt a comprehensive and well regulated system of mental and moral culture. Education is a subject in which every citizen and especially every parent, feels a deep and lively concern. It is one in which no jarring interests are involved, and no acrimonious political feelings excited ; for its benefits are so universal that all parties can cordially unite in advancing it. It is admitted by all that cultivated mind is the guardian genius of democracy, and while guided and controlled by virtue, is the noblest attribute of man. It is the only dictator that freemen acknowledge and the only security that freemen desire. The influence of education in the moral world, as in the physical, renders luminous what was before obscure. It opens a wide field for the exercise and improvement of all the faculties of man, and imparts vigor and clearness to those important truths in the science of government, as well as of morals, which would otherwise be lost in the darkness of ignorance. Without its aid how perilous and insufficient would
(149)
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be the deliberations of a government like ours. How ignoble and useless its legislation for all the purposes of happiness. How fragile and insecure its liberties. War would be conducted without the science necessary to secure success, and its bitterness and calamities would be unrelieved by the ameliorating circumstances which the improved con- dition of man has imparted to it. Peace would be joyless, because its train would be unattended by that civilization and refinement which alone can give zest to social and domestic enjoyments ; and how shall we protect our rights if we do not comprehend them? And can we comprehend them unless we acquire a knowledge of the past and present condition of things, and practice the habit of enlightened reflection? Cul- tivation is as necessary to the supply of rich intellectual and moral fruits, as are the labors of the husbandman to bring forth the valuable productions of the earth. But it would be superfluous to offer to this honorable Congress any extended argument to enforce the practical importance of this subject. I feel fully assured that it will, in that liberal spirit of im- provement which pervades the social world, lose not the auspicious opportunity to provide for literary institutions, with an influence commensurate with our future destinies. To patronize the general diffusion of knowledge, industry and charity, has been near the heart of the good and wise of all nations, while the ambitious and the ignorant would fain have threatened a policy so pure and laudable. But the rich domes and spires of edifices consecrated to these objects, which are continually increasing in numbers, throwing their scenic splendor over civilization and attesting the patriotism of their founders, show that this unhallowed purpose has not been accomplished. Our young republic has been formed by a Spartan spirit. Let it progress and ripen into Roman firm- ness and Athenian gracefulness and wisdom. Let those names which have been inscribed on the standard of her national glory, be found also on the pages of her history,
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associated with that profound and enlightened policy which is to make our country a bright link in that chain of free States which will some day encircle and unite in harmony the Amer- ican continent. Thus, and thus only, will true glory be per- fected; and our nation, which has sprung from the harsh trump of war, be matured into the refinements and tranquil happiness of peace. Let me, therefore, urge upon you, gentlemen, not to postpone the matter too long. The present is a propitious moment to lay the foundation of a great moral and intellectual edifice, which will in after ages be hailed as the chief ornament and blessing of Texas. A suitable appro- priation of lands to the purpose of general education can be made at this time, without inconvenience to the government or the people ; but defer it until the public domain shall have passed from our hands, and the uneducated youths of Texas will constitute the living monuments of our neglect and remissness."
Consider the condition of Texas at that moment. Her treasury empty ! her people yet in the throes of revolution ! her frontier bleeding from savage fury from San Antonio to Red River ! Only yet recognized by the United States ! Con- sider these and other calamities (especially from East Texas Indians and the rebellious Mexicans of Nacogdoches ) im- pending over the country, and how grandly stands forth Mira- beau B. Lamar, in his first utterances to Congress, as the champion of enlightened liberty.
President Lamar discussed the legal questions arising out of the change, by a constitutional provision, from the civil to the common law as the basis of the jurisprudence of the republic and recommended appropriate legislation.
He also advised, in this message, legislation in regard to Mexican brigandage on the southwestern frontier.
The preceding pages have briefly recited a few of the Indian atrocities perpetrated during the term of President Houston, but do not include depredations on and murders of the people
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of the frontier by a band of Comanches, committed after visiting, counseling with and receiving presents from the President, in Houston in 1837, and while returning to their own country. Representative John G. Robison, of Fayette, his brother, and a number of citizens of Bastrop County were among the victims. The Indian outrages in 1837 and 1838 (during Houston's administration ), and in 1839 and 1840 (during Lamar's term), were appalling. Both Houston and Lamar did all in their power to hold the Indians in check. It would be flagrantly unjust to hold either responsible for the partial failure of such efforts. The country was too weak and the combined tribes too powerful to do more than was done. The two presidents differred as to the mode of dealing with this momentous question ; but no sane man can doubt the patriotic desire of each to save the people of the country from such dreadful visitations.
Lamar came into the presidency with Indian hostilities along almost the entire frontier. On this subject he said:
" It is a cardinal principle in all political associations that protection is commensurate with allegiance, and the poorest citizen, whose sequestered cabin is reared on our remotest frontier, holds as sacred a claim upon the government for safety and security, as does the man who lives in ease and wealth in the heart of our most populous city. I am, by no means, desirous of aggravating the ordinary calamities of war by inculcating the harsh doctrines of lex talionis toward debased and ignorant savages. War is itself an evil which all good people will strive to avoid; but, when it cannot be avoided, it ought to be so met and pursued as will best secure a speedy and lasting peace. If that better mode consists in severity to the enemy, then severity to him becomes clemency to all. The moderation hitherto extended to the Indians on our border has been repeatedly retorted upon us in all the atrocious cruelties that characterize their mode of warfare.
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The Indian warrior, in his heartless and sanguinary vengeance, recognizes no distinction of age, sex or condition. All are indiscriminate victims to his cruelties."
The contemporary history of Texas bore testimony to the truth, the wisdom and the justice of Lamar's position.
The colonists and later immigrants to Texas found no security against wild nomadic tribes until they were overawed by fear and taught the difference between self-reliant American riflemen and the illy-armed peons of Mexico.
That the Indians in the early history of the Union were dishonestly swindled by agents, traders and speculators of the United States cannot be denied. They were the victims of crimes, the perpetrators of which, like the perpetrators of many other crimes incident to human progress, have been permitted to go unwhipped of justice. They are crimes for which the mass of the people cannot be held responsible. Such offenses against law and conscience are deplored by good men of all nations and all times, and dim some of the otherwise brightest pages of history. In Texas, however, the people fought the Indians in necessary self-defense, and for peaceful existence in a wilderness to improve which the Indians did no more than the wild beasts in its forests and on its plains. The land was the untamed and unoccupied gift of nature - an untilled and practically uninhabited waste - and it was the right of civilization to enter upon and reclaim it for the sus- tenance of a nobler race, capable of laying broad and deep the foundations of a powerful and glorious State.
President Lamar frankly discussed the relations of Texas with the semi-civilized Cherokees, confessing a want of knowl- edge on some points. He said: " That the immigrant tribes (i. e. Indians from the United States) have no legal or equit- able claim to any portion of our territory, is obvious from a cursory examination of their history. Their immigration to Texas was unsolicited and unauthorized, and has always
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been a source of regret to its more enlightened population. The Federal government of Mexico neither conceded or promised them lands or civil rights."
This is true, but it is not the whole truth. The Consultation of 1835, under the impression that they had grants from Mexico, most solemnly promised, in a resolution signed by the entire body to secure the Cherokees in those rights, and promised to have their boundaries established. Under the Provisional Government, General Houston and Colonel John Forbes, as commissioners, entered into a treaty with them in February, 1836, among the stipulations of which was a provision for marking their boundaries. A report was made to Governor Smith when there was no councilto ratify the treaty, and on the eve of the assemblage of the convention of March 1st, 1836. That body, in its eighteen days session, was engrossed with other and more momentous cares, and failed to ratify the treaty.
While President Lamar was correct in asserting that these Indians had no legal right in the country, he was assuredly wrong in adding that they had no equitable right to the country occupied by them. The act of the Consultation and the treaty made by authorized commissioners certainly gave them an equitable right. President Houston, so considering their claim, and feeling a personal responsibility, both as a member of the Consultation which made the pledge, and of the commission which made the treaty, and in the spirit of good faith, instructed Colonel Alexander Horton to survey and mark the boundaries. This was in 1838, and the work was, at least in large part, done. This action was repugnant in the first place to all land speculators, who desired to possess that section from purely selfish motives ; secondly, to citizens and soldiers who wished to locate their land certificates in it; and thirdly, to a large element who believed that the Cher- okees and associate bands in heart were enemies to Texas, and ready, whenever opportunity offered, to become allies of
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Mexico against Texas. The attitude of General Houston towards the Cherokees, among whom his youth was partially passed, was friendly, confiding as he did, in their professed fidelity. That of President Lamar, distrusting as he did their professions and listening to the repeated recitals of murders and other outrages charged to them, and soon afterwards placed as he was in possession of captured correspondence between them and Mexican emissaries, seems to have been warranted and to justify his belief that their continuance in the country would constitute a constant menace to its peace and safety.
In regard to the navy, frontier protection and commerce, even at this day, the views of President Lamar seem to have been wise. He also favored a loan, based on the public domain, to meet the necessities of the government, which, by the way, was never effected. Opposing banks, dependent on and controlled by individuals, he favored the creation of such an institution under government control; but his recom- mendations in this matter also failed of adoption and, by the non-action of Congress, the government was left no alterna- tive but a continued issue of irredeemable treasury notes, already (notwithstanding the assertions of some writers to the contrary ), materially depreciated below par. President Lamar had also said in his message:
" The exchequer bills of England, the assignats of France, and the treasury (revolutionary ) bills of the United States, furnish memorable examples of the inability of the most pow- ful and opulent governments to establish a good, practical circulating medium on their own credit alone, without the facilities of prompt redemption. The precious metals are the only uniform standard of value, and no paper represent- ative can acquire general confidence, and answer the legiti- mate purposes of trade, unless it be convertible, at the pleasure of the holder, into gold or silver."
This is a truth now recognized throughout the political and commercial world.
CHAPTER XV.
The Cherokee Indians - Their intrigues with Cordova and Mexican Com- manders at Matamoros - Their Defeat - Cordova starts for the Mata- moros - He is pursued and defeated by Burleson - Caldwell next pursues but fails to overtake Cordova.
Reference has been made to our relations with the Cherokee Indians and their twelve associate bands and the Mexican rebellion around Nacogdoches in 1838. The importance of these relations demands a more explicit narration of the events connected with them.
After returning to Matamoros in 1836, and until some time in 1838, General Vicente Filisola remained in command of northern Mexico, with headquarters in Matamoros. He was superseded, during the latter year, by General Valentino Canalizo. The former undertook, by well planned intrigues, to win to Mexico the friendship of all the Indians in Texas, including the Cherokees and associate bands, and to unite them in a persistent war on Texas. Through emissaries passing above the settlements he communicated with the Cherokees and others and with a number of Mexican citizens in and around Nacogdoches, and succeeded in enlisting many of them in his schemes. Canalizo, on succeeding Filisola, prosecuted the same policy. The most conspicuous of these Mexicans, as developed in the progress of events, was Vicente Cordova, from which the affair has generally been called " Cordova's Rebellion." But there were others actively en- gaged with him, some bearing American names, as Nat Norris and Joshua Robertson, and Mexicans named Juan Jose Rodriguez, C. Morales, J. Santos Coy, J. Vicente Micheli, J. Ariola and A. Corda.
The first outbreak occurred on the 4th of August, 1838, (156)
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when a party of Americans, who had pursued and recovered stolen horses in a Mexican settlement in Nacogdoches County, were fired upon on their return trip, and one of their number killed. The trail of the assailants was followed and found to be large and made by Mexicans. On the 7th, General Rusk learned that over a hundred Mexicans, headed by Cordova and Norris, were encamped on the Angelina. He immediately raised sixty volunteers and posted them at the lower crossing of that stream. The enemy were then on the west side. On the 10th, it was reported that three hundred Indians had joined Cordova. On the same day President Houston, who was then in Nacogdoches, and had previously issued a proclamation to the insurgents, received a letter, signed by the nine persons whose names have been given, disavowing allegiance to Texas, and claiming to be citizens of Mexico.
On the 10th, Cordova moved up towards the Cherokee nation. Major Henry W. Augustin was detached to follow his trail, while Rusk, having been re-inforced by other volun- teers, moved directly towards the village of Bowles, head- chief of the Cherokees, believing Cordova had gone there ; but, on reaching the Sabine, it was found that he had moved rapidly in the direction of the upper Trinity, while the great body of his followers had dispersed. Cordova remained on the upper Trinity and Brazos till March, 1839, in constant communication with the wild Indians. He urged them to a relentless war on Texas. He advised them to burn and destroy the homes and property of the settlers, and promised them, under instructions from Filisola and Canalizo, protec- tion under the Mexican government and fee simple rights to the respective territories occupied by them. He sent com- munications to Filisola and Canalizo, also to Manuel Flores in Matamoros, charged with diplomatic duties towards the Indians of Texas, urging Flores to meet with him for confer- ence and a more definite understanding.
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