USA > Texas > History of Texas : from 1685 to 1892, volume 2 > Part 13
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In the meantime, a combination of these rebellious and
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lawless Mexicans and Indians committed depredations on the settlements to such a degree, that General Rusk raised two hundred volunteers and moved against them. On the 14th of October, 1838, he arrived at Fort Houston (near Palestine), and, learning that the enemy were in force at the Kickapoo village (in Anderson County ), moved in that direction. At daylight on the 16th, he attacked them, and, after a short and hot engagement, charged them, upon which they fled with precipitation, and were pursued for some distance. Eleven warriors were left dead and a much larger number were wounded. General Rusk had eleven men wounded but none killed.
These events transpired during the presidency of General Houston and confronted the country when President Lamar assumed office on the 10th of December.
On the 27th of February, 1839, General Canalizo, from Matamoros, sent instructions to Cordova, in substance as had already been given to Flores, detailing the manner of proced- ure, and directing pledges and promises to be made to the Indians. The instructions embraced messages from Canalizo to the chiefs of the Caddoes, Seminoles, Biloxes, Cherokees, Kickapoos, Brazos, Tehuacanos and other tribes, in which he enjoined them to keep at a goodly distance from the frontier of the United States.
Of all the tribes mentioned the Caddoes were the only ones who dwelt along that border ; and, in consequence of acts attributed to them, General Rusk, in November, 1838, cap- tured and disarmed a portion of the tribe, and delivered them to their American agent in Shreveport, where they made a treaty, promising pacific behavior until peace should be made between Texas and the remainder of their tribe.
In his zeal to confer directly with Canalizo and Flores, Cor- dova resolved to go in person to Matamoros. From his temporary abiding place on the upper Trinity, with an es- cort of about seventy-five Mexicans, Indians and negroes, he
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set forth March, 1839. On the 26th of that month his camp was discovered at the foot of the mountains north of and not far from Austin. The news was speedily conveyed to Colonel Burleson at Bastrop, who, though colonel of the regulars then being recruited, was at his home, and in a short time he was at the head of eighty of his Colorado neighbors, as reliable and gallant citizen soldiers as lived in Texas. Sur- mising the probable route of Cordova, Colonel Burleson bore west till he struck his trail and, finding it several hours old, followed it as rapidly as his horses could travel till late in the afternoon of the 29th, when his scouts reported Cordova near at hand and unaware of the danger in his rear. Burleson in- creased his pace and came up with the enemy in an open body of post oaks, about six miles east, or probably nearer south- east, of Seguin, on the Guadalupe. Mr. Yoakum says the enemy fled at the first fire. He was misinformed. Cordova promptly formed his men, and, shielded by the large trees of the forest, made a stubborn resistance. Burleson dismounted a portion of his men, who also fought from behind trees for some time. Finally, seeing some of the enemy wavering, Burleson charged them, when they broke and were hotly pursued two or three miles into the Gaudalupe bottom, which they entered as twilight approached.
Burleson's horses were so jaded by rapid travel as to be incapable of further pursuit, and he moved up six miles to Seguin to protect the few families there from possible danger.
Cordova lost over twenty-five in killed - one-third his force - Burleson had none killed, but a considerable number wounded.
During the night Cordova passed on the east around and above Seguin and continued his retreat, passing some miles north of San Antonio, having crossed the Gaudalupe where New Braunfels now stands. At that time Captain Matthew Caldwell commanded a company of rangers who were scat-
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tered in two or three camps in that section. Collecting these and reinforced by a number of citizens, he pursued Cordova, who had dangerously wounded three of Caldwell's scouts above Seguin. He pressed the pursuit to the Nucces River, when it became evident that he could not overtake the refugees before they could reach and cross the Rio Grande. Hence further effort was useless, and Caldwell returned on the Presidio road via San Antonio, where the command was wel- comed with every demonstration of joy and given a feast (for they were out of provisions), over which Colonel Henry W. Karnes presided.
Manuel Flores, the Mexican Indian agent in Matamoros, responsive to Cordova's earnest desire for a personal confer- ence, and ignorant of the latter's disastrous defeat, set forth from Matamoros late in April to meet Cordova and the Indian tribes wherever they might be found - on the upper Brazos, Trinity, or east of the latter. He had an escort of about thirty Indians and Mexicans, supplies of ammunition, etc., for his allies and all the official papers from Filisola and Canalizo, to which reference has been made in these pages, empowering him to treat with the Indians so as to secure their united friendship for Mexico and their combined hostility to Texas. His march was necessarily slow. On the 14th of May, he crossed the road between Seguin and San Antonio, having committed depredations on and near the route, and on the 15th crossed the Guadalupe at the old Nacogdoches ford (now New Braunfels ). He was discovered near the Colorado, not far above where Austin was laid out later in the same year. Lieutenant (afterwards Captain ) James O. Rice, a gallant young ranger, in command of seventeen men, fell upon his trail, pursued, overhauled and assailed him on Brushy ( not the San Gabriel as stated by one historian ), in the edge of what is now Williamson County. Flores endeavored to make a stand, but Rice rushed forward with such impetu- osity as to throw the enemy into confusion and flight. Flores
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and two of his followers were left dead upon the ground, and fully half of those who escaped were wounded. Rice cap- tured and carried in one hundred horses and mules, three hundred pounds of powder, a large amount of lead, shot, balls, etc., and all the correspondence in possession of Flores. This correspondence revealed in detail the whole plot that had been formed for the destruction of the frontier people of Texas, to be followed up by the devastation of the entire country. The atrocious conspiracy was brought to naught by Burleson, Caldwell, Rice and their brave followers.
A review of all the facts from the spring of 1836 to these events in 1839, together with the revelations of the captured correspondence, caused President Lamar to resolve on the removal of the Cherokees and their associate bands from the heart of East Texas and their return to their kindred west of Arkansas, by peaceful negotiations if possible, but by force if necessary.
He desired to pay them for their improvements and other losses. He appointed Vice-President David G. Burnet, Gen- eral Albert Sidney Johnston, Secretary of War; Hugh McLeod, Adjutant-General, and General Thomas J. Rusk to meet and treat with them for their peaceful removal; but if that failed, then they were to be expelled by force. To be prepared for the latter contingency, he ordered Colonel Edward Burleson, then in command of the regular army, to march from Austin to the appointed rendezvous in the Cher- okee country, with two companies of regulars and the volun- teer companies of Captains James Ownsby and Mark B. Lewis, about two hundred strong and commanded by Major William J. Jones (still living opposite Galveston). On the ground they found the commissioners and, about the same time, General Kelsey H. Douglas arrived with several hundred East Texas militia and became senior officer. Burleson took with him, also, Captain Placido, with forty Toncahua warriors.
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After three days negotiation terms were finally agreed upon. The Indians were to leave the country for a consideration. The second day following was fixed for signing the treaty. But the Indians did not appear. The rendezvous was ten miles from their settlements. Scouts sent out returned and reported the Indians in force moving off. It was dscovered that Bowles, the principal chief, had been finessing for time to assembly all his warriors and surprise the whites by a superior force. His re-inforcements not arriving in time, he had begun falling back to meet them. Colonel Burleson was ordered to lead the pursuit. He pressed forward rapidly and late in the afternoon (it being July 16th, 1839), came up with them and had a severe engagement, partly in a small prairie and partly in heavy timber, into which Burleson drove them, when night came on and the Texian troops encamped. I now quote from the narrative of Major Wm. J. Jones, who was under Burleson in the first as well as the last engage- ment on the 17th of July. He says :
" It soon became apparent that the re-inforcements looked for by Bowles had not reached him and that he was falling back to meet them. This he succeeded in accomplishing the next morning (the 17th day of July ), at the Delaware village, now in Cherokee County, occupying an eminence in the open post-oaks, with the heavily timbered bottom of the Neches in their immediate rear. When our forces overtook them the main body of the enemy were in full sight, occupying the eminence where the village was located, while a detachment was posted in a ravine, tortuous in its course, and was intended to conceal their movements toward our rear, with a view to throw them- selves between our men and their horses. But the watchful eye of Colonel Burleson, who well understood Indian tactics, discovered this movement, in good time, when he ordered his entire force of three hundred men to charge and drive the Indians from their place of concealment. Although the weather was extremely hot and the men almost famished for
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water, this order was executed with promptness, routing the Indians and driving them back toward the village, surrounded by fences and cornfields. General Rusk, with all the force (about 400) of East Texas under his immediate command, had in the meantime advanced upon the enemy's front and kept them so hotly engaged in defense of their women and chil- dren that no re-inforcement could be spared from that quarter for the support of those who had been driven from the ravine. When they retreated upon the main body, their entire force was terrorized and fell back in great disorder upon the corn- fields, then in full bearing, and the dense timber of the river bottom. It was here that Bowles evinced the most desperate intrepidity, and made several unavailing efforts to rally his trusted warriors. * * It was in his third and last effort to restore his broken and disordered ranks, that he met his death. He was mounted upon a very fine sorrel horse, with blaze face and four white feet. He was shot in the back, near the spine, with a musket ball and three buckshot. He breathed a short time only after his fall. *
After this great defeat and the loss of their great and .trusted chief, the Indians disappeared in the adjoining jungles of the Neches, and, as best they could, in squads, retreated up the country, the larger portion finally joining their country- men west of the Arkansas. A band of them led by John Bowles (son of the deceased chief ) and Egg enroute to Mexico, were defeated, these two leaders killed and twenty-seven women and children captured, near the mouth of the San Saba, on Christmas day, 1839, by Colonel Burleson .. These captives were afterwards sent to the Cherokee nation.
In the battles of July 16th and 17th, many heroic actions were performed. Vice-President Burnet, General Johnston and Adjutant-General McLeod were wounded but not dan- gerously. Major David S. Kaufman, of the militia (after- wards a distinguished Congressman) was shot in the cheek. Captain S. W. Jordan of the regulars (afterwards by his
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retreat in October, 1840, from Saltillo, styled the Xenophon of his age), was severely wounded.
The victory at the Delaware village freed East Texas of those Indians. It had become an imperative necessity to the safety and population of the country. Yet, let it not be under- stood that all of right was with the whites and all of wrong with the Indians, for that would be false and unjust, and neither falsehood nor injustice should stain the pages of our history. From their stand-point, the Cherokees believed that they had a moral, equitable, and at least, a quasi-legal right to the country, and such in truth they had. But, between Mexican emissaries on the one hand,1 mischievous Indians on the other, and the grasping desire of unprincipled land- grabbers for their territory, one wrong produced a counter wrong until blood flowed and women and children were sacrificed by the more lawless of the Indians, and we have seen the result. All the Indians were not bad, nor were all the whites good. Self-preservation demanded the expulsion of the Indians. It has been ever thus where advancing civili- zation and savagery have been brought into juxtaposition and contended for the mastery.
1 Under oath, December 11th, 1840, before a committee of Congress, Adolphus Sterne, a prominent citizen of Nacogdoches, said: "The conduct of the Cherokees towards the American settlers in Texas, in 1826 and 1827, was hostile. Richard Fields, a Cherokee, and John Dunn Hunter, another Cherokee, were killed by them because they were friendly to the white men.
. His son, Fox Fields, was killed by the Cherokees for the same reason. Hawkins was killed by them for the same reason; and I believe that if General Gaona's division of the Mexican army had penetrated into Eastern Texas in 1836, the Cherokees and their associate bands would have massa- cred every white man, woman and child they could have got into their power. In consequence of that belief the people of Eastern Texas fled from their habitations in the spring of 1836."
CHAPTER XVI.
Austin becomes the seat of Government beyond the settlements - The Government removal - Fourth Congress assembled at the new seat of Government on the first Monday in November, 1839 - The Cherokee Land Bill - Commissioner J. Pinkney Henderson's return from Great Britain - Visit of Gen. Hamilton who was Loan Commissioner to Great Britain, France, Holland and Belgium.
The first Congress under Lamar's administration, in Janu- ary, 1839, passed a law providing for the permanent location of the seat of government. It was a question of deep interest and excited more or less sectional feeling. The whole west and the upper frontier wished it located as far in the interior as practicable, that it might become the grand focus of frontier protection. Messrs. William Menefee of Colorado, James Kerr of Jackson, Cornelius Van Ness of Bexar, and John Caldwell of Bastrop, were the especial champions of the measure. After many propositions, the law, as finally passed provided for the election, by joint vote of Congress, of five com- missioners, who should select the location and purchase lands for a town site, upon which action upon their part the Presi- dent was authorized to appoint an agent to plat and lay off the town, and have public buildings erected. The commissioners were restricted to the territory bounded cast by the Brazos; west by the Colorado and south by the old Nacogdoches road crossing (at Bastrop on the Colorado), and Nashville on the Brazos. The commissioners elected were Albert C. Horton of Matagorda, Isaac W. Burton of Houston County, William Menefee of Colorado, Isaac Campbell of San Augustine, and Louis P. Cooke of Brazoria. All excepting the first named were then members of the House of Representatives.
On the 15th of April, 1839, the commissioners reported in
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extenso to President Lamar, their examinations of both rivers and the country between, and the purchase of 7,135 acres of land, having a front of three miles on the east bank of the Colorado River, a mile or two below the base, or foot-hills of the high lands usually designated as the Colorado mountains. The price paid for this site was $21,000 in the treasury notes of the Republic. It was intended by Congress that the next session to assemble on the first Monday in November, 1839, should be held at the new site. President Lamar, as a fron- tier measure, was in favor of the change, and lost no time in carrying the law into effect. He appointed Edwin Waller as agent to lay off the town. At that time only two families (those of Harrell and Hornsby ) lived on the site and one or two families three miles below. Beyond thein to the north and northwest lay an unbroken wilderness. To the northeast it was sixty and eighty miles to a few settlements on the Brazos and Little River. Southwest to San Antonio, eighty- four miles, there was not a human habitation, and no road for the first thirty miles. It was bold enterprise thus to plant the capital of the young republic in the very teeth and traveled pathway of the wild savages. On the spot chosen still stands the State capital, the beautiful city of Austin.
Waller, with surveyors, carpenters and laborers, began his labors as soon as possible. While the town was being laid out, whipsaws and axes resounded in the vicinity, felling trees and converting them into plank, boards, shingles and house-logs. Lumber was hauled thirty-five miles from the mills at Bastrop. Hundreds of men were employed and guarded by rangers under Captains Mark B. Lewis and James Ownsby, of the battalion commanded by Major Wm. J. Jones.
By October a two-story frame house for the President, a board house for the Congress, and log buildings for all de- partments, were completed; and, while this was in progress, a large number of log cabins for residences and business pur-
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poses, several large houses of numerous rooms for taverns and two others of plank or boards were erected. The heads of departments and archives arrived during October, and by the end of that month, Austin had probably fifteen hundred in- habitants, many of whom lived in tents or under temporary sheds. It is safe to say that no town, containing the same number of souls, on the American continent, ever had more talent among its founders. Certainly in no settlement, where defense against savages devolved upon the members of every household, was there ever more enlightenment and refine- ment.1
1 There then resided in Austin : President Lamar ; Vice-President Burnet ; Abner S. Lipscomb, Secretary of State; Albert Sidney Johnston, first, and then, Branch T. Archer, Secretary of War; Dr. James H. Starr, Secretary of the Treasury; Louis P. Cooke, Secretary of the Navy; James Webb, Attorney-General; John P. Borden, Land Commissioner; Asa Brigham, Treasurer; and in other government offices: Musgrove Evans, Charles Mason, Charles de Morse, E. Lawrence Stickney, John B. Ransom, Joseph Daniels and Thomas Gales Foster. Among department clerks were : John M. Swisher, James H. Raymond, James F. Johnson, George J. Durham, Henry W. Raglin, Wm. S. Hotchkiss, Muhlenburg H. Beatty, George D. Biggar, M. P. Woodhouse, Alfred W. Luckett, Thos. Wm. Ward, Stephen Crosby, Parry W. Humphreys, Horace L. Upshur; Publishers : Jacob W. Cruger (of Hous- ton) and George W. Bonnell (killed at Mier), of the Centinel; Samuel Whiting (publisher) and George K. Teulon (editor) of the Gazette (Teulon died in China). Printers: Joel Miner, Alexander Area, W. D. Mims, - McLelland, Thomas Wilson, Wm. Carlton, Joseph A. Clark, William Clark, Martin Carroll Wing (drew a black bean and was shot in Mexico, March 25th, 1843) ; John Henry Brown (the only youth among them) and George W. Noble. Staff officers of the army : Colonels Hugh McLeod, Wm. G. Cooke, Wm. L. Cazneau, Peter H. Bell, Jacob Sniveley. Lawyers : James M. Ogden (drew a black bean and shot in Mexico), Joseph Lee, John D. Anderson, Francis A. Morris. Doctors : Moses Johnson, Joseph W. Robertson, and Richard F. Brennan (killed in the Mier prisoner rescue). Merchants: John Adriance, Alex Russell, Arch C. McFarland, Thomas L. Jones (drew a black bean and shot in Mexico), Lamar Moore, Wm. H. Murrah, and James Burke; H. Mulholland, German architect and draftsman. Jewelers: Charles R. Sossaman and Wm. Simpson. Hotel keepers : Bullock, Miller and Johnson, Mrs. Angelina B. Eberly, John Hall, succeeded by Thomas Smith (killed by Indians; his son, James W. Smith, the first county judge, was also killed Dy Indians). Other residents remembered were: Judge Luckett, Arch C.
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The fourth Congress assembled in the new capitol at Austin on the first Monday in November, 1839. At the first Congress in Austin were David G. Burnet, Vice-President, presiding over the Senate, and John D. McLeod, Secretary. Among the senators were Dr. George W. Barnett ( killed by Indians in 1848), K. H. Muse, Dr. Francis Moore, Jr., Isaac W. Bur- ton, John Dunn, Harvey Kendrick, James S. Lester, Dr. Anson Jones, Dr. Stephen H. Everitt, Jose Antonio Navarro and Ethan Stroud.
In the House of Representatives, David S. Kaufman was elected Speaker, and Thos. Wm. Ward, Clerk. Prominent among the members were General Sam Houston, Wm. H. Jack, and John W. Harris ( both from Brazoria), Cornelius Van Ness, William Menefee, Edward L. Holmes, Ben Mc- Culloch, John S. Menefee, Dr. Daniel Rowlett, Samuel M. Williams, Collin Mckinney, Daniel P. Coit, Isaac Parker, Dr. George W. Hill and John M. Hansford.
This Congress, though meeting on the extreme frontier, accomplished much to effect permanently the policy of the country. It established, with certain reservations suggested by the condition of the country, the common law of England as the rule of decision in the republic. It enacted a law establishing the marital rights of husband and wife and another regulating the descent and distribution of the estates of persons dying without wills. It created two traveling boards of commissioners to visit every county seat in the republic, examine the records of county boards, hear testimony and pass upon the legality of every certificate issued by such
Hyde, (first postmaster), W. W. Thompson, Wayne Barton (first sheriff), M. H. Nicholson, W. Buck Billingsly, J. Monroe Swisher, Captain James G. Swisher, - McCurdy, Harvey and Fenwick Smith, Van Cleave, James New- comb, Dolson and Black (both killed by Indians), Thomas Ward, Prentiss, Horst, Robert Todd, Ambrose Bonnell Pattison, Thomas Warren, John D. McLeod, John W. Lann and L. F. Marguerate.
The Count Alphonso de Saligny, first charge d'affaires from France to Texas, (recently arrived), was among the residents.
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boards. It was a wise and necessary law and went far to purge the records of frauds. The fraudulent issuance of cer- tificates was, however, discovered only in a few counties ; chiefly in Shelby, San Augustine and Jasper.
At this session a bill was introduced reserving from location the lands in the Cherokee country. This was a favorite measure of General Houston and designed to hold these lands (to be hereafter sold) as a basis of credit for the redemption of treasury notes, or what subsequently became known as Exchequer Bills. It was a wise measure in the then con- dition of the country, but was opposed by land speculators from purely selfish motives and by others for the reason (though neither a legal nor an equitable one) that it denied the holders of bounty land and head-right certificates the right to locate their certificates wherever they might desire. This opposition was met by the declaration that the lands had been won only in the previous July, by force of arms from the Cherokees, who claimed both a legal and equitable right to them, and were, therefore, not a part of the public domain, subject to such locations, when the certificates were issued ; and, if there was a doubt, it should be solved in favor of the government in view of the beneficent purpose to which it was proposed to appropriate the lands. The debate was earnest and spirited, General Houston leading on the affirmative and Speaker Kaufman in opposition.1
1 The author heard the concluding speeches of those gentlemen on the bill at a night session, about the middle of January, 1840, with the sympathies of ardent youth in opposition to the measure, the point chiefly discussed being the previous right of the Indians to the territory. Mr. Kaufman, a young man of graceful and fine physique, fluent and eloquent, was exceed- ingly felicitous. It was the first time the writer heard General Houston, though that pleasure was enjoyed at intervals afterward till twenty-one years later, when on the 5th of January, 1861, in Belton he heard one of General Houston's last (if not his last) regular address. But he never heard him on any occasion when he was so eloquent, so logical, so free from passion, or so majestic in person or manner. If preserved, which it was not, that speech would be a valuable addition to our political literature.
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