Last Confederate Army Surrenders, and It Wasn't Lee's Army

Oops, I am tardy; June 23^rd was the 147^th anniversary of the surrender of the last Confederate force. Here is a quick review of the surrender dates of Confederate armies:

April 9, 1865: surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia by General Robert E. Lee

April 26, 1865: surrender of forces commanded by Joseph E. Johnston

May 4, 1865: surrender of Departments of Alabama, Mississippi, and east Louisiana by Lt. General Richard Taylor

May 26, 1865: surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department by Lt. Gen. E. Kirby Smith

June 23, 1865: surrender of Indian tribes by Brigadier General Stand Watie near Fort Towson, Indian Territory. The Historical Marker Database includes photographs of the marker near the site of Watie’s surrender, and the News in History.com website has a transcription of an 1865 newspaper article about the surrender proceedings.

One of my pet peeves is the implication (often made by the national media) that the war ended with the surrender of Lee’s army. This is an Eastern-centric view of the war implying that Lee’s army embodied everything of importance. The surrender of Lee’s army started the process of surrenders by other Confederate armies, but the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia did not necessarily mean that the war’s end would be a quick or an inevitable process.

Well, I feel better now that I’ve vented about this…

Off the Beaten Track

On Thursday the temperature was fairly mild, the wind wasn’t too strong…what better time to go on a day trip and visit the gravesite of Stand Watie!

Watie, a Cherokee Indian, was born in Georgia in 1806. In the 1830s he was one of the signers of the Treaty of New Echota, in which the Cherokees agreed to cede their lands in the southeast in exchange for a new homeland in the Indian Territory. Approved by the U. S. Senate, the treaty was controversial in part because principal chief John Ross was not a signatory. Many of the signers of the treaty were eventually targeted for assassination but not all were actually attacked. However, Major Ridge, John Ridge, and Elias Boudinot were assassinated; Stand Watie escaped the attempt on his life.

When the Civil War started, Watie cast his allegiance with the Confederacy, and eventually became the only Indian to achieve the rank of general during the war. His wartime career mostly occurred in the Indian Territory where he achieved a reputation as a rather daring raider. For example, he led a force that captured a valuable Union wagon train at 2^nd Cabin Creek in September 1864, and his men even captured a steamboat on the Arkansas River. Watie did not surrender his small force until June 1865 giving them the distinction of being the last organized group of Confederates to surrender. Watie survived the war for only six years, dying in the Indian Territory in 1871.

Watie’s gravesite is not near an interstate highway or close to any large urban centers. Perhaps he would appreciate the fact that Polson Cemetery is still in the midst of a rural area in Delaware County, Oklahoma. Tyson Foods trucks rumble along, though, on a state highway several miles to the east. Driving to the cemetery from my hometown of Pryor, Oklahoma, involved traveling on state highway 20 to the Arkansas state line, then heading north on state highway 43 to the town of Southwest, Missouri, and then west into Oklahoma about three miles. Googling “Polson Cemetery” will yield an accurate and helpful map.

Two photographs of Watie’s gravesite:

And, close to Watie's final resting place are markers for John Ridge and Major Ridge, assassinated signers of the Treaty of New Echota:

An Attempt to Educate

In my previous posting, I highlighted a booklet that I recently purchased titled Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth Annual Convention Of The Oklahoma State Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (1932). The Proceedings notes the culmination of a project to fund and then give the “Confederate Museum” in Richmond, Virginia, a portrait of Stand Watie. This was accomplished at a cost of $168.48; the artist, Rev. Gregory Gerrer, was a monk at the St. Gregory’s Abbey in Shawnee, Oklahoma. Gerrer was a rather well known artist at the time, and you may read more about him by clicking the link on his name. Mrs. Lutie H. Walcott reported that the portrait was placed in the “Solid South” room and she stated “I think Oklahoma has done one big thing [,] for the eyes of some of [the] other states have been opened at last to what Indian Territory stood for during the war between the states.” Admittedly, I would like to know what she thought “Indian Territory stood for” during the conflict, but it is obvious these women were attempting to educate others about the war in the trans-Mississippi. The process still continues ladies!