Sir: I have the honor to transmit the inclosed copy of a communication from John Ross, the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation.
Under all the circumstances of the case I do not think it advisable to march into the Cherokee country at this time unless there is some urgent necessity for it. If the views expressed in my communication to you of the 14th instant are carried out, it will, I am satisfied, force the conviction on the Cherokees that they have but one course to pursue—that is, to join the Confederacy. The Choctaw and Chickasaw regiment will be kept on the south of them; Arkansas will be to the east; and with my force on the western border of Missouri no force will be able to march into the Cherokee Nation, and surrounded as they will be by Southern troops, they will have but one alternative at all events. From my position to the north of them, in any event, I will have a controlling power over them. I am satisfied from my interview with John Ross and from his communication that he is only waiting for some favorable opportunity to put himself with the North. His neutrality is only a pretext to await the issue of events.
I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant,
Ben. McCulloch, Brigadier-General Commanding.
Official Records, first ser., vol. iii, 595-596.
[245] See Pike to Toombs, May 20, 1861 [Official Records, first ser., vol. iii, 580-581].
[246] On the twenty-ninth of May, Pike wrote to Toombs again and informed him that he was leaving for Tahlequah that very morning [Ibid., fourth ser., vol. i, 359].
[247] See McCulloch to Walker, May 28, 1861 [Ibid., first ser., vol. iii, 587-588].
[248] See Pike to Cooley, February 17, 1866 [Indian Office, Miscellaneous Files].
[249] —Ibid.