Dr. Griffith’s solicitude for the Union interests apparently soon vanished. On the twentieth of April, he wrote[331] that, “under the circumstances,” he could not hold office. Coffin of Indiana was then selected[332] for the place of southern superintendent and, in a very little while, Griffith was among the applicants[333] for the corresponding position in the Confederate States. Between the dates of the two activities, moreover, he had been appointed by the Arkansas Convention one of the three special agents to interview the Indian tribes in the interests of secession. That was on the tenth of May.
The changes in the agency incumbents proved equally temporary and unfortunate. Particularly was this the case with two determined[334] upon on the sixth of April. Four days later, William Quesenbury[335] of Fayetteville, Arkansas was notified that he had been appointed to succeed William H. Garrett as agent for the Creeks, and John Crawford[336] of the same place that he had been appointed to succeed Robert J. Cowart as agent for the Cherokees. Both went over to the Confederacy. Nothing else could well have been expected of Crawford, or of Quesenbury either for that matter, and it is rather surprising that their past records were not more thoroughly examined. Quesenbury, like Richard P. Pulliam, was a sort of protégé of Elias Rector. Pulliam had been Rector’s clerk in the office and Quesenbury his clerk in the field.[337] Crawford had been very prominent[338] in the Arkansas legislature the preceding winter in the expression of ideas and sentiments hostile to Abraham Lincoln. He accepted the office of Cherokee agent under Lincoln, notwithstanding, and he subsequently said[339] that he did so because the Indians would not have liked a northern man to come among them. Before Crawford’s commission arrived, Cowart had departed[340] and Cherokee affairs were in dire confusion.[341] John J. Humphreys[342] of Tennessee had meanwhile been offered the Wichita Agency[343] and Peter P. Elder[344] of Kansas, the Neosho River. The Choctaw and Chickasaw Agency seems to have been left vacant. Truth to tell, there was no longer any such agency under United States control. Cooper had thrown in his lot with the secessionists and was already working actively in their cause.
The defection of Douglas H. Cooper, United States agent for the Choctaws and the Chickasaws, can not be passed by so very lightly; for it had such far reaching effects. The time came during and after the war, when the United States Indian Office came to have in its possession various documents[345] that proved conclusively that Douglas H. Cooper had been most instrumental in organizing the secession movement among the Indians of at least his own agency. It was even reported[346] that material was forthcoming to show how he “was engaged in raising troops for the Rebel Army, during the months of April, May, and June, 1861, while holding the office of U. S. Indian Agent.” His successor had been appointed considerably before the end of that time, however, and, when the war was over, the Indians themselves exonerated him from all responsibility in the matter of their own defection.[347] Notwithstanding, he most certainly did manifest unusual activity in behalf of the slaveholding power. Even his motives for manifesting activity are, in a sense, impugned as instanced by the following most extraordinary letter, which, written by Cooper to Rector privately and in confidence and later transmitted to Washington out of the ordinary course of official business, has already been quoted once for the purpose of forming a correct estimate of the recipient’s character. It is gratifying to know that such letters are very rare in connection with the history of the American Civil War.
Private & Confidential
[Copy]
Fort Smith May 1st 1861.
Major Elias Rector
Dr. Sir: I have concluded to act upon the suggestion yours of the 28th Ultimo contains.
If we work this thing shrewdly we can make a fortune each, satisfy the Indians, stand fair before the North, and revel in the unwavering confidence of our Southern Confederacy.
My share of the eighty thousand in gold[348] you can leave on deposite with Meyer Bro. subject to my order. Write me soon.