SKULLYVILLE, NEAR FORT SMITH, ARK., May 6, 1862.

Maj. Gen. EARL VAN DORN, C.S.A., Memphis, Tenn.

  GENERAL: I take the liberty of inclosing copy of report of a skirmish between Cherokee troops, under Col. Stand Watie, and the Federals. General Pike being near Fort Washita, at Nail's Bridge, miles southwest, I have thought it might be well to advise you direct of Col. Stand Watie's movements.
  As we are likely to resort to guerrilla warfare, at least those who are outside the new lines of defense, it would, in my opinion, be advisable to confer additional rank upon Col. Stand Watie, with authority to receive into the service all the reliable Indian force north of the Canadian rivers. The Indians have great confidence, and justly, in Col. Stand Watie's patriotism, prudence, and courage, and I think would rally to his standard. His thorough knowledge of the country renders him eminently suitable to direct the movements of guerrilla bands along the border of the Cherokee country, and the Indians will make the very best guerrillas. White troops should also be sent into the Cherokee country. As matters now stand, if a Federal force should advance into the Cherokee country I think Stand Watie would be driven out and a large majority of the Cherokees go over to the Federals. They complain that by treaty they were promised protection; but instead of protection they have been involved in a war with the Federal Government and then left to shift for themselves.
  I am ordered to fall back to the neighborhood of Boggy Depot, and shall march day after to-morrow.
  I am, general, yours, respectfully and truly,

DOUGLAS H. COOPER 

Source: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies

Recommended Reading: Rifles for Watie. Description: This is a rich and sweeping novel-rich in its panorama of history; in its details so clear that the reader never doubts for a moment that he is there; in its dozens of different people, each one fully realized and wholly recognizable. It is a story of a lesser -- known part of the Civil War, the Western campaign, a part different in its issues and its problems, and fought with a different savagery. Inexorably it moves to a dramatic climax, evoking a brilliant picture of a war and the men of both sides who fought in it.

In addition, he introduces the reader to the interesting and often colorful leaders of the military North and South, including the only American Indian to attain a general's rank in the war, Gen. Stand Watie (member of the Cherokee Nation). With outstanding illustrations by Andy Thomas, this story is a tribute to those who fought and a revealing portrait of the important role they played in this era of our country's history. Meet The Author: A resident of Carthage, Missouri, Steve Cottrell is a descendant of a Sixth Kansas Cavalry member who served in the Indian Territory during the Civil War. A graduate of Missouri Southern State College in Joplin, Cottrell has participated in several battle reenactments including the Academy Award winning motion picture, "Glory". Active in Civil War battlefield preservation and historical monument projects and contributor of a number of Civil War relics to regional museums, Cottrell recently co-authored Civil War in the Ozarks, also by Pelican. It is now in its second printing.

From Publishers Weekly: Beginning with the flight of the Creeks into Union territory pursued by Confederate forces (including many of Stand Watie's Cherokees), this popular history recounts grim, bloody, lesser-known events of the Civil War. Hatch (Clashes of the Cavalry) also describes the most incredible incidents.... Kit Carson, who fought Apaches and Navajos under the iron-fisted Colonel Carleton, arranged the Long Walk of the Navajos that made him infamous in Navajo history to this day. The North's "Captain" Woolsey, a volunteer soldier, became a brutal raider of the Apaches. General Sibley, a northerner and first Governor of Minnesota, oversaw the response to the Sioux Uprising of 1862 that left several hundred dead. The slaughter of Black Kettle's Cheyennes at Sand Creek in 1864 by Colorado volunteers under Colonel Chivington, a militant abolitionist whose views on Indians were a great deal less charitable, “forms a devastating chapter.” Hatch, a veteran of several books on the Indian Wars that focus on George Armstrong Custer, has added to this clear and even-handed account a scholarly apparatus that adds considerably to its value. 

Recommended Reading: The Cherokee Nation in the Civil War (Hardcover). Description: This book offers a broad overview of the war as it affected the Cherokees--a social history of a people plunged into crisis. The Cherokee Nation in the Civil War shows how the Cherokee people, who had only just begun to recover from the ordeal of removal, faced an equally devastating upheaval in the Civil War. Clarissa W. Confer illustrates how the Cherokee Nation, with its sovereign status and distinct culture, had a wartime experience unlike that of any other group of people--and suffered perhaps the greatest losses of land, population, and sovereignty. Continued below…

No one questions the horrific impact of the Civil War on America, but few realize its effect on American Indians. Residents of Indian Territory found the war especially devastating. Their homeland was beset not only by regular army operations but also by guerrillas and bushwhackers. Complicating the situation even further, Cherokee men fought for the Union as well as the Confederacy and created their own "brothers' war." About the Author: Clarissa W. Confer is Assistant Professor of History at California University of Pennsylvania.