[Letter] 1836 Jan. 21, Washington City, [D.C. to] Lewis Cass, Secretary of War / Lewis Ross

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Washington City
Jan. 21, 1836
Hon. [Honorable] Lewis Cass Secretary of War, Sir,
Some days since I received your note of the 6th Inst. [Instant] in which you inform me instructions have not yet been given to remove me. that understanding I was on the road, you thought it proper to delay any further action till my arrival, and that you are ready to receive any explanation I may wish to give. My Silance [Silence] till now was occasioned by absence from the City, to which I returned last evening. When your note was received, I had with me three of my children on their way to school in Maryland, where it was necessary I should accompany them. I now beg leave to make my statement. the charge, if it may be called a charge, is that I am living upon the Agency Reservation, to which it is said, I have no right. At the date of the treaty of the
27th of Feby. [February] 1819. between the United States and the Cherokee Nation, R.J. Meigs the then Agent, kept his office, and had established his Agency upon lands ceded by that treaty, but he had not claimed a mile square or other quantity of land as an Agency Reservation. About the year
1820, he removed his Agency to the present cite [site], I had at this period, a merchantile [mercantile] establishment at the old


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Agency where I then resided with my family, and at the earnest solicitation of Col. Meigs, I removed, and took up my residence near the place selected by him for his intending there to make my permanent home, and where I have ever since resided without molestation, or complaint from any quarter till recently. I have made very extensive improvements, to the value of many thousands of dollars. My right, residence and possessions are sanctioned, and secured to me by the laws, usages and customs of the Cherokee Nation, of which I am a member. Now if a mile square be laid off, making the house, in which Col Meigs kept his office the center, it will include me, but to my possessions, no agent has pretended a claim till the time of B.F. Curry, nor has any complaint of me or my residence save him. I will not trouble you with his conduct towards me personally, and will only remark, that I have been told he said in Milledgeville Georgia, that my continuance in my house depended upon my own conduct. that he had the power and if I proceeded to Washington he would turn me out. Shortly after Col. Meig's fixed upon the present site for his residence and Agency, one James Cowan was permitted to settle there as a tavern keeper, to this the Cherokees objected, upon the ground he was an intruder upon Indian territory, and that had no right to authorise [authorize] his residence there. The Col. insisted that as agent he was entitled to a mile Square for his tempory [temporary] use, and


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made some communications to the War Department on the subject, to which I beg leave respectfully to refer Hon [Honorable] Secretary. Col. Meigs was directed to apply to the authorities of the Cherokee Nation to have surveyed to him such mile Square. The Nation refused his request for the place desired, yet by his own authority he surveyed a mile square. In all this controversy my rights were not questioned, or my possession sought to be disturbed, but the Indians insisted upon the removal of Mr Cowan. Thus matters stood at the death of Col. Meigs. Col. Joseph McMinn, his successor, renewed the application of the Mile Square, and the Indians theirs for the removal of Cowan and there was, on this subject, a correspondence, in the year
1823 or
1824, between a Cherokee delegation at washington and Col. Thomas L. McKenney, now on file in your department, to which I beg leave to refer -- The Indians prevailed, and an order was issued for the removal of Cowan, but was never executed by Governor McMinn. After his death, Col. Hu [Colonel Hugh] Montgomery came into office, and gave the Indians to understand if they would renew their application he would remove Mr Cowan they did so and Cowan was removed, but a Mr Hardwick, the son in law of Montgomerys was established in his place, and the Indians gained nothing but a change of occupants. My rights were not doubted when Col. Montgomery settled in the Nation, he paid no respect


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to the lines marked by Col. Meigs, and in fact cultivated lands beyond them and never asked for any in my possession. So it will appear, as the truth is, that neither the United States or Cherokee Nation ever recognized a mile square as set apart for the [deleted text: [illegible text] ] temporary use of the Cherokee Agent. I am aware of the treaty stipulation that the agent shall have a sufficiency of land for his temporary use. This has never been refused, but that he shall have six hundred and forty acres, and his house in the center thereof, I presume, cannot be found in any treaty, and unless this be so, there is no necessity for interfering with my possessions, which in no way obstructs the business of the Agency -- I will further remark that by an act of Congress passed in the year
1833, the agency to the Cherokees East of the Mississippi was discontinued after a limited time, and I am not informed of any law or treaty that now authorised [authorized] the residence of any agent in the Nation then the land upon which I live, if ever included in any agency Reservation being no longer wanted for the tempory [temporary] use of an agent, belongs to the Cherokee Nation and not to the United States. This is the conclusion to which my mind comes, after an attentive examination of the Treaty of
1798 and the act of congress of
1833. The foregoing view of my rights, are, with due respect, submitted to the consideration of the Hon. [Honorable] Secretary -- I hope I may be indulged in one or two further remarks -- If the United States


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possess the right (I know she has this power) to dispossess me. I am not informed by your note of any necessity for an assertion of that right, which has been permitted to Slumber for so many years, more especially when I have been encouraged to expend large sums of money in permanent improvement for the comfort of my self and family, and I am slow to believe the interests of the United States requires my little children to be made homeless in the absence of their father. Was the agent no where to reside, but in my house? are my fields, store, house, barn, stables kitchens, Cotton Gin, ferry all wanted for the tempory [temporary] use of the Cherokee Agent? Can it be true, that the hard earnings of my life, my private property is thus to be taken from me, and that I am to return and find myself a stranger in my own dwelling, and another occupying what was once mine? I will abstain from further remarks on this unpleasant subject, and ask you will pardon any seeming warmth of expression. I am surr [sure] there must be something in the matter of which I am yet ignorant. I have long known the President personally, and you from character and that knowledge assures me that by neither will I ever be told "that pound of flesh is my right" and it further assures me, that when the truth shall be told you, I shall not be longer hunted down by my personal enemies, nor expelled from


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my fire side. If representations [deleted text: shall ] have been made to you, that my language or conduct towards the United States has been objectionable, in Justice to myself I have to be informed of the specific charge, For the correctness of my course I can appeal with confidence to Major Davis Major McIntosh, Lt. Batman, Lt. Howe, Lt. Harris, and many other officers of the United States, and who have had a fair opportunity to know my course. I might add a list of a hundred other names. I have my own opinion of the relations existing between the United States and Cherokee people, but I never have expressed that opinion in harsh or unkind terms towards the people or public functionaries of the United States. It is true some of those who have been among us have taken occasion to wound my feelings, to step a side [aside] from the path of duty to annoy me. of them I have spoken as their conduct deserved, but that conduct has not, by me, been attributed to the United States. In conclusion, I have to request that as soon as the Hon. [Honorable] Secretary shall determine upon the course thought right and proper to be preserved towards me, I may be advised of that determination. please accept assurances of the respect and high consideration of your

Obt. Humb. Servt. [Obedient Humble Servant]
[Signed] Lewis Ross



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P.S. At the time Col. Montgomery went out of office Benj. [Benjamin] F. Curry claimed all the lands in possession of Montgomery, and a difficulty arose between them as to what should be considered as public property, The whole matter was [unclear text: refused ] to the award of Maj. Davis, and Lt. Batman & Phillips they made an award which I am told is yet in the hands of Major Davis, this award has a direct bearing upon what is termed the agency Reservation and contains fact, useful to be known in reference to my case I must further trouble you with a reference to Maj. Wm. M. Davis --
Respectfully yours
[Signed] Lewis Ross





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Wash. [Washington]
Jany. [January] 21, 1836
Lewis Ross On the subject of his occupying the Cherokee Agency reservation. Furnished a statement of facts --

R59

22 Jan. 1836
Indian Office