[Footnote 447:—­Ibid., 869-871.]

can get until the President can send you troops.  If the enemy ever comes to the Canadian he cannot go far beyond that river.  The war must soon end since the recent victories near Richmond, and no treaty of peace will be made that will give up any part of your country to the Northern States.  If I am not again placed in command of your country some other officer will be in whom you can confide.  And whatever may be told you about me, you will soon learn that if I have not defended the whole country it was because I had not the troops with which to do it; that I have cared for your interest alone; that I have never made you a promise that I did not expect, and had not a right to expect, to be able to keep, and that I have never broken one intentionally nor except by the fault of others.

The only fair way to judge Pike’s farewell address to his Indian charges is to consider it in the light of its effect upon them, intended and accomplished.[448] So little reason has the red man had, in the course of his long experience with his white brother, to trust him that his faith in that white brother rests upon a very slender foundation.  Pike knew the Indian character amazingly well and knew that he must retain for the Confederacy the Indian’s confidence at all cost.  Were he to fail in that, his entire diplomatic work would have been done in vain.  To stay the Cherokees in their desertion to the North was of prime necessity.  They had already gone over in dangerously large numbers and must be checked before other tribes followed in their wake.  Very possibly Pike had been made aware

[Footnote 448:  Pike gives this as the effect of his proclamation: 

“... it effected what I desired.  The Choctaw force was immediately increased to two full regiments; the Creek force to two regiments and two companies; the Seminole force was doubled; the Chickasaws reorganized five companies and a sixth is being made up.  The Indians looked to me alone, and for me to vindicate myself was to vindicate the Government.  We lost half the Cherokees solely because their moneys and supplies were intercepted...”—­Ibid., 904-905.  See also Pike to Holmes, December 30, 1862.  Another effect was, the creation of a prejudice self-confessed in General Holmes’s mind against Pike.]

of Chief Ross’s complaint to Hindman.  If so, it was all important that he should vindicate himself.  So maligned had he been that his sensitiveness on the score of the discharge of his duties was very natural, very pardonable.  After all he had done for the Confederacy and for the Indians, it seemed hardly right that he should be blamed for all that others had failed to do.  His motives were pure and could not be honestly impugned by anybody.  The address was an error of judgment but it was made with the best of intentions.