some of the Cherokees by making reparation for past outrages, and to sow discord among others, Phillips despatched Lieutenant-colonel Lewis Downing on a scout southward.  He was just in time; for the Confederates were on the brink of hazarding a crossing at two places, Webber’s Falls and Fort Gibson.[724] Upon the return of Downing, Phillips himself moved across the border with the avowed intention of rendering military support, if needed, to the Cherokee Council, which convened on the fourth of February.[725] From Camp Ross, he continued to send out scouting parties, secret agents,[726] and agents of distribution.

The Cherokee Council assembled without the preliminary formality of a new election.  War conditions

[Footnote 722:  This remark would be especially applicable if the Colonel McIntosh, mentioned by Phillips, was Chilly, the son of William McIntosh of Indian Springs Treaty notoriety.]

[Footnote 723:  Official Records, vol. xxii, part ii, 100.]

[Footnote 724:—­Ibid., 85.]

[Footnote 725:—­Ibid., 96-97.]

[Footnote 726:—­Ibid., 100, 108.]

had made regular pollings impossible.  Consequently, the council that convened in February, 1863 was, to all intents and purposes, the selfsame body that, in October, 1861, had confirmed the alliance with the Confederate States.  It was Phillips’s intention to stand by, with military arm upraised, until the earlier action had been rescinded.  While he waited, word came that the harvest of defection among the Creeks had begun; for “a long line of persons"[727] was toiling through the snow, each wearing the white badge on his hat that Phillips and McIntosh had agreed should be their sign of fellowship.  Then came an order for Phillips to draw back within supporting distance of Fayetteville, which, it was believed, the Confederates were again threatening.[728] Phillips obeyed, as perforce, he had to; but he left a detachment behind to continue guarding the Cherokee Council.[729]

The legislative work of the Cherokee Council, partisan body that it was, with Lewis Downing as its presiding officer and Thomas Pegg as acting Principal Chief, was reactionary, yet epochal.  It comprised several measures and three of transcendant importance, passed between the eighteenth and the twenty-first: 

1.  An act revoking the alliance with the Confederate States and re-asserting allegiance to the United States.

2.  An act deposing all officers of any rank or character whatsoever, inclusive of legislative, executive, judicial, who were serving in capacities disloyal to the United States and to the Cherokee Nation.

[Footnote 727:  Official Records, vol. xxii, part ii, 101.]

[Footnote 728:—­Ibid., 111-112.]

[Footnote 729:—­Ibid., 115.]

3.  An act emancipating slaves throughout the Cherokee country.[730]