Watie’s last great raid was another Cabin Creek affair that reversed the failure of two years before.  It occurred in September and was undertaken by Watie and Gano together, the former waiving rank in favor of the latter for the time being.[959] A brilliant thing, it was, so Maxey, and Smith’s adjutant after him, reported.[960] The booty taken was great in amount and as much as possible of it utilized on the spot.  Maxey regretted that the Choctaws were not on hand also to be fitted out with much-needed clothing.[961] It was in contemplation that Watie should make a raid into Kansas to serve as a diversion, while Price was raiding Missouri.[962] The Kansans had probably much to be thankful for that circumstances hindered his penetrating far, since, at Cabin Creek, some of his men, becoming intoxicated, committed horrible excesses and “slaughtered indiscriminately."[963]

Had the force at Fort Gibson been at all adequate to the needs of the country it was supposed to defend, such raids as Watie’s would have been an utter impossibility.  Thanks to Federal indifference and mismanagement, however, the safety of Indian Territory was

[Footnote 959:  Cooper to T.M.  Scott, October 1, 1864, Official Records, vol. xli, part i, 783; Watie to T.B.  Heiston, October 3, 1864, Ibid., 785.]

[Footnote 960:—­Ibid., 793, 794.  Cooper described it “as brilliant as any one of the war” [Ibid., 783] and Maxey confessed that he had long thought that movements of the raiding kind were the most valuable for his district [Ibid., 777].]

[Footnote 961:  Maxey to Boggs, October 9, 1864, Ibid., part iii, 990.]

[Footnote 962:  Cooper to Bell, October 6, 1864, Ibid., 982-984.]

[Footnote 963:  Curtis Johnson to W.H.  Morris, September 20, 1864 [Ibid., part i, 774].]

of less consequence now than it had been before.  The incorporation with the Department of Arkansas and the consequent separation from that of Kansas had been anything but a wise move.  The relations of the Indian country with the state in which its exiles had found refuge were necessarily of the closest and particularly so at this time when their return from exile was under way and almost over.  For reasons not exactly creditable to the government, when all was known, Colonel Phillips had been removed from command at Fort Gibson.  At the time of Watie’s raid, Colonel C.W.  Adams was the incumbent of the post; but, following it, came Colonel S.H.  Wattles[964] and things went rapidly from bad to worse.  The grossest corruption prevailed and, in the midst of plenty, there was positive want.  Throughout the winter, cattle-driving was indulged in, army men, government agents, and civilians all participating.  It was only the ex-refugee that faced starvation.  All other folk grew rich.  Exploitation had succeeded neglect and Indian Territory presented the spectacle of one of the greatest scandals of the time; but its full story is not for recital here.