My Father, Sam Paul the
Politician
Sam Paul
As told to her great grandson, Dr James Phillips, discovertheword.com
These are her words through her eyes. You must remember of all the
people and newspaper articles written about my family, that my great
grandmother was an eyewitness to almost everything that happened among her
family from March 2, 1883 forward. Many of the stories written in newspapers and
by people that wrote the stories down years later were second and third hand
witnesses. Hattie Jane Paul was there and saw much of the action actually take
place, or heard the stories from eyewitnesses to these events. Every story that
Grams told me, no matter how fantastic it sounded, turned out to be very
historically accurate. Many times Grams would say, "Jimmy, if you get the
court records you will see that I told you the truth." As I quote Grams, I
will try to write as she spoke to me. The misspellings are intentional.
Grams would say:
My
father was a politician among the Chickasaw people. He was a lawman and
senator, and he ran for governor of the whole nation and he won it too, but
they counted out his voters votes. I never saw a man with more nerves of steel
than my father Sam Paul. He would stand up at public open air meetins and speak
in a load voice. It took a person with a strong voice to address a crowd back
in those days before mikerphones were invented.
He
spoke at every opportunity. People used to have all kinds of meetins before
radio came out. That was entertainment. Everybody went to church just to have somethin
to do. When Sam Paul started to speak everybody listened, his friends and his
enemies.
His
enemies would sometimes pull out their pistols and go to work tryin to kill
him. Someone would disarm them, and he would go on speakin just like nuthin
happened. Some people thought he made a lot of sense, but his ideers were so
different than most of the ol time Indians that he made a lot of enemies. My
uncle Tecumseh was a politician too. Most of the ol time Indians liked Kump a
lot more than my dad. My father would get up and make a speech then sometimes
Tecumseh would get up and speak before or afterwards. Nobody ever shot at
Tecumseh as far as I member.
Sam
Paul was fearless one time he went right into the enemy camp of ol Byrd and
gave a speech standin in his fancy drivin rig while him and his people had guns
on the opposin parties. My father spoke to them, and I think some later even
went over to his side. Jimmy, that was dangerous business back then, goin like
he did right into that camp of full bloods and apreechin his side of the
argument an getting out of there alive.
My
Father always carried a smaller pistol under his coat. It was a 3220. He was
never unarmed. It was dangerous business just walkin down the streets in those
days. When my father Sam Paul went out on his law man business he carried a big
colts 45 a Winchester rifle or more
likely that big ol 12 gauge lever action Winchester shotgun. It looked
just like a rifle, but it was real big.
In
the territory them outlaws were as afraid of Sam Paul as they were the plague
or small pox. He was deadly business to them ol boys. When he said, 'this is
marshal Sam Paul. Yur under arrest.' They were already whupped most of the
time. If they resisted, the shootin was on, and I mean in a hurry.
Oh, how I wish Grams could have seen the real contributions
that her father tried to make. Sam Paul had reached a terrible low in his life
with drunkenness and womanizing, but I truly believe that the last eight years
or so in his life, that he lived his life for his people. He lived those last
years of his life to try to secure a future for all Indian tribes in what was
Indian Territory. He spoke to each Indian tribe in their own language to
explain to them without an interpreter their options for a more secure future.
(Mike Tower in his foot notes, in the Outlaw
Statesman, states that Sam Paul knew
17 different Indian languages.)
The white settlers were coming into Indian
Territory by the thousands and they had the best politicians in Washington D.C.
that money could buy. If the Indian people were to survive they had better
learn how to deal with the white population on their own grounds. If you can’t
beat them, you had better learn how to join them. Sam Paul was ahead of all the
thinkers of his time. He was visionary. We know that now, but it got him
classified as a traitor in the eyes of the full bloods back in his time.
Sam Paul had the nerve to stand nearly alone and
fight unbelievable odds to protect the rights of others not looking to take an advantage
for himself. It states in a book written about those times, Leaders and Leading Men of the Indian
Territory, by Harry F. O'Beirne:
Mr. Paul
has ever been a staunch friend to the white man. His father was a white man,
and for no motives of self-interest to gain the favor of his people could he be
induced to be-little the blood inherited through his father. This of itself is
a noble quality, and will cover many imperfections,”------“As the leader of the
progressive party in the Chickasaw Nation, all eyes are now turned in his
direction, while he, himself, bent on restoring the white citizens to their
original status, is at the time of this writing making preparations for a trip
to the United states Capitol. Much depends on the result of his mission.
The white citizens spoken of here represent the
intermarried white citizens such as his own father Smith Paul. Sam Paul
actually won his bid to be governor of the Chickasaw nation but all of the
intermarried white citizens votes were disfranchised or counted out. These people
were Chickasaws by marriage. Their votes had counted all the way back to Mississippi
but now Byrd’s group changed all of that.
My family on nearly every side was Native
American. They had all suffered greatly from the greed of people willing to
look over right and wrong and to simply get what they could get in total
disregard of moral character.
The Indian Removal Act had devastated every
civilized tribe. All had their Trail of Tears. The Chickasaws, Ojibway, Sioux
, and, Cherokees, were my ancestral people.
All of them had come to Indian Territory to make a new start, where no one
would ever try to take their homelands away from them again. The Chickasaw and
Cherokee side of my family had treaties guaranteeing this.
In Mississippi alone the Chickasaw’s lost
plantations, beautiful homes , towns schools, and colleges, and their
government buildings, and their council houses. These were whole nations that
had been displaced The Chickasaw nation can be traced as far back as 1539-40
When Hernando De Soto lived among them during that winter then in the spring he
tried to make slaves out of the men using them for bearers and guides. The Chickasaws
revolted whipped his socks off scattered his hogs , which became the wild hogs
in the south starting out in Mississippi and spreading to the other states.
These hogs had been De Soto’s portable food supply brought from Spain. These peoples
complete holdings as nations were stolen from them because someone else wanted
their plantations, homes and schools.
The Cherokee side of my family were forced to walk
off and leave complete towns, working plantations, schools, colleges, a whole and
complete nation was forced out of their native lands that they had occupied for
hundreds of years.
Both nations the Chickasaws and Cherokees had
fought wars side by side with the United States government against opposing
foes but this same nation wanted their lands and holdings.
We hear so much about making foreign governments
into democracies today, giving their people the right to vote and build their
own autonomous democracies planning and developing their own futures. These
Indian Nations were all democracies. They ruled themselves they had elections
and everyone voted. Their schools were not segregated Women had the right to
own property, to be educated and to vote. Intermarriage was fully accepted. Not
only was intermarriage between races accepted but anyone who married into a
tribe was adopted and many times became a leader or chief. .Whites and blacks
were both accepted into the tribes as equal citizens. It did not take and act
of congress or an amendment to the constitution to enforce it either. It took
the United States Government over two
hundred years, a civil war, several acts of congress,
constitutional amendments, and so called race riots to reach this same high
state civilization and freedom for each individual in their nation that existed
two hundred years ago in these so called heathen democracies.
These Indian nations were complete autonomous entities.
All these nations were caused to relocate
on their separate trails of tears into what was to be Indian Territory
or Indianola, as some called it. In this
new land they would separately reestablish their autonomous nations and
democracies. In this new land they were to live out their separate futures
guaranteed forever their separate democratic autonomous governments.
These 5 civilized nations held perpetual treaties drawn
up by the U. S. government and the separate nations were to last forever or as
long as the wind would blow the rain would fall and the waters ran.
My great great great grandfather Smith Paul and
great great great grandmother Elateecha lived through the Chickasaw trail of
tears, many did not.
They had carved out a new home and had become prosperous
in this new land.
Then came the Civil war and many in the civilized tribes supported the Confederate
States of America. After the Civil War the United States decided to punish the
Indian nations for backing the South and confiscated half of Indian Territory from them for being rebels. Not all of each
tribe were Southern sympathizers. Many Indian men fought on the side of the
Union, but the U. S. made a good excuse for getting a lot more land free of
charge.
Then came the Dawes Act.
In 1905 my Cherokee great grandfather John Wilburn
was killed over the Dawes act. He had refused to sign a new treaty. His farm
and home was taken from his family and sold to a new white man and he, John
Wilburn, was killed while driving his cattle to his own pasture He was killed
as a trespasser on his own land in the sight of all of his children and wife.
He had become an enemy of the state. Many full bloods from all the Indian
nations would not sign this new treaty and nearly all of their lands were
stolen from them. Many were killed protesting this new treaty. Even their
orphaned children had their property stolen from them as guardians were
appointed for them as protectors under the guise of progress.
My great grandfather Harry Stewart of Ojibwa, and Sioux
heritage had told his wife Hattie Jane
and their children, ”Don’t ever speak the Indian language. Don’t tell
anyone you are Indian or related to the Pauls. What we have we will be able to
keep. If they find out you are Indian, you will not be able to keep what you
have worked a slaved for all of your lives”.
My family had left Oklahoma to come out to
California to be mistaken for the white emigrants. To buy homes and businesses
once again and to be able to hold onto what they would work for and build.
Now you can
see why my great grandmother Hattie was criticized for not laying down her heritage.
The Pauls were her family. The picture of that little half Indian and black
child was her brother and she loved him. He was her blood kin and her family.
Mattie, Sammie, Black Willie, Willie Hiram and Buck were her family and she
would not forget them or abandon her love for them. She had absolutely no prejudice
what so ever toward any race of people not even the whites that had abused her
people so much.
Grams instilled these same principles in me. When
she looked at a man or woman she did not see color or skin pigment she saw
another human being. She must have inherited this trait from her grandfather
Smith Paul.
This Dawes Act the last major catastrophe is what
Sam Paul saw as the Indian people’s last stand. To survive the Indian people
had to circumvent the Dawes Act and start their own Allotments before the U.S.
government could get involved.
Sam Paul died trying to lead his people ahead of
the enemy to out think them and outmaneuver them.
In 1999 Sam Paul was added to the Chickasaw Hall
of Fame, 108 years after he was politically assassinated by his own son, and 34
years after Grams died. Oh how she would have been proud of her father.
In 1965 my great grandmother Hattie Jane Paul
Stewart Russell died loving all her family, having never abandoned her heritage
or the love for her brothers and sisters.
I have heard many negative things about my great
great grandfather Samuel Ikard Paul and I know that many of those things were
true. At times he was a violent man, he was at times vicious in carrying out
warrants for law enforcement. But Grams said he loved animals and that he was
very gracious and kind to people. He was always ready to give them a helping
hand. He was willing to help a man start out in business or to make a loan to
the needy. These are the more important things that I now remember about
him. They are the things that last.
These are the acts that placed him in the Chickasaw Hall of Fame.
It has been reported the much of the story of the
wild and reckless character of Rooster Gogburn was partially made up of Sam
Paul’s real life and arrest episodes.
Sam Paul’s trials were so famous in Fort Smith
Arkansas that, Jon Wright guide of The Fort Smith National Historical site,
told me that they were going to do reenactments of his trials in their night
court episodes.
To the American public John Wayne who played
Rooster Gogburn was America’s hero. He was the frontier marshal taking the law
in his hands as jury judge and executioner.
My great great grandfather Sam Paul was my
hero. I have taken the bad with the good
and I smile as I say that was my grandpa.
What you don’t hear often is how that later in his
life Sam Paul lectured on strong family values and morality. He said that these
values would build and strengthen the Chickasaw Nation. Sam Paul must have said
strong Chickasaw homes will build a strong Chickasaw Nation.
As you had read in the other blogs my family came
out here to California and lived in a state of poverty that many people could
not even imagine. Some had fallen into depths of alcoholism but most of them survived.
It took my family a whole generation to settle
down out here in California, but Smith Paul and Elateecha’s descendants through
Sam Paul became businessmen military heroes, soldiers, firemen, artists,
educators, workers, ministers, entrepreneurs, lawyers, law officers, doctors,
and assets to their communities. Some failed but most succeeded. Those strong
Scottish and Chickasaw genes still run in the veins of many descendants from
coast to coast.
End Note by Robin Gunning:
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