, J. WiLUCS. J INTERVIEW 13083
McWJRTREY, J. WALLACE. INTERVIEW. #13083 r Interview with J. Wallace McMurtrey Haileyville, Oklahoma 49 Investigator - James Russell Gray Indian-Pioneer History, S-149 February 24, 1938 I am about a quarter Choctaw. He get our Indian blood from Mother; she was half Choctaw and half white and some of that white blood was French, though not all. I never did get it straight what her maiden name was; she went by the name of Lanier, but that was the name of her step-father, her mother's second husband. Her given name was Martha. She was born in Alabama in the Tallapoosa River region; her birth date was about 1817, since she was sixteen when she left Alabama with the tribe and came to the Territory over the in 1833 Lonesome Trail (Trail of Tears)/ That bitter trip is something she didn't like to discuss. Her people settled just across the line from Arkansas, about twelve miles or so southeast of Skullyville. She was still living in that neighborhood when she met and married Father. Father was a white man, a native of Arkansas. I don't know what year he was born, but I have heard him say he was the same age as the state of Arkansas; was born the same year Arkansas became a state. He was born over the line in
MoMOHTHSY, J. WALLACS. INTERVIEW. #13083 Arkansas, not more than half a mile from the house where I was born. I cone along on March 10, 1868. I was born within a stone's throw of the Arkansas line, just barely within the Territory. I grew up there until I was fifteen. The Ohootaw Nation was pretty thinly settled then; we didn't have so very many neighbors; just scattering houses. White men were scarce* Father raised stock; cattle, horses and hogs, practically no farming went on except for small patches around the houses planted in corn or gardens. A man made his money out of cattle. And the hogs were just a sideline; we turned them out to rustle for themselves, killing a few to eat when we needed them. Although we handled lots of cattle later, until I was. fifteen we never kept over fifty head at onoe* We just turned our cattle loose in the woods after branding them with our Mo brand capital M, small c. No one ever bothered them; certainly not the Choctaws, for they were as honest as sunshine. Talking about honesty, let me give an illustration. In those days people didn't lock their houses in the Chootaw
MeMORTHBT, J. WALLACE. IHTBRVTBt. #15083 251 Nation. If a man was going away from home for a week, he left the doors unlocked* Nobody ever bothered anything* Oh, someone Blight stop and go in the house to eat, but that was according to the tribal law* A hungry man would eat what he wanted and go on without touching anything except the food* The first house I can remember living in was a two-room log building. We had windows with glass in them, though not all houses had glass then; some houses did not even have openings for windows. We cooked at first over a fireplaoe, then when X was five we got a stove to cook on. I can't say that the food we ate was so very different from what people have now, except that we had more game. turkeys and the like were thick and easy to get. Deer and The creeks had plenty of fish in them. We got our supplies over in Arkansas. There was a place just over the line called Jim Fork; it was a country post office, and was in the house of the man who happened to be postmaster at the time. This man handled a few groceries and supplies, too* There was a place there in Arkansas called Hickory Grove; the name was later changed to Haokett City, and later to
tfehorthky, J, WALLACE. IWPER7TEW. #13083 Haokett* Hie nearest store In the Territory was at Skullyville. Of course, we often went to Port Smith for a load of supplies* I went to school at Haokett City; got there most of what schooling I did gete The school was a one-room building, taught by one teacher, usually a man. m 1883, Father decided to move from Skullyville County to Gain 8 County, and we came to a location about thirteen miles southeast of old North McAlester- three miles southwest of the present site of Hartshorne* To giro you the location in another way, it was roughly a mile east and two miles north of the present school-house called ' Sulphur,* and Sulphur school is in Section SI, Township 4 North, Range 16 Bast. Father wanted to put in a cattle ranch on a larger scale than he had ever before attempted. I was fifteen years old then, and for the next three or four years I traveled back and forth between our old home and the new one. We put up fences and built houses and barns; then Father moved our furniture and all our things, and we came to the new place to stay*
ifohdbthky, J.. WALLACE. DJTBHVEBW. #13083 253 ffs changed our brand then to Bar M Bar* brand, in those days In the Chootaw Nation,was A man's registered at the county seat with the county clerk* It seems to me that the county seat of Gainea County, when we first moved to the county, was at a place called Boiling Springs, northeast of the present eite of Gowen, nearly to the Sans Bois Mountains* Later, the county seat was moved Just south of filburton to Judge Riddle's place* County court wa,s held at the county seat. There was also a district court the county oourt. which was different and separate from The district court was held at one time at Judge Riddle's place* Then a house was built at the west end of Brown's Prairie southwest of Red Oak* and district court was moved there. That house finally burned, and I don't know where the district oourt went from there* When we first came to^oaines County this country was sparsely settled. Just to give you an idea what I mean > I will try to tell how many neighbors we had. In a radius of about eight miles from the present site of Hartshorne, I can remember only about fourteen families. Starting in a northerly direction, I remenfcer a Chootaw named John Adams
MoMJHTHKT, J* fiuuos* INTKHVJJ5W. #13083 254 who lived close to the spot where old Number Two Mine was later pot in. Two miles east of what is now Hartshorns lived another Indian family* A mile south of them 11Ted Jonas Iterant; twa miles south of him was Abner Parsley's place* Two miles south of what is now Hartshorne was a np*n named Joe Hocklatubby. About a mile west of him was a white man named Anderson, and another white man of the same name lived southwest of him nearly a mile. Freeney lived a short distance further west* Frank Sam James lived about where the Sulphur school-house is now, and Emerson James lived over the hill about half a mile to the west. A white man, I forget his name, lived in a / rent cabin on the Emerson James place* Then there was our family, end one half a mile west was Joslah Reed* we called "Granny;* Just northeast of us was an old lady that's all the name I ever knew for her* West of us, across Brushy Creek, lived Robinson James and his son John* Then Simon James* place, and west of that, near the present school-house called Craig, lived a negro freedaan named ifobearty* And that* all the families
J. WALLACE, wssmx*. #13083 255 I can recall, though there may have been one or two more* All these families were Indians except the ones I have specified as otherwise. I have heard tine and again, in the last few years, that the Ghoctaws used to live right around the creeks. That»s true as far as it goes; some of them did live along the creeks, but more lived out in the open prairies where they oould have room to handle stock; where the grass was better for grazing* We dug wells or found springs; we didn't have to depend on creek water for drinking. There was a sawad.ll on Blue Creek at the foot of Blue Mountain on the north side when we first came to Gaines County, but I do not count the men there as residents; they came and went, A man named Brooks had charge of the mill, and he sold his lumber to the coal mines around McAlester and Kreba. The roads in those days often followed different routes than they do now* There was the Fort Smlth-Stringtown route, for instance Skullyville; tt went from Fort Smith, Arkansas, to old westward tlirough the Sans Bois Mountains; to what is now Red Oak; to filburton; southwest toward the
25(5 MelfiJRTRKY, J. WALLACE. IKTSRTIBf. #13083 8 source of Buffalo Creak; through Tl Valley; southwest again* nngi Ing to Stringtown; then almost due a oath to the Red River. there was a route from McAlester to Hartford, Arkansas* It left North MeAlester and vent eastward toward where Adamson is now. It passed to the north of Adamson, though. Then it went on east and hit close to ffilburton, passing to the north along Fourohe Mallne Creek. Then to a little station on the Frisco Railroad called LeFlore; to Summerfield; turned north by Monroe; then to Hartford* There was another route from itoalester to Fort Smith* It went close to where Quinton is now; then on east to Skullyville and Fort Smith. After we moved to Gaines County we built up a pretty good sisad herd of cattle, having at one time around a thousand head. We drove a herd once or twice to LeFlore and shipped over the Frisco Railroad, but most of our stuff was shipped on the M. K, & T. from IfoAleater. ffe shipped to St. Louis. There wasn't any Hartshorne or Haileyrille when we first came here*
McJflJBTHSY, J. WALLA02. INTSHVISf. #13083 257 Z have fire-hunted for deer many a night where the two towns are now. We*d take a pan with a long handle, and we*d put rich pine sticks about two Inohes thick in the pan* "There were plenty of deer and the burning pine made a bright light that blinded them. There were canebrakes in the valley between the two towns; you could find plenty of canea long enough for fishing poles* Then coal was discovered, and white men began to pour into the country. in in 1888 or '89* myself an Indian; The first mine at Hartshome was put I had an Indian "right* and considered I hated to see the white men come, becaused knew that it was just a matter of time until they would take-' the country away from the Indians. I told all the Indians that right from the first. I said, l *Boys, you know I don't want to see statehood but it is coming, and we can't help it. The thing to do is to get the best terms we aan. B This question of opening up the Ohac&aw Nation caused a lot of trouble among the Choc taws. There were two factions; one for statehood, and one against it. Green
MoMOHPRET, J» WALLACE. IMKHVUSl, #13083 258 1Q McCurtaln, who was chief for so long, was for the development of the country. He and his followers were called Progressives. The other faction was called Nationalists. Under the Choctaw law, an Indian oould settle on a piece of land, no matter how large, and improve it, and if he did not get within a quarter of a mile of someone else'8 improvements the land was his to use as long as he wished. But no individual really owned land; it belonged to the tribe as a whole. But even before 1900 we voted on whether to allot land to individuals. This question was also a souroe of trouble between the two factions of Chootaws. There was bitter feeling on both sides, and even seme killing. I was a member of the council at Tuskahoma the year Green MeCurtain and Tom Hunter had suoh a close race for the position of High Ohief-^1902, I think it was. Lots of the followers of Hunter thought that he really won the election; they hinted at trickery. Thais how bitter things were* The allotment of land started about 1904, whether sane of the Indians wanted it or not. The number of acres an Indian got depended on the *tla*t«d worth of the land In question; I got 320 acres*
MCMCHTHK?, J» WALLAGS. INTSR7ISW. #13083 59 11 Than after the allotment was orer the Indiana held a vote on whether we should have statehood or not, but I, for one, saw that our election meant little. Statehood had been inevitable ever since the discovery of coal in the Chootaw Nation. And I just want to say this before I am through: I felt safer against robbery and violence when I was under the Ohoctaw law than I do now. A man never had to worry about thieves, because an Indian wouldn't steal. There are more killings in one year now than there were during all the years of the Choctaw