Yowani Choctaws

Yowani (probably from the word for caterpillar) ('Yguanes/Yugani/Iguanes-Spanish') is a branch of the Choctaw tribe which became part of the Caddo Confederacy [A History of the Caddo Indians, By William B. Glover, The Louisiana Historical Quarterly, Vol. 18, No. 4. October, 1935] . The Yowani were named for their village, located near what is now the town of Shubuta, Mississippi [Frederick Webb Hodge, ed., Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (2 vols., Washington: GPO, 1907, 1910, rpt., New York: Pageant, 1959)] . The Yowani continued to expand their holdings, eventually venturing into Louisiana, where they established close ties with the Caddo, adopting many of the Caddo customs [A History of the Caddo Indians, By William B. Glover, The Louisiana Historical Quarterly, Vol. 18, No. 4. October, 1935] . When Louisiana became part of the United States, many of the Indian tribes in the territory wished to emigrate. Spain agreed to allow the Yowanis and the Alabama-Coushatta to move to Spanish Texas. In 1824, a secong group of Yowani received permission from Mexico to establish villages in Texas. [Correspondence Between General Manuel Mier y Terán and Texas 1828-1832] . The Yowani gradually abandoned their original Mississippi homelands, and by 1850 most Yowani lived in Texas, Indian Territory, or in Rapides Parish, Louisiana [Texas Indian Papers 1837, census of tribes in the Republic, attitudes of the Yowani Choctaws and allied Chickasaws of Attoyac Bayou, Nacogdoches District] .

During the Texas Revolution in 1836, the Yowani were a party to a peace treaty with the provisional government of Texas [Treaty of Bowles Village, Cherokees and Twelve Assiciated Tribes and the Republic of Texas February 23, 1836] . Following Texas's independence and the creation of the Republic of Texas, relations between Indian tribes and English-speaking settlers degenerated. Under President Mirabeau B. Lamar, the Texas Army drove most of the Cherokee Indians out of Texas [Expulsion of the Cherokees, Texas State Library and Archoves Commission, http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/exhibits/indian/war/page1.html] . After a confrontation between a group of Indians and a few of the residents of Nacogdoches, which resulted in the deaths of at least three white men, a vigilante group set out after the offending Indians. Not being able to catch the perpetrators, the mob, seeking revenge attacked the peaceful and unsuspecting Choctaw village, murdering eleven [The Handbook of Texas Online: Indians; Republics of Mexico and Texas, George Klos, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/II/bzi4.html] . The survivors then split up with most leaving Texas, at least temporarily as tt was however, clear to them that Texas was a very dangerous place for any Indian in 1840 [Texas State Library and Archives Commission, Indian Relations in Texas, http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/exhibits/indian/war/mcleod-mar1840-1.html] .

Between 1840 and 1843 a gureilla war was fought between rogue elements of the Mexican Militia, led by Vicente Cordova [Handbook of Texas Online, Vicente Cordova, by Robert Bruce Blake, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/CC/fco71.html] and remnant groups of dispaced tribes, primarily Cherokees but including some Yowani Choctaws. The conflict culminated in the Battle of San Antonio in September of 1842 [Handbook of Texas Online, Adrian Woll, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/WW/fwo3.html] . There, both Indian and Mexican regulars were involved in the Dawson Massacre [Handbok of Texas Online, Dawson Massacre, by Thomas W. Cutrer, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/DD/qfd1.html] and the Battle of Salado Creek [Handbook of Texas Online, Salado Creek, Battle of, by Thomas W. Cutrer, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/SS/qfs1.html] . Following the departure of Mexican troops from Texas soil. For the remnant tribes, peace would come the following year with Sam Houston again as Texas President and a treaty of peace. The Treaty of Birds Fort [Treaty of Birds Fort, September 29, 1843, Texas State Library and Archives, Austin, Texas] brought an end to hostilities, especially for the Cherokees under Chief Chicken Trotter. Although only a few Choctaws were involved with the Cordova/Chicken Trotter group, the peace would have long lasting effects on the Yowani's. Thus, following the end of the Texas-Indian Wars, some of the Yowani returned to East Texas, settling with members of Chicken Trotters Cherokees and a few tribes to form the Mount Tabor Indian Community [1850 United States Census, Canton Beat EU] . Most of the male members of the community served in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War. In the early 20th century, several members of the Yowani Choctaws, led by William Clyde Thompson [The Dawes Commission and the Allotment of the Five Civilized Tribes, 1893-1914 By Kent Carter, Ancestry Publishing 1999, ISBN-10:091648985X, 13:978-0916489854] , who lived in Texas, relocated to the Chickasaw Nationin order to be included in the Dawes Commission Final Rolls as citizens by blood of the Choctaw Nation [William C. Thompson, et al. vs. Choctaw Nation, MCR File 341, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Muskogee, Oklahoma] . A long struggle insued between 1898 and 1909. In 1905 all were stricken from the Final Rolls of the Choctaw Nation [Letter of April 4, 1905 from Thomas Ryan, First Assistant Secretary Indian Affairs to Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes, Muskogee, Indian Territory, re: Willian C. Thompson et al MCR 341, MCR 7124, MCR 581 and MCR 458.] . Thompson then took the matter all the way to the United States Supreme Court [William C. Thompson and the Choctaw-Chickasaw Paper Chase by Dr. Douglas Hale, Oklahoma State University ] . After a favorable response [United States Department of the Interior, Secretary of the Interior-Choctaw Citizenship Cases, #4 William C. Thompson et al, pgs 151-157] the families were included on a 1909 Choctaw reinstatement list giving them citizenship in the Choctaw Nation [Choctaw Re-instatement list, correspondence from the Department of the Interior to the Commissioner of the Five Civilized Tribes, February 20, 1909 ] .

Antiquity

The Yowani Choctaws gained their name from the town in which they lived. The Choctaw people had established a town named Yowani, near what is now the town of Shubuta, Mississippi along the Chickasawhay River [Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico By Frederick Webb Hodge, Smithsonian Institution American Ethnology, Washington, D. C.: Government Printing Office, 1907, pgs 1001-1002, ISBN-10:0313212813; 13:978-0313212819] . Over time, this group expanded its holdings westward to the eastern dividing ridge of Bogue Homa, then northward as far as present day Pachuta Creek. From this position the territory ran south to the confluence of the Chickasawhay and Buckatunna Rivers [Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico By Frederick Webb Hodge, Smithsonian Institution American Ethnology, Washington, D. C.: Government Printing Office, 1907, pgs 1001-1002, ISBN-10:0313212813; 13:978-0313212819] . To the east, its lands ran into whate are now Greene and Choctaw Counties in Alabama, bordering on the Muscogee-Creek Nation.

By 1764, a group of Yowani had moved to Louisiana and established contact with the Caddo. Over time, the Yowani adopted Caddo customs. The groups became very interlinked, and Anthropologist James Mooney later listed the Yowani as one of the thirteen divisions of the Caddo Confederacy [A History of the Caddo Indians, By William B. Glover, The Louisiana Historical Quarterly, Vol. 18, No. 4. October, 1935 ] .

Moving westward

At the time that the Yowanis ventured into Louisiana, the territory was under Spanish control. In 1800, Spain traded Louisiana to France, and the following year the United States purchased the land. Many residents of Louisiana, including many of the Indian tribes, did not wish to be under the authority of the United States. Spain agreed to allow several Indian tribes, including the Yowani Choctwas and the Alabama-Coushatta to relocate to the neighboring Spanish province of Texas [Correspondence Between General Manuel Mier y Terán and Texas 1828-1832] . Other Indian tribes later immigrated to Texas to avoid the Americans; this included the Cherokees, Muscogee-Creek, Seminole, Shawnee, Delaware, Quapaw, Kickapoo and even Miami Indians [Texas Indian Papers 1825-1845, Texas State Library and Archives, Austin, Texas] . Following the Mexican War of Independence, Mexico assumed control of Texas. In 1824, another group of Yowanis under the leadership of Atahobia, petitioned the Mexican government to settle within the province of Texas [Correspondence Between General Manuel Mier y Terán and Texas 1828-1832] . They were given permission to establish several villages east of the Trinity River and west of the border with Louisiana.

During the period between 1810 and 1836 many of the relocated tribes, including the Yowani Choctaws, were often subject to attacks from the Comanche who roamed the western part of Texas, as well as the Lipan Apache, who were located in the southern part of the province [Texas Indian Papers 1825-1845, Texas State Library and Archives, Austin, Texas] . The Yowani often joined forces with the English-speaking settlers against the nomadic tribes.

By 1832, all but two families had left the traditional Yowani lands in Mississippi to migrate west [Frederick Webb Hodge, ed., Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (2 vols., Washington: GPO, 1907, 1910, rpt., New York: Pageant, 1959] . Although some settled briefly in what is now Rapides Parish, Louisiana, by 1850 many of the Yowanis had settled in the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory [Frederick Webb Hodge, ed., Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico (2 vols., Washington: GPO, 1907, 1910, rpt., New York: Pageant, 1959] . A small number did remain in Louisiana and established a close bond with the Coushatta [Coushatta heritage reaches deep into the past of Jefferson Davis Parish, Louisiana, by Kathy LaCombe-Tell, Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, June 2004 http://files.usgwarchives.org/la/jeffersondavis/history/coushat.txt] .

Texas Indian Wars 1835-1843

In 1835, English-speaking settlers and some anti-Santa Anna Tejanos in Texas launched the Texas Revolution to gain independence from Mexico [Handbook of Texas Online, Texas Revolution, by Eugene C. Barker and James W. Pohl, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/TT/qdt1.html] . The provisional Texas government sent Sam Houston, a man much respected by the Cherokee tribe, to negotiate a treaty with the Indians living in East Texas. A treaty was concluded at Bowles Village on February 23, 1836 between the Cherokees and Twelve Associated Tribes and the provisional Texas government. This treaty was the first in an attempt to form an inter-tribal community in which the Choctaws were fully involved [Treaty of Bowles Village February 23, 1836, Texas State Library nd Archives, Austin, Texas] .

In March 1836, the Republic of Texas was established and won its full independence from Mexico the following month [Handbook of Texas Online, Texas Revolution, by Eugene C. Barker and James W. Pohl, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/TT/qdt1.html] . Houston was elected the first president of the Republic and continued to negotiate peace with the various Indian tribes. After 1837, the Yowani villages were combined to form a single village on Attoyac Bayou in extreme southeastern Rusk County [Texas Indian Papers, Census of Tribes, Texas State library and Archives, Austin, Texas] . An 1837 census of Indians in the Republic of Texas noted that seventy Yowani Choctaws lived in this village, along with several Chickasaw. The census also stated that these people were peaceable [Texas Indian Papers, Census of Tribes, Texas State library and Archives, Austin, Texas] .

The Texas Legislature refused to ratify many of Houston's treaties, however. The second president of the Republic, Mirabeau Lamar [Hanbook of Texas Online, Mirabeau Bonaparte Lamar, by Herbert Gambrell, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/LL/fla15.html] , did not share Houston's respect for the native tribes, and refused to honor Houston's treaties [Handbook of Texas Online, Samuel Houston, by Thomas H. Kreneck, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/HH/fho73.html] . New settlers to the region often settled on lands that had been granted to Indian tribes, and some tribes respondeded accordinly [Handbook of Texas Online, Killough Massacre, by Christopher Long, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/KK/btk1.html] . In the summer of 1839, Lamar ordered the Texian Army to attack the Cherokee villages [Hanbook of Texas online, Cherokee War, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/CC/qdc1.html] . The Cherokees were eventually driven out of Texas and into Indian Territory.

Several small Cherokee bands escaped detection and were not forcibly removed from their homes. One small band, led by Chicken Trotter or Devireaux Jarrett Bell, attempted to regain some of their lands in 1840 [The 1840 Census of the Republic of Texas, 1966 Pemberton Press, Austin, Texas, Edited by Gifford White, Nacogdoches County ] . While his petition was pending in the Republic legislature, Bell and several other Cherokees were involved in an altercated with three white men near Nacogdoches. The resulting scuffle led to the deaths of the three whites. Knowing the state of Indian/white relations, Bell led his group to Mexico.

Angry at the death of the three white men, a vigilante group formed in Nacogdoches. Unable to catch up to Bell and his group, the vigilantes decided to extract vengenance from the nearby Yowani village where some eleven Choctaw men, women, and children were murdered [Handbook of Texas Online, Indians, Texas and Mexican Republics, by George Klos, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/II/bzi4.html] . After the attack, the Yowani Choctaws abandoned their village. Some returned to Mississippi and others moved to Indian Territory to join the Choctaw Nation [Some East Texas Native Families: Texas Cherokees and Associate Bands Genealogy Project: Rootsweb Global Search: Familyties http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=familyties] , A third group joined the Caddo at the Brazos Reservation [Caddo, Twenty Years Without A Home, Texas Beyond History, http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/tejas/voices/without.html] further west and eventually accompanied the Caddo to a reservation in what is now Oklahoma. A fourth group, led by Woody Jones, chose to remain in East Texas, moving further into the Piney woods to avoid detection.

Throughout Lamar's term as president, fighting persisted between the Republic of Texas and various groups of Indians, including those under Chicken Trotter/Bell, who launched a guerilla campaign against Texans. When Lamar's term expired, Sam Houston was elected to a second term as preisdent. Houston again began treaty negotiations with the tribes, culminating in the Treaty of Birds Fort, which was concluded on September 29, 1843. This treaty ended most hostilities in Texas with the immigrant tribes. Although the Yowani were not a direct party to it, they had several ties to those in attendance. Many of the displaced tribes, including some Yowani Choctaws, formed a new community, Mount Tabor Indian Community. Many Yowanis continued to live under the authority of Woody Jones in Houston County near the border with Trinity County.

Mount Tabor Community

The Mount Tabor Community continued to grow after Texas joined the United States in 1845. President James K. Polk granted permission to the Ridge Party of Cherokees to relocate there from Indian Territory. More Yowani Choctaws, led by Atahobia's grandson Archibald Thompson, also relocated to the Mount Tabor Community by 1850.

The Civil War

When the American Civil War erupted, almost all of the people living at Mount Tabor supported the Confederacy. Many enlisted in the Confederate Army as part of the Cherokee Mounted Rifles under Stand Watie. During the way, two other Cherokee communities formed in Texas. These were mainly for the protection of Confederate soldiers families. Besides Rusk County, there was a small community near present day Waco and later as an offshoot to the Rusk County group, another formed in Wood County near Quitman. Of the Waco group, there is no information that indicates this was anything but a Cherokee community. However, the Wood County group consisted of both Cherokees and Choctaws.

While a few of the Yowani Choctawd enlisted with the Cherokee Mounted Rifles, most became part of the Texas 14th Cavalry The war took a heavy toll on the community as nearly 1/4 of all male residents were dead by the end of the war.

Dawes Commission

Between 1866 and the close of the Dawes Commission Final Rolls, 80% of the Cherokees left Mount Tabor to return north to the Cherokee Nation. Most Choctaws remained in Texas, with a few relocating in the Chickasaw Nation. Only during the period of the Dawes Commission did a number of Choctaws take the opportunities available and move north.

From this just a handful moved to Atoka in the Choctaw Nation and only one family moved to Tuskahoma. The majority moved into Pickens County in the Chickasaw Nation near present day Marlow, Oklahoma.

Many of the Yowani Choctaws from Texas sought on the Final Rolls of the Five Civilized Tribes as Citizens by Blood in the Choctaw Nation. In 1906, 70 members of the Yowani Choctaws who lived in Texas were stricken from the membership rolls of the Choctaw Nation. William C. Thompson and his cousin John Thurston Thompson, Jr., sued. In 1909, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Texas Choctaws should be reinstated.

Recent years

Throughout the twentieth century there have been strong leaders among he Texas Choctaws. The most recognizable would be Martin Luther Thompson. However all deferred to the Cherokees for overall leadership. No Choctaw had ever became Chairman of the Executive Committee before 1988. Following the separation from the Cherokee Nation caused by the 1975 constitution, Foster T. Bean, an original enrollee on the Guion Miller Roll, took over for W. W. (Bill) Keeler, as he resigned to become the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Judge Bean served in that capacity until retiring from it in 1988. He was replaced by J.C. Thompson, who, although Cherokee through the Hicks family was one-eighth Choctaw and one-thirty-second Chickasaw. Thompson held the position for eleven years until Terry Thompson-easterly took over in 1989. Terry was descended from Arthur Thompson, brother of William Clyde Thompson. Terry was the first woman to hold the position and the first to have no Cherokee blood. Terry was Choctaw, Chickasaw and Muscogee-Creek. This making her the first person of Creek blood to head the community. in 2001 she was replaced by Peggy Dean-Atwood, Choctaw, Chickasaw and a descendant of Archibald Thompson. In 2002, Dr. J.C. Thompson was again Chairman and remains to this day. He is assisted by Ras Pool also descended from the Cherokee, Choctaw and Chickasaw people. Ras being the grandson of Martin Luther Thompson.

Today the biggest problem facing the group is the health of it's leadership which has been continuing failing. Dr. Thompson has continually tried to find others to take the wheel, most recently attempting to draft Jay Hannah as Chairman.

See also

* Mount Tabor Indian Cemetery
* Stand Watie
* William Clyde Thompson
* John Martin Thompson
* Charles Collins Thompson
* Martin Luther Thompson

References

ources

* "The Choctaw Revolt", By Charles Paape, (unpublished manuscript) University of Illinois/Urbana, 1946 dissertation on the Choctaw civil war
* Correspondence Between General Manuel Mier y Terán and Texas 1828-1832
* The Choctaw Before Removal By Carolyn Keller Reeves, Published by University Press of Mississippi, 2004, ISBN 1578066859, 9781578066858
* A History of the Caddo Indians, By William B. Glover, The Louisiana Historical Quarterly, Vol. 18, No. 4. October, 1935
* Texas A&M University-Sons of Dewitt Colony Texas: Texas--Disputed Border and Buffer between New Spain and the United States, Neutral Ground (No Man's Land) between the Sabine and Arroyo Hondo--Attempts to Control Immigration 1805-1809
* Texas A&M University-The Journal of Lieutenant Colonel Don Manuel Salcedo, March 11, 1810 - June 23, 1810
* Texas A&M University-Tenoxtitlan, Dream Capital of Texas; by Dr. Malcolm D. McLean, Originally published in "The Southwestern Historical Quarterly" July 1966, Vol. LXX, No. 1
* Texas A&M Unibersity-Sons of DeWitt Colony Texas: Some difficulties of a Texas Emprsario, Letter from L.R. Kenny to Stephen F. Austin, May 5, 1826
* Texas A&M University-Sons of DeWitt Colony Texas: Letter of Peter Ellis Bean to US President Andrew Jackson September 11, 1835
* Texas Indian Papers 1837, census of tribes in the Republic, attitudes of the Yowani Choctaws and allied Chickasaws of Attoyac Bayou, Nacogdoches District
* Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, Volume 2, "Yowani" by By Frederick Webb Hodge
* Texas by Terán By Manuel de Mier y Teran, Jack Jackson, John Wheat, Scooter Cheatham, Lynn Marshall
* 1840 Census of the Republic of Texas
* The Texas Cherokees and Associate Bands, (unpublished manuscript) by Dr. J.C. Thompson & Dr. Irv May, April 2000Rs|date=August 2008
* The Yowani Choctaws, (unpublished manuscript) by Dr. J.C. Thompson May, 2006Rs|date=August 2008
* The Old Mount Tabor Community; Genealogy of Old and New Cherokee Indian Families, (out of print) By George Morrison Bell Sr. 1969
* Some East Texas Native Families: Texas Cherokees and Associate Bands Genealogy Project: Rootsweb Global Search: Familyties http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=familytiesRs|date=August 2008
* Oklahoma Genealogical Society Quarterly, Volume 9, Number 2, 1964
* Cherokee Adairs, By Betty Barker and the Adair Reunion Committee; A family history recording the Adair family from Europe to the Cheorkee Nation, 2003, ARC Press, ISBN 0-938041-975
* The Dawes Commission and the Allotment of the Five Civilized Tribes, 1893-1914 By Kent Carter, Published by Ancestry Publishing, 1999, ISBN 091648985X, 9780916489854
* Cherokee Cavaliers: Forty Years of Cherokee History As Told in the Correspondence of the Ridge-Watie-Boudinot Family, 1939 By Edward Everett Dale and Gaston Litton, University of Oklahoma Press; ISBN-10:080612721X, 13:978-0806127217
* The Handbook of Texas Online: Indians; Republics of Mexico and Texas, George Klos, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/II/bzi4.html
* The Handbook of Texas Online: Yowani Indians, Margery H. Krieger, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/YY/bmy12.html
* Asbury Cemetery, Smith County, Texas, Information related to Choctaw and Cherokee descendants buried there, by Paul Ridenour, 2005: http://www.paulridenour.com/asbury.htm
* Mount Tabor Indian Cemetery, Rusk County, Texas; Information related to Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw and Muscogee descendants buried there, by Paul Ridenour, 2005: http://www.paulridenour.com/mttabor.htm : http://www.paulridenour.com/tabor.htm
* Thompson Cemetery, Rusk County, Texas; Information related to Cherokee descendants buried there, by Paul Ridenour, 2005: http://www.paulridenour.com/thompson.htm
* Handbook of Texas Online: John Martin Thompson, By Thomas D. Isern http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/TT/fth43.html
* Texas-Cherokees vs United States Docket 26, 26 Ind Cl Comm. 78 (1971)
* Library of the University of Michigan, Department of the Interior, Laws, Decisions and Regulations Affecting the work of the Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes 1893-1906 pgs 130-138
* United States Department of the Interior, secretary of the Interior-Choctaw Citizenship Cases, #4 William C. Thompson et al, pgs 151-157

External links

* [http://books.google.com/books?id=euEeAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA1001&lpg=PA1001&dq=yowani+choctaw&source=web&ots=islZgOFMyX&sig=bdMd1SCWJlIoismsUF0hl5Uzt-g&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=9&ct=resultGoogle Book Search, Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico By Frederick Webb Hodge]
* [http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/adaes/legacy.html]
* [http://www.chickasaw.net The Chickasaw Nation of Oklahoma (official site)]
* [http://ops.tamu.edu/x075bb/caddo/Indians.html, A History of the Caddo Indians By: WILLIAM B. GLOVER]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/thompson.htm,Thompson Cemetery, Rusk County, Texas; Information related to Cherokee descendants buried there, by Paul Ridenour, 2005]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/mttabor.htm, Mount Tabor Indian Cemetery, Rusk County, Texas]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/tabor.htm, Mount Tabor Indian Cemetery, Rusk County, Texas]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/asbury.htm, Asbury Cemetery, Smith County, Texas, Information related to Choctaw and Cherokee descendants buried there, by Paul Ridenour, 2005]
* [http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/YY/bmy12.html, The Handbook of Texas Online: Yowani Indians, Margery H. Krieger]
* [http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/II/bzi4.html, The Handbook of Texas Online: Indians by George Klos]
* [http://www.txrusk.com/cemetery/cemmtabo.htm, Mt. Tabor Cemetery, Rusk County TxGenWeb]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/taborstarr.htm, A Starr Studded Event, April 9, 2005 by Paul Ridenour]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/starr.htm, The George Harlan Starr and Nancy (Bell) Starr Home, Located near Leveretts Chapel, Texas (Mt. Tabor Indian Community), by Paul Ridenour 2005]
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/mrmain.htm, Ridenour's Major Ridge Home Page, by Paul Ridenour 2008]
* [http://www.delawarenation.com/crc/memorandums/IntroArtIandII12September05.pdf, Law Offices of Steven D. Sandven, Texas Choctaw proposed constitution separate from the Texas Cherokes and Associate Bands, 2005]