Small and oval, more decorative than practical. More of a living room than a dining room. Perhaps its original owners, the McLeans of Appomattox Court House in Virginia, once used this table for an afternoon tea or snack. It is easier, however, to imagine it as a tray to place a cup of coffee or a half-read newspaper. One of those newspapers that reported on the American Civil War.
Looking today as if it just left the hands of a cabinet-maker, this relic is linked to a key chapter of America. Actually, two chapters, but the second is not as well known as the first. 158 years ago, here at this side table, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to his greatest Union rival, Ulysses S. Grant. This is the best known episode, that of April 9, 1865.
This is the coffee table where the Civil War officially ended on April 9, a Sunday. The fighting, however, continued for more than a month, led by other Confederate commanders who were unwilling or unable to take notice. In fact, the last Confederate general to surrender did not do so until June 23. And it was a very special general, Stand Watie, a Cherokee Indian.
Because the war that bled the US between 1861 and 1865 was also an Indian war. And this is the lesser known episode. The beginning of the end for Native Americans began much earlier, but after 1865 it accelerated. During the civil war, the two sides in the conflict sought the support of the Indians, as did the Spanish, British and French before. And the Indians allied themselves with one or the other desperately.
War was inherent to these peoples, but they were wars for survival, for subsistence, for control of hunting and land. They did not yearn for the extermination of the enemy. The National Museum of the American Indian, a jewel of the Smithsonian Institution, estimates that at least 3,500 natives fought for the Union the white way, seeking total defeat. One of those warriors was by Lee and Grant’s table that April 9th.
Seneca Ely S. Parker (1828-1895) was the highest ranking Indian in the Union Army: Lieutenant Colonel and Grant’s Secretary. He was cultured and refined (if it hadn’t been for his skin color, he would have studied law, but the racism of the time closed the doors of the legal profession and he had to settle for studying engineering). He transcribed the terms of surrender and starred in one of the most repeated anecdotes by US schoolchildren.
When Lee saw Parker, he exclaimed, “I’m glad to find a real American.” The respondent replied: “We are all Americans here.” Although they continued to die for their country (the First and Second World Wars, Vietnam…), the truth is that theirs did not achieve citizenship until 1924 (56 years after African-Americans) and they could not vote in all states until 1962 (42 years after the women).
And if some 3,500 Indians fought for the Union, almost 5,000 did so for the Confederacy. They believed that their loyalty would be rewarded with the recognition of the treaties. But for the sides in conflict they were only chess pawns, says James M. McPherson, the canonical historian of the American Civil War thanks to Battle cry of freedom, not translated into Spanish, but into French (La guerre de Sécession).
One of General Lee’s main concerns exemplifies what kind of war that was: he wanted the North to guarantee the defeated soldiers ownership of their mounts, whether they were horses or mules, “so they could tend their farms and plant the spring crops.” . Most of the Confederate soldiers were small farmers, without slaves, who allowed themselves to be killed by wealthy slave-owning landowners.
Tribes such as the Cherokee also fought for them, which did possess slaves of African descent. More than defending slavery, the Indians wanted to make sure that their lands would not suffer further plunder and that the whites respected the treaties. The foremost native commander in the South was Booth Watie (1806-1871), the only Indian to rise to the rank of brigadier general in the Civil War.
Stand Watie led the Indian Cavalry Brigade, which included the 1st and 2nd Cherokee Cavalry, the Creek squadron, and the Osage and Seminole battalions. General Watie’s men did not surrender until June 23 in the confines of the future state of Oklahoma. It would take even longer for the flag to be lowered, at the end of the year, by the last Confederate warship, Captain James Waddell’s cruiser CSS Shenandoah.
Former enemies, Ely S. Parker, the Seneca, and Stand Watie, the Cherokee, died in disappointment. His people paid a terrible price, regardless of the flag they embraced. There were peoples, such as the Cherokee and the Seminole, who lost almost a third of their population due to the hardships of the war. And despite their sacrifice, tribal lands were even less secure than before the conflict.
A coffee table and two chairs with more than a century and a half of history speak of all this (Grant’s, with leather back; Lee’s, with mesh). Its first owner, Wilmer McLean, has a curious story. He and his family left their Manassas estate, the scene of one of the first great battles of 1861. They took refuge in Appomattox Court House, little imagining that the war would formally end there four years later.
And what happened to the table and chairs? The winners knew that they were witnessing a historic moment and appropriated pieces of the room as souvenirs. A northern general took Grant’s chair and another took Lee’s. A third, Philip Sheridan, of ill-favored memory in the South, took the table and later gave it to General Custer’s wife. The three objects were later donated to the Smithsonian Institution, which has kept them since 1915.
