The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War

The American Indian as Participant of the Civil war by Annie Heloise Abel, discusses the Indians and their involvement in the Civil war on both sides of the issue.  The book also tells the story of the Indians in Southern Kansas and what they went through during the country's most turbulent times prior to World War II.  She also discusses one of Kansas most colorful figures, Jim Kane who fought for the Union during the war.

The first chapter begins with the Battle of Pea Ridge and starts out by stating that "the Indian alliance, so assiduously sought by the Southern Confederacy and so laboriously built up, soon revealed itself to be most unstable. Direct and unmistakable signs of its instability appeared in connection with the first real military test to which it was subjected, the Battle of Pea Ridge or Elkhorn, as it is better known in the South, the battle that stands out in the history of the War of Secession as being the most decisive victory to date of the Union forces in the West and as marking the turning point in the political relationship of the State of Missouri with the Confederate government."

 

Source: The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War, by Annie Heloise Abel,available at Project Gutenberg.