Going Snake Massacre
Contents
The Going Snake
Massacre was an incident that occurred on April 15th, 1872, during
the early days of the Old West, in Tahlequah,
Oklahoma, then the capitol
of the Cherokee Nation in Indian Territory.
In the incident, eight US Marshals were
killed when ten US Marshals were ambushed during the trial of a murder
suspect, who had been arrested for shooting one man, then murdering the
man's Cherokee wife.
The incident is generally referred to as
a massacre mostly due to the killing of eight Deputy US Marshals, but the
term also comes from the fact that fourteen Cherokees were also killed by
the US Marshals. In true fact, it was actually more of a gunfight
than a massacre.
The US Marshals have one version of what
led up to the incident, whereas the Cherokee nation had another. Over
time, various versions of the initial incident have surfaced, with all
indicating three particular facts. That the murder suspect, Zeke Proctor did
object to a Cherokee woman being involved with a white man, that the
victim Jim Kecterson had once been married to Proctor's sister, and
that the murder victim Polly Beck was a love interest to
Proctor.
Aside from those, the variations of the
story have several detailed differences, and are often quite different.
Zeke Proctor, a Cherokee, maintained his
killing of Polly, also a Cherokee, was accidental. Some versions state
that Jim Kecterson, a white man, had previously been involved with
Proctor's sister, Susan, and had left her and their children destitute,
leaving her for Polly.
Susan Proctor and Jim Kecterson had once
been married, but it is also said that the children were not Kecterson's.
Another version indicates that Kecterson had caught Proctor stealing
cattle, and intended to have him prosecuted.
Yet another version indicates that
Proctor had been previously involved romantically with Polly, who was
known locally to be promiscuous, dating several men, most of them white,
and that he was still in love with her. Yet, another version indicates
that Proctor had never been involved with Polly, but was jealous over an
Indian woman having married or becoming involved with a white man.
She was said to have been an attractive
woman, of mixed race with her father being white, the widow of another
white man named Steve Hilderbrand, who had been killed during the Civil
War, and Kecterson was either her fourth or fifth husband. Polly was
formerly Polly Beck, with one brother and two first cousins being Deputy
US Marshals.
During the Civil War, Zeke Proctor had
fought for the Union Army, whereas all of the Beck family had fought for
the Confederate Army. Following the war, tensions between the Beck's and
the Proctor's was high, much due to those former loyalties, and partly due
to Proctor's alleged romantic interest in Polly Beck.
Also, Proctor was a member of the
Cherokee Keetoowah tribe, which believed strongly at the time in the
preservation of the traditional ways, and strongly believing against the
encroachment of whites. This belief included the disapproval of Cherokee
women becoming involved romantically with white men, despite Proctor's
father having been white, and Polly Beck's father having been white.
Proctor was the son of a known murderer,
was known to often be drunk, and had previously been known to have forced
his way into a house where a young girl had been playing the piano, and
after she stopped he held her at gunpoint and made her continue
playing.
He had previously been involved in
several saloon brawls in the small town of Cincinnati, Arkansas, but was
known for his trait of always returning afterward to pay for damages. He
had previously killed two Cherokee brothers from the Jaybird family.
Whatever the reason was that brought them
together, Proctor confronted them both at Polly's dead husband's mill,
near Siloam Springs, Arkansas but in Oklahoma Territory, on February 27.
The incident developed into an argument, whereas Zeke Proctor produced a
rifle and shot the Kecterson man in the head, slightly wounding him.
Proctor then turned to the Cherokee wife, Polly, and shot her, killing
her.
He was captured and arrested by US
Marshals working the territory. At the time, American Indian courts
handled all cases involving American Indians. Kecterson, believing
Proctor would not be convicted in a Cherokee court, appealed to the local
federal court, asking that an arrest warrant be issued to insure that
Proctor received a trial that was unbiased, in a non-Cherokee court. This
prompted the federal court to dispatch ten US Marshals to secure the
arrest of Proctor at the court house in Tahlequah. However, prior to the
US Marshals arriving, the trial had been moved to a local Cherokee school
house.
The posse of ten US Marshals was led by
Deputy US Marshal Jacob Owens and Deputy US Marshal Joseph Peavy. Three
members of the posse were Cherokee, from the Beck family, and kin to
murder victim Polly Beck. This added to the tensions already in place
prior to their arrival. Also, the Beck and Proctor families had other
issues that led to a common dislike of one another.
The Marshals entered town, and went
straight to the school house. As they approached, a large band of Cherokee
men ambushed them. The Marshals, caught in the open, had no cover. They
immediately returned fire, and began retreating from the open school
yard.
The Marshals killed three of the Cherokee
men, and wounded six others, before being overwhelmed by a mass of men
numbering around thirty. Seven of the US Marshals were killed on the spot,
with three escaping. Deputy Marshal Owens died several hours later from
wounds he'd received. At least fourteen other Cherokee men were wounded by
the end of the fight, eleven of those dying within days.
The two Marshals who survived were Joseph
Peavy and Isaac Vinn. Both were wounded, but recovered.
- Will Beck
- Black Sut Beck
- Will Hicks
- George Selridge
- Jim Ward
- Riley Woods
- Sam Beck
- Jacob Owens
- Johnson Proctor, brother to suspect
Zeke Proctor
- Alberty, Proctor's attorney
- Andrew Palone, a Cherokee and Civil
War veteran
- Eleven other Cherokee men, whose names
are not known, died within days of the shootout
- Six Cherokee men were wounded,
including Zeke Proctor and the Judge, Sixkiller.
Proctor was acquitted the next day, in a
Cherokee court. The Cherokee court ruling on Proctor was accepted, due to
federal law not allowing him to be tried twice for the same crime, and at
the time Cherokee courts did have jurisdiction. US Marshal James
Huckleberry immediately dispatched twenty one Deputy US Marshals under the
command of Charles Robinson. They took with them two doctors, who helped
tend to wounded Cherokee civilians.
The second posse arrested several men
believed to have been involved in the murder of the Marshals, to include
jury foreman Arch Scaper. There was no resistance made against the second
posse. Zeke Proctor had fled by the time of this posses arrival. The
suspects were taken to Fort Smith, Arkansas for trial, but all were
eventually released for lack of evidence or witnesses willing to testify.
Several indictments were issued after the
shootout, by both the federal court and the Cherokee court. Zeke Proctor
and twenty others were indicted for the killing of the Marshals, whereas
the Cherokee court issued indictments against the US Marshals for the
killing of fourteen Cherokee men. Eventually, by 1873, all indictments on
both sides were dropped, and Zeke Proctor received amnesty.
Zeke Proctor continued living in the
area. By the 1880s he owned a small ranch. He was elected as a Cherokee
Senator in 1877, and in 1894 he was elected Sheriff. He also, ironically,
served as a Deputy US Marshal from 1891 to 1894, under "Hanging
Judge" Parker. Proctor died in 1904, at the age of 76.
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