[131] Letter to the Alabama commissioner, J. M. Calhoun, January 7, 1861 [_Official Records_, fourth ser., vol. i, 74]. [132] "Report of a Committee of the Convention, being an address to the people of Texas, March 30, 1861."--_Ibid._, 199. [133] _Official Records_, fourth ser., vol. i, 322-325. [134] Leeper to Greenwood, February 12, 1861 [General Files, _Wichita, 1860-1861_, L373]. [135] _Official Records_, first ser., vol. i, 656. [136] --_Ibid._ [137] --_Ibid._, 660. [138] --_Ibid._, 648. [139] _Official Records_, first ser., vol. i, 656. [140] The Indian Office protested against a reduction of the forts because of treaty guaranties to the Indians [Dole to Smith, April 30, 1861, Indian Office, _Report Book_, no. 12, p. 152]. [141] Townsend to Emory, March 21, 1861 [_Official Records_, first ser., vol. i, 659]. [142] Same to same, _ibid._, 660. [143] Emory to Townsend, April 2, 1861 [_ibid._, 660]. [144] At the time, when it was intended to remove all the troops from Fort Cobb for purposes of concentration farther south and nearer to the source of danger, instructions were issued that the Reserve Indians, whose peculiar protection Fort Cobb was, might remove within the limits of Fort Washita; but the Choctaws and the Chickasaws objected and, in deference to their wishes, Emory suspended the permission [_Official Records_, first ser., vol. i, 663], his excuse being that Fort Cobb was not to be abandoned anyway. The contractors, Johnson and Grimes, whom Superintendent Rector had so much favored, had a good deal to do with the forming of this decision. They told Emory that the Reserve Indians were not free to move; for they had no means and that they were "hutted and planting at Fort Cobb." Quite naturally the food contractors did not wish the Indians to be taken out of their reach within the limits of a military reservation. [145] Matthew Leeper was very insistent. He not only wrote letters to Emory arguing his case but travelled from his agency to Fort Smith to interview him. [146] Emory refused to grant the appeal of Major Sackett and Captain Prince not to abandon Fort Arbuckle [_Official Records_, first ser., vol. i, 666].