At the North Fork Village, in the Creek country, the work of negotiating Indian treaties in the interests of the Confederacy really began and it did not end until a rather long series of them had been concluded. The series consisted of nine main treaties[258] and the nine group themselves into three distinct classes. The basis of classification is the relative strength or power of the tribe, or better, the degree of concession which the Confederacy, on account of that strength or that power or under stress of its own dire needs, felt itself obliged to make. This is the list as classified: FIRST CLASS 1. Creek, negotiated at North Fork, Creek Nation, July[259] 10, 1861 2. Choctaw and Chickasaw, negotiated at North Fork, July 12, 1861 3. Seminole, negotiated at the Seminole Council House, August 1, 1861 4. Cherokee, negotiated at Tahlequah, Cherokee Nation, October 7, 1861 SECOND CLASS 1. Osage, negotiated at Park Hill, Cherokee Nation, October 2, 1861 2. Seneca and Shawnee, negotiated at Park Hill, October 4, 1861 3. Quapaw, negotiated at Park Hill, October 4, 1861 THIRD CLASS 1. Wichita, etc., negotiated at the Wichita Agency near the False Washita River, August 12, 1861 2. Comanche, negotiated at the Wichita Agency, August 12, 1861 Although all the treaties, made in 1861 by Albert Pike, were negotiated under authority[260] of the Act of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States, approved May 21, 1861, by which the Confederacy offered and agreed to accept the protectorate of the Indian tribes west of Arkansas and Missouri, only those made with the great tribes contained a statement,[261] definitely showing that the protectorate had been formally offered, formally accepted and formally assumed. Thus, in a very unequivocal way, Creeks, Choctaws, Chickasaws, Seminoles, and Cherokees, all signified[262] their willingness to transfer their allegiance from the United to the Confederate States. The smaller tribes seem not to have been asked to make the same concession and their nationality was, in no sense, recognized. They acted more or less under duress or compulsion, and the very negotiation of treaties with them was taken as a full compliance with the confederate scheme.