Cabin Creek was a Civil War engagement fought in Oklahoma, 1863. It was a Union victory.
Col. James M. Williams of the First Kansas Colored Infantry led a Union supply train from Fort Scott, Kansas, to Fort Gibson, Oklahoma (then Indian Territory). As he approached the crossing of Cabin Creek, he learned that Confederate Col. Stand Watie, with about 1,600 to 1,800 men intended to assault him there. Watie was waiting for about 1,500 reinforcements under the command of Brig. Gen. William L. Cabell to join him before attacking the supply train. Cabell, however, was detained due to high water on Grand River. Cabin Creek also had high water, preventing a crossing at first, but when it had receded enough, Williams drove the Confederates off with artillery fire and two cavalry charges. The wagon train continued to Fort Gibson and delivered the supplies, making it possible for the Union forces to maintain their presence in Indian territory and take the offensive that resulted in a victory at Honey Springs and the fall of Fort Smith, Arkansas.
On July 1 and 2, 1863, fighting broke out at Mayes County, Oklahoma, in an engagement now remembered as the First Battle of Cabin Creek, part of the wider Civil War. Colonel Stand Watie hoped his Confederate troops could catch a Union supply convoy by surprise, but the convoy's commander, Colonel James Monroe Williams, had already been tipped off about the plan. Rain had swollen the creek's waters, yet this did not stop Williams from pressing forward with an attack that broke through the dug-in Confederate lines and sent them retreating. That same month, a separate Confederate detachment tried to strike at a Union wagon train headed toward Fort Gibson, but failed to slow it down, a failure that helped pave the way for the Union's later triumph at the Battle of Honey Springs. This clash also holds a distinct place in history as the first occasion when African American soldiers fought side by side with white troops.
The Cabin Creek battlefield itself, situated in the Cherokee Nation within Indian Territory, saw two separate clashes during the war. It lay at the spot where the Texas Road forded Cabin Creek, close to what is now Big Cabin, Oklahoma. Confederate forces initiated both encounters there with the same goal in mind: cutting off Union supply lines.
The second clash unfolded in September 1864, once again as Confederates attempted to seize a Union supply train. This time they succeeded, making off with mules, wagons, and provisions worth more than a million dollars. By that stage of the conflict, however, such a haul did little to change the war's ultimate direction. Stand Watie, now serving as a Confederate general, commanded the raiders in both encounters at Cabin Creek.
Colonel James M. Williams commanded the soldiers guarding a Union supply train as it moved from Fort Scott, Kansas, toward Fort Gibson, Oklahoma, a post situated within Indian Territory at that time. The column followed the Texas Road and drew its strength from several units combined together: detachments from the 2nd Colorado Infantry Regiment, the 3rd Wisconsin Volunteer Cavalry Regiment, the 6th Regiment Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, the 9th Regiment Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, the 3rd Regiment of the Indian Home Guard, the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry, and the 2nd Kansas Artillery.
On the Confederate side, Colonel Stand Watie planned to strike this convoy by surprise, positioning between 1,600 and 1,800 troops at the crossing point on Cabin Creek to wait for it. He expected reinforcement in the form of 1,500 more soldiers under Brigadier General William L. Cabell, whose arrival would have bolstered his numbers before launching the assault. Those reinforcements never reached him in time, however, since rising waters along the Grand River held Cabell's men back.
On the first of July, Williams reached the crossing, where prisoners taken from Watie's ranks revealed what the Confederate force intended to do. Watie had positioned his men along a line stretching roughly a mile on each side of the crossing, with trenches carved into the brushy creek bank. Because the creek was running unusually high, deep enough to reach above a man's shoulders, Williams decided to hold off engaging the enemy until the next day, pulling his wagons into a defensive ring on a stretch of nearby prairie.
The following day, Williams opened with thirty minutes of artillery fire before sending the Third Indian Home Guard forward. The creek, though somewhat lower at waist height, still proved too much, and heavy fire from the Confederate position drove the Home Guard back before they could cross. Williams then sent the Ninth Kansas Cavalry charging ahead, shielded by fire from the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry. Once the cavalry had secured a foothold on the far bank, Williams personally led his own men, the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry, in a direct charge through the water and into the brush beyond. The Confederates broke and fell back, with Williams chasing them for a quarter mile as they tried, unsuccessfully, to regroup in an open clearing.
With the crossing secured, Williams brought his supply train through and delivered it safely to Fort Gibson. The fighting cost Watie's force 65 killed, while Union losses ranged between 3 and 23 dead, along with 30 men wounded.
This engagement kept a Union presence alive in the Indian territory, setting the stage for triumphs that would follow at Honey Springs and Fort Smith. Shortly afterward, Union forces built defensive posts along the Texas Road, one of them positioned at the Cabin Creek crossing. Notably, this clash stands as the first occasion on which African American troops, specifically the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry, served in combat beside white soldiers. On 7 July 2007, a monument honoring the 1st Kansas Colored Infantry was dedicated on the site where the fighting had taken place.
This page covers Cabin Creek. A full Aubrey report for the area pulls together this battle alongside historic sites, land records, and everything else the record holds within a few miles:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
The account on this page is written by Aubrey Research from cited sources. Wikipedia is cited as a reference; its text is not reproduced.
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in the US, drawing on NRHP records, battlefield archives, census history and geological data to tell the full story of a place.