Choctaw County, Oklahoma Biography: David Folsom - f425 --------------------------------- Rusty Lang Rlang90547@aol.com ----------------------------------------------------------------- USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. ---------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------- DAVID FOLSOM David Folsom was one of the early leaders of the Choctaw tribes and was instrumental in negotiating the treaty that gave them a new homeland in Oklahoma. He was born Jan. 25, 1791 in Bok Tuklo, Miss., a descendant of Nathaniel Folsom, a white trader who had pioneered to the West from Rowan County, N.C., by way of Georgia. Nathaniel, probably a descendant of the pre-revolutionary Folsom family who immigrated to Massachusetts from England, married two Choctaw Indian sisters. The sisters descended from a long line of chiefs. Nathaniel was highly regarded among the people who adopted him and multiplied prolificly, siring 24 descendants. The Choctaws labeled him "Father of all Folsoms." When David was about 7, he lived with his sister Molly and her husband Samuel Mitchelll, a U.S. Indian agent. He stayed three years, learned to speak very good English and showed remarkable musical talent. After returning home, he worked on his father’s homestead at Pigeon Roost, making his own money raising crops. Nathaniel home-schooled David and hired a tutor to help him. David left at 16 to go to school in Tennesse, but only stayed six months then returned to help Nathaniel at his tavern and trading post. David, himself a half-blood, married Rhoda Nail, daughter of Henry Nail, a Revolutionary War standout, and his Choctaw wife. David was the first Indian married under the white man’s, not tribal law. At the same time, John Pitchlynn married Rhoda, daughter of Ebenezer Folsom who died; then Sophia, daughter of Nathaniel Folsom, David’s sister who bore Peter. Peter, whose Indian named translates to Snapping Turtle, later went on to become an important Choctaw leader. David served three years in the Indian Wars, commissioned by General Andrew Jackson and fighting with him and the great Choctaw chief, Pushmataha in the Pensacola Battle. He left with the rank of colonel, a title that was honored him the rest of his life. A great advocate of education, David enduced Presbyterian missionaries to settle in the area and build several christian schools, one near David Folsom home where a community of about 100 Choctaws had settled.(CMM) As with other members of the Folsom and other early white settlers such as Louis LeFlore, John Turnbull and John Pitchlynn, he was greatly influenced by protestant missionaries, such as Cyrus Kingsbury, who moved into the area. They inter-married and were converted to their religion while maintaining the better qualities of Indian life, their honesty, independence and tribal ways. The missionary school boys learned to read and write, heard bible lessons while going into the woods with axes to clear and cultivate the land, the manual labor causing some consternation to older Indians who were accustomed to children enjoying a carefree life. Strife had begun within the tribe among the full bloods who wished to retain their native ways, hunting, game-playing and their pagan religions -- and the mixed-blood leaders such as Folsom and Pitchlynn, who favored a more educated and civilized life for the tribe, while retaining their beloved homeland in Mississippi. David housed some missionaries at his home and taught them the Choctaw language. David’s children, Salina, Peter, Loring and George, no doubt benefited from their educated guests. White pioneers, however, were lobbying Washington, D.C., and President Andrew Jackson, to move the Choctaws out of Mississippi westward. Similar removals were being sought for other tribes including the Creeks of Alabama, Cherokees of Tennessee and Kentucky, and Seminoles of Florida, Doaks Treaty of 1825 partially settled the unrest by giving away some of the tribe’s Arkansas land. Forces were reporting to Washington the failure of the education and religious efforts of the missionaries. David Folsom served as an intermediary between the two factions, while remaining opposed to removal. He visited the mission schools to check on their progress, along with chiefs Puckshanubee and Mushulatubbee and reported to Washington. The issue of slavery also split the tribe further -- well-off "aristocratic" landowners such as John Pitchlynn, who owned 200 acres and 50 slaves were swayed by desire to keep their plantations. David owned 10 slaves. And chief Mushulatubee owned 10 slaves for his 30 acres. Most of the members of the nation, however, owned no land and lived off the land communaly. Meanwhile, personal debts prompted chiefs Pushmataha and Mushulatubee to favor selling their lands to the U.S. in order to pay off their debts to traders. A delegation include the chiefs and David Folsom journeyed to Washington where Puckshanubbee stepped off a cliff and died. History differs on whether or not it was an accident, because it brought a new leader Robert Cole, who was critic of the missionary schools. On the same trip, which was laden with fine food and many rounds of whiskey, chief Pushmataha died ofwhat was probably pneumonia. Said David Folsom, "God has seen fit to take those men away so that better men may be raised up in their places." Folsom became a very powerful person and was respected as a christian man and eloquent , passionate speaker for his causes. In 1826 David Folsom was elected chief of the northern district , one of three in the Choctaw Nation, as tribe members began to trust him more than the despotic Mushulatubbee. It marked the beginning of leadership of the older generation being replaced by mixed-blood Indians. Students at the Mayhue mission wrote to Folsom after a visit: "We rejoice to think that we have a chief who is a friend to his people, and wishes their good, and favors the schools in the nation. Had it not been for you and the friends of the mission, we think we should have been wandering about in the wilderness." Indians were beginning to show their new civilized ways. At Folsom’s new home near Yoknokchaya on Robinson Road, tribe members were raising cotton, making cloth and operating blacksmith shops. They were more temperate in their drinking, but still enjoyed their visiting, feasting and stickball games. Meanwhile Folsom was beginning to see the ultimate reality of the cessation of the Mississippi homeland and tempered his position in order to gain favorable terms in the inevitable treaty . He sought for rights of the poor, as well as the rich. The nation was approaching a state of civil war with removal, slavery, education splintering the tribe. At the same time the state of Mississippi sought to impose its own law on tribe members. Again Folsom stepped up and showed his leadership in a show-down between the factions, when hundreds of warriors mounted with guns, bows and arrows faced off. However, Folsom proffered his hand to his opponent, Nitakechi, who accepted it. The two opposing sides built a fire and held council and a civil war was averted. Negotiations lead in part by Folsom for the Indians and President Andrew Jackson finally settled the issue of ceding land in Mississippiand removal of the tribe to Oklahoma. On Sept. 27, 1925 , David was among the Choctaw chiefs and delegates who signed the Treating of Dancing Rabbity Creek, beginning what has come to be known as theTrail of Tears that Indians followed on their harsh journey into the wilderness. David had charge of the first of the groups moving to Oklahoma. In the fall of 1832, the group suffered disease, hunger, rains and floods before arriving in Little River in Eastern Oklahoma. Nathaniel and his son McKee settled at Mountain Fork, later called Eagle town, Red River County. Nathaniel died there Oct. 19, 1833. After they settled in Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory, which was to become Oklahoma. Rhoda Folsom died in 1837. David then married Jane (Jincy) Ball in 1841. David had a large influential family and in religion and tribal politics. His daughter Susan was the wife of the governor of the Chickasaw tribe.David’s son Loring S.W. Folsom, married Melvina Pitchlynn about 1842 in Colgate Co., I.T. His son, Col. Sampson N. Folsom, was an officer in the Choctaw Regiment in the Confederate Army. Many Folsom descendants went on to achieve prominence because of public service in the tribe, in law and in the ministry. ((COO). None of these were more beloved or accomplished, however, than David, who died at the age of 56. He was buried at Fort Towson cemetery. His tomb inscription reads , "He being dead yet speaketh." Sources: 1. Chronicles of Oklahoma, vol.4, 1926. 2. "Choctaws and Missionaires in Mississippi, 1818-1918" by Clara Sue Kidwell, 1995, University of Oklahoma Press. 3. New England Historical and Genealogical Register, April 1888. 4. "The Rise and Fall of the Choctaw Republic," by Angie Debo, 1934, University of Oklahoma Press.