Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/48

 their perpetrators might be immediately removed. Accordingly, early in 1832 he went to Washington city and presented such a statement as resulted in an investigation of the conduct of no less than five agents and sub-agents and their prompt removal. These agents and sub-agents had powerful friends in Congress. Instigated by mortified pride, they crowded the journals of Arkansas with infamous libels upon Houston's character. They never forgave him the crime of tearing away the mask from a band of leagued land pirates, and they lavishly used their money with a venal press to overwhelm him with infamy. A hostile majority controlled Congress at that time and used the most strenuous exertions to crush General Jackson; but the heroic old man smiled on the shafts of calumny which were hurled harmlessly at him; and 'midst the waves of malignity which surged around him, untouched, unscathed, he calmly gazed upon the futile efforts of his political foes. But a young hero was the sworn friend of the President. If they could not strike General Jackson directly, they might injure him through his personal friend. All the foes of General Jackson were successfully rallied against him. He had proved incontrovertibly against them some startling facts. The agents had been contractors for furnishing Indian rations. To multitudes only a scanty and insufficient supply of food had been supplied, and through their neglect or cupidity, some of the Indians had actually died of starvation. As there was but one point in the two nations (Creeks and Cherokees) where rations were issued, the emigrants, as they could not make a crop, were compelled to locate in a most unhealthy district of country, where only their rations could be obtained. The exposure of this grievous wrong aroused the fiercest malignity of the desperate men, determined on injuring General Jackson and crushing General Houston.

The truth of history requires that names shall not be suppressed. Hon. Wm. Stansberry, of Ohio, a gentleman remarkable at that time for his personal animosity toward General Jackson, was selected as the file leader of the crusade against General Houston. He had been elected as a friend of the President, but was induced to become the instrument of wiser, if not better men, to make the onslaught. In his place, as representative of Ohio in the House of Representatives, he boldly charged General Houston with an attempt to obtain a contract for Indian rations fraudulent in character and design, and as boldly insinuated that the then Secretary of War and even General Jackson were involved in the attempt to defraud.

All sorts of calumny had been heaped upon Houston. He had hitherto borne all in silence; but his forbearance now forsook him. That the integrity of his bnst personal and political friend should be assailed by a member of Congress, without shadow of evidence, was