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                                                                                                                                             Red Clay Jan. 26, 1839
                                Mr. John Howard Payne,
                                                        Dear Sir,
                                                                        From an incidental remark the other day, I thought I might have a letter in the Post Office at Calhoun. I took the earliest opportunity to ascertain if it were so, and found yours of Nov. 7. had been lodged there several months. We often meet with similar difficulties in obtaining letters from distant friends, therefore have requested that our address be Cleaveland, East Ten.  There we ought to have found your letter, as that post office is nearer than any other to Red Clay.
  Had it come to hand, in due course of Mail, it would have been after Mr. Ross and his people were beyond my reach, so that they could have been no help in your present engagement, in proceeding with their History; but I could, in or measure, have relieved your mind of uncertainties, which must have been very perplexing. I have often thought of your laudable undertaking, and have not failed to sympathise with you, knowing how much you needed assistance from the friends of Cherokees in this region. But in looking round to devine some method to give you help it seemed that everyone, competent to such a task, had his head, heart and hands completely filled in striving to keep this poor oppressed people from being crushed into the dust. If some one, to gather facts, could have been placed among us from the 23 of May till the last of the Cherokees set their faces towards the West, then followed on with them to behold their misery and sorrows on their journey, the knowledge thus gained, would be of unspeakable value to place before the public. Besides recording what took place in their time, materials, to fill the deficient Chapters of your History, could have been obtained from the aged Cherokees, who had been gathered into camps, and who will soon leave this stage of action, and such knowledge, lost to the world. 
  I am much at a loss to judge what course I ought to pursue in reference to that part of your letter where you are wishing for materials to fill vacancies in your History. You say, "They endeavor to convey to Mr. Ross my impression, that the Second Chapter of which I speak ought to be very carefully prepared." If Mr. Ross was to attend to that, I am pretty sure he has failed in doing it, from the ixtreme pressure of his business. Of what you saw in Cherokee Council, you can form but a faint idea of the labours and perplexities that have fallen to his lot, since he returned from Washington I have sometimes been astonished that he could preserve composure of mind, sufficient to transact business as all. When he returned from Washington, he found his people all prisoners, and considered himself one among the rest. He was however permitted to hold a general council with them in which they still protested against the treaty, though came to the conclusion to take the charge of their own removal, which