[1] Other members of Cooley's party representing the U. S. government were: Elijah Sells, Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Southern Superintendency; William Harney, an Army officer who had spent most of the Civil War in Europe; Ely Parker, a Seneca chief and U. S. Army officer who had been the military secretary for General Grant; Charles Mix, secretary of the council and long-time chief clerk at the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Attendance was mandatory for all the tribes that had signed treaties with the Confederate States government—Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Cherokee, Shawnee, Delaware, Wichita, Comanche, Great Osage, Seneca, and Quapaw.
They were already aware that the government planned to take part of their lands in the territory, and realized that they had no bargaining power on that point.
[b] They were prepared to make peace with each other (they had agreed to that in principle at the Camp Napoleon Council, which the government refused to recognize), and they knew, of course, about the outlawing of slavery.
[6] Choctaw Chief Allen Wright suggested the term Oklahoma as the name for the Indian Territory under an intertribal council.
[7] Before the Fort Smith council adjourned, it was agreed that the delegations would reconvene in Washington D. C. in early 1866 to complete their individual treaties with the government.