Miami Indian Territory and Land Cessions
It has been correctly said that the Miamis were of the Algonquin family. whose dominions extended from the most eastern extremity of New England westward to the waters of the Mississippi, embracing the territory north from the Gulf of Mexico to the land of the Esquimaux Everywhere throughout this vast expanse, branches of their primitive family were to be found, tracing their lineage back to the parent stock. But, while it is true that they were descendants in direct line " of those who greeted the colonists of Raleigh at Roanoke, of those who welcomed the Pilgrims at Plymouth," they only sustain that relation in common with numerous other kindred tribes, and are only entitled to special consideration because of their enjoyment, by inheritance, of more of the elements in affinity with the parent stem than their less consanguineous neighbors, being, also, more powerful in competition with them. Bancroft says, too: "The Miamis were more stable, and their own traditions preserve the memory of their ancient limits, illustrated by the regular tracing of Little Turtle. at the treaty of Greenville, elsewhere noted. The same reputable historian says further: “ The forests beyond Detroit were at first found unoccupied, or, it may be, roamed over by bands too feeble to attract a trader or win a missionary; the Ottawas, Algonquin fugitives from the basin of the magnificent river whose name commemorates them, fled to the Bay of Saginaw and took possession of the whole north of the peninsula as of a derelict country; yet the Miamis occupied its southern moiety, and their principal mission was founded by Allouez, on the banks of the St. Joseph, in the limits of the present State of Michigan.” In 1670, the Miamis were the most powerful confederacy in the West, when, it is said, an army of five thousand men could be called into the field. It is also stated that, in the early part of the eighteenth century, the Pottawatomies had crowded the Miamis from their dwellings, at Chicago. The intruders came from the islands near the entrance of Green Bay, and were a branch of the great nation of the Chippewas. That nation, or, as some write, the Ojibwas, held the country from the mouth of Green Bay to the head waters of Lake Superior. and were early visited by the French at Sault St. Mary and Chegoimegon." Notwithstanding the fact that they met with occasional reverses, they continued‘ to be a leading and influential tribe, leaving the impress of their name on many of our Western rivers.
The great treaty entered into by the Miamis and the Commissioners on the part of the United States, under the provisions of which the first important cession of territory in this part of Indiana was made, was concluded on the 6th of October, 1818, at St. Mary’s, Ohio. The boundaries of the territory embraced in this cession were substantially the following: “Commencing near the town of LaGro, on the Wabash, where the Salamonie unites with the Wabash River; running thence through Wabash and Grant Counties into Madison County, its southeast corner was about four miles southeast of Independence, at the center of Section 17; thence running south of west, with the general course of the Wabash River, across Tipton County, close to the town of Tipton, just north thereof, to where it intersects a line running north and south from Logansport, which is the western boundary of Howard County, one mile west of Range line No. 1, east; thence north to Logansport; thence up the Wabash to the mouth of the Salamonie, the place of beginning. There was contained within these boundaries 930,000 acres. The greater part of this reservation remained in the hands of the Indians until November, 1840, when it was relinquished, being the last of their claims in Indiana.
By the treaty of October 23, 1826, held at Paradise Springs, known as the old “ Treaty Grounds," the chiefs and warriors of the Miamis, in council with Lewis Cass, James B. Ray and John Tipton, Commissioners representing the United States, ceded to the latter power "all their claim to lands in the State of Indiana, north and west of the Wabash and Miami Rivers, and of the cession made by the said tribe to the United States, by the treaty concluded at St. Mary's, October 6, 1818." By further provision of the same treaty, the State of Indiana was authorized to lay out a canal or road through any of the reservations, and for the use of a canal, six chains along the same were appropriated.
By treaty of November 6, 1838, they made a further cession to the United States of certain lands reserved by former treaties. Finally, on the 28th of November, 1840, they relinquished their right to all the remaining lands in Indiana, except certain specific reservations, for which they re ceived the sum of $550,000, and agreed to vacate these lands within five years. They did not move, however, until 1847.
