War of 1812 Era · 1809

Convention with the Weas, Oct. 26, 1809

ID T-0049

Date 1809-10-26

Articles 2

Instrument Note

Parties

United States and the Wea Nation

Context

Executed at Vincennes on October 26, 1809. The Wea — a Miami-affiliated nation in the Wabash valley — had been party to multiple Harrison cession instruments. This convention specifically addressed their concurrence with the Fort Wayne cession of the month before.

Significance

Two articles confirming the Wea's consent to the Fort Wayne cession and establishing specific additional payments to Wea leaders. The same structure as T-0048: a separate instrument for a nation that required additional inducement to sign on to the main treaty's terms.

Legal Observation

T-0047, T-0048, and T-0049 were executed within four weeks, all arising from the same Fort Wayne negotiating session. Three separate instruments, three separate sets of obligations. In the legal record, they appear as orderly sequential transactions. In practice, they were the fractured result of a single negotiation in which different nations required different consideration to agree to a transaction some of them had refused to enter on the first offer.

shall within one year from the date hereof, be built in the Cherokee country, for the use of the nation, at such place as shall be considered most convenient; that the said Cherokees shall be furnished with a machine for cleaning cotton; and also, that the old Cherokee chief, called the Black Fox, shall be paid annually one hundred dollars by the United States during his life.

ARTICLE III

It is also agreed on the part of the United States, that the government thereof will use its influence and best endeavors to prevail on the Chick- asaw nation of Indians to agree to the following boundary between that nation and the Cherokees to the southward of the Tennessee river, viz. beginning at the mouth of Caney Creek near the lower part of the Muscle Shoals, and to run up said creek to its head, and in a direct line from thence to the Flat Stone or Rock, the old corner boundary. But it is understood by the contracting parties that the United States do not engage to have the aforesaid line or boundary established, but only to endeavor to prevail on the Chickasaw nation to consent to such a line as the boundary between the two nations. TREATY WITH THE CHEROKEES. 1807. 103

ARTICLE IV

It is further agreed on the part of the United States that the claims Farther agree- which the Chickasaws may have to the two tracts reserved by the first ment. article of this convention on the north side of the Tennessee river, shall be settled by the United States in such manner as will be equit- able, and will secure to the Cherokees the title to the said reservations. [In the fifth line of the first article, the words, at the point of an island called Chickasaw Island; in the twentieth line of the same article, the words, including John D. Chesholm, Au, tow, we, and Cheh Chuh; and in the fifth line of the third article, the words, up said creek to its head and, were interlined before the signing and sealing of these presents. ]

Done at

the place and on the day and year first above written. HENRY DEARBORN. Double Head, John Jolly, James Vann, John Lowry, Tallotiskee, Red Bird, Chu, lioa, John Walker, Sour Mush, Young Wolf, Turtle at home, Skeuka, Ka, ti, hu, Sequechu, John M:Lemore, Wm. Shoury. Broom,

Source: U.S. Statutes at Large, Vol. VII. Edited by Richard Peters, Esq. Boston: Charles C. Little and James Brown, 1846. Reprinted by Dennis & Co., Inc., Buffalo, N.Y., 1962. Source lines 10339–10398.