Expansion Era · 1815

Treaty with the Teetons, July 19, 1815

Concluded at Brownstown in

ID T-0055

Date 1815-07-19

Articles 1

Instrument Note

Parties

United States and the Teton Sioux

Context

Executed July 19, 1815 at Portage des Sioux, Missouri Territory. One of a series of instruments with nations west of the Mississippi — the first major treaty-making with the nations of the upper Missouri. The Teton Sioux (Lakota) occupied the plains of present-day South Dakota and Nebraska.

Significance

One article: peace, protection formula, and reaffirmation of prior treaty relations. The instrument is the first formal U.S. treaty with the Teton Sioux in this volume. The protection formula appears — the Teton acknowledge themselves 'under the protection of the United States and no other nation.' The U.S. was at this point claiming sovereignty over Lakota territory by virtue of the Louisiana Purchase, despite having no physical presence in most of it.

Legal Observation

The Teton Sioux signed a protection formula in 1815 for territory the United States would not reach militarily for another thirty years. The treaty was a claim — the U.S. asserting legal jurisdiction over a relationship that did not yet have physical reality. The legal record shows U.S. treaty relations with the Lakota beginning in 1815. The political reality of those relations would not begin until the Fort Laramie era of the 1850s.

tribes, North West of the river Ohio, of the one part, and the Sachems, Chiefs, and Warriors of the Chippewa, Ottawa, Pot- tawatamie, Wyandot, and Shawanoese nations of Indians, of the other part. Articte J. Waereas by a treaty concluded at Detroit, on the seven- teenth day of November, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and seven, a tract of land lying to the West and North of the river Miami, of Lake Erie, and principally within the territory of Michi- gan, was ceded by the Indian nations, to the United States; and whereas the lands lying on the south eastern side of the said river Miami, and between said river, and the boundary lines established by the treaties of Greenville and Fort Industry, with the exception of a few small re- servations to the United States, still belong to the Indian nations, so that the United States cannot, of right, open and maintain a convenient road from the settlements in the state of Ohio, to the settlements in the territory of Michigan, nor extend those settlements so as to connect them; in order therefore to promote this object, so desirable and evi- dently beneficial to the Indian nations, as well as to the United States, the parties have agreed to the following articles, which when ratified by the President of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate thereof, shall be reciprocally binding. AnTrcLE II. The several nations of Indians aforesaid, in order to promote the object mentioned in the preceding article, and in considera- tion of the friendship they bear towards the United States, for the liberal and benevolent policy, which has been practised towards them by the government thereof, do hereby give, grant, and cede, unto the said United States, a tract of land for a road, of one hundred and twenty feet in weadth, from the foot of the rapids of the river Miami of Lake Erie, to the western line of the Connecticut reserve, and all the laud within one mile of the said road, on each side thereof, for the purpose of establishing settlements along the same; also a tract of land, for a road only, of one hundred and twenty feet in weadth, to run south- wardly from what is called Lower Sandusky, to the boundary line es- tablished by the treaty of Greenville, with the privilege of taking at all times, such timber and other materials, from the adjacent lands as may be necessary for making and keeping in repair the said road, with the bridges that may be required along the same. AnrIcLE III. Tt is agreed, that the lines embracing the lands, given and ceded by the preceding article, shall be run in such directions, as may be thought most adviseable by the President of the United States for the purposes aforesaid. Artcore IV. It is agreed, that the said Indian nations shall retain the privilege of hunting and fishing on the lands given and ceded as above, so long as the same shall remain the property of the United States, TREATY WITH THE DELAWARES, ETC, 1809. Artictz V. The several nations of Indians aforesaid, do again ac- knowledge themselves to be under the protection of the United States, and of no other sovereign ; and the United States on their part do renew their covenant, to extend protection to them according to the intent and meaning of stipulations in former treaties.

Done at

Brownstown in the territory of Michigan this twenty-fifth day of November, in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and eight, and of the independence of the United States of America the thirty-third. WILLIAM HULL, Commissioner. Chippewas. Wap-me-me, or White Pigeon, Ne-me-kas, or Little Thunder, Ma-che. Puck-e-nese, or Spark of Fire, Wyandotts. Macquettequet, or Little Bear, Miere, or Walk in the Water, Shimnanaquette. I-yo-na-yo-ta-ha, or Joe, Ottewas. Ska-ho mat, or Black Chief, Kewachewan, Adam Brown. Tondagane. Shawanoese. Pottawatamies. Ma-ka-te-we-ka-sha, or Black Hoof Mogau, Koi-ta-way-pie, or Col. Lewis. Executed after having been fully explained and understood in presence of Reuben Attwater, Secretary of the territory of Michigan. James Witherell a Judge of Michigan territory. Jacob Visger, Judge of the district court. — Jos. Watson, Secre- tary L. M. T. Wm. Brown. B. Campau. Lewis Bond, A. Lyons, as to the Otta- wa chiefs. Whittmore Knaggs, William Walker, F. Duchouquet, Samuel Sanders, Sworn Interpreters. Attest, Harris Hampden Hickman, Secretary to the commission. To the Indian names are subjoined a mark and seal. Between the United States of America, and the tribes of Indians called the Delawares, Putawatimies, Miamies and Eel River Miamies. James Mapison, President of the United States, by William Henry Harrison, governor and commander-in-chief of the Indiana territory, superintendant of Indian affairs, and commissioner plenipotentiary of the United States for treating with the said Indian tribes, and the Sachems, Head men and Warriors of the Delaware, Putawatame, Mi- ami and Eel River tribes of Indians, have agreed and concluded upon the following treaty ; which, when ratified by the said President, with the advice and consent of the Senate of the United States, shall be binding on said parties. Art. Ist. The Miami and Eel River tribes, and the Delawares and Putawatimies, as their allies, agree to cede to the United States all that tract of country which shall be included between the boundary line established by the treaty of Fort Wayne, the Wabash, and a line to be drawn from the mouth of a creek called Racoon Creek, emptying into the Wabash, on the south-east side, about twelve miles below the mouth of the Vermilion river, so as to strike the boundary line established by the treaty of Grouseland, at such a distance from its commencement at

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 11321–11450.