IV. INDIAN TREATIES.

 

Among the treaties made between the government and the various tribes of Indians then occupying this part of the Northwest Territory a number of reservations were set off to various bands of the different tribes. Those who occupied the territory now known as Marshall County were the Pottawattomie tribe of Indians; they were divided into bands and governed by chiefs.

 

The largest reservation was called the "Me-no-mi-nee reserve." It was located beginning about a mile west and north of Plymouth, near where the Catholic cemetery is located. The east line ran directly south to a point about a mile south of Wolf Creek Mills, thence about three miles and a half west, thence north to the north line and east to the starting point. It contained twenty-two sections, or 14,080 acres in all, and embraced within its boundaries Pretty Lake, Twin lakes, and a considerable portion of Yellow river southwest of Plymouth. The most noted Indian village in the county (Menominee) was located on this reservation near Yellow river and near Twin lakes. Here a treaty was negotiated which will be noted further on.

 

There was another small reservation containing several sections located on Maxinkuckee lake, beginning a short distance south of where Mr. Van Schoiack formerly lived, thence north along the water's edge of the lake to about where the Peru point now is, thence east far enough to take in the town of Maxinkuckee. It was called Neeswaugee and Quashqua reservation. All the summer cottages from a short distance north of the Peru clubhouse, now the Brownell cottage, to the division line between Mr. Van Schoiack and Mr. Edwards are in what was once this reservation.

 

Adjoining the Neeswaugee and Quashqua reservation on the south and extending south a considerable distance into Fulton County was what was called the Aubenaube reservation. Next to the Menominee it was the largest reservation in the county. It contained ten or twelve sections in this county and quite a number in Fulton County. It extended east from the lake five or six miles.

 

Immediately east of Aubenaube reserve was what was called Mankekose reserve, containing four or five sections. These are all the Indian reservations in the county of which any record has been kept.

 

On December 4, 1834, a treaty between William Marshall, commissioner on the part of the United States, and Comoza, a chief of the Pottawattomies and his band, was concluded on the banks of this lake, which is spelled in the document "Mux-ee-nie-kuc-kee." By this treaty the Indians ceded to the United States two sections of land reserved for them by the second article of the treaty between the United States and the said Indians on the Tippecanoe river October 26, 1832, and they further agreed to yield peaceable possession within two years, and in consideration of the sum of

 

36                                            HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.

 

$400 in goods and an annuity of $400 for one year. The treaty was signed by William Marshall, Neeseeawquet, Comoza, Ah-he-pah-am-sa, Pawpee, and was witnessed by J. B, Duret, secretary of the commission, and by Cyrus Taber and Joseph Barron, interpreters.

Another treaty was made August 5, 1836, at the camp near Yellow river known as the Menominee village, near Twin lakes, between Abel C., Pepper on the part of the United States, and Pe-pin-a-waw, N a-ta-ka and Mac-a-ta-ma-ah, chiefs and headmen of the Pottawattomie tribe of Indians and their bands. By this treaty the Indians ceded twenty-two sections reserved for them, for which the government agreed to pay the Indians the sum of $14,080 in specie after the ratification of the treaty. It was further agreed that the chiefs and headmen and their bands should remove to the country west of the Mississippi river provided for the Pottawattomie nation within two years. At the request of the band entering into this treaty it was stipulated that after its ratification the United States should appoint a commissioner who should be authorized to pay such debts of the band as might be proved to his satisfaction to be just, to be deducted from the amount stipulated to be paid for the land ceded.

 

The treaty was signed by Abel C. Pepper as the agent of the United States, and the following Pottawattomie chiefs:

Pee-pin-a-waw,                            Pash-po-ho,                          Pah-siss,

Qua-taw,                                             Pam-bo-go,                          W ee-wis-saw ,

Na-ta-ka,                                             I-o-wah,                            Ma-che-saw,

Kan-kaw-kay,                                     Co-qua-wah,                                 Nas-waw-hah,

Mac-a-taw-mo-way,                                  Mup-a-hue,                             Mas-saw,

Pis-saw,                                              See-co-ese,                                    Ash-kum,

Wi-aw-koos-say,                             O-kah-maus,                          Me-shaw-ki-to-quah,

Nas-waw-kay,                                     Nu-bosh,                           Ku-waw-nay.        

Te-cum-seh,                                       J o-quiss,

 

These names were taken down by the interpreter, as the Indians did not know how to spell or write, and the interpreter spelled them according to the sound as well as he could, and it is not strange that there should be many ways of spelling different names and places bearing Indian names. The reader will undoubtedly see in Kan-kaw-kay, our present Kankakee; in I-o-wah, the state of Iowa; in Ku-waw-nay, the town of Kewanna, in Fulton County; Nas-waw-kay, and Nas-waw-hah, brother chiefs were what finally came to be in English "N ees-wau-gee."

 

None of the foregoing chiefs, except Pee-pin-a-wawi Na-taw-ka and Mac-a-taw-may-ah, had any interest in the twenty-two sections named in the treaty. The securing of their names to the treaty was more as a blind to make it appear that they really had some interest in the reservation than for any other purpose. This was done because Chief Me-no-mi-nee, the principal owner of the reservation, refused to sign the treaty or become a party to it in any way. The names of these chiefs were readily secured, because most or all of them were indebted to the white traders and schemers for articles which they had sold the land, and for which they could get no pay unless they were connected with the treaty and filed their claims with the commissioner and had them paid out of the amount the government was

 

HISTORY OF MARSHALL COUNTY.                                     37

 

to pay the Indians for the twenty-two sections of land ceded. This was the final result of it. The white traders secured the allowance of their claims which were paid out of the amount the government agreed to pay for the reservation, and the Indians received just that much less. And to make the matter worse the government agents dickered with these three principal Indian chiefs for the 14,000 acres of land at $1 an acre instead of $1.25, the regular price. So in this way the Indians were cheated out of $3,500, besides the fraudulent claims that were allowed and paid out of the amount agreed to be paid for the Reservation. Before the two years expired in which the Indians had to vacate the reservation, the white traders and schemers had sold the Indians enough whisky, tobacco, beads, red calico and trinkets of no practical value (in fact, a detriment to them), at exorbitant prices, to eat up all the government had paid them for the reservation, and when the time came for them to be driven away west of the Mississippi river they had not a cent of the $14,080 left. No wonder Menominee, who had not disposed of his interest in the reservation, when the government agents and soldiers came to forcibly remove him west of the Mississippi cried aloud in the agony of his heart: "My God, has it come to this?"