WHEN Minnesota Territory was created in 1849, it embraced a large area, extending westward to the Missouri river. But of this large area only a small part could be occupied by the whites--a strip of territory ceded by the Sioux in 1837, between the Mississippi and St. Croix rivers and extending not so far north as the present city of Brainerd. All white settlement within the territory was confined to this area, and when the federal census of 1850 was taken Minnesota had a population of only 6077.
There was a loud and persistent demand for the privilege of settlement on the west side of the Mississippi and for the acquisition of the lands of the Sioux. Almost as soon as territorial government was begun, Governor Alexander Ramsey applied himself to the task, and the people of the new territory were unanimous in aiding their chief executive. The traders, who were a powerful influence in the affairs of the new territory and who formed a large part of the population, perceived in it the shortest way of collecting their claims against the Indians; the land speculators knew that it would open the door to limitless dealing in real estate; lumbermen looked longingly upon the pine forests then not within their reach; farmers anxiously awaited the time when they could push still farther west; and a numerous horde of vagrants, such as hover about frontier places, added their encouragement to plans to open the Sioux lands.
The first Legislature petitioned Congress for the purchase of the country west of the Mississippi, and in October, 1849, the Sioux were summoned to treat for the surrender of their lands. The council resulted in failure because only a few of the Indians attended. The matter was not allowed to drop and a treaty was finally accomplished in 1851.
In the spring of 1851 President Fillmore, at the solicitation of residents of Minnesota Territory, directed that a treaty with the Sioux be made and named as commissioners to conduct the negotiations Governor Alexander Ramsey, ex-officio commissioner for Minnesota, and Luke Lea, the national commissioner of Indian affairs. It was believed that the upper bands--the Sissitons and Wahpetons-- were less opposed to the treaty than the lower bands, and those were summoned to council at Traverse des Sioux July 1, 1851.
The upper bands did not arrive in numbers until July '18, and it was July 23 when a treaty was completed. By its terms the upper Sioux sold to the United States all their lands for $1,665,000, except a reservation twenty miles wide straddling the Minnesota river and extending from Lake Traverse to the Yellow Medicine river. 1 The government agreed to make annual payments of $168,000 for fifty years, of which $40,000 was to be in cash; to expend $30,000 for schools, mills, blacksmith shops, etc.; to remove the Indians to their new homes; and to provide them with subsistence for one year. A residue of $210,000 was to be paid to the chiefs in such manner as they elected, in settlement of their affairs with the traders.
On August 5 a second treaty, ceding the same lands, was signed at Mendota by the lower bands-M'deywakanton and Warpekute. The reservation provided for these bands was a continuance of the upper reservation and extended ten miles on each side of the Minnesota river from the Yellow Medicine river to the vicinity of the present city of New Ulm.2 There was undoubtedly sharp practice on the part of the whites participating in the treaty making, especially with regard to the matter of settling claims against the Indians by the traders. By the terms of the two treaties there were transferred from the possession of some 8000 Indians to the United States about 30,000,000 acres3 of some of the best land on the face of the earth at a cost of about twelve and one-half cents per acre. Nearly all of this was in Minnesota.
This early it seems to have been the purpose of the government---or at least of the commissioners negotiating the treaty---to maintain a watchful care over the Sioux and to undertake their civilization---a scheme which had never before been undertaken with any of the savages. In his report (November 3, 1851) to the commissioner of Indian affairs," Governor Ramsey said:
The treaties provide for their concentration in a more confined area, where they can be more readily controlled for their best interest and where at the same time the United States can more satisfactorily discharge the duty of protection which is due to them and without any increase of expenditure extend to a greater number the benefits of its measures and policies. Here, restricted within narrower limits, supplied with implements of husbandry and the arts, with manual labor schools established, with farms opened, with mills constructed and dwelling houses erected, they will be surrounded by a cordon of auspicious influences to render labor respectable, to enlighten their ignorance, to conquer their prejudices, to chasten and repress their nomadic inclinations, and to cultivate those habits of thrift and economy which follow in the train of individual property.
While the treaties had been successfully negotiated, they had yet to be ratified by the United States Senate. Southern senators were adverse to extending the area of settlement in the North and thus pave the way for another "free" state, and there was strong opposition to the treaty. Not until June 23, 1852, was a ratification voted by a slender majority, and then it was burdened with amendments which its opponents believed the Sioux would never agree to. The paragraphs providing for the reservations were replaced by a provision that the president should select new homes for the Minnesota Sioux outside the ceded territory. Governor Ramsey secured the signatures of the Indians to the amended treaty in September, 1852, and in February, 1853, President Fillmore proclaimed the treaties in force.
The reservations provided for by the treaties and eliminated by the Senate had a curious and vacillating treatment at the hands of the government. They were to have been surveyed, but were not. Meanwhile the Indians had been transferred to the reservations, and the president allowed them to remain there and did not select another site outside the territory. On July 31, 1854, he was authorized to confirm these lands to the Sioux forever. He did not do this, but the lands were officially recognized as the property of the Sioux by the Senate later. As a result complications arose which necessitated later treaties, the story of which will be told in chronological place.
After the lands were ceded settlers poured into the country west of the Mississippi, established homes, founded towns, and began the work of reclaiming the country from savagery. For some years the settlement did not extend to the western part of the territory, but in Southeastern Minnesota and along the Minnesota river up to the reservation limits there were a number of flourishing communities. Among the centers of population on the Minnesota were the villages of St. Peter, Mankato and New Ulm. There was some little delay in the establishment of agencies on the reservations. and in the meantime the first permanent white home was established in Yellow Medicine county.
In the autumn of 1852 Dr. Thomas S. Williamson, who had established the mission at Lac qui Parle in 1835 and who had labored among the Sioux there most of the time since, moved his family down the Minnesota river and became the first resident of Yellow Medicine county. His new home was on the reservation, on land which when surveyed was found to be the southwest quarter of section 24, Minnesota Falls township. The site was about one-half mile from the Minnesota river and not far from the school house of district No. 31. At this point he established a mission called Pajutazee,4 the Indian name for the Yellow Medicine river.
In the spring of 1853 Dr. Williamson there began teaching school, and that summer he began the erection of a school house---the third in the Minnesota valley---which was not completed until the next year. In a report of the mission dated September 26, 1854, Dr. Williamson said: "We have suffered much inconvenience ever since we have been here for the lack of a proper school house. We have a good frame, 16x20 feet, enclosed and covered, which we hope will be made comfortable before the Indians get back from the payment."
Dr. Williamson's church at Pajutazee had thirteen Indian communicants in 1854, of which seven had been members of his church at Lac qui Parle and six had been received on probation at the new location. The church and school of this pioneer missionary were maintained until the outbreak of the Sioux War, when Dr. Williamson and his family were forced to flee the country.
After the treaties had been put in force and the Indians had located on their reservations, the government undertook to carry out the provisions of the treaties and establish an agency on each of the reservations. For the lower bands an agency was located on the Minnesota river, about eight miles east of the present city of Redwood Falls, the place being designated Lower Agency, or Redwood Agency. For a time the agent who had charge of the Indians of both reservations resided there, but in 1858 he made his official home at the Upper Agency.
In Yellow Medicine county was the site of the agency for the upper bands and the place was referred to as Upper Agency, Yellow Medicine Agency, or simply Pajutazee. Its location was about two miles up the Yellow Medicine river from its mouth, on the north side, close to where in after years was founded the village of Yellow Medicine City, in the fraction of Sioux Agency township. The site was selected and the first buildings were erected in the summer of 1854. Here were government warehouses, the residences of the agent and employee of the government, and various shops and mills promised in the treaty stipulations. A half mile distant were stores of the traders, who dealt in goods salable to the Indians and, the agency employes.
This Upper Agency became a place of considerable importance and was virtually the capital of the Indian country. Here resided at little band of frontiersmen, far out in the Indian country and far from others of their race, without military protection and at the mercy of the most warlike tribe of Indians that inhabited the continent. It was at this capital of the Indian country that the upper bands were accustomed annually to assemble to receive their annuities, to hold council with the superintendent and agent, and to transact all their business with the government. Yellow Medicine county, which before had been of small importance in the affairs of the Indian country, now become the center of activities and many stirring events occurred within its boundaries.
At the time of the establishment of the agencies Governor W. A. German was the superintendent of Indian affairs for the Northwest and R. G. Murphy was Sioux Indian agent. The agent first established the Redwood Agency and in July, 1854, set out to select a site for the Sissiton and Wahpeton bands on the upper reserve, Governor Gorman having a little before this started men with plows and teams on the way. Agent Murphy had difficulty in obtaining men to proceed to such a distance into the Indian country, but on the first of July he contracted with Andrew Robertson as farmer for the upper bands.
Agent Murphy, Farmer Robertson and thirteen men started out from Redwood early in July with teams and implements for the Yellow Medicine country to select the site for the agency. The agent found it a matter of difficulty to make a selection. His instructions were to select a point that would provide for the future building of schools and mills in the vicinity, and as he found the country scarce in timber, he spent considerable time in exploring the upper country before choosing the site he did. He remained on the Yellow Medicine until August 28, when he returned to Redwood, leaving Mr. Robertson and his men to commence the buildings and make preparations for spending the winter at the new agency. All was not serene on the Yellow Medicine at this early day; the Sioux and Chippewas engaged in battle, and the prospects of war caused some of the white men to desert and others to take the stock to the Lower Agency for protection.
Farmer Robertson, in a report to Agent Murphy dated "Sissiton and Wahpeton Establishment, Yellow Medicine River," September 29, 1854, gave an account of the founding of the Upper Agency as follows: 5
Sir: I have to report that, in pursuance of orders from Governor and Superintendent W. A. Gorman, I went on the seventh of June last from St. Paul to this place, with two men, six yoke of oxen and two plows, to begin work for the Sissiton and Wahpeton Sioux under the treaty of twenty-third July, 1851. The journey, occupied twelve days. With the assistance of two other men sent up by Governor Gorman and a further supply of oxen, so much of the Indian field at Yellow Medicine as was not planted by the Indians was cross-plowed and sown with turnip seed. One addition to the same field, of about ten acres, was broken, and, at a short distance, five acres for an Indian who adopted the dress and habits of the whites and desired a separate farm. This Indian has now built himself a log house on his land, has made hay for his cattle, of which he possesses six head, purchased by himself, and is proceeding to get out fence during the ensuing winter.
The men then went to hay making until they became alarmed at the frequent report of Chippewas being in the neighborhood and the Sioux bringing in fifteen scalps, when two of them left and the others resorted to Redwood with the cattle for protection. Having received your appointment as farmer for the upper Sioux, I was employed until the twenty-eighth August in assisting to engage laborers, getting the necessary materials and transporting them to this place.
On the last mentioned date I received your order as to the location of this establishment and have since been actively employed in getting up the buildings necessary to shelter the men and cattle for the winter, cutting hay, hauling supplies, etc.
The Indians have expressed their willingness to work, have begun to cut logs for building houses, which they request me to haul during the winter, and are already urgent for a supply of blacksmith's work and agricultural implements to enable them to plant more extensively next spring.
I find the upper Indians much more impressed with the necessity of planting largely than the lower Indians. One band opened quite a new village about three miles from here, where they planted last summer with wooden hoes. In this way one woman has put away ten barrels of corn. . . .
To carry on the farming according to the stipulations of the treaty of 1851 will require a much more extensive supply of men, cattle and implements than we at present possess, and to do good they must be here before the termination of winter. . . .
A. ROBERTSON.
The destruction of the Lac qui Parle mission buildings by fire in March, 1854, and the fact that the government was building the agency on the Yellow Medicine led to the removal of that mission to Yellow Medicine county in the summer of that year. 6 The site selected by Missionary S. R. Riggs was on Hazel Run creek, only a short distance from the Minnesota river. It was some two miles northwest of Dr. Williamson's mission station and about four miles in a direct line northwest of the agency. Otherwise described, it was on the south half of section 15, Minnesota Falls township. The new station was called Hazelwood and it was maintained until the Sioux outbreak in 1862. During the eight years of its existence more and better buildings were erected there than at any other mission station among the Dakotas in Minnesota.
While the site for Hazelwood Mission had been selected in the summer of 1854 and the buildings started, it was September before Rev. Riggs moved his family there and took possession of the new house, which was still unfinished. In November I. F. Aiton was employed to teach the school established and he conducted it during the winter with an average attendance of ten pupils. In the fall most of the Indians went to Redwood Agency to attend the payment and few of them returned before the first of December.
The erection of a sawmill by Rev. Riggs met with considerable opposition by the Indians, but it was installed and began operations in December. Besides furnishing lumber for the mission buildings, the mill supplied lumber for the Indians in the erection of houses.
Because of the absence of most of the Indians during the fall of 1854, the attendance at Dr. Williamson's school was not large during the fall, but during the winter months there was an average attendance of twenty students.
During the winter of 1854-55 Farmer Robertson, who was in charge of affairs at the Upper Agency, Agent Murphy being at Redwood, spent the time with his men getting out rails and posts for fences and logs for houses, stables and cattle sheds. In the spring he broke 131 acres of land for the establishment and the Indians, 7 and during the summer he erected a number of buildings. For the agency he put up a large blacksmith shop, a house for the blacksmith, and a boarding house, 60x22 feet, for the occupancy of laborers. He assisted the Indians in the erection of ten log and one frame houses, hauling the logs and supplying the sash frames, glass and nails, while the Indians themselves did most of the work under the farmer's direction. In putting up the frame houses the Indians were assisted by Rev. Riggs, and Mr. Robertson gave much credit to both Rev. Riggs and Dr. Williamson for the improvements made by the natives.
Mr. Robertson referred to two Indian villages near the agency and a. small village near Wood lake. He reported good crops, especially of corn, and made the statement that the Indians would have at great abundance of food during the winter. Buffalo in large numbers were reported within three hours' walk of the villages. The farmer made a plea for the establishment of a school, none having yet been started by the government. Materials for saw- and gristmills were brought in during the year 1855 and a dam across the Yellow Medicine was completed, but the irons having failed to arrive, the mills were not started until the next year.
Considerable progress was.1nade by the missionaries during 1855. A boarding school for girls was authorized by the Board of Foreign Missions, and a building for the purpose was erected by Rev. Riggs. There were only a few students during the year. The sawmill operated under the direction of the missionary was better patronized. From it was furnished gratuitously lumber for floors for nine log cabins, and the Indians were allowed to purchase several thousand feet of sawed lumber in addition at the bare cost of sawing. Of the frame building mentioned by Mr. Robertson, Rev. Riggs said: "Simon Anawangmani now has a neat frame, 24x16 feet and ten feet high, giving him storage and sleeping room upstairs. The sills and sleepers he hewed, shaved the shingles and dug the cellar himself. The window sash, glass and nails were furnished him by the government, through the kindness of Mr. Robertson."
During the summer Rev. Riggs began the erection of a church, which, however, was not ready for occupancy until the spring of 1856. The Indians contributed $175 in money and work, $300 was raised by subscription from other sources, and $200 was donated by the board under which the mission was operated.
Dr. Williamson, in a report dated September, 1855, said:
. . . It is, however, painfully manifest to us that the Dakotas here are less disposed to send their children to school than they were a year or two ago. . . .
The females of the mission family spent much of their time in instructing the Dakota women in knitting, needle work, washing. ironing, etc., with good measure of success. In this department Miss Jane Williamson [sister of Dr. Williamson], who has had charge of the school, has been aided much by Miss Briggs and, since she left, by Miss Daws. The whole number who have attended the school here within the year of Indian blood is 55. . . .
After the establishment of the agency traders located in the vicinity for trade with the Indians. The first of these was Nathan Myrick. In 1855 Joseph Fortier, 8 who later was sheriff of Yellow Medicine county and a citizen of many years' standing, located at the agency and took employment with Mr. Myrick. Later he and Frank Stay opened a trading post on the southwest quarter of section 8, Sandnes township, on the Yellow Medicine river, where was living at the time of the massacre James W. Lindsay and another man.
The authorities in the Indian country encountered some little trouble with the upper bands in 1856. The chiefs and a large portion of their followers of three bands of Sissiton and Wahpeton Indians refused to remain on the reserve. As a punishment, they were deprived of their share of the annuities for the year, but they still refused to come back. In his report for 1856 Agent Murphy said: "The Indians generally have been very troublesome this year, and I am pained to have to state that they have foolishly begun to kill the cattle of the department. Five were destroyed in one night by the Sissitons and Wahpetons and one by the M'dewakantons and Wahpakutas."
During 1856 the most important "work at the Upper Agency was the opening of the saw- and gristmill on the Yellow Medicine, which began operations late in the spring. Because of scarcity of help and the low stage of water in the river, rapid progress was not made in manufacturing lumber, an average of 1000 feet of light wood and 750 feet of white oak being sawed per day. The Indians cut logs, which were sawed on shares, and completed the houses that had been started the year before and erected others. One thousand twelve acres of land on the upper reservation were plowed (some of it as far up the river as Lake Traverse and Big Stone lake), a fair crop was raised by the Indians, and there was grain sufficient to keep the Indians during the winter.
During the year Mr. Robertson erected a 30x20 foot house for the use of the physician, a carpenter shop, a stable, cattle shed, and other buildings for the convenience of the whites.
The church at Hazelwood was occupied in May, 1856, although not entirely completed. The female boarding school was in operation during the year, in charge of Mrs. Anne Ackley, who arrived at the mission in May. Dr. Williamson's school at Pajutazee was attended by fifty-eight Indians during the year, although the average daily attendance was only about ten.
Agent Murphy was replaced in October, 1856, by Charles E. Flandreau, who was in charge one year, and W. J. Cullen became superintendent of Indian affairs for the Northwest. During the winter of 1856-57 Agent Flandreau established a government school at the Upper Agency, which was conducted with an average attendance of sixteen pupils.
There was serious trouble on the reservation in 1857. The Indians were in an ugly mood, and only by the narrowest margin was prevented the massacre of all the whites on the Yellow Medicine. The prime causes were dissatisfaction on the part of the Indians with the administration of their affairs by the government, the interpretations of the provisions of the treaty of 1851, and the matter of the payment of the annuities. The dissatisfaction was intensified and the trouble brought to a head as the result of actions of government officials following the Spirit Lake massacre in the spring.
Inkpaduta, a renegade Sioux, and a following of fourteen warriors, with their squaws and children, with but slight ties with the annuity Sioux, for some years had lived apart from others of their tribe and had their headquarters on the upper Des Moines river. They became troublesome during the winter of 1856-57 and committed several outrages on the whites in Northwestern Iowa. They went on the warpath on March 8, 1857, killed about forty persons on Lake Okoboji and the vicinity, took four women captives, and on March 26 attacked the white settlement at Springfield, where is now situated the village of Jackson, Minnesota. There seven white people were murdered and three wounded. Inkpaduta and his band were repulsed before their work of carnage was completed and fled to the unsettled country to the west. Soldiers were sent to the scene of the massacre but did not pursue the Indians.
Some two months after the massacre at Springfield, Agent Flandreau, who was temporarily at the Upper Agency, learned of the presence in the vicinity of some of the Indians who had taken part in the massacre. He obtained from Fort Ridgely (located on the Minnesota river in Nicollet county) a detachment of seventeen men under Lieutenant Murry and on July 2 proceeded to the camp of Sleepy Eye, situated at a bend of the Yellow Medicine river, about five miles above the agency and probably on the north edge of Wood Lake township. The soldiers surrounded the three lodges of Indians found there. From one of the tents Makpeahoteman (Roaring Cloud), a son of Inkpaduta, and his wife broke forth and fled when they saw the soldiers. The man was shot and killed by the troops and the woman, surrendering herself, was taken to the agency for examination with the view of discovering the whereabouts of the remainder of the band.
The killing of Roaring Cloud and the retention of his squaw precipitated the trouble that had been brewing for some time. Members of Sleepy Eye's band and other Indians to the number of 500 surrounded the house of the physician of the agency, Dr. Daniels, where Agent Flandreau then was, and demanded the release of the squaw. They were insolent and threatened the lives of the whites. The agent and his employes were without adequate means of resistance and the woman was surrendered.
The next day Major W. J. Cullen, superintendent of Indian affairs for the Northwest, arrived at Yellow Medicine Agency and took the active management of affairs, Agent Flandreau departing for St. Paul to take part in the deliberations of the constitutional convention. Major Cullen at once armed and organized the employes of the agency for its defense and on the next day hastened down the river to Fort Ridgely for military support. Major Sherman of the Tenth Infantry had just reached the fort from Fort Snelling. With twenty-five men of his regiment and a battery he at once set out for the seat of trouble. With extraordinary energy he accomplished a forced march of forty-five miles, over ground at some points very difficult for the passage of ordnance, in a single day and night, arriving at Yellow Medicine on the morning of the next day.
On July 9 Major Cullen held a conference with the Indians at the Upper Agency and demanded the delivery of Inkpaduta and his band as the condition of the payment of annuities. This was regarded by the Indians as a great wrong visited upon the innocent for the crimes of the guilty, and the Sioux were insulting and excited. On the twelfth Major Cullen held a conference with the lower bands, without result.
On the thirteenth Colonel Abercrombie arrived at Yellow Medicine Agency from Fort Randall with four companies of United States troops---about 200 men,---and a company of thirty-fire men was sent to relieve the company with Major Sherman, who had been ordered to join his regiment on the way to Utah.
Major Cullen returned to the Upper Agency on the fourteenth, where, despite the presence of troops, matters were in a critical state. All the upper bands---about 5000 in number---were gathered about the agency and in addition some 200 lodges of the Yanktons and Yanktonais. There was great alarm and excitement among the whites at the agency. All work was suspended and many who had families sent them to safer places of abode.
A fight between the Indians and Major Sherman's troops was narrowly averted on July 15. One of the soldiers was stabbed--not fatally--by an Indian close to the camp of the troops. The commander took a firm stand and demanded the surrender of the Indian who had committed the act. The savages refused and showed fight, about 2500 of them being armed and apparently intent on beginning a massacre. Major Sherman got his battery in position and ready to fire, but the Indians finally weakened and delivered the prisoner.
The authorities at Yellow Medicine were in no position to enforce their demands for the surrender of Inkpaduta and his warriors, and the Indians knowing it refused to organize an expedition for the capture. However, through the efforts of Agent Flandreau, a band of 106 annuity Indians, under the leadership of Little Crow, accompanied by four half-breeds, was got together and on Ju1y 22 set out from Yellow Medicine in an effort to capture the renegade and his band. This war party was absent thirteen days. Little Crow alleged he pursued the Inkpaduta band to Big Dry Wood lake, twenty miles northwest from Skunk lake, that he killed three warriors, wounded one, and took two women and one child prisoner.
A council with the Sissiton and Wahpeton bands was held at Upper Agency August 10, participated in by Major Kintzing Pritchette, a special agent sent to investigate the troubles in the Indian country. The special agent also demanded the surrender of the murderers as the only means of securing the annuities, but the Indians declared they should not be held accountable for the deeds of Inkpaduta and his band and refused to comply with the further demands of the government agents.9 A similar council was held at the Yellow Medicine Agency September 1, but with futile result.
Those representing the government at the agency weakened and recommended that the annuities be paid,10 and there was no further effort to bring to punishment those who had committed the murders at Okoboji lake and Springfield. The Indians construed the action as one of weakness and assumed that the whites were afraid to pursue the matter further lest it terminate in disastrous results to the exposed settlements on the frontier. They became more insolent than ever and thereafter until their subjugation in the Sioux War they made trouble for the government employes. To the course pursued by the government agents at Yellow Medicine Agency in the summer of 1857 many authorities attribute one of the principal causes of the terrible massacre of 1862. In Charles S. Bryant's History of the Sioux Massacre is the following:
Little Crow and his adherents had found capital out of which to foment future difficulties in which the two races should become involved. And it is now believed, and subsequent circumstances have greatly strengthened that belief, that Little Crow, from the time the government ceased its efforts to punish Inkpaduta, began to agitate his great scheme of driving the whites from the state of Minnesota: a scheme which finally culminated in the ever-to-be-remembered massacre of August, 1862.
In the fall of 1857 Charles E. Flandreau was succeeded as agent by Joseph R. Brown, who had much experience with the Sioux. The new agent moved his headquarters from the Redwood Agency to that of the Yellow Medicine the next year.
In the spring of 1858 Agent Brown took a party of Sioux chiefs to Washington, where on June 19 was signed another treaty, which had an important bearing on the future relations between the Indians and whites and which in course of time resulted in further grievance by the Indians.11 It will be remembered that the treaty of 1851 provided for reservations extending from Lake Traverse to near the present site to New Ulm with a width of ten miles on each side of the Minnesota river; that the reservation provision was stricken out before the treaty was confirmed by the Senate and provision made for locating the Sioux in some other part of the country, the president to make the selection; that the president did not do this but that the Sioux were removed to the original reservations; that on July 31, 1854, the president was authorized to confirm the lands of these reservations to the Sioux forever, but that he did not do so. In this mixed state of affairs the government had always recognized the rights of the Indians to their reservations, as though they had been confirmed by the chief executive.
The treaty of 1858 introduced a new element of discord by making a distinction between the reservation lands lying on the south of the Minnesota river and those on the north. It provided that those on the south should be allotted in severalty, eighty acres to each, and that those on the north should "be subject to investigation," that is, to ascertain if the Indians had any right to claim and occupy them. The action of the Senate, after an investigation of the title of the Sioux to the reservations on the north side, was taken June 27, 1860, in the form of a resolution, which declared that "said Indians possessed a just and valid right and title to said reservations, and that they be allowed the sum of thirty cents per acre for the lands contained in that portion thereof lying on the north side of the Minnesota river, exclusive of the cost of survey and sale, or any contingent expense that may accrue whatever, which by the treaties of June, 1858, they have relinquished and given up to the United States." A careful perusal of the treaty of 1858, however, fails to show that the Indians did relinquish their lands on the north side of the river. This resolution of the Senate was put in force, and in 1860 those parts of the original reservations lying north of the Minnesota river were thrown open to settlement and whites began to build homes and establish residences in favored spots of the former reserve.
The treaty of 1858 provided a radical change in the manner of dealing with the annuity Indians, and an elaborate scheme for the civilization of the savages was undertaken. A civilization fund was provided, to be taken from the annuities and to be expended in improvements on the lands of such of them as should abandon their tribal relations and adopt the habits and modes of life of the white race. The lands were to be surveyed into farms, and eighty acres was to be allotted to each head of family who should comply with the provisions. On each farm was to be erected the necessary buildings, and farming implements and cattle were to be furnished. In addition to these favors the government offered to pay the Indians for such labors of value as were performed and to buy their surplus crops. Under the direction of Agent Joseph R. Brown these reforms were put under way within it short time after the adoption of the treaty.
In the spring of 1858 the Belfast, the first steamer to navigate the waters of the upper Minnesota,12 brought a cargo of supplies for the Upper Agency and unloaded at the mouth of the Yellow Medicine. The following account of the trip was published in the Granite Falls Tribune September 20, 1887, the facts having been supplied by Charles Halloran, a steward of the Belfast.
In May, 1858, Captain Force of the Belfast got orders to take a load of supplies to Forts Snelling and Ridge1y and the Indian agency at Yellow Medicine. After receiving her cargo, she set out for the comparatively unknown region of the wild West, steaming up the Father of Waters to the then small village of St. Paul, where the laughing water of the beautiful Minnesota empties.
Not much hardship was experienced on the voyage, as the boat was well equipped with everything necessary for such a trip, including considerable ammunition and guns. The boat was manned by a crew that was selected with a view of meeting hardship and perhaps adversity before her return to St. Louis, and with a spirit of adventure characterized by long experience and many trips up rivers that had never been visited by white men before. Day after day passed and the little craft crept steadily northward, winding her way through morasses and that part of the river bordered by timber, occasionally seeing a lodge of copper-colored natives camped on the bank where white men had never explored. She finally reached Redwood, where the captain was induced by the Indian agent to continue on to Yellow Medicine with supplies, as the roads were in bad condition for teaming.
Towards evening the Belfast tied to a tree at the mouth of the Yellow Medicine and discharged her freight. Many at the agency went down to see the sight, one that had never been witnessed before. After unloading and having made preparations for the return trip, she struck out over the water blue.
The Belfast had not gone far when she was compelled to recognize the salute of a craft that had followed close in her wake. This craft, made famous by the stories of all the early settlers, proceeded on. Being very lightly loaded and nothing impeding her progress, she managed to get as far north as Big Stone lake. When on the return she grounded a few miles this side of the lake, and the water suddenly falling, she was abandoned. The spot is today marked by her rotten hull that has decayed almost beyond recognition.
The Belfast meandered homeward without accident or other feature to make her career a great one, besides having the honor of being the first boat that came up the Minnesota so far as Yellow Medicine.
Thinking that perhaps some one of our readers may remember the episode and perhaps one or more of the crew, we name a few of the officers: Captain Force; Peter Hull, pilot; James and Charles Conley, engineers; William Carleton, clerk.
Almost immediately upon his return from Washington, Agent Brown set about the work of carrying out the provisions of the new treaty, and within a short time sixteen Indians had been induced to cut off their scalp-locks and put on white man's dress. In the latter part of July, 1858, he employed Frederick P. Leavenworth to survey the lands for allotment to the improvement Sioux. The surveyor laid out in eighty acre tracts the lands in the valley of the Yellow Medicine river, on both sides of the stream from the mouth to the reserve limits in the northwest corner of Wood Lake township, and along the southwest bank of the Minnesota from the mouth of the Yellow Medicine to Bad Rapids, near the site of the present city of Granite Falls. No improvements were made on the lands until the next year.
Major Brown also began an active campaign along educational lines, the only school on the upper reserve during the winter of 1857-58 having been taught at Hazelwood by John L. McCullough, with an average attendance of ten. On August 8, 1858, the agent appointed a superintendent of schools and directed that teachers be employed and schools opened at the Lower Agency and Redwood settlement for the lower Sioux, and at the Upper Agency, at Wahpaytoan's village, at Hazelwood, Lac qui Parle and Big Stone lake for the upper bands. He moved his headquarters to the Upper Agency, where a building had been erected for him and where he believed he would he in closer touch with all the bands.13 Other buildings erected at the agency in Yellow Medicine county were residences for the superintendent of schools and the family of the carpenter and a school house. The agent deplored the fact that there was no suitable building for council room and kindred purposes and in his report for 1858 said:
There is not a safe building on either reservation for the storage of property in charge of the agent previous to its issue to the proper subordinates or to the Indians; neither is there a building in which to council with the Indians when it becomes necessary, as is frequently the case, to meet 200 or 300 at a time. To remedy these deficiencies, I propose to burn a kiln of brick in the spring and erect a building at Yellow Medicine, the lower story to serve as a store room and the second story for a council room.
Some trouble was had with the Indians by reason of the introduction of whisky on the reservations by half-breeds, and the agent felt the necessity of some system of licensing the traders at the agencies, whereby they could be put under control, intimating that all of them were not satisfactory to the authorities.
A freshet in March, 1858, destroyed the dam across the Yellow Medicine, but it was repaired in a short time, and both the saw- and gristmills were in operation during the summer. Samuel Brown, who had been appointed superintendent of farming in the fall of 1857, said of the mill in his report for 1858: "This mill has, from its first erection, been a source of expense without profit, and during the last winter cost the department the labor of a millwright, two assistants and eight men, whose services have resulted in nothing but to swell the expense of this establishment."
In the spring of 1859, when the effort to put the civilization scheme into effect was made, great opposition on the part of the Indians developed, and there were troublesome times on the banks of the Yellow Medicine. The Indians disliked the idea of taking any portion of the general fund belonging to the tribes for the purpose of bringing about their "civilization," and the great majority of them didn't want to become civilized anyway. Those Indians who retained the blanket, and hence were called "blanket Indians," denounced the measure as a fraud. The chase to them was a God-given right; this scheme forfeited that ancient right, as it pointed unmistakably to the destruction of the chase. Especially the younger Indians were opposed to the proposed new order of things and declared that they would never submit to such humiliation.
To assist in starting the new plan Major Cullen, the superintendent of Indian affairs for the Northwest, came to the Upper Agency and brought with him a wagon train of 200 wagons loaded with supplies. The steamer Franklin Steele also brought other supplies, arriving at the Yellow Medicine June 20. To quell disturbances and protect the whites, two companies of infantry in command of Captains Sully and Steele, one battery in command of Major Sherman, and a troop of cavalry in command of Captain Davidson were brought to the agency and stationed temporarily in the vicinity.
About the first of July a council was held, participated in by Major Cullen, Major Brown and the military officers on the part of the whites, and by Little Crow, Standing Buffalo, Little Six and Medicine Bottle on the part of the Indians. Pierre Botteneau was interpreter. An agreement was reached after lengthy talks, but within a day or two trouble again started and the camp was in an uproar. Out of about 5000 Indians present, most of them, including all the younger men, repudiated their agreement and refused to allow the new scheme to be tried. A11 persuasions having failed, the battery was trained on the mob, which had the effect of calming the Indians, and terms were made, although the savages were not in a pleasant frame of mind.14
Not all the Indians were opposed to the new plans of the government, and some took kindly to agricultural life. Major Brown was enthusiastically - in favor of the new arrangement and the work progressed rapidly in 1859. Before the close of the year about 200 Indians, including many heads of families, had given up their wild life, adopted the white man's dress, shorn their scalp-locks, and settled down to farming. To these "civilized" Indians had been issued one hundred yoke of oxen, twenty-five cows, twelve pair of pigs, twenty-five plows and twenty wagons.
To house the farmer Indians the sawmills were kept busy manufacturing lumber,15 and the supply of timber was greatly reduced. The agent feared that the use of so much of the timber for lumber would deplete the fuel supply and declared his intention to erect brick houses in the future, stating that there was material of a good quality for the manufacture of brick in the vicinity. Seventy houses for the lower Sioux and fifty for the upper bands were framed at the mill and hauled out to the different locations, about one hundred being completed and occupied the next winter.
Each of the Indian homes was 16x20 feet and one and one-half stories high, was weather boarded, lathed and plastered. With each building went sufficient fencing to enclose a five-acre field. The actual cost of each house, including board fencing, was about $425. The Indians dug the cellars, hauled the frames from the mill, helped with the lathing, and mixed and carried mortar--for doing which they were paid wages.
N. R. Brown was appointed superintendent of agricultural improvements for the valley of the Yellow Medicine and that portion of the lower Sioux reserve between the Yellow Medicine and Rice creek on September 1, 1859, and to him was given the task of allotting the lands to the Indians. In his report for the year he said: "I have recognized the right of no Indian to land except those who have assumed the dress of civilization and have put up sufficient hay for their cattle during the winter and who assist in the construction of their own homes."
Agent Joseph R. Brown, who had been the father of the civilization scheme, was enthusiastic over the results. In his report to the superintendent dated September 10, 1859, he said:
The importance of the agricultural "improvement and civilization" progress among the annuity Sioux since my last annual report leads me to fear the result of a concise detail of the revolution which has taken place in regard to that branch of our Indian policy. The change manifested among the Sioux has been so extensive, so sudden, and so complete that it is difficult for us here, who have watched with deep anxiety the workings of the policy inaugurated under the present administration, to realize that the men now found performing the various labors pertaining to a prosperous agricultural life, dressed in the style of civilization, advocating the establishment of schools and conversing fluently and feelingly upon the various interests connected with man's improvement, are the same that one year ago were roving over the broad prairies with trap and gun, a blanket constituting the most important article of dress, denouncing the restraints of the school house and closing their ears against all arguments in favor of civilized life.
For the Upper Agency the principal improvement in 1859 was a warehouse, constructed entirely of brick manufactured near the agency (on the southwest quarter of section 29, of the fraction of Sioux Agency township). It was a two-story building, 24x50 feet, with a two-story addition, thirty feet square, for the use of the agent. Other smaller buildings, also of brick, were erected during the year.
Educational facilities were greatly enlarged during the twelve-month under the management of J. W. Jenkins, superintendent of schools for the Sissitons and Wahpetons. At the beginning of the year there were only two schools in operation, and those only for short periods. They were the Rush creek school (Dr. Williamson's mission) and the Hazelwood school (Rev. Riggs' mission). In the fall of 1859 schools were being conducted at Hazelwood by A. L. Riggs and N. A. Renville, with an average attendance of thirteen; at Rush creek by John McCollough, with an average attendance of twelve; at Yellow Medicine by Lydia Blair, with an average attendance of eight; at Lac qui Parle by S. B. Garvie; and at Big Stone lake by Gabriel Renville and Mary Renville. Besides these, a boarding school was conducted by Rev. Riggs with Mrs. Anna B. Ackley as teacher, and there was one at Rev. Williamson's mission conducted by Miss Jane Williamson, with seventeen students. A manual training school was opened at the agency November 1.
Among the events of the year was the death at the Lower Agency of Colonel Andrew Robertson, who had built the Upper Agency and who at the time of his death was the superintendent of schools for the lower bands. The blacksmith shop, of unhewn logs, at the upper agency was destroyed by fire May 29, 1859, bringing a loss of about $2000. William Allen was the blacksmith. The Rush brook sawmill was in charge of Calvin Hubbard. In his September report he stated that he had sawed 260,000 feet of lumber and that before he had taken charge 45,000 feet had been manufactured. The shingle mill in connection had been used but little.
While a gratifying number of the Sioux had become farmers and abandoned their former modes of living to some extent, all was not peace and harmony in the Indian country. A large majority of the Sioux had not yet become "civilized" and were bitterly opposed to the new order. The government authorities at the agency were not supplied with military protection and were in no position to protect the farmer Indians from the ravages of the blanket Indians, who persisted in their determination to remain followers of the chase and continue on the warpath.
When the chase failed, the blanket Indians resorted to their relatives, the farmers. They would pitch their tepees around the houses and begin the process of eating the more industrious out of house and home. When this had been accomplished the farmers, driven by the law of self preservation, would depart to seek such subsistence as the uncertain fortunes of the chase might yield. Then would the blanket Indians complete the destruction, destroying the fields, fences and houses to their hearts' content. The farmers were robbed of the fruits of their industry, and many became discouraged and disgusted with the system.
The authorities in the Indian country reported conditions and asked for troops to protect their wards. This was granted, and during the summer and fall of 1860 Captain A. A. Gibson with a small force of soldiers was stationed at the Yellow Medicine Agency.16 The presence of the soldiers had a beneficial effect, and while they were present the depredations were not so pronounced. Captain Gibson saw the necessity of the continued presence of troops at Yellow Medicine and in his report said:
The Upper Agency is in direct contact with the wild bands at the north and west. It has to stem the brunt of every shock, and for want of protection the "Hazelwood Republic," that commenced auspiciously, has already been broken up17 by the hostilities, the unchecked and still unpunished depredations and murders committed by the neighboring bands. If the troops be removed from this agency . . . it will have to be abandoned.
At the close of the year 1860 Agent Brown reported 118 families of Indians on the two reserves living in houses, farming and raising stock. On the upper reserve fifteen new houses for the Indians were erected during the year. All of these were of brick, each with a twenty-one foot front and seventeen feet deep, one and one-half stories high. Brick additions, 21x12 feet, were also added to the houses of John Other Day and Akipa. Some of the frame houses were destroyed by prairie fires.
During the year five new buildings were added to the group at the agency: A two-story manual training school, 75x25 feet, with bake house and oven attached; two two-story buildings for employes, one 40x20 feet, with a 12x15 foot kitchen, and one 37x20 feet, with kitchens on each end; one one and one-half story prison, 24x17 feet; one one and a half story stable, 44x17 feet. Captain Gibson's troops temporarily occupied the manual training school building, and the officers were quartered in the employes' buildings. For the erection of the buildings the Rush brook mill during the year sawed 58,000 feet of lumber, 125,000 shingles and 20,000 lath.
There was small attendance at three government schools during 1860. The Rush brook school was taught by J. L. McCullough, that at Hazelwood by A. S. Huggins, and the one at Red Iron's village by Mr. and Mrs. Jonas Pettijohn. A manual training school was started during the year and was attended by seven boys and five girls; it was in charge of J. B. Renville, Mrs. Renville and Miss Nelly Brown. The school at Dr. Williamson's mission, supported by the American Board Commissioners Foreign Missions and taught by Miss Jane Williamson, had an enrollment of twenty-three males and eighteen females. S. Brown was superintendent of schools for the upper bands.
In the summer of 1861 the administration of Abraham Lincoln provided a new set of officials for the Indian country. Colonel Clark W. Thompson became superintendent of Indian affairs and Thomas J. Galbraith became Sioux agent. The latter took charge of the agency on June 6 and located at Yellow Medicine. With him came many new employes, nearly all bringing their families. Among the employes at the Upper Agency during that and the following year were Nelson Givens, assistant agent; Mr. Goodell, farmer; Dr. J. L. Wakefield, physician; A. T. C. Pierson, superintendent of schools; M. M. Carson, carpenter; N. A. Miller, blacksmith; F. A. Cramsie and Edward Cramsie, assistant blacksmiths; Mr. DeCamp, contractor at sawmills; Mr. Ryder, contractor at brick plant.
Realizing the necessity of military protection, both Agent Galbraith and Superintendent Thompson urged their superior officers to have troops stationed at Yellow Medicine,18 but without avail. Conditions were about the same in 1861 as they had been the few preceding years. Agent Galbraith continued the policy originated by his predecessors and supported by the government, although he did not fully believe in the system and saw many defects. After the massacre he wrote of conditions at the agency previous to the outbreak as follows:
By my predecessor a new and radical system was inaugurated, and in its inauguration he was aided by the Christian missionaries and by the government. The treaties of 1858 were ostensibly made to carry this new system into effect. The theory, in substance, was to break up the community system which obtained among the Sioux, weaken and destroy their tribal relations, and individualize them, by giving each of them a separate home. . . . On the first day of June, 1861, when I entered upon the duties of my office, I found that the system had just been inaugurated. Some hundred families of the annuity Sioux had become novitiates, and their relatives and friends seemed to be favorably disposed to the new order of things. But I also found that against these were arrayed over 5000 annuity Sioux, besides at least 3000 Yanktonais, all inflamed by the most bitter, relentless and devilish hostility.
I saw to some extent the difficulty of the situation, but I determined to continue, if in my power, the civilization system. To favor it, to aid and build it up by every fair means, I advised, encouraged and assisted the farmer novitiates; in short, I sustained the policy inaugurated by my predecessor and sustained and recommended by the government. I soon discovered that the system could not be successful without a sufficient force to protect the farmer from the hostility of the blanket Indians.
During my term and up to the time of the outbreak, about 175 had their hair cut and had adopted the habits and customs of white men.
For a time, indeed, my hopes were strong that civilization would soon be in the ascendant. But the increase of the civilization party and their evident prosperity only tended to exasperate the Indians of the ancient customs and to widen the breach.
There was great activity at the Yellow Medicine Agency during the spring and summer of 1862. In the spring the agent purchased and brought to the reserve large quantities of farming implements, building material, goods, etc. In July Mr. Ryder had burned a kiln of 200,000 brick and had in condition for burning 100,000 more. Carpenters were employed in erecting more Indian houses, and it was the intention to put up fifty or more houses during the season, at a cost of $300 each. One of the most important improvements completed was the repairing of the road between Yellow Medicine and the Lower Agency and the construction of eighteen bridges on it. The work was completed about August 1, and the result, as stated by Mr. Galbraith, was "one of the best roads in the state." Seventeen of the bridges were common ones, built of oak timbers and covered with oak plank, all elevated above high water and ranging from twenty-two and one-half to fifty feet long. The other was a truss bridge, sixty-seven feet long, spanning Wood Lake creek, where a little later was fought the battle of Wood Lake.
In the spring of 1862 Parker I. Pierce, seventeen years of age, accompanied by a brother, walked from the Lower to the Upper Agency to work and has given us a picture of the establishment as witnessed by his youthful eyes. In telling of his arrival, in his book, Antelope Bill, he said:
The country west of us was very flat and we could see the Upper Agency and the American flag waving above it. This eight was refreshing; our journey's end was near. We came to the valley of the Yellow Medicine. The banks were skirted with low timber; it flowed on for a mile or so and discharged its waters into the Minnesota, forming very nearly two right angles at its mouth. We looked down into the valley. Here were the buildings of the traders. We passed by them and taking the trail which wound up and about the bluff came up the steep hill and reached our long desired resting place. We were at the government buildings. We went to the largest of these and inquired for the agent. . . .
About forty rods east from the agent's house was the government warehouse, built of brick and two stories high. In the rear were T. J. Galbraith's rooms. A little north was Dr. Wakefield's residence; northwest was the boss carpenter's residence, a large two-story brick building. East from our boarding house was Mr. Givens', the second agent, house, and also the house of Noah Sinks, the clerk.
Traders, four in number,19 were half a mile away, down below the hill. A mile or so away the Yellow Medicine flowed into the Minnesota river. There was timber on both streams and some on the bluff north of the agency. The government buildings stood on a high bluff, one side extending and spreading out upon the prairie westward.
Conditions were normal at the agency and throughout the Indian country until July, 1862, when there were indications that trouble might follow, as there always had been during the payment of the annuities. Quiet was restored again and affairs were moving in the even tenor of their ways when came the terrible Sioux massacre, which resulted in such fearful loss of life and changed the whole order of things.
2 - In the lower reservation were the present townships of Sioux Agency, about one-half of Wood Lake and a small part of Echo, in Yellow Medicine county.
3 - "The territory ceded by the Indians was declared to be: "All their lands in the state of Iowa and also all their lands in the territory of Minnesota lying east of the following line, to-wit: Beginning at the junction of the Buffalo river with the Red River of the North [about twelve miles north or Moorhead, in Clay county]; thence along the western bank of said Red River of the North to the mouth of the Sioux Wood river; thence along the western bank of said Sioux Wood river to Lake Traverse; thence along the western shore of said lake to the southern extremity thereof: thence in a direct line to the junction of Kampeska lake with the Tchan-ka.-sna-du-ta, or Sioux river; thence along the western bank of said river to its point of intersection with the northern line of the state of Iowa: including all islands in said rivers and lakes."
4 - Many and varied were the spellings of this name employed by those who visited the river In the early days and made their homes at the mission and agency. As Dr. Willliamson was an authority on the Sioux language and invariably used the spelling Pajutazee, that will hereafter be the orthography used in this work.
5 - This report and much of the data used in the preparation of the history of the agency and the missions of Yellow Medicine county were obtained from the reports of the commissioners of Indian affairs to the secretaries of the interior, on file in the library of the Minnesota Historical Society.
6 - "In June last Rev. S. B. Treat, one of the secretaries of the American Board Commissioners Foreign Missions, visited this mission [Lac qui Parle] among the Dakotas. It was then thought advisable, owing to the fact that the fire had consumed the greater part of the improvements at Lac qui Parle, as well as other circumstances of a different nature, to remove the station twenty-five miles down the Minnesota river, to the neighborhood of the rapids. Here, accordingly, buildings are in process of erection. A portable sawmill is now on the ground and will probably be in operation early in the winter. This move partly originated with and is undertaken in behalf of those at Lac qui Parle and also in this region who are desirous of making progress. The American Board incur the expense of the sawmill, partly to facilitate our operations in buildings, but chiefly to assist those who are anxious to better their conditions by living in more comfortable and convenient habitations and having their own individual fields-in a word, of making some approach to the habits and circumstances of civilized Christian men. . . . "-Report of S. R. Riggs, dated Mission Station at Lac qui Parle, September 1, 1854, to Agent R. S. Murphy.
7 - "In the spring I cross-plowed the Indian field of fifty acres and broke about five acres within the piece left unbroken last year. I also broke new lands on the bottoms to the extent or about twelve acres and have since broken pieces of about four acres each for eight Indians who are desirous of making separate farms, the land being plowed for them conditionally that they build each a log house near it and make their own fence. I have also broken about twelve acres for the establishment, which has been fenced and planted with potatoes, corn and oats. . . . I have also broken an additional field of twenty acres for the establishment, which will be ready for planting in the spring."--Robertson's Report. September 15, 1855.
8 - For a sketch of the life of Joseph Fortier the reader is referred to the biographical section of this volume.
9 - The spokesman of the Indians was Mazakuti Mani, who said:
"The soldiers have appointed me to speak for them. The men who killed the white people did not belong to us and we did not expect to be called upon to account for the deeds of another band. We have always tried to do as our Great Father tells us. One of our young men brought in a captive woman. I went out and brought in the other. The soldiers came up here, and our men assisted to kill one of Inkpaduta's sons at this place. The lower Indians did not get up the war party for you; it was our Indians, the Wahpetons and Sissitons. The soldiers here say that they were told by you that a thousand dollars would be paid for killing each of the murderers. We, with the men who went out, want to be paid for what we have done. Three men were killed, as you know. . All of us want our money very much. A man of another band has done wrong, and we are to suffer for it. Our old women and children are hungry for this. I have seen $10,000 sent here to pay for our going out. I wish our soldiers were paid for it. I suppose our Great Father has more money than this."
To which Major Pritchette replied:
"Your Great Father has sent me to see Superintendent Cullen and to say to him he was well satisfied with his conduct, because he had acted according to his instructions. Your Great Father had heard that some of his white children had been cruelly and brutally murdered by some of the Sioux nation. The news was sent on the wings of the lightning from the extreme north to the land of eternal summer, throughout which his children dwell. His young men wished to make war on the whole Sioux nation and revenge the death of their brethren. But your Great Father a just father and wished to treat all his children alike with justice. He wants no innocent man punished for the guilty. He punishes the guilty alone. He expects that those missionaries who have been here teaching you the laws of the Great Spirit had taught you this.
"Whenever a Sioux is injured by a white man your Great Father will punish him, and he expects from the chiefs and warriors of the Great Sioux nation that they will punish those Indians who injure the whites. He considers the Sioux as a part of his family; and as friends and brothers he expects them to do as the whites do to them. He knows that the Sioux nation is divided into bands; but he knows also how they can all band together for common protection. He expects this because they are his friends. As long as these murderers remain unpunished or not delivered up, they are not acting as friends of their Great Father. It is for this reason that he has withheld the annuity. Your Great Father will have his white children protected; and all who have told you that your Great Father is not able to punish those who injure them will find themselves bitterly mistaken. Your Great Father desires to do good to all his children and will do all in his power to accomplish it, but he is firmly resolved to punish all who do wrong."
10 - On August 18, 1857, Major Cullen wired the commissioner of Indian affairs: "If the department concurs, I am of the opinion that the Sioux of the Mississippi, having done all in their power to punish or surrender Inkpaduta and his band, their annuities may with propriety be paid."
Major Pritchette concurred in this opinion, and in a letter bearing the same date he wrote:
"No encouragement was given them that such a request would be granted. It is the opinion, however, of Superintendent Cullen, the late agent, Judge Flandreau, Governor Medary, and the general intelligent sentiment, that the annuities may now with propriety be paid, without a violation of the implied spirit of the expressed determination of the department to withhold them until the murderers of Spirit Lake should be surrendered or punished. It is argued that the present friendly disposition of the Indians is manifest and should not be endangered by subjecting them to the wants incident to their condition during the coming winter and the consequent temptation to depredation, to which the withholding their money would leave them exposed."
11 - Representing the Sissiton and Wahpeton bands, the signers of the treaty were Muzzahsha (Red Iron), Wamdupidutah (War Eagle's Scarlet Tail), Ojunl (Planter), Hahutanai (The Stumpy Horn), Mazzomanee (Walking Iron), Mazzakootemanee (Shoots Iron as He Walks), Uplyahidevaw (Chief of Lac qui Parle), Umpedutokechaw (Other Day) and Tchandupahotanka (His Pipe With Strong Voice).
12 - In 1841 a pleasure steamer made a trip up the Minnesota so far as Shakopee and was the first steamer to ply the waters of that stream. The next large vessel to navigate the Minnesota was the Anthony Wayne, which in June and again on July 18, 1850, made trips nearly to Mankato. The Nominee also navigated the stream for some distance that year. On July 22, 1850, the Yankee was run to near the mouth of the Cottonwood. The Belfast in 1858 was the first to go so far up as the Yellow Medicine.
In the sixties the Black Hawk, Favorite and Franklin Steele, fine side-wheel steamers, plied between St. Paul and Mankato on regular time. There were also many stern-wheelers in the regular trade, and occasionally one would run up on the upper river.
13 - "During the present fall a building has been erected at Yellow Medicine for the use of the agent. This is much more convenient, as the agent must of necessity pay frequent visits to the different locations within the agency, and he should therefore be as near the center of the reservation as circumstances will permit. The Yellow Medicine is the line between the two reservations, from which the agent may visit the upper or lower reservation at pleasure. . . .
"By locating at the Yellow Medicine, the Indians upon either reservation may visit the agent on the edge of their own reservation. This location, therefore, is not only more convenient for the Indians, but also relieves the agent from much unnecessary travel."--Report of Agent Brown, September 30, 1858.
14 - An incident of these perilous times has been told. by Adam Bohland, who was in the Indian country in the summer of 1859 as a member of a surveying party. In the spring of that year Henry Hutton and C. H. Snow were awarded government contracts for surveys in the present counties of Redwood, Yellow Medicine and Lac qui Parle: to run the western boundary line of Minnesota; to survey the Pipestone Indian resrvation of one square mile; and to run the lines of the Yankton reservation on the Missouri river. The party for the survey of the western boundary line and the Yankton reservation, twenty-five in number, was organized in St. Paul and early in June left for the Indian country on the steamer Time and Tide, Captain Louis Robert.
The surveyors arrived at the Upper Agency June 29 and remained until July 2, being witnesses of the troubles there. On the second day after leaving, a courier sent by Major Cullen requested their return, as the Indians were again making trouble and it was considered unsafe for the surveyors to continue. After the savages had been quieted again, Mr. Hutton and his party proceeded with their work. Mr. Bohland has written of the trip:
"At the Yellow Bank river we met a party of Indians from a village at Big Stone lake. They requested us to quit surveying and return to the agency. Being well armed--each man was provided with a musket and sufficient ammunition--we did not pay any attention to their threats and went on. While camping at the font of Big Stone lake, where we had previously placed an iron monument, a large delegation of Indians from the nearby village waited on Mr. Hutton and requested him not to proceed any further. They claimed that this was their best hunting ground and by penetrating it we would drive away the buffalo and other game. Having been unsuccessful with their demands, the Indians finally left our camp with vows of vengeance.
"The following day we proceeded to survey the boundary line from the iron monument at the foot of Big Stone lake in a southerly direction to the Iowa line. In spite of the critical situation, we now entered a vast wilderness where roamed thousands of buffalo and which was dominated by the nomadic and warlike Sioux, who, only a short time previous, had massacred numerous settlers near Spirit lake. While surveying the Yankton Indian reservation on the Missouri river, episodes similar to those we experienced with the Indians at Big Stone lake occurred. Having completed the aforesaid survey, we returned to St. Paul, where we arrived the second week in November."
15 - Three steam sawmills, purchased in New York, were installed during 1859. Two of the mills were for the lower Sioux and one, located at Rush brook, a short distance from the agency, was for the upper Sioux. The latter mill was in operation to the first of September. In the fall it was turned into a gristmill, and during the winter months it was employed in grinding grain.
16 - ". . . Upon representations made to this bureau, that a portion of these Indians who were adverse to abandoning their tribal costume and habits had intimidated those of the tribe who had practically applied themselves to agriculture, and with a view to protect the latter in their laudable efforts for improvement, the war department was requested to place a company of United States troops at the agency at Yellow Medicine for the assistance of the agent in protecting the 'farmers' in their vocations. This request was promptly acceded to, and the presence of the troops has resulted in affording the requisite protection. The disaffected individuals of the tribe exhibited their hostility to the 'agriculturists' and their opposition to the peaceful pursuits of civilization by leaving the reservation on war and hunting excursions."--Report of A. B. Greenwood, commissioner of Indian affairs, to J. Thompson, secretary of the interior, November 30, 1860.
17 - When Rev. Riggs located the mission in Yellow Medicine county in 1854, he formed a sort of republican government among the savages, but, as intimated by Captain Gibson, it was a visionary scheme and resulted in failure.
18 - "I recommend and strongly urge that a company of cavalry be stationed at Yellow Medicine. It would serve alike to overawe the wild Indians, horse thieves and whisky sellers--to catch the two latter and protect the farmer Indians from depredations."--Report of Superintendent Clark W. Thompson, October 30, 1861.
19 - As near as I can learn, the proprietors of the stores at Yellow Medicine in 1862 were Stewart B. Garvie, Peter Patoile, William R. Forbes and Daly & Pratt.