The Red Man's Retreat from Northern Indiana

Home , Battle of Tippecanoe, Carey Mission, Deep River (Indiana), History of Indiana, John Tipton, Michigan Road

The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana Leon M. Gordon II* Early Indian settlements in the northern part of Indiana were centered along the Wabash River, in the Fort Wayne area, and east of Chicago. Potawatomi and Miami predomi- nated and acted as buffers between the Fox, Sauk, and Wine- bag0 in Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota, and the Shawnee in Ohio. Following the defeat of the Prophet and Tecumseh’s forces at the mouth of the Tippecanoe River on November 7, 1811, scattered bands from the Wabash area fled to northern Indiana in large numbers. By 1830 white settlers thus found groups of Potawatomi and Miami scattered over the area in villages of varying size. The necessity of effecting a modus vivendi with the natives, which was never fully solved, but rather eliminated by their ultimate removal, immediately presented itself. Even before the battle of Tippecanoe, the Calumet River in Lake County had been a favorite haunt of Indians, both because of its abundance of fish and navigability for canoes. Available records indicate that as late as the 1830’s and 1840’s the stream was still attractive to them. On August 2, 1833, Charles Butler, heading for Chicago, ferried the river and recorded in his diary the presence of a Potawatomi encampment along the shore. The Indians had hammocks slung between the trees on the river’s west bank.’ An Indian post run by a Frenchman and his Indian squaw stood nearby and consisted of six or eight primitively constructed log cabins which were gray with age.2 As late as 1850, Indians were still at the fork of the Grand Calumet ; the squaws worked for white women and received payment in food supplies. Chief Shaubenee, the short thick-set owner of Shaubenee’s Grove in Lake County, resisted the settlers’ influence, and unlike his two daughters continued to dress in moccasins, leggings, and a blanket.

*Leon M. Gordon I1 is a graduate assistant on the staff of the Indiana Magazine of HiSto~y,Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana. This article is a revised chapter of a master’s thesis at Indiana Uni- versity, 1949, written under the direction of John D. Barnhart. *Charles Butler, “Letter of August 4, 1833,” Bessie .L. Pierce, As Others See Chzcago (Chicago, 1933), 41n. ZCharles F. Hoffman, A Winter in the West (2 vols., New York, 1835), I, 229. 40 Indiana Magazine of History

Most of the natives in that area left by 1862 when Tolleston was developing.8 There were also other settlements near the Calumet River, as well as on Cedar Creek, north of Cedar Lake, and on Red Oak and Big White Oak islands in the Kankakee River, south of the Calumet. Some three hundred and fifty Indians camped on those islands during the winter of 1837- 1838. The following year hunting attractions at Deep River, a tributary of the Calumet, drew Indians from Michigan City. Hunting parties of fifteen to twenty were seen at Pleasant Grove, on the shore of the former river, in 1840.’ About six hundred natives camped in the woods near West Creek, another tributary of the Calumet, over the winter of 1837-1838, and there was another small settlement south of Lowell. In 1840, the Indians camped at the site of the latter town appeared rough and disheveled but not hostile to Mrs. John M. Dwyer, an early settler of Lowell. The Indians left the area prior to the Mexican War. Around present Gary and vicinity, Indians were especially common in the early thirties, but only a few remained scattered about the neighborhood as late as 1869.5 A center of Indian settlement in the middle thirties was also located two miles southwest of present Memillville, then called Wiggin’s Point, which at the time was a division point of the Potawatomi trail. One branch went southwest to Will County, Illinois, and the other passed through Benton County to the Wabash.e Although the red men were neighbors of the whites for many years, reactions to their presence +ere generally not hostile. There was an undercurrent of hope, however, that the tribes would soon be removed. Until that day arrived, comments on the Indians’ peculiar way of life were common.

a James W. Lester, “Pioneer Stories of the Calumet,” zndkm Mugdne of History (Bloomington, Indiana, 1905- ) , XVIII (1922), 167-168. 4Zbid., 172; TCimothy] H. Ball, Lake County, Indiana, 1854-1872 (Chicago, 1873), 67, 70, 73, 77-78. BBall, Lake County, Zndkm, 1854-1872, p. 72; [James W. Lester], Historical Records of the Lake County Old Settlers Association (n.p., 1924), 9; History o Lake County, Lake County Historical Association Publicatwn (Gary, indiana, 1929), X, 82-83. eLester, “Pioneer Stories of the Calumet,” Zndkm Magazine of History, XVIII, 347 349-360; Elmore Barce and Robert A. Swan, History of Benton dwnty, Zn&iancl (3 vols., Fowler, Indiana, 1930), I, 58-69. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern In&iana 41 On Robinson’s Prairie near present Crown Point in 1834, sticks covered with long grass and flag matting composed the natives’ tepees, which had small smoke holes at their apex. The fragile nature of their homes on Lake Michigan was due partly to the temporary nature of their camps since they moved as often as a dozen times a year. Lakeside loca- tions were favored in winter and high grassy knolls in sum- mer.r Indians of the Calumet made a rather uniform impression on the early settlers. Moccasins, broadcloth or buckskin leggings, a kind of kilt, and often a blanket thrown over their shoulders constituted the natives usual apparel. White men considered them lazy and incurable beggars, who ex- changed venison, leggings, bead work, cranberries, and skins for bread, flour, tobacco, corn, pork, salt, iron kettles, po- tatoes, meal, and other products. The squaws wove cloth, made bead work, chopped wood, built the fires, and waited on the braves, while the latter fished and hunted. Indian men evidently excelled in these occupations, for in the thirties some thirty thousand muskrat and several hundred mink skins were taken annually from the Kankakee area, the latter worth about ten dollars apiece. Settlers took an annual toll of about three thousand duck and used severaLcamps along the shore of the Kankakee River as bases from which hunting forays were made.8 Two other quite diverse practices which provoked comment were the Indians’ burial methods and their operation of excellent sugar camps on Door Prairie in La Porte County. Bodies, often surrounded with food and hunting equipment, were usually interred in a sitting position, but were some- times laid horizontally in tree branches. The sugar camps were a lesser-known pursuit of the braves, but they were well supplied with the necessary copper and brass kettles.

THerbert A. Kellar (ed.), Solon Robinson, Pioneer and Agl-imltur- ist (2 vols., Indianapolis, 1936)) I, 55. These volumes are XXI-XXII of the Indiana Historical Collections (Indianapolis, 1916- ) . T[imo- thy] Ball, Lake County, Z&hna, 1884 (Crown Point, Indiana, 1884), 179. For a good description of the Indians’ winter camps, see Hoffman, A Winter in the West, 11, 323, note I. *Kellar, Solon Robinson, 66; Lester, “Pioneer Stories of the Calu- met,” Indium Magazine of History, XVIII, 168, 348; Ball, Lake County, Indian?, 1884,,p. 180-184; Amasa C. Washburn, “Canoeing on the Kan- kakee in 1831, Society of Indiana Pioneers Yewbook (n.p., 1921- ), (1944), 6,9,11. 42 Indiana Magazine of History

Every spring the camps were the site of feverish activity but were mostly deserted in inter.^ Solon Robinson, the founder of Crown Point, was one of many to comment on the Indians’ civility except when drunk, and he blamed white men for the unhappy consequences, which included the beating of a boy with the ram- rod of a native’s gun; fights among themselves in drunken brawls, usually with fatal consequences ; terrorization of the inhabitants of an isolated cabin by Indians on their way to a liquor dispensary ; and a gradual disintegration of their character.1° In La Porte County, Indians in the mid-thirties were concentrated on Tsrre Coupee Prairie and in the vicinity of La Porte. As in other camps, the women worked while the men followed field and stream. Natives’ wigwams there were often lined with furs and fancy blankets, but the deleterious effects of alcohol upset the normal tenor of camp life. Remains of deserted settlements were scattered throughout the county.ll Indians roamed over the face of Noble County until 1838 and made their usual impression of friendly beggary except when drunk. As in other areas, the natives dressed in gaudy, multi-patched clothes, and squaws carried their babies strapped to boards that hung from their backs.12 Other centers of Indian settlement in northeastern Indi- ana where life went on much as noted above were around Columbia City in Whitley County, and Jamestown and Brock- ville in Steuben County. In the Wabash Valley, natives congregated in the vicinity of Decatur, Adams County, and Big Creek in White County. Trading with white settlers and raiding their homes for food were common. Indian and

9 Ball, Lake County, Indiana, 1834-1872,p. 68; Kellar, Solon Robin- son, I, 63. For a good description of the process involved in the Indians’ sugar manufacture, see Hoffman, A Winter in the West, 11, 227, note J. IoKellar, Solon Robinson, I, 55; Charles C. Chapman and Company (pub.), History of Elkhart County, Zn$iana (Chicago, 1881), 662; Inter- State Publishing Company (pub.), Hzstory of Steuben County, Zn+mna (Chicago, 1885), 294; Inter-State Publishing Company (pub.), Hastoly of DeKalb County, Indiana (Chicago, 1885), 273-274, 295. 11Timothy E. Howard, HistolYy of St. Joseph County, Indiana (2 vols., Chicago, 1907), I, 299; Thomas H.. Cannon, History of Lake County and the Calumet Region (2 vols., Indianapolis, 1927), I, 170. 12 Samuel E. Alvord, History of Noble County, Indiana (Logansport, Indiana, 1902) , 132. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 43

Crooked creeks in Cass County were major centers of Indian settlement there.lS Thus, Indians and whites lived together throughout northern Indiana, each making use of what the other had to offer, yet basically wary of the other’s activities. During the entire period from 1830 to 1860, expanding settlement, often in advance of legally cleared titles, created increasing friction which did not end till the natives’ removal. The redskins’ fight to keep their land aroused the sympathy of Harriet Martineau, an English writer and journalist, who wrote in June, 1836, that she pitied the “poor, helpless, squalid Potawatomi,” beset by squatters. The traveler ap- proved of one band’s refusal to part with their land and expressed the hope that an unpleasant family with whom she breakfasted would be forced to leave and to abandon their irnpr~vements.~~ Division of interest between the two races was brought most sharply into focus over questions of trade. By an 1819 federal law, the Wea in Indiana were granted an annuity of $3,000 ; the Potawatomi, $2,500 ; the Delaware, $4,- 000 ; and the Miami, $15,000, plus specific gifts ; this law laid the foundation for a lucrative exchange of goods to the bene- fit of white traders.I5 Frequently, however, the greater trading volume made the Indians worse off than before. Senator Daniel Pratt visited a camp near Logansport in 1836 after one of the payments, where he saw drunken In- dians sprawled in grotesque positions, and a young girl ly- ing dead from a tomahawk gash. James Chute, an eye- witness of the annual payment to the Miami in 1831 on the Wabash about fifty miles from Fort Wayne, reported that four hundred were drunk by the next day.16

13 Weston A. Goodspeed and Charles Blanchard (eds.) , Counties of Whitley and Noble, Indiana (Chicago, 1882), 191; [Martha C. M. Lynch], Reminiscences of Adam, Jay, and Randolph Counties (n.p., n.d.), 94; F. A. Battey and Company (pub.), Counties of White and Pulaski (Chicago, 1883), 197; Jehu 2. Powell, Hzstory of Cass County, Indiana (2 vols., Chicago, 1913), I, 591,314. 14 Harriet Martineau, Society in America (2 vols., New York, 1837), I, 244. 15 United States Statutes at Large, IV, Ch. 87. 16 Powell, History of Cass County, I, 312; James Chute to Absalom Peters, Fort Wayne, December 12, 1831 Amencan Home Missionary Society Manuscript photostats (hereinaha referred to as A.H.M.S. MSS photostats), Indiana Division, Indiana State Library, Indianapolis, Indiana. 44 Indiana Magazine of History

At Logansport annual payments to the Miami and Potawatomi occupied from two to four weeks each. In 1833, a session about two months long took place over negotiations for the rest of the Indian lands. Sellers, collectors, and hopeful contractors for Indian supplies flocked to the place, already crowded by a motley group of idlers, jockeys, gamblers, debauchees, and liquor dispensers, who exhibited “total depravity” and wreaked havoc on the community’s rnorals.l7 Traders’ income from such payments obviously presented a golden opportunity to men like George W. and William G. Ewing,ls Lathrop M. Taylor,1° and many others. John Tipton, who was appointed as agent for the Potawatomi and Miami in 1823, effected removal of the agency from Fort Wayne to the site of Logansport in 1828, although both places remained important.*O After the removal, Charles Furman, the first Presbyter- ian missionary at Fort Wayne in 1830, observed that the town had formerly been a place of Indian trade with a garrison of soldiers stationed there. Although the detach- ment under Major Josiah H. Vose21 was withdrawn on

‘?Martin M. Post to Absalom Peters, Logansport, December 31, 1833, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. 18The Ewings Lame from Ohio to Fort Wayne in 1822. Although they were best known for their real estate and fur trading operations, they presented large claims against the Indians’ annuity payments every year. George lived until 1866; William died in 1864. Wallace A. Brice, History of Fort Wayze (Fort Wayne, Indiana, 1868), part 2, pp. 23-28. 1Q Lathrop M. Taylor, who was born at Clinton, New York, in 1806, lived in Fort Wayne from 1820 to 1826. Active in the fur trade he artici ated in the founding of South Bend with Alexis Coquillad in &ovem\er, 1830. Taylor served as postmaster of South Bend, St. Joseph County court clerk and recorder, and colonel of the Seventy-ninth Regi- ment of the Indiana Militia. A Biographical History of Eminent and Self-Made Men of the State of Indiana (2 vols., Cincinnati, Ohio, 1880), 11, District 13, p. 62. For a study of Taylor, see Bert Anson’s articles in the Indium Magazine of History, XLIV (1948), 367-383;XLV (1949), 147-170,249-264, 369-382. 20 John Tipton (1786-1839) moved to Indiana from Sevier County, Tennessee, and became a major general in the Indiana Militia after service in the War of 1812. He acted as Indian agent at Fort Wayne and Logansport from 1823 to 1831 and was a member of the United States Senate from 1831 to 1839. In 1838, Governor David Wallace appointed him to effect the Potawatomi removal. Nellie A. Robertson and Dorothy Riker (eds.), The John Tipton Papers (3 vols., Indianapolis, 1942), psim. These volumes are XXIV-XXVI of the Indiana Historical Collecttons. Logan Esarey, History of Indiana (2d ed., 2 vols., Indian- apolis, 1918), I, 367-368. 21 Vose had been a citizen of Manchester, New Hampshire, and was promoted to the rank of major in the Twenty-first Infantry Regiment during the War of 1812. From May 31,1817, to April 19,1819, he served The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 45

April 19, 1819, Fort Wayne remained an important trade center.22 Feeling ran high against “villainous” traders who liberally dispensed whisky to confuse the natives and then gave them shoddy articles at high cost. Although the licensed trader did not deal in perfect fairness, there was more cheating outside the agencies. Hugh McCulloch in a fit of bitterness charged that “the vices, cupidity, in justice, and inhumanity of professing Christians” were hastening the ex- tinction of the Indians as a James Chute, the resident Presbyterian missionary at Fort Wayne, strongly condemned the dispensing of liquor, but even a fatal stabbing failed to halt its flow. Within six months he expressed approval of an act passed at the last session of the legislature which prohibited the supplying of alcohol to Indians under penalty. Although Chute par- ticularly regretted the effect of the Indians’ intemperance on the town’s inhabitants, his belief that some of the most notorious offenders had renounced the practice was too op- timisti~.~’ At Logansport where the Potawatomi usually camped on the west side of Eel River or at the site of East Logan- sport, the same pattern was repeated while Miami came in smaller numbers to the south side of the Wabash. Some believed the former went on wilder sprees at the conclusion of their trading. In 1830, Martin Post, a resident Presby- terian missionary, properly called the town the headquarters of the federal agency and of the state’s Indian trade. Large reservations in the immediate vicinity facilitated trading as the last commandant .at Fort Wa e. Three years after rising to the rank of colonel, he died at New gleans on July 15, 1846. Bert J. Griswold, Fwt Wayne, Gateway to the West (Indianapolis, 1927), 77-78. This is volume XV of the Indiana Historical Collecthns. 22Charles E. Furman to Peters, Fort Wayne, February 19, 1830, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats; Vincennes, Indiaha, Centinel, July 19, 1819, quoted in Esarey, History of Indiana, I, 323. 2sHugh McCulloch, Men and Measures of Half a Century (New York, 1888), 101-103. For an even stronger condemnation of the robbing, thieving, murdering rumsellers, see J. B. Finley, Life Among the Zndkna (Cincinnati, Ohio, 1860), 618. 24Chute to Peters, Fort Wayne, December 12, 1831, and June 13, 1832, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. The law in question was passed on February 3, 1832, and imposed a maximum penalty of ten days in jail and a fifty dollar fine for anyone who “shall sell, ve, barter, or exchange, or dispose in my way either directly or indirect%, any s iritous or intoxicating liquors” to Indians. Laws of the Stats of ?ndi‘am, 1831-183.2, pp. 268-269. 46 Indiana Magazine of History activity and fostered the accompanying vices. On one occasion Post attributed a missing horse to Indian thievery.25 By June, 1833, Post blamed the high cost of living on the Indians’ heavy consumption of flour and bacon, which raised their market price. A year later he wrote that property in Logansport had been acquired chiefly because of the Indian trade but regretted that its owners were not of a type to encourage preaching of the Gospel. The “deplorable profanation” of Sunday, more or less true in all the Wabash towns, was partly blamed on Indian traders and adven- turers.2e That the total bills would be greater than the annuities was the traders’ principal fear. From their point of view such a calamity occurred at the October, 1836, disburse- ment. Payments were made on a pro rata plan that deprived the Indians of most of their money.2r Similarly, the settling of accounts at the forks of the Wabash near present Hunt- ington in September, 1841, presented manifold difficulties. Othniel Clark, one of the commissioners, called the mass of accounts “a terrible job” ; the Indians, “a drunken, broken- down, profligate race”; and urged them to get as far from the whites as possible. Individual accounts ran as high as three thousand dollars with charges of eight to twenty-five dollars for dirks and bowie knives and twenty-five dollars for a cloth blanket one and three quarters yards long. Sur- prisingly, Clark claimed that most of the articles used in the Indian trade were “very fine.”28 Two weeks later he again discredited the Indians’ character and vowed he wanted

26 Thomas B. Helm (ed.) , Histwy of Cass County, Indiana (Chicago, 1886), 259-260; Post to Peters, Logansport, May 24, 1830, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. 26 Post to Peters, Logansport, June 26, 1833; January 12, 1835; and July 7,1835, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. 27 Esarey, Histoly of Indiana, I, 325. 28 Othniel Looker Clark was born in 1835 at Clarksville, West Vir- ginia, and died at Lafayette in 1866. He came there in 1826 as the town’s first physician and later served as a senator and representative. In 1841 he was a pointed by Governor Samuel Bigger to settle the accounts of the gabash Valley Indians at their last meeting before bein sent west. Notes of William M. Reser, former vice-president of the kppecanoe County Historical Association. Clark to William Rey- nolds, Forks of the Wabash, September 11, 1841, MS in English Col- lection, Indiana Historical Society Library, Indianapolis, Indiana. Con- trast Clark’s opinion of the trade articles with McCulloch’s view that their inferior quality justified suspicion of something worse than neglect or incompetence by government agencies. McCulloch, Men and Meas- Ur68, 102. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 47 nothing more to do with them in any way. At the final settlement the Ewings’ claim ran close to two hundred thousand dollars ; Cyrus Taber and Allen Hamilton’szDapproached one hundred thousand dollars; and others ranged from twenty-five thousand dollars to very small sums.so A fourth major center of the Indian trade was the treaty grounds near the mouth of the Tippecanoe River, par- ticularly during the distribution of goods at the treaties of Tippecanoe from October 20 to 27, 1832. Observations of the area at the height of its importance were relatively few. One of the best descriptions was made in the early fifties by David Turpie, who went from the edge of Pretty Prairie along the Tippecanoe to the Wabash and overlooked the de- pressed site from a high bank. Second-growth timber almost covered it, the Indians having cut the original wood for defense purposes. He noted the fertility of the adjacent land and facilities for canoe travel. A system of trails com- pleted the Indians’ communications network from the west bank of the Tippecanoe to points along the Waba~h.~l With two such diverse civilizations existing side by side in contiguous settlements, their relations further strained by problems raised in trading activities, not much was needed to upset the delicate balance. The disruptive factor proved to be Black Hawk’s War from 1831 to 1832. Indians around the mouth of Rock River in northwestern Illinois were supposedly secure in their land holdings as a result of treaty provisions which removed them from eastern areas.

29Cyrus Taber was born in Tiverton, Rhode Island, in 1800, and settled in present Allen County in 1822. Going into the mercantile busi- ness with Allen Hamilton and Samuel Hanna, his firm became Hamilton and Taber in 1838. Through successive partnerships, Taber was able to retire in 1848, and devoted himself to the development of Logansport. A Biographical History of Eminent and Self-Made Men of the State of Indiana, 11, District 10, p. 39. Allen Hamilton, who was born in 1798 in County Tyrone, Ireland, came to Quebec in 1817. After working in a Philadelphia iron store, he became deputy registrar of the Fort Wayne land office. The Indian trade, however, quickly claimed his interest. He served as Allen County clerk from 1830 to 1837, and in 1840 was named one of the commissioners for the extinguishment of the Miami title in Indiana. From 1841-1844 he was their agent and also served as a member of the 1850 constitutional convention, a member of the state legislature, and president of the Fort Wayne branch bank. Jacob P. Dunn, Memokl ad Genealogical Record of Representatiue Citizens of Inoliana (Indianapolis, 1914), 628-631. SoClark to Reynolds, Forks of the Wabash, September 25, 1841, MS in English Collection. 81 Esarey, History of Indiana, I, 324-325; David Turpie, Sketches of Mg Own Times (Indianapolis, 1903), 169-173. 48 Indiana Magazine of History

The steady advance of squatter settlement, however, had increased tension between the two races since 1829. The Sauk Indians finally withdrew to the west side of the Mississippi but retained cornfields on the east side. Cultivation of these fields led to minor destruction of both white and Indian property, and finally early in April, 1832, Black Hawk crossed the river with nearly two thousand Sauk and Fox, which included six to eight hundred warriors.s2 Previously the chief‘s threatening actions had caused about five hundred Kickapoo to leave their homes in Illinois and spend nearly a year hunting, fishing, and trapping on the Iroquois River where it flowed through Jasper and New- ton counties. Defeat of the Illinois militia at the skirmish of Stillman’s Run on May 14, 1832, spurred the dispatch of regular army troops under General Winfield Scott. Plagued by Asiatic cholera, his troops did not get into action before the end of the war on August 2 at the battle of Bad Axe, southwest of present Madison, Wisconsin, near the Missis- sip~i.~~ Long before the war’s successful termination, however, rumors of terrible destruction supposedly following in its wake were spreading terror among northern Indiana citizens. Exaggerated stories were encouraged in part by the false belief that Indiana Potawatomi were included as enemies in the proclamation of hostilities issued by Illinois’ Governor John Reynolds. Lafayette was one of the focal points of alarm, and in May, 1832, a Captain Newel1 of the Warren County militia led troops over the surrounding area to re- assure the people until word was received from Logansport that all the northern Indiana tribes were quiet.34 Talk of danger quickly spread from Lafayette to Delphi, facilitated by lack of accurate information partly due to very sparse settlement west of the Tippecanoe. Constant reports, including the usual tales of blood, arrived there that Black Hawk’s Indians were rapidly advancing toward the frontier west of the Tippecanoe in a retreat from Illinois soldiers. Settlers in the area deserted their homes and took refuge on the east side of that river and the Wabash. A horse com-

33 Frank H. Stevens, The Black Hawk War (Chicago, 1903), 79-111. 33Louis H. Hamilton and William DarroCh, A Standard History of Jasper and Benton Counties, Zndkzm (2 vole., Chicago, 1916), I, 169; Milo M. Quaife, Chicago and the Old Northwest (Chicago, 1913), 323-337. 34 Esarey, Histmy of Indiana, I, 327-328. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 49 pany under Captain Andrew Wood, organized at Delphi, rode to the mouth of the Monon River but returned without seeing any Apparently the threat was proved groundless by June, and in July, James Crawford, the Presbyterian missionary, commented that a considerable number had been alarmed. His parishioners on the border of the Grand Prairie returned to their homes when the fright subsided, although the war was not over.s6 Near the state’s northern border rumors were equally rampant, but the Potawatomi at Lima, Lagrange County, for example, appeared more excited against the Sauk and Fox for fear that they would become involved in the war than against the whites. Settlers in northeastern La Porte County were warned of the danger in May by John Coleman, a courier sent by the Indian agent at Fort Dearborn. Some headed for Carey Mission just over the Michigan border by way of Terre Coupbe, and others fled east toward Fort Wayne; the more resolute built a good blockhouse in which many refugees lived from a few days to several weeks until the excitement subsided.s7 Refugees from the west spread the infectious fear to South Bend ;by then the stories had grown to include killings, driving off of stock, and burning of property. On May 23, 1832, an express rider from Chicago brought news of killings on Rock River. A rumor that the Indians were going to head for Canada spread terror because South Bend would be on their direct route. Plans for a fort were drawn so that all lines of approach could be controlled by the defenders. The walls were to be formed of small logs, sharpened to a point and extended ten feet above the ground with a ditch surrounding the stockade. Actually, the panic subsided before much work was done.s8 The wave of alarm continued to spread east and resulted

35 John C. Odell, History of Cawoll County, Indiana (Indianapolis, 1916), 230; Inter-State Publishing Company, History of DeKalb CounCy, 126-130. 36 James Crawford to Peters, Delphi, July 10, 1832, A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. 37 Ella Lonn, “Ripples of the Black Hawk War in Northern Indiana,” Indiana Magazine of History, XX (1924), 294-296. 38 Ibid., 298; Charles C. Chapman and Company (pub.),, Histo of St. Joseph County, Indiana (Chicago, 1880), 521; Howard, Hzstory JSt. Joseph County, I, 146. 50 Indiana Magazine of History in the dispatch of scouting parties over Elkhart County and vicinity, while settlers congregated at Niles, Michigan, South Bend, and Goshen. In July, 1832, Colonel John Jackson rode over the Elkhart prairies bearing the wild tale that the Indians were at Niles, and he urged all able-bodied men to assemble at Goshen. The motley gathering, carrying a variety of weapons, began to build a fort in Goshen, and another one named for Captain Henry Beane, on Elkhart Prairie. Soon after Jackson’s solicitation for aid at Indianap- olis late in June, it was ascertained that the closest hostile Indians were at least sixty miles northwest of Shortly after the building of Fort Beane and Colonel Jackson’s trip, two companions traveled over an Indian trail through practically uninhabited country to Waubee’s village, six miles northwest of Goshen, and to Squabach’s village at the site of present Oswego, on the pretext of obtaining seed corn but actually to check on the Indians’ activities. After careful scrutiny, the natives cordially welcomed them, and their report allayed the excitement at Goshen. Disputes over the name of the fort there caused its aband~nment.~~ Meanwhile, the Indiana militia under Colonel A. W. Rus- sell marched north through Illinois, around the southern end of Lake Michigan, and through the St. Joseph’s country to Indianapolis in early June ; and a border patrol quartered at Attica remained active until August 10. In addition two companies of regulars were raised from the Vincennes and Charlestown regions, When clear thinking prevailed once more, the near cessation of emigration and a corresponding interruption in the region’s development were found to be the most serious effects of the war in northern Indiana.41 Such an irreconcilable cleavage of interest between the two races caused most of the settlers to look forward to the ultimate extinguishment of the Indian title in the northern part of the state and to their eventual removal. Fears aroused by Black Hawk increased the settlers’ determination that the Indians must be removed. The great potentiality of the whole Wabash country was apparent to all, and in 1830 some felt that its full possibilities would be revealed

89 Lonn, “Ripples of the Black Hawk War in Northern Indiana,” Indiana Magazine of History, XX,301-303. 40 Zbid., 304-306. 41 Zbid., 306-307; Esarey, History of Indiana, I, 330-332. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 61 within the next two or three years when white settlers would obtain those lands still held by Indians.42 The background of the government‘s policy looking toward the creation of an Indian territory west of the Mis- sissippi River is too complex to be told here,4S but in 1830 the President was given power to set aside districts in government land west of the river for those Indians who might “choose to exchange the lands where they now reside and to remove there.” Government assistance for such removal was also promised.“ Provision for extinguishment of the Potawatomi title in Indiana was the next step.45 In pursuance of these two acts measures were taken for the negotiation of three treaties with the Potawatomi in October, 1832, by which they obtained western land for their cessions, but retained nearly one hundred and ten designated reserves in the state. Pay- ment for horses stolen, annuities totaling forty-five thousand dollars, and gifts worth over one hundred seventy thousand dollars were also provided.45 Actually, more than three hundred sixty-five thousand dollars worth of goods were distributed, and at least fifty traders on the treaty grounds scrambled for the Indians’ favor.” Almost simultaneously with the Potawatomi negotiations, overtures were being made to the Miami near Logan- sport, which attracted “speculators, gamblers, horse racers, and loungers” from the town. First arrangements with the Miami were not consummated, however, until October 23, 1834, by William Marshall at the forks of the Wabash in a treaty that provided for the usual exchange of land, a

42 Post to Peters, Logansport, May 24, 1830., A.H.M.S. MSS photostats. 43 The most complete treatment of the subject up to the passage of the removal act is found in Annie H. Abel, “The History of Events Resulting in Indian Consolidation West of the Mississippi,” Annua2 Report of the American Historied Association for the Year 1906 (2 vols., Washington, 1908), I, 233-450. For a brief resumC, see Dwight L. Smith (fa.), “The Attempted Potawatomi Emigration of 1839,” Zndiana Maga- zane of History, XLV, 51-53. 44 United States Statutes at Large, IV, 411-413. 45 Zbid., 564. 46Treaties of October 20, 26, and 27, 1832, Charles J. Kappler (ed.), Indian Affairs, Laws, and Treaties, in Senate Documents, 58 Cong., 2 Seas., no. 139 (2d ed., 2 vols., serial nos. 4623 and 4624), 11, 353-356, 367-370, 372-375. 47 Esarey, History of Indiana, I, 324. 52 Indiana Magazine of Historg money payment, compensation for stolen horses, and the set- ting aside of about twenty reserves.48 Settlers were quick to note the extinguishment of the Potawatomi title, and the observant Solon Robinson expressed hope that the remainder of the Miami reservation might soon come into white possession since it lay in a fertile and central part of the state contiguous to the Wabash and Erie Canal. He was not optimistic about its immediate ac- complishment, however, because of their intelligent French half-breed chief, John B. Richard~ille.~~Robinson was like- wise anxious to correct the “erroneous impression” held by most people regarding the 1832 Potawatomi purchase. He pictured ten thousand acres of fine prairie within its bounds for every one of swamp, luxuriant grass growing along the Kankakee River, pure spring water, and an absence of decay- ing timber, which was burned off annually by the Indians.6o Natives from northern Indiana as in other regions were quick to take advantage of the annuities provided in the treaties and were frequently seen going to collect the payments at Winamac and Detroit. Monticello was an important point on the road to the former and Terre Coupbe to the latter.61 Although not directly concerned with land in Indiana, a conclave at Chicago in 1833 authorized the same type of payments and land exchanges as noted in the above treaties. An estimated five thousand people gathered around the “up- start village,” and one native band camped five miles south- east. To some individuals the treaty negotiations meant an opportunity to press spurious claims against the helpless natives for damage actually caused by disease, wild animals, and dishonest white men.62

48 “Journal of Ebenezer Mattoon Chamberlain 1832-5,” Indiana Mag- azine of History, XV (1919), 248; Treaty of October 23, 1834, Kappler, Indian Affairs,11,425-428. 49Kellar, Solon Robinson, I, 64. He was correct in believing that there would be a delay. See Treaty of November 6,1838,with the Miami, Kappler, Indhn Affairs, 11, 519-524. 50 KelIar, Solon Robinson, I, 54. He was probably too laudatory in his praise. 51 W. H. Hammelle, A Standard Histwy of White County, Indiana (2 vols., Chicago, 1915), I, 401; Howard History o St. Joseph County, I 148. Hugh V. Compton, an early settier of St. Joseph County, cal!ed tkem a “queer looking lot,” who boiled the remnants of hog butchemg for soup. 52Charles Latrobe, The Rambler in North Amwica (2 vols., New York, 1835), I, 140; Patrick Shireff, A TOUTThrough North AHa The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 53

Despite the succession of Indian treaties in the early and mid-thirties, concern over the natives’ activity was not completely removed, and memories of Black Hawk’s War were freshened after the rising of the Creek in Georgia early in 1836. In June, Harriet Martineau, noticing an encampment of federal troops near Chicago, echoed the current fears of many settlers. Supposedly, after general consultations, the Comanches had decided to help the Mexicans in Texas, and the war belt was being passed among the Winnebago on the west shore of Lake Michigan. The alarm, however, was unfounded and soon s~bsided.~~ Meanwhile, once the Potawatomi cessions of October, 1832, had been obtained, settlers grew increasingly anxious for abolition of the reserves which the treaties had granted. Those in Marshall County, for example, covered most of its total area. Aubenaubee’s village of forty-six sections in the southern part of the county was the largest. Menominee’s, southwest of Plymouth, contained twenty-two sections ; Benack had eight ; Quashqua, three ; and there were numerous smaller ones.64 As a result of increasing pressure, William Marshall was appointed commissioner in 1834 and purchased about half the land involved for fifty cents an acre. To finish the job, Colonel Abel C. Pepper55negotiated nine treaties with the Potawatomi between March 26 and September 23, 1836, which effected the purchase of one hundred thirty- five sections for $95,360 and provided for removal within two years.56 Impatient settlers moved steadily onto the dis-

(Edinburgh 1835), 220. The treaty in question was consummated with the United kation of Ottawa, Chippewa, and Potawatomi from Septem- ber 26 to October 1, 1833, by which they ceded five million acres in Illinois and Michigan. Kappler, Indian Affairs, 11, 402-415. 5s Martineau, Society in America, I, 258-259. 54 Kappler, Indian Affairs, 11, 353, 368, 373-374. 66Abel C. Pepper was born in Kentucky and settled in Dearborn County, Indiana, in 1815. After service in the War of 1812, he held various county offices, served in the state legislature, and lost the lieutenant-governor’s race in 1828. Pepper then rose through the ranks to become superintendent of Indian removal for Indiana, Illinois, Michi- gan, and Wisconsin. He was a federal marshal from 1845 to 1849 and served in the 1850 constitutional convention. Pepper died in 1860. Wil- liam W. Woollen, Biographical and Historical Sketches of Early Indiana (Indianapolis, 1883) , 407-411. 5eTreaties of March 26, 29, April 11, 22, August 5, September 20, 22, and 23, 1836,Bap lek, Indian A fairs, 11, 450, 457-459, 462-463, 470- 472. The treaty of $arch 26 ceded four sections northeast of Warsaw, and that of March. 29 ceded four sections between the one above and Warsaw. Thirty-six sections of Aubenaubee’s reserve between Lake 54 Indiana Magazine of History

puted reserves, and within two years Congress took cognizance of their uncertain status by granting pre-emption rights for a quarter section at one dollar and twenty-five cents an acre for every head of a family or male over twenty- one with four months’ residence at the time of the act‘s passage.57 Representatives of religious orders active among the Indians worked to smooth the natives’ relations with white men in addition to teaching them the fundamental tenets of Christianity. Ever since the days of the St. Joseph Mission at the site of present Niles, Michigan, which was conducted by the Jesuits from 1690 to 1761,58the Potawatomi had em- braced Catholicism, simply but faithfully. The story of Isaac McCoy at Carey Mission near Niles,59 Abraham Burnett at Menominee’s village in the 1820’~,~Oand Fathers Rez6 and Badin who were active around Niles and at Notre Dame from 1830 to 1835,81represented an extension of religious activity by other sects as well as a solidifying of Catholicism at Menominee’s village by the Jesuits.62 In the spring of 1835, Louis Deseille, a Flemish priest, and Simon Brut6 de Remur, first bishop of Vincennes, visited the Tippecanoe settlements where the bishop quickly grasped the growing conflict between the government’s increasing agitation for removal and the missionaries’ activity. That friction prompted an abortive removal attempt by Pepper, for

Maxinkuckee and Rochester were ceded April 11, and the two treaties of April 22 ceded thirteen sections along the shore of the lake. The treaty of August 5 ceded Menominee’s village of twenty-two sections, which caused disputes and bitterness when the two-year time limit expired. The three treaties of September 20, 22, and 23, 1836, ceded ten sections about five miles northeast of Rochester, four sections immediately south of the above, and thirty-eight sections on Eel River due north of Peru. See Charles C. Royce (cornp.), Indian Land Cessions in the United States (2 parts, Washington, 1899), part 2, pp. 756-763. 67 United States Statutes at Large, V, 251-252; Daniel McDonald, History of Marshall County, Indiana (2 vols., Chicago, 1908), I, 19. 58 George Park, “The St. Joseph Mission,” Mississid Valley Histor- ical Review (Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1914- ), XVII (1930), 24-54. 59 Isaac McCoy, History of Baptist Indian Missions (Washington, 1840), 95-96. 60 “Abram B. Burnett, Potawatomi Chief,” Kansas State Historical Society Collections (Topeka, Kansas, 1881- ) , (1913-1914), 371-373. 81 The Catholic Encyclopedia (16 vols., New York, 1907-1914), IV (1908), 759; XI1 (1911), 320; Dictionary of American Bkgraphy (21 vols., New York, 1943), I, 488-489. 62 Irving McKee, “The Trail of Death,” Indiana Historical Society PubZications (Indianapolis, 1895- ) , XIV (1944), 11-14. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 55 example, in 1833 from Logansport, but only about seventy natives reached the Mississippi.63 A working agreement was made between Deseille and Pepper relative to the Marshall County reserves, but Corn- missary General George Gibson, whose department would have responsibility for an emigration, was too encouraging in his reassurances to the priest. Although the latter’s con- tinuing activity at the Yellow River reserve irritated Pepper, signing of the nine treaties referred to above was a definite victory for the removal policy.64 Despite valiant efforts to serve the red man and pacify the whites, Deseille, who had stayed among the Marshall County Indians, was ordered on May 16, 1837, to depart as an alien or to prove himself a citizen. Although he remained in the neighborhood, the priest had to be replaced. Thus, Benjamin Marie Petit came to Menominee’s reserve for a three-week visit in October and November, 1837, but did not secure a permanent residence there till the spring of 1838.65 At the time of Petit’s first visit, the village on the north bank of Twin Lakes contained seventy-five to one hundred log huts and wigwams of poles covered with bark and matting, which were grouped irregularly around their hewn-log chapel. The church, surmounted by a white flag in the rear, was about twenty by forty feet in size and filled with crude benches. A ladder furnished access to the missionary’s room over the chapel which contained a rope hammock, chair, and table. The nearby graveyard was filled with some bodies buried underground, some sitting upright protected by pole fences, and others placed in covered hollowed logs.e6 Petit approvingly observed the following routine. After a sunrise bell, the Indians assembled, heard a digest of the previous day’s sermon and mass, and sang hymns after morning

83 Zbid., 15-18. 64 Zbid., 18-23. 65Petit was born at Rennes, France, in 1811, and graduated from the University of Rennes in 1829. Three years later he concluded his legal studies, but after three years of practice, Petit entered the Seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris. After his arrival in America on July 21, 1836, Petit worked through the orders to the priesthood soon after September 23, 1837. After winning his battle to accompany the Potawatomi to their new home in Kansas on the Osage River, the priest died in St. Louis on February 10, 1839. Zbid., 26-28, 114-116, 24-26. esMcDonald, History of MwshaZZ County, I, 30, 32, 19; Howard, History of St. Joseph County, I, 52. 56 Indiana Magazine of History prayers. The sermons were translated by a seventy-two-year- old French lady. Petit then heard the Indians’ confessions till sunset and evening prayers, an exhortation, catechism, and benediction follo~ed.~~ Such religious activity, however, could not still the In- dians’ clamor against Pepper’s treaty of August 5, 1836. Claims were vehemently put forth that it was invalid because of the means employed in the negotiations and because the list of the signers lacked Menominee’s name. The priest considered it “as illegal as possible” and recorded the Indians’ preparations to protest personally at Washington.e* Having promised Menominee a memorial explaining his tribe’s griev- ance to the President, Petit celebrated Christmas, 1837, with nothing further accomplished and expressed doubt that the Indians would obtain the necessary money for the Washing- ton mission.e0 After lending two hundred dollars to the chiefs en route to the capital, Petit continued his round of religious activity until April 4, 1838, when he obtained a permanent residence at the Twin Lakes settlement, with an unfastened plank floor, a huge fireplace, and a mat for a bed. His pleasure was dimmed, however, by the doubtful chance for success of the Washington appeal.*O Petit’s last hope was that the courts would negate the removal plans. Meanwhile, by the end of June, William Polke71 had assembled four hundred to five hundred Potawatomi near Plymouth preparatory for emigration, and he and the priest held an extended conversa- tion relative to Petit‘s objections to the removal. By July 26, 1838, it was apparent that the Indians’ Washington mission had collapsed ; the possibility of federal action was eliminated; and the priest held serious doubts as to his own future with the tribe. Succeeding letters to Tipton and

67McDonald, History of Marshall County, I, 19, 32; McKee, “The Trail of Death.” Indiana Historical Society Publhtwns, XIV, 83. 68 McKee, “The Trail of Death,” Indiana Historical Society Publicm tiom, XIV, 51-62. 89 Ibid., 43. 70 Ibid., 65, 65-66. 71 William Polke of Knox County was Isaac McCoy’s brother-in-law. After serving as a member of the 1816 constitutional convention and as a state senator, he worked for Carey Mission. Polke later became commissioner for the Michigan Road and registrar of the Fort Wayne land office. He died in 1843. Robertson and Riker, The John Tipton Papers, I, 46811. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indium 67

Pepper were optimistic for better relations which never mate- riali~ed.?~ The last service in the chapel was held on August 4; the church ornaments were removed; and at the last assembly, prayers were offered for success in the new hunting grounds. Sincere emotion threatened to halt the ritual. Amid increasing tension, the whites demanded possession on August 5, the deadline under the treaty terms. The Indians refused, however, and between the fifteenth and twentieth chopped in a settler’s cabin door. In retaliation white raiders destroyed ten or twelve Indian homes. When he heard the news of these disturbances, Governor David Wallace authorized Tip- ton to enroll a hundred Having sent militia squads to northern Indiana to gather scattered natives there, Tipton assembled them in the chapel and explained the treaty provision requiring removal within two years. It was useless for the natives to argue that irregularities in negotiation voided the requirement, and Menominee and two or three other chiefs who refused to go peaceably were confined in the chapel under guard.74 Petit sorrowfully heard the news at Bertrand, Michigan, where he was recuperating from illness, but his fear that he could not accompany the Indians was dispelled by Septem- ber 8. On September 1, seven hundred and fourteen natives were enrolled for the journey, and the following day was spent in loading half of the twenty-six wagons with baggage. Forty-seven more Indians were added to the total before the exiles started their journey.75 After Tipton assured himself that the village’s improve- ments would be “protected from waste and destruction,” the caravan began to move at 9:30 A.M., September 4, leaving some behind because of illness. Eyewitnesses in the main felt

‘2 McKee, “The Trail of Death,” Indiana Historical Society Publka- tiom, XIV, 76-77. TaIbid., 128, 90; Howard, History of St. Joseph Count I, 52, 54; Robertson and Riker The John Tipton Papers, 111, 675. hter an exchange of letters with Wallace, Tipton wrote on August 28 that his arrangements were made, and he was depending on the counties of La Pork for fifteen men, St. Joseph for five, Miami for fifteen, F’ulton for five, Marshall for ten, Cass for thirty-fivel and on Colonel James R. M. Bryant for fifteen. Ibid., 680. 74Robertson and Riker, The John Tipton Pa erf, 111, 682, 660-662; Daniel McDonald, Removal of the Potawatomi ?duns front Northern Indiana (Plymouth, Indiana, 1899), 44-46. 75 McKee, “The Trail of Death,” Indiana Hi0t035cal Society Pub& aatwns, XIV, 128,90; “Journal of an Emi ating Pa of Pottawattomie Indians,” Indiana Magazine of Histo SI(1925)~16-317; Robertson and Riker, Ths John Tipton Papers, 1% 686-690. 58 Indiana Magazine of History

sympathetic toward those who formed the “sad sight.” The Indians were disarmed, and a soldier placed over every group of thirty or forty. Available government wagons apparently frightened the natives, and most of them preferred to walk.76 With an insufficient water supply the procession, which included two hundred and eighty-six horses and twenty-six wagons, traveled to Chippewa Port, twenty-one miles from the Twin Lakes encampment, on September 7. Two days later, Petit arrived at South 3end with Brut& and on the same day physicians discovered three hundred cases of illness among the immigrants. As the main party proceeded along the north bank of the Wabash past Winamac’s old village and Delphi, it made an imposing sight to James H. Stewart, an old settler of Delphi; the Indians were strung out for three miles beside the river. Polke’s optimism, however, in looking forward to the “pleasantest and happiest of the emigrations west” seemed hardly justified.17 On September 12 the wandering band forded the Tippe- canoe to the battleground encampment, where cloth, blankets, and shirts worth $5,469.81 were distributed to the Indians. The heat and excessive dust became worse, and a Dr. Ritchie found one hundred and six natives ill on the thirteenth, which meant the wagons were crowded with sufferers. Oppressive drouth was drying up streams in the vicinity of Williams- port, but by irregular advances the caravan reached Danville, Illinois, on September 17, where in fulfillment of previous arrangements, Polke assumed leadership of the remainder of the emigrati~n.?~

7eRobertson and Riker, The John Tipton Papem, 111, 689, 693; “Journal of an Emigrating Party of Pottawattomie Indians,” Idhm Magazine of History, XXI, 317; McDonald, Removal of the Potawatmni Indians from Northern Indiana, 44,46. 77 “Journal of an Emigrating Party of Pottawattomie Indians,” Indiana Magazine of History, XXI, .317. Tipton said fifty-three were left at Chippewa. Robertson and Riker, The John Tipton Papers, 111, 692-693, 699 702; McKee, “The Trail of Dqath,” Indiana Historical Society Publications, XIV, 92-93. Since leaving the Chippewa camp, Tipton had taken charge of the front of the rocession, while Polke oversaw affairs in the rear. See also James H. gewart, Recollections of the Early Settlement of Carroll County, Indiana (Cincinnati, Ohio, 1872), 97-98. 78 “Journal of an Emigrating Party of Pottawattomie Indians,” Indiana Magazine of History, XXI, 319-320; Robertson and Riker, The John Tipton Papers, 111, 702-703, 704, 709. The muster roll at this stage of the emigration numbered 859. For further information on the journey to Independence, Missouri, see Dwight L. Smith (ed.), “A Can- tinuation of the Journal of an Emigrating Party of Potawatomie In- dians, 1838, and Ten William Polke Manuscripts,” Indiana Magazine of Histw, XLIV, 393-408. The Red Man’s Retreat From Northern Indiana 59

Before concluding the story of the major Indian removal from northern Indiana, attention should be called to the almost directly opposite pictures of the emigration one gets from Petit’s letters and from accounts of other white men connected with the party. A flood of sympathy pervaded the former, full of references to “my poor Christians, under the burning noon-day sun,” crammed into baggage wagons with “sick and dying people on all On the other hand, one of the teamsters remembering the trek after a mellowing interval of thirty years, considered the Indians well treated, not suffering from lack of food or water. The journal attributed to Polke, while mentioning the heat, dust, and not too adequate provisions, merely mentions ten deaths, mostly those of children, which occurred before the Illinois line was reached. The truth probably lies in the middle ground, closer to Petit’s view than Polke’s. At any rate, the priest’s version has gained ascendancy in the popular mind and resulted in characterization of the trek as “the trail of death.”80 While it is not the purpose of this article to tell the story of subsequent removals in detail, cognizance should be taken of the projected Potawatomi emigration of 1839, the pertinent documents for which have only recently been unearthed.*’ Reference has been made above to the treaty with the Miami of October 23, 1834, which was not ratified until November 10, 1837. Another treaty was negotiated on No- vember 6, 1838, which involved cession of one hundred seventy-seven thousand acres south of the Wabash for $325,- 680; payments to chiefs Richardville and Godfroy; forty- seven specific grants of land ; and provision for removal west of the Mississippi “when the said tribe may be disposed to emigrate from their present country.”82 The tribe’s uncertain status waa clarified by cession of the so-called “resi- due of the big reserve,” which amounted to five hundred eleven thousand acres, for five hundred fifty thousand dol-

79 McKee, “The Trail of Death,” Indiana Historical Society Publi- cations, XIV, 98-99, passim. 80 McDonald, Removal of !he P?tawatomi Indians from Northe? Zn- dkm, 47; “Journal of an Emlgrating Party of Pottawattomie Indians,” Indiana Magazine of History, XXI, 315-336, pasmm. 81 Smith, “The Attem ted Potawatomi Emigration of 1839,” Indian& Magadw of History, XLg 61-80. 81 Kappler, Zdkn AffaCrs, 11,519-624. 60 Indiana Magazine of History

lars on November 28, 1840. The treaty stipulated that the Indians “shall remove to the country assigned to them west of the Mississippi within five years from this date.” Despite increasingly depraved living conditions, the Miami secured a time extension on their removal from November, 1845, to August, 1846. An infantry company from Newport barracks near Cincinnati under Captain William R. Juett finally suc- ceeded in getting over three hundred Indians loaded on five canalboats at Peru near the end of Taken to Cincinnati by way of the Wabash and Erie Canal, the natives were put on the “Colorado” bound for St. Louis. From there they were taken to the mouth of the Kansas River, where their personal belongings and ponies had been brought overland. The tribe’s subsequent history in Kansas was one of unrestrained whisky consumption and decimation of numbers until by 1854 their agent claimed that only two hundred and seventy-five remained.84 In 1847 another group, mostly stragglers and deserters from the emigration of the previous year, were gathered from around Columbia City, Huntington, South Bend, Manchester, Peru, and Winamac. Starting eleven miles north of Peru, the caravan passed through Winamac and Ottawa, Illinois, on its way to join the other Kansas exiles.8K Such was the course of the principal Indian removals from northern Indi- ana. Their execution was not a credit to the settlers, but the conclusion was inevitable. Whenever white men came into contact with Indian settlements, exploitation of the natives followed ; a process which continued until the Indians’ presence became a hindrance and danger to extension of white settlement. At that point pressure for removal treaties became the strongest. Only when the Indians had withdrawn could the full exploitation of areas previously controlled by them be effected. This pattern of relations between the two races is clear in northern Indiana, and there was never serious doubt which of the two groups would emerge victorious.

8sIbid,, 631-634; Grant Foreman, The Last Trek of the. Id@m (Chicago, 1946), 127-128; McDonald, Removal of the Potawatomz Indam from Northern Indiana, 48. 84Foreman, The Last Trek of the Indians, 129-131. For a good treatment of the Miami in the Northwest to the Battle of Tippecsnoe, see Elmore Barce, The Land of the Miamis (Fowler, Indiana, 1922). BsMcDonald, Remwval of ths Potawatomi Indians from Northern Indi&na, 48.