TREATIES IVITH JNDIAiV TRIBES FOR LAI^D IN MISSOURI. 185 



their claims on our lands, though they were of first importance to our pioneers, 

 securing to them, as they did in a great measure, immunity from midnight as- 

 saults and depredations, and the restoration of friends held as captives, and prop- 

 erty previously stolen. 



Were it not for benefits of this nature there would be something ludicrous in 

 our Government solemnly treating with the tribes that it did, for that portion of 

 our State lying north of the Missouri River. They had driven the Missouris, 

 lately scourged by an epidemic, from their homes, and were claiming the country 

 from their ability to hunt over it and raid through it, owing to the near location 

 of their villages to its borders. This claim, however, was prudently acknowledg- 

 ed and treated for by the Government on three different occasions. The first 

 treaty for any part of our State north of the Missouri River, was negotiated at 

 St. Louis, Nov. 3, 1804, by Wm. H'. Harrison, Governor of the Territory of 

 Indiana and superintendent of the Indian affairs for that territory and the district 

 of Louisiana, on the part of the United States and five chiefs of the Sac and Fox 

 Indians for their tribes. The second article of this treaty stipulates that "the 

 general boundary line between the lands of the United States and of said Indian 

 tribes shall be as follows, to-wit : beginning at a point on the Missouri River op- 

 posite to the mouth of the Gasconade River, thence in a direct line so as to strike 

 the river Jeffreon at a distance of thirty miles from its mouth and down the said 

 Jeffreon to the Mississippi, thence up the Mississippi to the mouth of the Wiscon- 

 sin River, and up the same to a point which shall be thirty-six miles in a direct 

 line from the mouth of the said river, thence by a direct line to Fox River branch 

 of the Illinois, thence down Fox River to the Illinois, and down the same to the 

 Mississippi." 



By this treaty the Government acquired the eastern portion of the State lying 

 north of the Missouri River, the northwestern part of Illinois and the southwest- 

 ern part of Wisconsin. The consideration paid was $2,234.50 in goods paid 

 down, and the promise of $1,000 worth to be -delivered at St. Louis, yearly. 

 Among the chiefs who signed this treaty were Jumping Fish, Sun Fish and Bear. 

 This treaty was assented to or re-ratified at Portage des Sioux, St. Charles Co., 

 Missouri, on the 13th day of September, 1815, William Clark, Ninian Edwards 

 and Auguste Chouteau acting as commissioners for the Government and thirty-four 

 Sac and Fox chiefs on the part of these tribes, among them Big Eagle, Sturgeon, 

 The Devil, and He-that-Stands-by-the-Tree, of the Sacs, and Sur, Quick Riser, 

 Scenting Fox, White Skin and others of the Foxes. The object of this ratification 

 was to re-estabhsh the peaceful relations existing between the parties thereto, prior 

 to the war of 181 2, which had been disturbed by emissaries of Great Britain. 



The Sacs and Foxes who had been parties to this treaty and to its subse- 

 quent ratification were a division of these tribes that had removed from Wiscon- 

 sin, across the Mississippi and hunted from that river to the Missouri. On the 

 13th day of May, 181 6, the Sacs and Foxes of Rock River, Wisconsin, entered 

 into a treaty of assent and ratification of the treaty of 1804 at St. Louis, Mo., 

 confirming that and all other contracts and agreements heretofore made between 



