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ОглавлениеCherokees West of the Mississippi—Their Wants and Condition
Early in 1818 a representative delegation from that portion of the Cherokees who had removed to the Arkansas visited Washington with the view of reaching a more satisfactory understanding concerning the location and extent of their newly acquired homes in that region. As early as January 14 of that year, they had addressed a memorial to the Secretary of War asking, among other things, that the United States should recognize them as a separate and distinct people, clothed with the power to frame and administer their own laws, after the manner of their brethren east of the Mississippi.
Long and patient hearings were accorded to this delegation by the authorities of the Government, and, predicated upon their requests, instructions were issued243 to Governor William Clark, superintendent of Indian affairs at Saint Louis, among other things, to secure a cessation of hostilities then raging between the Arkansas Cherokees and the Osages; furthermore, to induce, if possible, the Shawnees and Delawares then residing in the neighborhood of Cape Girardeau to relinquish their land and join the Western Cherokees, or, in the event of a favorable termination of the Quapaw treaty then pending, that they might be located on lands acquired from them.
During the year the Arkansas Cherokees had also learned that the Oneidas of New York were desirous of obtaining a home in the West, and had made overtures for their settlement among them.244 The main object of the Cherokees in desiring to secure these originally eastern Indians for close neighbors is to be found in the increased strength they would be able to muster in sustaining their quarrel with their native western neighbors.
It may be interesting in this connection to note the fact that in 1825 the Cherokees sent a delegation to Wapakoneta, Ohio, accompanied by certain Western Shawnees, whose mission was to induce the Shawnees at that point to join them in the West. Governor Lewis Cass, under instructions from the War Department, held a council at Wapakoneta, lasting nine days,245 having in view the accomplishment of this end, but it was unsuccessful.
Governor Clark was also advised by his instructions of the desire of the Cherokees to secure an indefinite outlet west, in order that they should not in the future, by the encroachments of the whites and the diminution of game, be deprived of uninterrupted access to the more remote haunts of the buffalo and other large game animals. He was instructed to do everything consistent with justice in the matter to favor the Cherokees by securing from the Osages the concession of such a privilege, it being the object of the President that every favorable inducement should be held out to the Cherokees east of the Mississippi to remove and join their western brethren. This extension of their territory to the west was promised them by the President in the near future, and in the summer of 1819246 the Secretary of War instructed Reuben Lewis, United States Indian agent, to assure the Cherokees that the President, through the recent accession of territory from the Osages, was ready and willing to fulfill his promise.
Survey of east boundary of Cherokees in Arkansas.—Provision having been made in the treaty of 1817247 for a definition of the east line of the tract assigned the Cherokees on the Arkansas, Mr. Reuben Lewis, the Indian agent in that section, was designated, in the fall of 1818,248 to run and mark the line, and upon its completion to cause to be removed, without delay, all white settlers living west thereof, with the single exception mentioned in the treaty.
These instructions to Mr. Lewis miscarried in the mails and did not reach him until the following summer. The line had in the mean time been run by General William Rector, under the authority of the Commissioner of the General Land Office, which survey Mr. Lewis was authorized to accept as the correct boundary provided the Cherokees were satisfied therewith.249 The field notes of this survey were certified by General Rector April 14, 1819, and show the length of the line from Point Remove to White River to have been 71 miles 55 chains and the course N. 53° E.250
Treaty between Cherokees and Osages.—During this interval251 Governor Clark had succeeded in securing the presence at Saint Louis of representative delegations of both the Osage and Western Cherokee tribes, between whom, after protracted negotiations, he succeeded in establishing the most peaceful and harmonious relations, which were evidenced by all the usual formalities of a treaty.
