The Last American FrontierPaxson, Frederic L. (Frederic Logan)
History
The Last American Frontier
Paxson, Frederic L. (Frederic Logan)
Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); West (U.S.) -- History
The southern part of the Indian Country was early set aside as the new
home of the eastern confederacies lying near the Gulf of Mexico. The
Creeks, Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole had in the twenties
begun to feel the pressure of the southern states. Jackson's campaigns
had weakened them even before the cession of Florida to the United
States removed their place of refuge. Georgia was demanding their
removal when Monroe announced his policy.
A new home for the Choctaw was provided in the extreme Southwest in
1830. Ten years before, this nation had been given a home in Arkansas
territory, but now, at Dancing Rabbit Creek, it received a new eastern
limit in a line drawn from Fort Smith on the Arkansas due south to the
Red River. Arkansas had originally reached from the Mississippi to the
hundredth meridian, but it was, after this Choctaw cession, cut down
to the new Choctaw line, which remains its boundary to-day. From Fort
Smith the new boundary was run northerly to the southwest corner of
Missouri.
The Creeks and Cherokee promised in 1833 to go into the Indian Country,
west of Arkansas and north of the Choctaw. The Creeks became the
neighbors of the Choctaw, separated from them by the Canadian River,
while the Cherokee adjoined the Creeks on the north and east. With
small exceptions the whole of the present state of Oklahoma was thus
assigned to these three nations. The migrations from their old homes
came deliberately in the thirties and forties. The Chickasaw in 1837
purchased from the Choctaw the right to occupy the western end of their
strip between the Red and Canadian. The Seminole had acquired similar
rights among the Creeks, but were so reluctant to keep the pledge to
emigrate that their removal taxed the ability of the United States army
for several years.
Between the southern portion of the Indian Country and the Missouri
bend minor tribes were colonized in profusion. The Quapaw and United
Seneca and Shawnee nations were put into the triangle between the
Neosho and Missouri. The Cherokee received an extra grant in the
"Cherokee Neutral Strip," between the Osage line of 1825 and the
Missouri line. Next to the north was made a reserve for the New York
Indians, which they refused to occupy. The new Miami home came next,
along the Missouri line; while north of this were little reserves for
individual bands of Ottawa and Chippewa, for the Piankashaw and Wea,
the Kaskaskia and Peoria, the last of which adjoined the Shawnee line
of 1825 upon the south.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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