Unassigned Lands
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
by the Creek (Muskogee) and Seminole
Seminole
The Seminole are a Native American people originally of Florida, who now reside primarily in that state and Oklahoma. The Seminole nation emerged in a process of ethnogenesis out of groups of Native Americans, most significantly Creeks from what is now Georgia and Alabama, who settled in Florida in...
Indians following the Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
and on which no other tribes had been settled. By 1883 it was bounded by the Cherokee Outlet
Cherokee Outlet
The Cherokee Outlet, often mistakenly referred to as the Cherokee Strip, was located in what is now the state of Oklahoma, in the United States. It was a sixty-mile wide strip of land south of the Oklahoma-Kansas border between the 96th and 100th meridians. It was about 225 miles long and in 1891...
on the north, several relocated Indian reservations on the east, the Chickasaw
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw are Native American people originally from the region that would become the Southeastern United States...
lands on the south, and the Cheyenne
Cheyenne
Cheyenne are a Native American people of the Great Plains, who are of the Algonquian language family. The Cheyenne Nation is composed of two united tribes, the Só'taeo'o and the Tsétsêhéstâhese .The Cheyenne are thought to have branched off other tribes of Algonquian stock inhabiting lands...
-Arapaho
Arapaho
The Arapaho are a tribe of Native Americans historically living on the eastern plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They were close allies of the Cheyenne tribe and loosely aligned with the Sioux. Arapaho is an Algonquian language closely related to Gros Ventre, whose people are seen as an early...
reserve on the west. The area amounted to 1,887,796.47 acres (2,949 miles² or 7,640 km²).
The Indian era
The Treaty of Indian SpringsTreaty of Indian Springs
There are two Treaties of Indian Springs with the Creek Indians. The first treaty was signed January 8, 1821. In it, the Lower Creek ceded land to the state of Georgia in return for cash payments totaling $200,000 over a period of 14 years...
, February 12, 1825, provided for a delegation of Creeks to visit the west in order that
... they may select any other territory, west of the MississippiMississippi RiverThe Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...
, on RedRed River (Mississippi watershed)The Red River, or sometimes the Red River of the South, is a major tributary of the Mississippi and Atchafalaya Rivers in the southern United States of America. The river gains its name from the red-bed country of its watershed. It is one of several rivers with that name...
, CanadianCanadian RiverThe Canadian River is the longest tributary of the Arkansas River. It is about long, starting in Colorado and traveling through New Mexico, the Texas Panhandle, and most of Oklahoma....
, ArkansasArkansas RiverThe Arkansas River is a major tributary of the Mississippi River. The Arkansas generally flows to the east and southeast as it traverses the U.S. states of Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. The river's initial basin starts in the Western United States in Colorado, specifically the Arkansas...
, or MissouriMissouri RiverThe Missouri River flows through the central United States, and is a tributary of the Mississippi River. It is the longest river in North America and drains the third largest area, though only the thirteenth largest by discharge. The Missouri's watershed encompasses most of the American Great...
Rivers...
to replace their lands in Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
. A dispute arose between the Lower Creek Council, which signed the treaty, and the Upper Creek Council, which objected. The dispute led to the killing of General William McIntosh, the chief of the Lower Creeks, and left the treaty in doubt. Despite that, the Creeks were relocated to the west. On February 14, 1833, the Treaty of Okmulgee was signed at Fort Gibson
Fort Gibson, Oklahoma
Fort Gibson is a town in Cherokee and Muskogee counties in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The population was 4,054 at the 2000 census. It is the location of Fort Gibson National Cemetery and is located near at the end of the Cherokees' Trail of Tears at Tahlequah, Oklahoma.Colonel Matthew Arbuckle of...
. In it the Creeks finally agreed to cede their lands in the east. Article 2 of the 1833 treaty defined the land chosen under the 1825 treaty as being west and south of the Cherokee
Cherokee
The Cherokee are a Native American people historically settled in the Southeastern United States . Linguistically, they are part of the Iroquoian language family...
lands and bordering the Canadian River
Canadian River
The Canadian River is the longest tributary of the Arkansas River. It is about long, starting in Colorado and traveling through New Mexico, the Texas Panhandle, and most of Oklahoma....
on the south and the Mexican
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
border on the west.
In the Seminole Treaty signed March 28, 1833, but not ratified, the Seminoles agreed to settle on the Little River portion of the Creek lands in Indian Territory. Some Seminoles moved but the rest retreated, resulting in the Second Seminole War
Second Seminole War
The Second Seminole War, also known as the Florida War, was a conflict from 1835 to 1842 in Florida between various groups of Native Americans collectively known as Seminoles and the United States, part of a series of conflicts called the Seminole Wars...
. After the Second War, most of the Seminoles moved to the Indian Territory. A treaty between the Creeks and Seminoles, ratified August 16, 1856, gave the Seminoles the agreed upon tract of Creek land between the Canadian River on the south and the North Fork of the Canadian River
North Canadian River
The North Canadian River is a tributary of the Canadian River, approximately long, that flows through New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma in the United States....
on the north.
The divisions within the Creeks continued up through the Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
when the Council, under control of the Lower Creeks, signed a treaty with the Confederacy on July 10, 1861. Creek support for the South was not unanimous however. In a series of confrontations, Opothleyahola
Opothleyahola
Opothleyahola, also spelled Opothle Yohola, Opothleyoholo, Hu-pui-hilth Yahola, and Hopoeitheyohola, was a Muscogee Creek Indian chief, noted as a brilliant orator. He was a speaker of the Upper Creek Council. He led Creek forces against the United States government during the first two Seminole...
's pro-Union
Union (American Civil War)
During the American Civil War, the Union was a name used to refer to the federal government of the United States, which was supported by the twenty free states and five border slave states. It was opposed by 11 southern slave states that had declared a secession to join together to form the...
Creeks, belonging mostly to the Upper Creeks, were driven into Kansas
Kansas
Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
during the winter of 1861-62 with a huge loss of life among themselves and their few Seminole allies under Halleck Tustenuggee
Halleck Tustenuggee
Halleck Tustenuggee was a 19th century Seminole warchief. He fought against the United States government in the Second Seminole War and for the government in the American Civil War.Tustenuggee, translated as "Warrior" or "Grand Chief of War," was a common surname for Seminole warchiefs...
.
When the Confederacy lost the Civil War, the United States forced the Creeks into a new treaty. Under Article 3 of the 1866 Creek Treaty, they agreed to cede the western portion of their lands
In compliance with the desire of the United States to locate other Indians and freedmenFreedmanA freedman is a former slave who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, slaves became freedmen either by manumission or emancipation ....
thereon, the Creeks hereby cede and convey to the United States, to be sold to and used as homes for such other civilized Indians as the United States may choose to settle thereon... the west half of their entire domain ... [for] ... the sum of thirty (30) cents per acre ($74.13/km²), amounting to nine hundred and seventy-five thousand one hundred and sixty-eight dollars...
The Seminole's active support of the Confederacy cost them much more than it did the Creeks. Article 3 of the Seminole Treaty, ratified July 19, 1866, required that
... the Seminoles cede and convey to the United States their entire domain ... [for] ... the sum of three hundred and twenty-five thousand three hundred and sixty-two ($325,362) dollars, said purchase being at the rate of fifteen cents per acre ($37.07/km²).
In the same treaty, the Seminole
Seminole
The Seminole are a Native American people originally of Florida, who now reside primarily in that state and Oklahoma. The Seminole nation emerged in a process of ethnogenesis out of groups of Native Americans, most significantly Creeks from what is now Georgia and Alabama, who settled in Florida in...
s were the first tribe relocated to the ceded Creek land. Several tribes of Eastern Indians were also moved to the eastern end of the ceded Creek land. The Absentee Shawnee and Citizen Band of Pottawatomi shared a reserve, also, the Sac and Fox
Sac and Fox Nation
The Sac and Fox Nation is the largest of three federally recognized tribes of Sac and Meskwaki Native Americans. They are located in Oklahoma and are predominantly Sac....
. Later, the Kickapoo were moved in and, lastly, the Iowa
Iowa tribe
The Iowa , also known as the Báxoje, are a Native American Siouan people. Today they are enrolled in either of two federally recognized tribes, the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma and the Ioway Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska....
. The combined Cheyenne
Cheyenne
Cheyenne are a Native American people of the Great Plains, who are of the Algonquian language family. The Cheyenne Nation is composed of two united tribes, the Só'taeo'o and the Tsétsêhéstâhese .The Cheyenne are thought to have branched off other tribes of Algonquian stock inhabiting lands...
Arapaho
Arapaho
The Arapaho are a tribe of Native Americans historically living on the eastern plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They were close allies of the Cheyenne tribe and loosely aligned with the Sioux. Arapaho is an Algonquian language closely related to Gros Ventre, whose people are seen as an early...
tribe was given the western end of the Creek and Seminole land along with some land ceded from the other tribes. Most of the former Creek and Seminole land, as was true for the rest of central and western Indian Territory, was leased from the Indian tribes by large cattle ranching companies.
The pro-settlement campaign
During the Choctaw-Chickasaw Treaty negotiations of 1866, the Principal Chief of the Choctaws, Allen Wright, coined the term Oklahoma and suggested it as the name for all of Indian Territory. (Oklahoma Historical Society) |
In about 1879, Elias C. Boudinot
Elias Cornelius Boudinot
Elias Cornelius Boudinot was a delegate to the Arkansas secession convention, a colonel in the Confederate States Army, and a territorial representative in the Confederate Congress.-Life:...
began a campaign, perhaps at the behest of one of his clients, the M-K-T Railroad
Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad
The Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad was incorporated May 23, 1870. In its earliest days the MKT was commonly referred to as "the K-T", which was its stock exchange symbol; this common designation soon evolved into "the Katy"....
, to open the land "unoccupied by any Indian" to settlement by non-Indians. He pointed out in a letter published in 1879 that four of the Five Civilized Tribes
Five Civilized Tribes
The Five Civilized Tribes were the five Native American nations—the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole—that were considered civilized by Anglo-European settlers during the colonial and early federal period because they adopted many of the colonists' customs and had generally good...
, unlike the Cherokee, had extinguished their complete title to the lands ceded following the Civil War and received full payment. He also said:
Whatever may have been the desire or intention of the United States Government in 1866 to locate Indians and negroes upon these lands, it is certain that no such desire or intention exists in 1879. The Negro since that date, has become a citizen of the United States, and Congress has recently enacted laws which practically forbid the removal of any more Indians into the Territory.
He put forth the view that area was now Public Land
Public domain (land)
Public domain is a term used to describe lands that were not under private or state ownership during the 18th and 19th centuries in the United States, as the country was expanding. These lands were obtained from the 13 original colonies, from Native American tribes, or from purchase from other...
and suggested the names "Unassigned Lands" and "Oklahoma" for the district.
In an attempt to prevent encroachment, President
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford Birchard Hayes was the 19th President of the United States . As president, he oversaw the end of Reconstruction and the United States' entry into the Second Industrial Revolution...
issued a proclamation on April 26, 1879, forbidding trespass into the area
...which Territory is designated, organized, and described by treaties and laws of the United States and by executive authorities as the Indian's country...
It was too late. Almost immediately speculators and landless citizens began organizing and agitating for the opening of the land to settlement. The newspapers generally referred to these pro-settlement forces as Boomers and followed Boudinot's lead in referring to the area as the Unassigned Lands or Oklahoma.
The Boomers planned excursions, which they called raids, into the area and surveyed townsites, built homes, and planted crops. The United States sent troops to round them up and expel them. The raids continued for several years. The Boomers tried to get a legal opinion as to the status of the public lands, but the government, instead of charging them for illegal settlement of Indian land, charged them only under the Intercourse Act
Indian Intercourse Act
The Nonintercourse Act is the collective name given to six statutes passed by the United States Congress in 1790, 1793, 1796, 1799, 1802, and 1834. The Act regulates commerce between Native Americans and non-Indians...
. Finally, in United States vs. Payne in 1884, the United States District Court
United States district court
The United States district courts are the general trial courts of the United States federal court system. Both civil and criminal cases are filed in the district court, which is a court of law, equity, and admiralty. There is a United States bankruptcy court associated with each United States...
at Topeka
Topeka, Kansas
Topeka |Kansa]]: Tó Pee Kuh) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Shawnee County. It is situated along the Kansas River in the central part of Shawnee County, located in northeast Kansas, in the Central United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was...
, Kansas
Kansas
Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
ruled that settling on the Unassigned Lands was not a criminal offense.
The government refused to accept the decision and the raids continued. Finally General Pleasant Porter
Pleasant Porter
Pleasant Porter , was a respected American Indian statesman and the Principal Chief of the Creek Nation from 1899 until his death. He served with the Confederacy in the 1st Creek Mounted Volunteers, as Superintendent of Schools in the Creek Nation , as commander of the Creek Light Horsemen , and...
, the Creek Council's delegate to Washington, offered to relinquish all Creek claims to that part of the ceded territory which remained unassigned. On January 31, 1889, the United States and the Creeks agreed to quit any claims to title of the land. The Creeks received approximately $2,250,000.
The settlement and statehood
The Springer Amendment was immediately added to the Indian Appropriation Act of 1889 to authorize settlement under the provisions of the Homestead ActHomestead Act
A homestead act is one of three United States federal laws that gave an applicant freehold title to an area called a "homestead" – typically 160 acres of undeveloped federal land west of the Mississippi River....
of 1862. The amendment, however, denied the settlers their squatter's rights. The lands were to be settled by a land run
Land run
Land run usually refers to an historical event in which previously restricted land of the United States was opened for homesteading on a first arrival basis. Some newly opened lands were sold first-come, sold by bid, or won by lottery, or by means other than a run...
. The original settlers were rounded up and expelled. On April 22, 1889, the Oklahoma lands were settled by what would later be called the Run of '89
Land Run of 1889
The Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889 was the first land run into the Unassigned Lands and included all or part of the 2005 modern day Canadian, Cleveland, Kingfisher, Logan, Oklahoma, and Payne counties of the U.S. state of Oklahoma...
. Over 50,000 people entered on the first day, among them several thousand former slaves and descendants of slaves. Tent cities grew overnight at Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
, Kingfisher
Kingfisher, Oklahoma
Kingfisher is a city in and the county seat of Kingfisher County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 4,380 at the 2000 census. It is the former home and namesake of Kingfisher College.-History:...
, El Reno
El Reno, Oklahoma
El Reno is a city in Canadian County, Oklahoma, United States, in the central part of the state. A part of the Oklahoma City Metropolitan Statistical Area, El Reno is west of downtown Oklahoma City...
, Norman
Norman, Oklahoma
Norman is a city in Cleveland County, Oklahoma, United States, and is located south of downtown Oklahoma City. It is part of the Oklahoma City metropolitan area. As of the 2010 census, Norman was to have 110,925 full-time residents, making it the third-largest city in Oklahoma and the...
, Guthrie
Guthrie, Oklahoma
Guthrie is a city in and the county seat of Logan County, Oklahoma, United States, and a part of the Oklahoma City Metroplex. The population was 9,925 at the 2000 census.Guthrie was the territorial and later the first state capital for Oklahoma...
and Stillwater
Stillwater, Oklahoma
Stillwater is a city in north-central Oklahoma at the intersection of U.S. 177 and State Highway 51. It is the county seat of Payne County, Oklahoma, United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 45,688. Stillwater is the principal city of the Stillwater Micropolitan Statistical...
, which was the first of the settlements.
Federal troops provided law enforcement and the closest criminal and civil jurisdictions were the federal courts in Fort Smith, Arkansas
Fort Smith, Arkansas
Fort Smith is the second-largest city in Arkansas and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County. With a population of 86,209 in 2010, it is the principal city of the Fort Smith, Arkansas-Oklahoma Metropolitan Statistical Area, a region of 298,592 residents which encompasses the Arkansas...
. Despite that, the district was generally peaceful. Most land disputes were settled without bloodshed, although a few took years to resolve.
The Organic Act of 1890 incorporated the Unassigned Lands into the new Oklahoma Territory
Oklahoma Territory
The Territory of Oklahoma was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 2, 1890, until November 16, 1907, when it was joined with the Indian Territory under a new constitution and admitted to the Union as the State of Oklahoma.-Organization:Oklahoma Territory's...
. Under the act local officials were appointed to handle civil and criminal matters until elections were held. In 1907 Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
became the 46th state.