Aacimotaatiiyankwi

By Isaac Stephani and Cam Shriver

Note: This blog post stems from original research conducted by undergraduate student Isaac Stephani in Dr. Cam Shriver’s Intro to the Miami Tribe class at Miami University in spring 2019.

In late September of 1817, the Treaty of Fort Meigs, also known as the Treaty of Maumee Rapids, was signed. In it, six Native nations collectively ceded over 4.5 million acres of territory to the United States. Representing the United States was Governor of the Michigan territory Lewis Cass, and Ohio legislator Duncan McArthur, while numerous leaders represented the six Native tribes present: ​Wyandot​s, ​Senecas, Delawares, Shawnees, Potawatomis, Ottawas, and Ojibwes. Marking one of the largest cessions of land by Native peoples since the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, the Treaty of Fort Meigs was part of a larger effort to move Native people Westward of the Mississippi River, as was Lewis Cass’ objective over the course of his nearly three decades as Governor of the Michigan territory.^[1] Secretary of War George Graham, who oversaw the U.S. Indian Department, congratulated Cass on his negotiation at Fort Meigs, writing that the “extent of cession far exceed[s] my most sanguine expectations.”^[2] But despite the treaty’s cession of land that the Miami leader Mihšihkinaahkwa ‘Little Turtle’ had claimed as belonging to the Miami nation, no Myaamia leaders signed it. Where were the Myaamia at the 1817 Treaty of Fort Meigs? Until now, we have had little evidence to explain Myaamia feelings at the time; there are still questions to answer. But the lack of Myaamia participation at Fort Meigs contextualizes the Treaty of St. Mary’s, signed by Myaamia leaders just over a year later on October 6, 1818, which ceded a huge area of Miami country. It also puts into clearer focus the pressures on Native American nations to yield swaths of their heritage homelands. Read the rest of this entry »