Living Law,
Living LandSupport land rights
All treaties and agreements

Treaty

Potawatomi (Mesquawbuck's Band) at Turkey Creek Prairie, Indiana (1836)

In March 1836 Mesquawbuck's Potawatomi band ceded four reserved sections and agreed to move west of the Mississippi within two years.

Signed
March 26, 1836
Senate
Ratified
The land in this treaty’s record. Open on the map

What happened

On March 26, 1836, Abel C. Pepper, commissioner for the United States, signed a treaty at a camp on Turkey Creek Prairie, Indiana. The other party was Mesquawbuck, a chief of the Potawatomi (spelled Pottawatamy in the text), and his band.

In Article 1 the chief and his band ceded the four sections of land reserved for them by the second article of the October 1832 treaty with the Potawatomi on the Tippecanoe River. The treaty states no acreage. In Article 4 they agreed to yield peaceable possession of those sections and to remove to the country west of the Mississippi provided for the Potawatomi nation by the United States, within two years of the signing date.

The United States agreed to pay $2,560 in specie, meaning coin, at the next annuity payment after ratification, and to pay the necessary expenses of making the treaty. The Senate struck out Article 6, whose text is not shown on the page. The treaty was proclaimed on June 4, 1836.

The treaty text does not describe how the negotiation went, and the sources used here do not say what happened to the band after it.

Summarized with AI assistance from 3 sources and checked against their words; not yet reviewed by historians or by the nations. Report an error

What the sources say, and how this was checked

Well supported by the sources below.

  1. agree to yield peaceable possession of the above sections of land and remove to the country west of the MississippiTreaty with the Potawatomi, 1836 (OSU Tribal Treaties Database)
  2. the sum of twenty-five hundred and sixty dollars in specie at the next payment of annuityTreaty with the Potawatomi, 1836 (OSU Tribal Treaties Database)
  3. west of the Mississippi provided for the Pottawatamy nation by the United StatesTreaty with the Potawatomi, 7 Stat. 490 (govinfo)

Research notes. Acreage not stated (four sections). Article 6 was stricken by the Senate and its content is not on the page. The cited sources do not describe the signing or what happened to the band afterward.

What the treaty did to the land

Each shape is a numbered area in the federal government’s 1899 record of land cessions.

What happened next

Everything the record holds about this land and this treaty, in order: what earlier agreements said, what this one did, and what the United States, the courts and the nations did afterwards.

  1. 1832

    Land kept

    Land set aside as a reservation for the Potawatomi (Mes-quaw-buck's band)

    By Potawatomi (St. Joseph, Cold Water, Wabash, and Elkhart Bands) at Tippecanoe River, Indiana (1832)

    area 204

  2. 1836

    This treaty

    Land ceded to the United States by the Potawatomi (Mes-quaw-buck's band)

    In March 1836 Mesquawbuck's Potawatomi band ceded four reserved sections and agreed to move west of the Mississippi within two years.

Who is doing the work today

The nations connected to this treaty come first, then groups returning land and defending treaty rights. Support goes directly to them.

This history belongs to living nations. Start with them:

Working with these nations

Native legal and land defense, nationally

Gifts go straight to each organization; this atlas takes nothing. Listing is not endorsement: how organizations are listed.

Sources

  1. treaties.okstate.edu/treaties/treaty-with-the-potawatomi-1836-0450reference work
    Treaty with the Potawatomi, 1836 Mar. 26, 1836. | 7 Stat., 490.

Shapes are approximate and are not legal descriptions of land, title or jurisdiction.