Upper Sioux Agency

Upper Sioux Agency. . American Indian agencies existed to implement U.S. Government Indian policies. By the mid-1800s, agencies such as this one dotted the land west of the Mississippi river. The U.S. government intended to assimilate native people into English speaking, textbook-educated, American society.

The Dakota people call this area Pezihutazizi (Where They Dig for Yellow Medicine). Dakota women grew and gathered foods while men hunted game across a large area. But the treaties of 1851 and 1858 reduced Dakota landholdings from millions of acres to small reservations along the southern bank of the Minnesota River. The Sisseton and Wahpeton Dakota bands held the reservation land from Lake Traverse to the Yellow Medicine River.

The Upper (or Yellow Medicine Agency) was established here in 1854 with buildings that reflected the government’s goals for assimilation. The Agency boasted comfortable homes for government employees as well as a school, brick warehouse, stables, and a jail. Trader stores and Christian missions were nearby. The total area contained at least 100 houses for Dakota farmers, hinting at the success of the government’s endeavors.

Anger at the unfairness of the treaties festered, however, and spilled over when annuities were delayed and food was short. In early August 1862, nearly 4,000 Dakota gathered at the agency, demanding payment and food. Noting their desperation, the Indian agent distributed some food and the demands temporarily subsided. The silence was short-lived. Most of the agency buildings were looted and burned during the six-week U.S.-Dakota War of 1862.