Avoiding Removal - The Pokagon Band of Potawatomi

Avoiding Removal - The Pokagon Band of Potawatomi. . , Logo text: , "Pokégnek Bodéwadmik" (Pokagon Band of Potawatomi) , , New Buffalo was founded during an era of Indian removal from the region. Historically, the Potawatomi lands included millions of acres in Southern Michigan, Northern Illinois and Indiana, Southeastern Wisconsin and Northwestern Ohio. As the French, British, and later, the Americans fought each other for space and resources on the American continent, the many different tribes allied with different European groups to protect their lands. Despite playing an important role in the history of the United States, Potawatomi communities were forcibly removed from Michigan with President Andrew Jackson's Indian Removal Act of 1830. , On September 4, 1838, over 800 Potawatomi who originally resisted removal to Oklahoma were relocated to Kansas, in what is known as the "Potawatomi Trail of Death." However, just one year before Captain Wessel Whittaker ran aground near what would become New Buffalo, the 1833 Treaty of Chicago was signed. While both the 1821 and 1833 Treaties of Chicago ceded Potawatomi lands throughout the Great Lakes to the Federal Government, Leopold Pokagon negotiated an amendment to the 1833 Treaty. This amendment allowed some Catholic Potawatomi to stay in their traditional homelands here in the St. Joseph River Valley. A faction of the descendants of the families who were able to stay in the area is known today as the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians. However, it was not until September 21, 1994 that the federally-recognized status of the Pokagon Band was reaffirmed by an Act of Congress. This day is now recognized as Sovereignty Day by the citizens of the Pokagon Band., Map of Removals Legend: , Potawatomi Removals , Direction of removal , Direction of return , Direction of migration , Ceded territories , Interim reservation , Present-day community , Community shared with other tribe , Interim community, Captions: , Between 1795 and 1842 the United States negotiated with several tribes of Michigan Indians to acquire most of the 58,216 square miles (151 326 sq km) of which the state is comprised. After this series of land cessions, the Indians held only 32 square miles (83.2 sq km) of reserved land., Modern Michigan reservations include Bay Mills near Brimley in Chippewa County. Hannahville near Wilson in Menominee County, L'Anse in Baraga and Ontonagon counties, and the Isabella Reserve near Mount Pleasant in Isabella County., Map of Treaties Legend , Reservations , Greenville Treaty 1795 , Detroit Treaty 1807 , Maumee Treaty 1817 , Saginaw Treaty 1819 , Sault Saint Marie Treaty 1820 , Chicago Treaty 1821 , Carey Mission Treaty 1828 , Chicago Treaty 1833 , Washington Treaty 1836 , Cedar Point Treaty 1836 , La Pointe Treaty 1842, Potawatomi "Trail of Death" march: Sept. - Nov. 1838 , (---) Designates 1838 Potawatomi Trail of Death route starting in Indiana, crossing Illinois and Missouri, and ending at present day Osawatomie, Kansas., In September 1838 over 850 Potawatomi Indian people were rounded-up and marched at gunpoint from their Indiana homeland. Many walked the 660-mile distance, which took two months. More than 40 died, mostly children, of typhoid fever and the stress of the forced removal., (o) Dots on the trail are some of the 48 places where the Potawatomi people camped one night or more on the forced removal and certain other locations mentioned in the official journal kept by a government agent.