The Neosha Valley Experience

The Neosha Valley Experience. . , The 256,000-acre reservation selected in 1846 as the "permanent" home for the Kansa Indians included Council Grove. Located in the Neosho Valley on the banks of the Neosho River, the area possessed rich soil and abundant timber. Not surprisingly, its charms were not lost on white settlers and commercial land developers. The Kansas arrived in the Upper Neosho Valley in the late spring of 1848. Their trek was made with the benefit of neither government supervision nor an accurate or official land survey to specify the reservation's boundaries. Individual chiefs established their villages in the vicinity of Council Grove., However, even as the Neosho Valley lands were supposedly being set aside for the Kansa tribe, in reality they were in the process of being taken away from them. With no adequate government effort to enforce the treaty, squatters and merchants flocked to the area in increasing numbers. They took advantage of the lack of an adequate land survey to claim that the reservation did not include Council Grove. In fact, the government encouraged such behavior. In 1854, President Pierce signed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which opened Kansas Territory to squatters and speculators before a single acre of Indian land was legally available for settlement. In 1855, Kansas Territorial Governor Andrew H. Reeder--who was subsequently dismissed for land speculation -- announced that squatters could establish claims in advance of a public survey. , Individual agents of the Indian department did attempt to prevent the Kansa lands from being overrun by outsiders. But in each case, their efforts were hampered by lack of assistance and by the violent threats they faced from the white settlers. One agent's cabin was burned to the ground by settlers who the agent had attempted to evict from Kansa lands. In the face of death threats, that agent fled with his family to Missouri., An official survey of the Kansa lands was finally completed in 1856. It clearly showed that Council Grove was located well within the Kansa reservation. But by then the damage had been done. The twenty square-mile reservation was completely overrun by white settlers who had no intention of relinquishing their land claims, asserting that their claims had been made "in good faith." Squatters and merchants, seeking clear title to their stakes and townsite, insisted that the Kansas be expelled from the valley. The Indian agent at this time, John Montgomery, reported that "Although the Kansas have seen their country taken from them … they have remained quiet and peaceful, for which they deserve credit.", In 1857, a Kansa delegation led by Hard Hart, White Hair and The Wolf obtained a personal interview in Washington with the Indian Commissioner. Displaying a keen understanding of unfolding events, they complained that white settlers had invaded their reservation and were robbing them of their timber. They demanded more precise information about the land granted to them in 1846 by the government. , With Kansa leaders now assuming a more aggressive posture, the government came to realize it would have to choose between expelling the squatters or arranging yet another land-cession treaty. It chose the latter course. A treaty ratified in 1859 allowed the Kansas to keep only 80,000 acres of land. Then in 1863, Congress authorized the executive branch to enter into treaties that would result in the removal of all Indians from Kansas.