The Winnebago Agency 1846–1855

The Winnebago Agency 1846–1855. . America's westward expansion came at the expense of the American Indians. Tribes were relocated as the tide of European settlement reached their traditional homelands, and the treaties negotiated with them were seldom long lasting or satisfying to either side. Among the many Indian nations affected were the Winnebago, whose homeland was the area known today as southwestern Wisconsin., In 1832 a new reservation was established for the Winnebago along the Mississippi River near the present Iowa–Minnesota border. They were placed at this location to serve as a buffer between the Dakota and Sauk tribes. Only 14 years later the Winnebago people were relocated to the Crow Wing River in Central Minnesota, centered around the present-day town of Long Prairie in the area of the Todd County Fairgrounds. Here the reservation population numbered over 2,500 individuals, and more than 150 structures included a headquarters, school, church, convent, stores and offices., In only nine years the Winnebago were uprooted again and moved to a new location near present-day St. Clair in Blue Earth County. Here they remained for seven years until, following the U.S.–Dakota Conflict of 1862 in which they took no part, they were forcibly moved along with the Dakota to Crow Creek Reservation in South Dakota., The road that had been constructed from Little Falls to the Winnebago reservation in the Crow Wing region later served settlers moving into the area. The reservation headquarters was renamed Long Prairie and eventually became the county seat of Todd County.