Page:History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century Volume 1.djvu/251



“The law never did and never will protect the people in all their rights so fully as the early settlers protected themselves by these claim organizations.”

Many of the early traders and trappers who made homes near the mouth of the Des Moines River married Indian wives, and their children usually adopted the habits of their Indian mothers as they grew up. When the treaty of August 4, 1824, was made by William Clark with the Sac and Fox Indians, the following stipulation was made:

“The small tract of land lying between the Mississippi and Des Moines rivers is intended for the use of the half-breeds belonging to the Sac and Fox nation; they holding it by the same title and in same manner that other Indian titles are held.”

This reservation embraced about 113,000 acres of choice lauds, lying in the southeast corner of Iowa, in the county of Lee. On the 13th of June, 1834, Congress passed an act authorizing the half-breeds to individually preempt, acquire title to and sell these lands. A company was organized under a special act of the Territorial Legislature for the purpose of buying and selling the half-breed lands. This tract had been divided into one hundred and one pieces, and the company had purchased forty-one of these tracts of land. The treaty making the reservation was very indefinite in its terms, failing to designate the number of persons or the names of those entitled to the lands. It was therefore impossible to determine who were the rightful owners, and those who purchased had no means of knowing whether the parties selling could convey good titles.

In order to settle the question of titles, an act was passed by the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature on the 16th of January, 1838, requiring all persons claiming title to file their respective claims with the clerk of the District Court of Lee County, within one year, showing the nature of their claims to title. Edward Johnston, Thomas S. Wilson and David Brigham were appointed a commission to