By Michael Dickey – Former Site Director, Arrow Rock State Historic Site, Missouri Department of Natural Resources for a Program: April 25, 2015 Conflicted Perspectives Symposium, St. Charles County College
The War Department in 1808 instituted the factory system to implement Jefferson’s vision. Factories were government fur trading posts that competed directly with private traders in an effort to pacify and control Indians. A military garrison was assigned to protect each factory. Meriwether Lewis proposed that the factory for the Osage be located on the Missouri River as travel on the Osage River was often limited due to low water conditions.[9] In August of 1808 a keelboat under the command of Captain Eli B. Clemson of the 1st U.S. Infantry set out up the Missouri River from Fort Belle Fontaine near St. Louis, followed a short time later by William Clark and Nathan Boone’s overland march of mounted dragoons from St. Charles.[10] The troops rendezvoused at the “Fire Prairie” several miles east of present–day Independence Missouri. There they began construction of Fort Osage, sometimes identified as Fort Clark.
Clark sent Boone and an interpreter out to bring the Osages in to council. Clark employed a carrot-and-stick strategy, threatening war on the Osage but promising that all would be forgiven and they would have their own very trading post if they became American friends. Clark also promised them protection from their enemies.
What pleased most was the idea I suggested that it was better that they should be on the lands of the U.S. where they Could Hunt without the fear of other Indians attacking…than being in continual dread of all the eastern Tribes whom they knew wished to destroy them & possess their Country.[11]
The Osage accepted Clark’s proposal and signed a treaty on September 14. Clark informed Secretary of War Henry Dearborn of the price they paid and what they got in return:
near 50,000 Square Miles of excellent Country – for which I have promised the Osage protection under the guns of the Fort at Fire prairie, to keep a Store at that place to trade with them, to furnish them with a Blacksmith, a Mill, Plows, to build them two houses of logs and to pay for the Horses and property they have taken from the Citizens of the U. States.” [12]
Later a group of 75 Osages arrived in St. Louis returning some stolen horses. They said the treaty was invalid because they had not been present at the signing. They also said that White Hair was a “government chief” who had no authority to make binding agreements for the tribe. Thus, the treaty of 1808 exacerbated existing political dissension in the tribe. The Osages had dealt with the French, British and Spanish for over 100 years on their own terms, sometimes playing them against each other to their own advantage. The French were gone, the Spanish in New Mexico had nothing to trade and the British were too distant to easily trade with. So the Osage could really only deal with the United States and were not able to do so from a position of political unity.
Governor Lewis revised the treaty and Pierre Chouteau was dispatched to Fort Osage to persuade the Osages to sign it. Most of the Big and Little Osage had relocated to the fort. Chouteau had to distribute more gifts and promise an early dispersal of the annuity payments to get them to sign. In the original treaty, a line was drawn straight south from Fort Osage to the Arkansas River and everything east of that boundary to the Mississippi River was ceded. The revised treaty required that they cede an additional 20 million acres of land north of the Missouri River, territory that was also claimed by the Ioway and Sac & Fox nations. However, the government did not consult with those nations about the cession.
The Big Osage became displeased with their new residence and returned to their old towns on the Osage River in 1810. In 1811, war clouds gathered on the frontier as the Shawnee chief Tecumseh built a confederacy of Indian tribes and the British were perceived as inciting the Indians to make war on the United States. The Osage refused Tecumseh’s overtures to join as many tribes in the confederacy were their hereditary enemies. Plus, they weren’t willing to jeopardize the trade at Fort Osage. The British however were reaching out to western tribes to trade in an effort solidify Indian unity. The Osage as U.S. clients and the Ioway as British clients became engaged in a proxy war, receiving tacit support from their sponsors in their raids against each other. After the United States declared war on Great Britain on June 18, 1812, the Little Osage chiefs promised George C. Sibley the fort’s factor (trader), “never to desert their American father as long as he was faithful to them.”[13]
In May of 1813 Frederick Bates, acting Governor of Missouri Territory sought volunteers to defend the Missouri frontier from the pro-British Sac and Fox nation on the Rock River of Illinois. Pierre Chouteau secured 275 first-line Osage warriors for the task. When Governor Benjamin Howard returned from Kentucky he canceled the planned attack, which angered Chouteau and the Osages. Howard and territorial delegate Edward Hempstead distrusted and feared any group of armed Indians roaming the countryside, even though they were allies. Hempstead feared the Osage would change sides at the first opportunity and attack the Missouri settlements. [14]
Fort Osage was closed in June of 1813 as being useless to the defense of the frontier. The U.S. still needed to maintain Osage loyalty so Sibley relocated the factory to the Arrow Rock bluff that October. Gray Bird of the Big Osage liked the Arrow Rock location “on account of the Settlements of Americans near it which I think afford us more security when we come to trade.”[15] Gray Bird obviously saw the Boonslick settlement as a buffer between them and their enemies, the Sac & Fox, Potawatomi and Ioway. However, Big Soldier of the Little Osage disagreed with the move:
I was lately on a visit to the Great American Chief. He told me that Ft. Clark should be made stronger than ever, that he would plant an iron post there that could not be pulled up and that would never decay. I fear he has forgotten that promise and instead of planting an iron post intends to let the old wooden one rot. The Trading House is not for nothing. We have given our Sons for it and I tell you plainly I think the President has done very wrong to remove it at all…[16]
The Osage leaders clearly had a higher degree of sophistication and understanding of events going on around them than they are usually given credit for. However dependence on American trade and political disunity in the tribe made it ever more difficult for them to control those events. Despite the Little Osage objections, trade continued at Arrow Rock until April of 1814 when the post was abandoned due to troubling events. Sac & Fox raids in the Missouri valley began increasing. Osage leaders met in council with a faction of the Sac & Fox who been relocated to the Missouri River by Clark the previous September. A Sac chief named Quashquame raised a British Union Jack over the council house, alarming factor John Johnson. [17] Osages robbed trappers on the Gasconade River and killed some hunters on the White River. Some Little Osages traveled to Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin the base of British operations in the Mississippi valley where they received presents. Despite these incidents, the Osage nation did not commit to the British side although Clark on August 14 reported that the British were “making great exertions to gain over the Osages…”[18] Sibley’s operation at Arrow Rock had helped maintain Osage loyalty at a critical juncture as did the influence of Auguste and Pierre Chouteau, who were married into the Big Osage tribe.
Great Britain and the United States signed a peace accord on December 24, 1814 in Ghent, Belgium. Congress ratified the treaty on February 28, 1815 officially ending the War of 1812. However, no provisions were made for the Indian nations involved and peace had to be negotiated separately with each tribe. President James Madison appointed William Clark, Illinois Territorial Governor Ninian Edwards and U.S. Indian Agent Auguste Chouteau as Indian Peace Commissioners and they were convened from May 11 through September 28. They were appropriated $20,000 in trade goods to use as presents for the Indians.[19]
Endnotes
[9] Clarence E. Carter, Ed., The Territorial Papers of the United States, vol. 14, Louisiana and Missouri Territory 1806-1814 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934-1962) p. 196
[10] Ibid p. 209-210
[11] Clark to Dearborn Sept. 23, 1808 Indian Claims Commission 733 Docket No. 105 The Osage Nation of Indians, 1962 p. 858 http://digital.library.okstate.edu/icc/v11/iccv11bp812.pdf
[12] Carter, p. 225
[13] James, Edwin. An Account of an Expedition to the Rocky Mountains in the Years 1819 and 1820. H.C. Cary, Philadelphia, Vol II 1823, p. 248
[14] Carter, p. 673-676
[15] Ibid p. 714
[16] Ibid p. 714
[17] Gregg, Kate. War of 1812 on the Missouri Frontier. Missouri Historical Review, Vol. 32: 122 – 123
[18] Carter, p. 787
[19] March, David. The History of Missouri Vol. I. Lewis Historical Publishing Co. New York 1967, p. 303
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