Primary Sources Access – Foundation (Plan E): American Indians and the American West (1809-1971)

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of Columbia, 1876-April 1878

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of Columbia, 1876-April 1878 is a collection of correspondence and documents related to the U.S. Army's experience in the newly settled American West. This collection focuses on the Bannock Campaign of 1878, also known as the Bannock War. This conflict occurred between June and August 1878, but documents found in this collection are from as early as 1866 and as late as November 1878. However, most of the correspondence and documents relate directly to the experience of the U.S. Army, and related state and local militias, in fighting the Bannock, Shoshone, and Paiute Indians. Documents in this collection include correspondence between military commanders about skirmishes and conflicts with the Bannock; requests for supplies, weapons, and food; and the transfer of military personnel and units to counter the Bannock Indian attacks.

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of New Mexico, 1853-1866

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of New Mexico, 1853-1866is a collection of correspondence and documents related to the U.S. Army's experience in the newly settled American West. The majority of these documents are from 1862 to 1866, although a few documents are from the 1850s. The Department of New Mexico dealt with the area in modern-day Arizona, as well as New Mexico. Several of the letters in this collection relate to the threat of a Confederate invasion during the years of the Civil War, while others relate to the U.S. Army campaign against the Apaches and Navajos. Other documents throughout the collection consist of correspondence between military commanders requesting supplies and rations, reports on interactions with groups of Navajo and Apache Indians, and military facility inspection reports.

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of Oregon, 1858-1860

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of Oregon, 1858-1860 is a collection of documents and correspondence that provides a detailed view of the encounters between the U.S. Army and American Indian tribes in the west. During the time of westward expansion, the U.S. Army was the only division of the federal government that maintained a consistent presence in the new territories. Local governments existed, but civilians frequently looked to the U.S. Army for support and protection. The correspondence and documents in this collection are varied and include the mundane, such as requests for supplies and leaves of absence, while other documents include peace treaties signed between the U.S. government, represented by the U.S. Army, and various Indian tribes in the west. Documents in this collection are organized chronologically, and then alphabetically--typically by last name of correspondent.

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of the Northwest, 1862-1865

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Department of the Northwest, 1862-1865 is a collection of correspondence and documents related to the U.S. Army's experience in the newly settled American West. The majority of the documents from this collection are from 1862 and 1863, although several of the folders contain documents from as late as 1865. The Department of the Northwest dealt mainly with the area in modern-day Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, and the Dakotas. Many of the letters in this collection relate to the Dakota War of 1862 and its aftermath in the region. Other documents throughout the collection consist of correspondence between military commanders requesting supplies and rations, reports on interactions with groups of Sioux and Chippewa Indians, and requests from white settlers for army protection. Documents in this collection are organized chronologically, and then alphabetically--typically by last name of correspondent.

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Records of the Yellowstone Expedition, and U.S. Army District of Yellowstone and Yellowstone Command, 1872-1881

American Indians and the U.S. Army: Records of the Yellowstone Expedition, and U.S. Army District of Yellowstone and Yellowstone Command, 1872-1881 is a collection of correspondence and documents related to the U.S. Army's experience in the newly settled American West. This collection contains documents from as early as 1872, but focuses mainly on the Great Sioux War of 1876-1877 and the four years after the war. The final folder in the collection deals with Sitting Bull's surrender in 1881. The earlier folders relate to the U.S. Army's Yellowstone Expedition of 1873, led by David Sloane Stanley and George Armstrong Custer. The purpose of this expedition was to survey a route for the Northern Pacific Railroad. Documents throughout the collection consist of correspondence between military commanders requesting supplies and rations, reports on skirmishes with groups of Sioux and Cheyenne, descriptions of terrain and interactions with Indian scouts and guides, and the movement of troops to aid in the fighting.

American West: Overland Journeys, 1841-1880

Western settlers created what we think of as the American West. Explorers came and went, soldiers came and went, miners and others came and went--but settlers came to stay. History Vault brings the lives of the settlers into focus through The American West: Overland Journeys, 1841-1880.

Apache Campaign of 1886: Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands, Department of Arizona

"Apache war over." With these three words written from Fort Bowie, Arizona, on September 6, 1886, General Nelson A. Miles marked the end of an era. On September 4, 1886, the legendary Apache warrior Geronimo and his followers surrendered to the U.S. Army, ending the last organized resistance to the U.S. government by Indians not already confined to a reservation. General Miles's letter is part of The Apache Campaign of 1886: Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands, Department of Arizona, filmed from the holdings of the National Archives in Washington, D.C. This collection documents in extensive detail the last year of the U.S. Army's pursuit of Geronimo. While the majority of the correspondence is from 1886, the collection also includes material from 1885 and some scattered correspondence from before 1885. The collection consists of correspondence, telegrams, general military orders, reports, and other documents of the U.S. Army's Department of Arizona. The collection addresses many typical administrative details, including supplies, enlistments, leaves, courts-martial, and troop movements, while also addressing issues such as alcohol use, desertion, food and foodstuffs, health, horses, Indian scouts, signals and communications, and transportation. The focus of the collection is reports of scouting operations and military skirmishes with Apaches in Arizona, New Mexico, and Mexico.

Chicago History Museum Collections on American Indians and the American West

Chicago History Museum Collections on Native Americans and the American West contains a wealth of information on the land, peoples, exploration, and transformation of the trans-Appalachian West, from 1754 to 1899. The collection is split into eight different series, providing many perspectives on the expansion of the United States. The eight series are: American Fur Company, Ninian Edwards Papers, George W. Lawe Papers, Menard Family Papers, Jeremiah Porter Diaries, James Wilkinson Papers, Winnebago Grammar Book, and the Story of the Winnebagoes. Documents in this collection are primarily correspondence, financial accounts, legal documents, and diary entries.

Indian Removal to the West, 1832-1840: Files of the Office of the Commissary General of Subsistence

"[The U.S. government is] aware that by your advice the Indians have in many instances withdrawn from their engagements to emigrate the present season--and by this conduct [of resisting removal] are losing the benefit of removing at the period best fitted for such operations. If you value the welfare of your people why shut your eyes to the evils and sufferings such counsel must inevitably entail upon them--upon you rests the responsibility of the consequences dreadful as they may be and when the period arrives for carrying out the provisions of the treaty and the imperative mandate of the law must be executed by the United States, the Cherokees compelled to leave their present homes unprepared, will perceive too late that they have been misled by false hopes and may bitterly repent amid tears and blood having listened to such advice" (101098-015-0473). John Mason Jr., an Indian agent, wrote these words on November 24, 1837, to a Cherokee delegation visiting Washington, D.C., to protest the removal of Cherokee Indians from North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama. Mason, as a government representative, was trying to convince the delegation to return home and begin encouraging their fellow Cherokee to relocate west of the Mississippi River as soon as possible so as to take advantage of the best travel season. Most Cherokee did not willingly move west, and Mason's words would prove prophetic as the Cherokee were forcibly removed during 1838-1839 in what became known as "The Trail of Tears."

Indian Wars of the West and Frontier Army Life, 1862-1898: Official Histories and Personal Narratives

The struggle between white America and Indians has been a subject of much fascination. The materials comprising Indian Wars of the West and Frontier Army Life: Official Histories and Personal Narratives provide the researcher with a unique look into America's western past. Individually and collectively, these histories and narratives constitute a source of great historical value. Many of the items are first-person accounts that chronicle the trials and tribulations of army life on the frontier. The histories and narratives describe the wonder and excitement of living on the frontier, meetings with Indians, the drudgery of camp life, the boredom of garrison duty, and details of day-to-day existence in inhospitable parts of the West. Attitudes are here recorded with a fullness found in very few other kinds of sources--attitudes toward army life, toward officers and fellow soldiers, toward the Indian enemy, and toward the political questions of the day. Comparable perspectives are also available concerning officers (and bureaucrats), insights into relations among themselves, efforts to secure promotion, and motivation behind the planning and conduct of operations. Such characteristics make these histories and narratives one of the most useful sources available to scholars.

Lake Mohonk Conference of Friends of the Indian

From 1883 to 1916 the center of the movement to reform federal Indian policy was the annual Lake Mohonk Conference of Friends of the Indian. During these years the conferences exerted a powerful influence on both official government policy and the private attitudes of many Americans. The policies formulated or influenced by Mohonk have left a legacy which is still very much with us. In 1904, the conference added "Other Dependent Peoples" to its name to account for the many indigenous populations under the purview of the U.S. federal government.

Letters Received by the Attorney General, 1809-1870: Western Law and Order

Letters Received by the Attorney General, 1809-1870: Western Law and Order contains requests, pleadings, worries, gripes, and grumblings of the U.S. attorneys, marshals, judges, governors, territorial officials, and private citizens writing to the attorney general. They describe the problems and tribulations, the pettiness and the strivings of those who lived in the western United States.

Letters Received by the Attorney General, 1871-1884: Western Law and Order

Letters Received by the Attorney General, 1871-1884: Western Law and Order follows in order and sequence History Vault's Letters Received by the Attorney General, 1809-1870: Western Law and Order. That collection, numbering approximately 11,000 pages, tracks the great migration westward into empty spaces and across forbidding terrain. The files reproduced here, though they span a modest fourteen years, total approximately 63,000 pages, nearly six times as many as Part 1. That amazing increase simply illustrates one of the most profound results of civilization: bureaucratization.

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 1, Section 1: Navajo, Five Civilized Tribes, Pueblo, Cheyenne and Arapaho, and Ute, 1914-1956

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 1, Section 1 brings together crucial material on the government, history, law, culture, and society of American Indians. Originating from the Bureau of Indian Affairs record collection, History Vault is making available tens of thousands of pages of tribal council meeting minutes. Council meeting minutes provide the most basic documents on the government of Indian tribes. This section covers 1914-1956, and includes the Navajo, Five Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), and Seminole), Pueblo, Cheyenne and Arapaho, and Ute Indians.

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 1, Section 2: Chippewa, Klamath, and Sioux (Standing Rock, Rosebud, Pine Ridge, and Cheyenne River), 1911-1956

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 1, Section 2 brings together crucial material on the government, history, law, culture, and society of American Indians. Originating from the Bureau of Indian Affairs record collection, History Vault is making available tens of thousands of pages of tribal council meeting minutes. Council meeting minutes provide the most basic documents on the government of Indian tribes. This section covers 1911-1956, and includes the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, Klamath Indians, Standing Rock Sioux Indians, Rosebud Sioux Indians, Pine Ridge (Oglala) Sioux Indians, Flandreau Santee Sioux Indians, and Cheyenne River Sioux Indians.

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 2, Section 1: Navajo, Five Civilized Tribes, Ute, Pueblo, and Cheyenne and Arapaho, 1957-1971

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 2, Section 1 brings together crucial material on the government, history, law, culture, and society of American Indians. Originating from the Bureau of Indian Affairs record collection, History Vault is making available tens of thousands of pages of tribal council meeting minutes. Council meeting minutes provide the most basic documents on the government of Indian tribes. This section covers 1957-1971, and includes the Navajo, Five Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), and Seminole), Pueblo, Cheyenne and Arapaho, and Ute Indians.

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 2, Section 2: Sioux (Standing Rock, Rosebud, Pine Ridge, and Cheyenne River), Chippewa, and Klamath, 1957-1971

Major Council Meetings of American Indian Tribes, Part 2, Section 2 brings together crucial material on the government, history, law, culture, and society of American Indians. Originating from the Bureau of Indian Affairs record collection, History Vault is making available tens of thousands of pages of tribal council meeting minutes. Council meeting minutes provide the most basic documents on the government of Indian tribes. This section covers 1957-1971, and includes the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, Red Lake Chippewa, Klamath Indians, Standing Rock Sioux Indians, Rosebud Sioux Indians, Pine Ridge (Oglala) Sioux Indians, and Cheyenne River Sioux Indians.

Native Americans and the New Deal: The Office Files of John Collier, 1933-1945

The granting of citizenship in 1924 to all American Indians was looked upon as the final step in the effort to "Americanize" the Indian. Yet those on reservations were still considered wards of the federal government. This wardship was reinforced by a series of beliefs and laws that sought to transform American Indians into "Indian Americans." Mandated assimilation and acculturation proved disastrous to most Indian tribes. Indians lost their "allotted" lands due to death or bankruptcy, educational programs were too narrow and fixated on "white" ideals, and Indian heritage and tribal culture were cast aside without the substitution of anything in their place. The stage was set for heightened poverty, disease, and illiteracy.

Native Americans Reference Collection: Documents Collected by the Office of Indian Affairs, Part 1: 1840-1900

During the period of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the Office of Indian Affairs was criticized and bureaucratized, but only partially reformed. The vast majority of the documents included in The Native Americans Reference Collection: Documents Collected by the Office of Indian Affairs reflect three basic themes of American Indian history: the continuing need and demand for reform; the Indian services; and the interrelationship of law and guardianship. The documents were originally collected as Miscellaneous Documents Relating to Indian Affairs (hereafter Miscellaneous documents) kept by the Financial Division of the Office of Indian Affairs. Part 1 covers 1840-1900 and contains volumes 1 through part of volume 52, approximately 29,000 pages; Part 2 covers 1901-1948 and contains the second half of volume 52 through volume 138, approximately 47,000 pages. The pagination scheme of the volumes is continuous, although a number of the volumes retain the original published scheme and do not fit within the scheme begun by the Office of Indian Affairs. Each document has been separated as a "folder" and a version of the original document title has been used as a description. This narrative covers both parts.

Native Americans Reference Collection: Documents Collected by the Office of Indian Affairs, Part 2: 1901-1948

During the period of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, the Office of Indian Affairs was criticized and bureaucratized, but only partially reformed. The vast majority of the documents included in The Native Americans Reference Collection: Documents Collected by the Office of Indian Affairs reflect three basic themes of American Indian history: the continuing need and demand for reform; the Indian services; and the interrelationship of law and guardianship. The documents were originally collected as Miscellaneous Documents Relating to Indian Affairs (hereafter Miscellaneous documents) kept by the Financial Division of the Office of Indian Affairs. Part 1 covers 1840-1900 and contains volumes 1 through part of volume 52, approximately 29,000 pages; Part 2 covers 1901-1948 and contains the second half of volume 52 through volume 138, approximately 47,000 pages. The pagination scheme of the volumes is continuous, although a number of the volumes retain the original published scheme and do not fit within the scheme begun by the Office of Indian Affairs. Each document has been separated as a "folder" and a version of the original document title has been used as a description. This narrative covers both parts.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series A: Indian Delegations to Washington

Created on March 11, 1824, the Bureau of Indian Affairs is responsible for the administration and management of federal-Indian relations and policy in the United States. Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series A: Indian Delegations to Washington provides insight into these relations, with documents covering issues associated with American Indian delegation visits to Washington, D.C. during the first half of the twentieth century.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series B: Indian Customs and Social Relations

Created on March 11, 1824, the Bureau of Indian Affairs is responsible for the administration and management of federal-Indian relations and policy in the United States. Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series B: Indian Customs and Social Relations provides insight into the federal government's efforts to acculturate and assimilate American Indians in the early twentieth century, and later the revitalization of American Indian cultures and social organizations, embodied in the Indian Reorganization Act.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series C: Indian Health and Medical Affairs, Part 1: Reports on Medical and Nursing Activities

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series C: Indian Health and Medical Affairs, Part 1: Reports on Medical and Nursing Activities highlights Bureau of Indian Affair's efforts to provide American Indians with health and medical care. The collection consists of reports, memoranda, surveys, statistical data, and correspondence from Indian agency physicians, medical directors, and supervisory nurses, between the years 1907 and 1939. Material appears in alphabetical order, and therein chronologically, by Indian agency, reservation, or school. Seventy-two American Indian agencies, reservations, hospitals, and schools are represented. Documents in the collection provide detailed information on hospital patients; medical and surgical services; medical work done outside of hospitals and dispensaries; dentistry; prevention activities; public health projects; efforts to alleviate cases of trachoma, tuberculosis, and venereal disease; and unsanitary conditions in the home and at schools.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series C: Indian Health and Medical Affairs, Part 2: Diseases

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series C: Indian Health and Medical Affairs, Part 2: Diseases contains Bureau of Indian Affairs documents chronicling quarantines, tuberculosis, trachoma, venereal disease, sanitation, diseases and injuries, and epidemics among more than forty different Indian tribes. The files are organized by the above topics, and thereunder by name of Indian tribe or agency.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series D: Education, Part 1: General Organization, Regulations, and Types of Schools

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series D: Education, Part 1: General Organization, Regulations, and Types of Schools consists of Bureau of Indian Affairs documents on general Indian education, education rules and regulations, and compulsory education, primarily dating from the 1930s. The files include correspondence, reports, surveys, school newsletters, attendance rolls, and photographs exchanged between Indian agencies and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in Washington, D.C. Prominent correspondents include John Collier, Willard W. Beatty, Paul L. Fickinger, and Samuel H. Thompson, as well as local social workers, educational field agents, principals, and teachers.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series D: Education, Part 2: Correspondence and Reports on Reservation Day and Boarding Schools, Section A: Albuquerque through Pima

Indian Commissioner Charles J. Rhoads provided a pointed summary of the challenges facing the U.S. government in his 1931 annual report.

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series D: Education, Part 2: Correspondence and Reports on Reservation Day and Boarding Schools, Section B: Pine Ridge through Zuni

In the files of the first section of Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Central Classified Files, 1907-1939, Series D: Education, Part 2: Correspondence and Reports on Reservation Day and Boarding Schools, Indian Administrator Charles J. Rhoads summarized the challenges of the bureau in his 1931 annual report:

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Law and Order Section: Alcohol and Peyote Use by American Indians, 1908-1933

Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Law and Order Section: Alcohol and Peyote Use by American Indians, 1908-1933 is organized into four distinct parts made up of reports and correspondence between Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) agents (initially known as the United States Indian Service under the Department of Interior). The first section contains chronological correspondence on peyote use among American Indians. The second section consists of BIA officer reports, in alphabetical order by last name of reporting officer, for the years 1915-1917; the reports mainly cover alcohol-related topics. The third part comprises a few liquor seizure reports from 1915-1917, in no discernable order. The final and largest section contains alcohol-related arrest and case reports and is arranged in alphabetical order by the surname of defendants covering the years 1923-1933. The documents in this collection are limited to Indian reservations, mainly in the upper Midwest, but other locations include reservations in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and California. The primary correspondents in the collection are Henry A. Larson, who was a chief special officer in the BIA, and agents T. A. Hubbard, F. C. Rogers, James M. Pyle, E. W. Jermark, and Charles E. Shell.

Records of the Indian Division, Office of the Secretary of the Interior: Special Files, 1848-1907

Records of the Indian Division, Office of the Secretary of the Interior: Special Files, 1848-1907 chronicles a wide variety of topics in the great morass known as "Indian Affairs." The Department of Interior, established in 1849, assumed general supervision of Indian administration. The Bureau of Indian Affairs, under the direction of the secretary of interior, had primary responsibility for the actual conduct of Indian administration. No general records of the Office of the Secretary of the Interior exist from its establishment in 1849 until a central filing system started in 1907. The individual divisions of the Interior Department maintained their own records, particularly the Indian Division. Subject, or "special," files contain letters received by the division, copies of letters sent, reports, memoranda, printed matter, and other records.

Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands: Department of the West, 1853-1861

Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands: Department of the West, 1853-1861 is a collection of documents and correspondence related to the U.S. Army's experience during the period of westward expansion. This collection includes correspondence related to the operation of military bases and posts in the west. Documents in this collection include those related to the daily administration of the military, such as requests for supplies, requests from individual soldiers for leave, concerns and complications related to receiving military pay, and the assignment and transfer of units and individual soldiers and officers. This collection is organized chronologically, and then alphabetically--typically by last name of correspondent.

Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands: Division of West Mississippi, 1864-1865

Records of the U.S. Army Continental Commands: Division of West Mississippi, 1864-1865 is comprised of records held at the National Archives. Documents in this collection are organized chronologically, and then alphabetically--typically by last name of correspondent. Due to this organization system, each folder includes correspondence on a myriad of different topics. Researchers will discover correspondence between military officials, between military officials and civilian authorities, and between military officials and civilians. The correspondence and documents cover all U.S. Army operations in the Civil War's Western Theater and include transfers of personnel and units, request for supplies and weapons, contracts and supply procurement, and information about the military justice system.

Reports of the Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes

Reports of the Commissioner to the Five Civilized Tribes contains the annual and special reports by the commissioner, covering the years 1893 to 1920. Some of the key congressional hearings concerning the Five Civilized Tribes have been appended to the reports. The collection includes two lengthy hearings regarding 1) an investigation of contracts with the Five Civilized Tribes and Osage Indians in Oklahoma (002134-002-0394; 1,300 pages) and 2) an investigation of affairs in Indian Territory (002134-003-0163; report with hearings, 2,100 pages); as well as a lengthy Department of Interior report and supporting documents for S. 7625, a Bill for the Relief of Certain Members of the Five Civilized Tribes in Oklahoma (002134-002-1114; 600 pages). The reports and hearings form an indispensable source of information about the Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), Chickasaw, Seminole, and Cherokee tribes.

Survey of Conditions of the Indians in the United States

Survey of Conditions of the Indians in the United States contains hearing and investigatory transcripts covering numerous Indian tribes, reservations, and agencies. The documentary legacy of hearings and investigations conducted between 1928 and 1943 by the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs provide insights into many major tribes: Sioux, Navajo, Quapaw, Chickasaw, Apache, Pueblo, Ute, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kickapoo, Klamath, and many others.

Survey of Indian Reservations

Survey of Indian Reservations was compiled by the South Dakota Emergency Relief Administration during the Great Depression. The health, housing, education, finances, religion, and customs of the individual Indian families on major reservations were examined and the resulting data analyzed by experts. The collection consists of reports, memoranda, surveys, statistical data, and correspondence from Indian agency employees during 1935. The areas studied include the Sisseton Agency; Pine Ridge Agency; Rosebud Agency; Cheyenne Agency; Standing Rock Agency; and Crow, Lower Brule, and Flandreau Reservations.

U.S. Army in the Era of Indian Removal: Case Files of Military Courts and Commissions

The nineteenth-century policy of Indian removal is traced in key events, geographies, and historical themes in U.S. Army in the Era of Indian Removal: Case Files of Military Courts and Commissions. This collection includes some 6,000 pages of primary source materials assembled as part of the ProQuest History Vault module "American Indians and the American West, 1809-1971." Through court documents of military courts-martial and courts of inquiry, the U.S. Army's key role in executing and administering programs of removal of American Indians from the eastern part of the United States to areas of resettlement west of the Mississippi River is examined. The Indian wars of the mid-1830s, centered especially in the Southeastern States of Alabama, Florida, and Georgia; periods of violent interactions between white and Indian populations in the west in the 1860s and 1870s; and a series of courts-martial of military officers and personnel in the 1870s-1880s comprise the three major groups of materials in this collection.

U.S. Army in the Era of Indian Removal: Papers of Quartermaster General Thomas S. Jesup, 1818-1852

The nineteenth-century policy of Indian removal is traced in the extensive military papers of Brigadier General Thomas S. Jesup, the "father of the modern Quartermaster Corps," and a central figure not only in supplies and logistics but in military strategy and as a chronicler of the central events of the Creek and Seminole Indian wars in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia in the mid-1830s. U.S. Army in the Era of Indian Removal: Papers of Quartermaster General Thomas S. Jesup, 1818-1852 is a collection of some 14,000 pages of primary source materials assembled as part of the ProQuest History Vault module "American Indians and the American West, 1809-1971."