Black Hawk War (1832)

BLACK HAWK WAR (1832)

The Black Hawk War—named after the Indian leader Black Hawk (1767–1838)—was the last of the Indian wars that took place in the Old Northwest Territory, north of the Ohio and east of the Mississippi rivers. The conflict completed the grab for Indian territory that started before the American Revolution (1775–1783), continued through the Indian wars of the 1790s, and reached a peak just after the War of 1812 (1812–14). Black Hawk's struggle to keep the last traces of Sac and Fox lands in what is now western Illinois led directly to the forced expulsion of his group of Native Americans from their traditional territory.

Black Hawk had a history of grievances with white Americans dating back over a quarter of a century. In 1804 he had signed a treaty that—he thought—conveyed only some hunting rights in Sac and Fox lands to white Americans. When he found that he had in fact ceded some 50 million acres to the U.S. government, Black Hawk joined the Shawnee leader Tecumseh and the British in opposing American expansion during the War of 1812.

After the war Black Hawk returned to his homeland, but he was confronted with increasing numbers of white settlers. In 1829 one family entered his home when he was away on a hunting trip and dispossessed him. Protests to U.S. Indian agents only resulted in suggestions that he and his supporters (known as the "British Band" of Sac and Fox) find new lands west of the Mississippi River. He was also informed by the General Land Office that his homelands were to be opened to white settlement. Black Hawk responded by dividing his time between summer camps in his homeland and winter camps, in what is now Iowa, west of the Mississippi.

The outbreak of the Black Hawk War had less to do with direct disagreements between the Native American leader and white Americans than it did with internal politics among the Sac and Fox themselves. Black Hawk's opposition to the U.S. government was countered by another Sac and Fox chief called Keokuk. Keokuk favored negotiations with the government. During 1831–32 he ceded the Rock River country in what is now northwestern Illinois—the heart of Sac and Fox territory—to the Americans in exchange for an annuity and promises of lands west of the Mississippi. When Black Hawk and the British Band of Sac and Fox rejected the agreement and crossed the Mississippi in April of 1832—accompanied by a scattering of Winnebagos and Potawatomis. It was Keokuk who warned the whites of Blackhawk's approach.

General Henry Atkinson appealed to Illinois governor John Reynolds to raise 3,000 militiamen to augment his small force of 220 regular soldiers. Reynolds, however, was only able to pull together about 1,700 raw, untrained troops, including a young Abraham Lincoln. On April 28, 1832, Atkinson and his men set off in pursuit of Black Hawk and the British Band. Major Isaac Stillman's militia unit caught up with them on May 14 at the mouth of the Kyte River. Black Hawk had discovered that neither the Potawatomis nor the Winnebagos were willing to support him against the soldiers and had decided to surrender. The militia, which had been drinking heavily, panicked at the sight of Black Hawk's emissaries and fired on them, killing two. With only 40 warriors to call upon, Black Hawk set up an ambush and, in a battle known as Stillman's Run, routed Major Stillman's force of 275 men.

The comparatively easy defeat of the militia emboldened Blackhawk and his followers. On May 20 a group made up mostly of Black Hawk's Potawatomi supporters attacked a farmstead at Indian Creek, killed 15 men, women, and children, and kidnapped two girls (who were later ransomed). The Indian Creek Massacre roused the frontier. By mid-June Atkinson had the 3,000 militia he had originally wanted, plus 400 regular soldiers. President Andrew Jackson (1828–36) ordered Major General Winfield Scott to gather 800 soldiers at Chicago and move west in support of Atkinson. Lieutenant James W. Kingsbury, commanding the steamboat Warrior, was also ordered to proceed up the Mississippi to cut off Black Hawk from possible escape to the West.

By August 1, 1832, Black Hawk had abandoned any hope of regaining his homelands. His followers were trying to cross the Mississippi River in handmade canoes or rafts when the Warrior found them and, after negotiations failed, fired on them. Two days later the militia units under Colonel Henry Dodge and Atkinson arrived and captured or killed many of the remaining Sacs and Foxes. Those who escaped across the Mississippi—about 200—were captured by Sioux who were allied with the U.S. government. Black Hawk himself was turned over to the Americans by the Winnebagos, among whom he had sought refuge.

On September 19, 1832, General Scott brought the Black Hawk War to an end by concluding a treaty with the remaining Sacs and Foxes. The treaty ceded to the U.S. government a strip of Sac and Fox land running along the western bank of the Mississippi River— almost the entire length of Iowa's Mississippi river-bank—and reaching 50 miles inland. The territory, comprising a total of about six million acres, was to be vacated entirely by the Sacs and Foxes by June 1, 1833. The U.S. government paid $660,000 for this concession.

See also: Andrew Jackson, Tecumseh, War of 1812

FURTHER READING

Black Hawk. Black Hawk: An Autobiography. Edited by Donald Jackson. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1955.

Eby, Cecil D. "That Disgraceful Affair:" The Black Hawk War. New York: W. W. Norton, 1973.

Gurko, Miriam. Indian America: The Black Hawk War. New York: Crowell, 1970.

Hagan, William T. The Sac and the Fox Indians. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1958.

Weeks, Philip. Farewell, My Nation: The American Indian and the United States, 1820–1890. Arlington Heights, IL: H. Davidson, 1990.

i touched the goose quill to the treaty . . . not knowing, however, that by that act i consented to give away my village.

black hawk, sac indian leader, 1831