Memory-1857, December

   The Shawnees is the most important tribe in the territory. They are more numerous and farther advanced than any others in civilization. The reservation is one of the most fertile tracts of land, chiefly prairie, in Kansas. It is well watered with several considerable streams and has an abundance of excellent timber. It lies on the Missouri border south of the Kansas River, and covers a space of country equal in extent to about fifty miles square. While the late legislature were making arrangements for the passage of a law to take the census of Kansas preparatory to an election for delegates to form a State Constitution, about three thousand citizens of Missouri, partly to seize upon the Indian lands, and partly to be registered as voters to carry out the object of the contemplated act, we’re rushing across the border and staking out claims upon this reservation. On every quarter section they laid what they call a ”foundation.“ This is done by placing four poles upon the ground in the form of a square. In order to conform as they supposed, more fully to the letter, if not the spirit of the pre-emption laws, some of these ingenious squatters, also “roofed in” their “foundations.” This was accomplished by standing a pole upright in the center of the square and nailing to the top of it a half dozen shingles to represent a roof. In looking at these singular creations, it is difficult to determine which most to admire, the ingenuity or the dishonesty which could prompt men to resort to such miserable pretexts to avail themselves unjustly of the benefit of a law, the true meaning and intent of which is too clearly and definitively expressed to be misunderstood. Having laid their foundations and shingled their houses, and thus established their claims, agreeably, as they pretended, to the requirements of the pre-emption laws, the lands granted by solemn treaty to the Indians, and having registered their names as citizens and legal voters, these worthy squatters returned to the Missouri homes, to await the election day, and then come back to exercise the freeman’s right of suffrage and stultify the votes of actual and honest settlers. Should the lands be open for pre-emption and settlement by treaty with the Shawnees, as is anticipated, the claims made upon these shallow pretexts, will be maintained with pistol and bowie-knife, against any who may dare to question their legality. Such is squatter sovereignty as understood and practiced on the western borders of Missouri.

   On this reservation, near Westport, Mo., stands the “Shawnee Mission” of the Methodist Church South. Three sections of their best lands were granted by the Shawnees to this mission, which are handsomely fenced in, partly with stone, and upon which are erected several substantial and capricious brick buildings, all of which has been accomplished by government funds and per centages on Indian annuities. Two sections of the three comprising this elegant farm, which is better improved and more profitably cultivated than any in the territory, has, by skillful management on his part, become the property of Rev. Thomas Johnson, the head of the church, and late President of the Council of the Legislative Assembly.

John H. Gihon, M.D. Geary and Kansas, Governor Geary’s Administration in Kansas. pp.21-22. Read the book.