OCR Text |
Show REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. XLVII nisb to each Ii~climth e amonnt of laud specified in the agreement. I n , this contingency the act of Julie 15, 1880, st,ipuIates that t11e South-ern Ute.s sha.11 be located "upon snch other unoccupied agricultural lands as may be. found on the La Plata River or in its ricinity in Xew Mexico." SITTING BULL INDIAXS. In July last the military authorit.ies turned over to the Iudiau agent at.Standing ltock Agency, Dakota, 9,858 Sioux IndGiis who had been with Sit,ting Bull1 in the British possessions, and who had, from time to time, surrendered to the military. Of this number 139 .irere permitted to join their relatives at Cheyenne River Agency, the balance remailling a t Standing Rock Ager~cjrf or the present, where arrangements have been made to submist then!. Sit,ting Bull himself and his more ilomc-dia, te followers, 137 in nnrnber, are &ill prisoners, under the s~uveil-lance of the military, at Port Randall, Dakota Territory. ;It all of the Sioux agencies quietness has prevailed and progress has been made during the year, aud no event of importance has occurred except the death of Spotted Tail, hereditary head chief of the Sioux, who was killed by anot,her India11 at Rosebud Agency. A full account of the atfair will be fo~mdin Agent Cook's annual report herewith, page 54. The murderer is in the custody of the jndicial authorities for trial, the United States Attorney-Genera,l having expressed the opiniou that he is subject to trial by the Uliit'ed States conrts. PONOAS. By mist,akc, the Uuited States, in 1868, ceded to the Sioux t,l~lea ud in Dakota which had previously been ceded to the Poncas, and in 1878 the P o ~ ~ cwaesr e removed to their present location in Indian Territory, where a reservation containing 101,894.31 acres of land was assigned to them in the Oherokee country, west of the 96th degree of longit~~de, where, upon payment to the Cherokees for the same, it was providgd by the sixteenth article of the Cherokee treaty of July 19,1866, that the United States might settle friendly Indians. The Po~~loawse re a t first dissatisfied at their removal, hut, as stated in the last annual report of this office, iu October of last year the Ponca chiefs then on the reservation in Indian Territory forwarded to this office a petition earnestly requesting to he permitted to come to Washington to for-mally part with their right to all lands in Dakota, and to obtair~ a title to their present reservation, and to settle all their matt.ers with the government. Their request was granted, and while in Warhing-ton they entered into an agreemeld of the. kind indicated in their re-quest of 25th October, 1880. By act of Marc11 3,1881, Congress appropriated the sum of $165,000 to enable the Secret.ary of the Interior "to indemnify the Poilca tribe of Indians for lames sosta.ine.d by therniu corrxeqnence of their reu~oral |