The Half-Breed Tract in Iowa was a significant area reserved for the half-breeds of the Sac and Fox tribes as per the treaty signed on August 4, 1824. This reservation, approximately 119,000 acres between the Mississippi and Des Moines Rivers, was intended to provide land for those of mixed Native American and European descent. However, complications arose when the surveyor’s line deviated, leading to disputes over the land’s boundaries. In 1834, Congress relinquished the United States’ reversionary rights, allowing half-breeds to own the land outright. This led to a rush of speculators exploiting the half-breeds, often through dubious transactions. To resolve these conflicts, a commission was established in 1838, but its actions were later invalidated, resulting in prolonged legal battles. The final resolution came through the 1841 decree of partition by the United States District Court for the Territory of Iowa, which divided the land into shares for the claimants, a system still recognized today.
Before any permanent settlement had been made in the Territory of Iowa, white adventurers, trappers, and traders, many of whom were scattered along the Mississippi and its tributaries as agents and employees of the American Fur Company, intermarried with the females of the Sac and Fox Indians, producing a race of half-breeds, whose number was never definitely ascertained. There were some respectable and excellent people among them, children of men of some refinement and education. For instance, Dr. Muir, a gentleman educated at Edinburgh, Scotland, a surgeon in the United States Army stationed at a military post located on the present site of Warsaw, married an Indian woman, and reared his family of three daughters in the city of Keokuk. Other examples might be cited, but they are probably exceptions to the general rule, and the race is now nearly or quite extinct in Iowa.
A treaty was made at Washington, August 4, 1824, between the Sacs and Foxes and the United States, by which that portion of Lee County was reserved to the half-breeds of those tribes, and which was afterward known as “The Half-Breed Tract.” This reservation is the triangular piece of land, containing about 119,000 acres, lying between the Mississippi and Des Moines Rivers. It is bounded on the north by the prolongation of the northern line of Missouri. This line was intended to be a straight one, running due east, which would have caused it to strike the Mississippi River at or below Montrose; but the surveyor who ran it took no notice of the change in the variation of the needle as he proceeded eastward, and, in consequence, the line he ran was bent, deviating more and more to the northward of a direct line as he approached the Mississippi, so that it struck that river at the lower edge of the town of Fort Madison. “This erroneous line,” says Judge Mason, “has been acquiesced in as well in fixing the northern limit of the Half-Breed Tract as in determining the northern boundary line of the State of Missouri.” The line thus run included in the reservation a portion of the lower part of the city of Fort Madison, and all of the present townships of Van Buren, Charleston, Jefferson, Des Moines, Montrose, and Jackson.
Under the treaty of 1824, the half-breeds had the right to occupy the soil but could not convey it, the reversion being reserved to the United States. But on the 30th day of January, 1834, by act of Congress, this reversionary right was relinquished, and the half-breeds acquired the lands in fee simple. This was no sooner done, than a horde of speculators rushed in to buy land of the half-breed owners, and, in many instances, a gun, a blanket, a pony or a few quarts of whisky was sufficient for the purchase of large estates. There was a deal of sharp practice on both sides; Indians would often claim ownership of land by virtue of being half-breeds and had no difficulty in proving their mixed blood by the Indians, and they would then cheat the speculators by selling land to which they had no rightful title. On the other hand, speculators often claimed land in which they had no ownership. It was diamond cut diamond, until at last things became badly mixed. There were no authorized surveys, and no boundary lines to claims, and, as a natural result, numerous conflicts and quarrels ensued.
To settle these difficulties, to decide the validity of claims or sell them for the benefit of the real owners, by act of the Legislature of Wisconsin Territory, approved January 16, 1838, Edward Johnstone, Thomas S. Wilson, and David Brigham were appointed Commissioners, and clothed with power to effect these objects. The act provided that these Commissioners should be paid six dollars a day each. The commission entered upon its duties and continued until the next session of the Legislature, when the act creating it was repealed, invalidating all that had been done and depriving the Commissioners of their pay. The repealing act, however, authorized the Commissioners to commence action against the owners of the Half-Breed Tract, to receive pay for their services, in the District Court of Lee County. Two judgments were obtained, and on execution the whole of the tract was sold to Hugh T. Reid, the Sheriff executing the deed. Mr. Reid sold portions of it to various parties, but his own title was questioned and he became involved in litigation. Decisions in favor of Reid and those holding under him were made by both District and Supreme Courts, but in December, 1850, these decisions were finally reversed by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Joseph Webster, plaintiff in error, vs. Hugh T. Reid, and the judgment titles failed. About nine years before the “judgment titles” were finally abrogated as above, another class of titles were brought into competition with them, and in the conflict between the two, the final decision was obtained. These were the titles based on the “decree of partition” issued by the United States District Court for the Territory of Iowa, on the 8th of May, 1841, and certified to by the Clerk on the 2d day of June of that year. Edward Johnstone and Hugh T. Reid, then law partners at Fort Madison, filed the petition for the decree on behalf of the St. Louis claimants of half-breed lands. Francis S. Key, author of the Star Spangled Banner, who was then attorney for the New York Land Company, which held heavy interest in these lands, took a leading part in the measure, and drew up the document in which it was presented to the court. Judge Charles Mason, of Burlington, presided. The plan of partition divided the tract into one hundred and one shares, and arranged that each claimant should draw his proportion by lot, and should abide the result, whatever it might be. The arrangement was entered into, the lots drawn, and the plat of the same filed in the Recorder’s office, October 6, 1841. Upon this basis the titles to land in the Half-Breed Tract are now held.
Source: Western Publishing Company, History of western Iowa, its settlement and growth. A comprehensive compilation of progressive events concerning the counties, cities, towns, and villages–biographical sketches of the pioneers and business men, with an authentic history of the state of Iowa, 2 volumes; Sioux City : Western Publishing Company, 1882.