Chronology of American Indian History

P

1822

The United States ends the
factory system.
Congress abolishes the Office of Indian Trade (see
entry for 1806) and the factory system, through
which the United States operated its own trading
houses. The trading houses proved too inefficient
to accommodate the growing demands for furs.
In place of the factory system, the government
authorizes independent traders to deal with Indian
trappers and hunters.

1823

Johnson v. M’Intosh restricts Indian
land sales.
In Johnson v. M’Intosh, a non-Indian who purchased
a tract of land from the Piankasaw Indians sues a
non-Indian who claimed he was granted the same
plot by the U.S. government. The Supreme Court
finds that the man who obtained the tract through
the government land grant had the superior claim.
In the decision, the Court maintains that when
tribal territory is incorporated into the United
States, the tribes’ “rights of complete sovereignty, as
independent nations, [are] necessarily diminished.”
In addition to further undermining Indian tribes’
sovereign status, the ruling determines that Indian
tribes have no authority to negotiate land cessions
with anyone except the U.S. government.

Sacagawea’s (Sacajawea’s) son, Jean-Baptiste
Charbonneau, travels to Europe.
Under the sponsorship of Prince Paul Wilhelm,
Shoshone Indian Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau
travels to Germany, where he sets up residence in
a castle outside of Stuttgart. Over the following six
years, Charbonneau will study languages and tour
lands throughout Africa and Europe. The son of Sa-
cagawea (Sacajawea), as an infant he accompanied
his famous mother on the Lewis and Clark Expedi-
tion (see entry for APRIL 1804). (See also entry for
MAY 4, 1999.)

1824

Mission Indians at La Purísima

Concepción revolt.

Indians at La Purísima Concepción, a mission near

present-day Lompoc, California, rebel against their

Spanish overlords after two Indians are killed in a

dispute. With the aid of Indians from the nearby

Mission Santa Ines, they take over La Purísima and

hold it for a month. The rebels are finally subdued

by Spanish troops in a three-hour battle. During

the conflict, 16 Indians are killed, and many more

are injured. Spanish officials come down hard on

the uprising’s instigators, executing seven and im-

prisoning 18 others.

The Life of Mary Jemison is published.

The highly popular Life of Mary Jemison recounts

the 70 years Jemison spent among the Seneca after

“Not long after the Delawares

came to live with us, my [Iro-

quois] sisters told me that I

must go and live with one of

them, whose name was Shenin-

jee. Not daring to cross them, or

disobey their commands, with

a great degree of reluctance I

went; and Sheninjee and I were

married according to Indian

custom.... The idea of spend-

ing my days with him, at first

seemed perfectly irreconcilable

to my feelings: but his good na-

ture, generosity, tenderness, and

friendship towards me, soon

gained my affection; and, strange

as it may seem, I loved him!”

—Mary Jemison, captive of the

Seneca, in her 1824 autobiography