Ojibwe Trading Kinship Groups

Beaulieu, Borup, Oakes

Brothers Paul H. and Clement H. Beaulieu were sons of a French fur trader and grandsons of a prominent Ojibwe leader. There were trading at La Pointe, Wisconsin when an Ojibwe delegation from present-day Minnesota arrived there to sign a treaty there, and soon followed the Ojibwe back to present-day Crow Wing to take advantage of trading opportunities.

Clement worked initially for the American Fur Company; by the time of the Civil War, he was the primary supplier of all trade goos to the Ojibwe. His former AFC associate Henry Sibley named him an officer in the Minnesota militia, and after the Civil War he became a Indian agent. Paul became a surveyor for the Stevens Expedition, an excursion on behalf of the Pacific Railroad. When the White Earth Ojibwe reservation was created, Paul was the first person on the Ojibwe rolls to move there.

Paul and Clement had two sisters, Julia and Elizabeth, who married respectively Charles Oakes and Charles Borup (who had been the AFC representative at La Pointe). These brothers-in-law entered business together, forming some of the earliest banking ventures in Minnesota. With Clement Beaulieu, they owned the Northern Fur Company (a successor to AFC), and presented claims for debt payments at the 1854 Ojibwe treaty.

Paul Beaulieu signed treaties with the Ojibwe in 1845, 1855, 1863 and 1864. Clement Beaulieu, Borup and Oakes all signed the 1842 Ojibwe treaty in Wisconsin. Clement also signed the 1855 treaty in Minnesota Territory, and Oakes signed an 1847 land cession treaty.

Schoolcraft, Aitkin, Warren

Henry Schoolcraft, who signed the 1825 multinational treaty at Prairie du Chien and 8 other Ojibwe treaties, first made a name for himself as a mineralogist, identifying copper and lead deposits. In 1819 he wrote a book entitled Lead Mines of Missouri that drew the attention of Lewis Cass, Michigan Territorial Governor. The next year, on an expedition with Cass, Schoolcraft bribed local Ho-Chunk men to show him the location of lead mines in the Prairie du Chien area. He was then appointed the head US Indian agent for all of the vast Michigan Territory. He appointed his brothers and brothers-in-law to positions in the Indian Affairs bureaucracy, and they signed Ojibwe treaties in what is now Michigan.

Schoolcraft's first wife was a member of a prominent eastern Ojibwe family. She shared with him the stories that became a primary source for Longfellow's Song of Hiawatha. Through a network of marriages with her relatives (French, American and Ojibwe), other treaty signers joined the same extended family as Schoolcraft. Lyman Warren became a prominent fur trader and signed treaties with the Ojibwe from what is now Minnesota in 1842 and 1837. His son Truman signed Ojibwe treaties in 1855, 1863, 1864, and 1867. Lyman's son William, who signed an 1847 Ojibwe land cession treaty, forged an identity that straddled two worlds, writing an important history of the Ojibwe people and serving in the Minnesota Legislature.

William Warren's wife, Mathilda Aitkin (daughter of fur trader William Aitkin) also had a relationship with treaty signer Samuel Abbe. Aitkin (for whom Aitkin County is named) advocated the introduction of whiskey into the Indian trade; he signed Ojibwe treaties in 1842 and 1847. Abbe wend on to the join the board of directors of railroad and canal companies, and signed an Ojibwe treaty in 1863.

Morrison and Kittson

The Morrison/Kittson family developed an intricate network of connections - business interests, political positions, and family ties - that spanned the entire treaty-making era for Ojibwe people in what is now Minnesota.

William Morrison and his brother Alan (who signed the Ojibwe treaties of 1847) were prominent fur traders who married into both Ojibwe and white families. (Morrison County is named after them.) Their mixed-blood children received "half breed" tracts in an 1826 treaty. Their white children became business leaders in Minnesota. Alan's son John, a signer of 1863 and 1864 Ojibwe treaties, became chief of police at White Earth. William's son D. G. Morrison, who signed treaties in 1863 and 1866, was one of the original incorporators of Fond du Lac, which became Duluth.

One of William's wives was a sister of Norman Kittson (for whom Kittson County is named), one of the most prominent early Minnesotans in the freight and transportation industries.

Alan Morrison and his nephew D. G., as well as Norman Kittson, were Territorial legislators.

Chouteau Relatives: Hempstead, Lisa, Gratiot

Political, business and family connections in the US profoundly shaped US-Indian relations. One illustration of how close these connections were can be found in the Hempstead family.

Edward Hempstead moved west from Connecticut as a young lawyer, immediately after the Louisiana purchase, and established a lucrative law practice. By the next year he was signing treaties with the Delaware and Piankeshaw, and became the first elected representative from west of the Mississippi. His family followed him to St. Louis.

His brother Charles Hempstead, also a lawyer, soon relocated to Galena, IL, and started lead mines, eventually furthering his interests by signing treaties with the Ojibwe and Ho-Chunk in 1829.

William Hempstead, presumably the brother of Edward, signed the international land cession treaty at Prairie du Chien in 1830.

Their sister Mary married Manuel Lisa, a very prominent fur trader west of the Mississippi and an off-and-on rival and partner of the Chouteau family, a fur trade powerhouse. Lisa had signed seven treaties in 1815 and 1817, including two treaties with the Dakota.

Sister Susan Hempstead married Henry Gratiot shortly after moving to St. Louis. Gratiot was the nephew of Auguste and Pierre Chouteau, who founded the Chouteau family in Missouri. His father had personally financed the military operation of George Rogers Clark on the western front in the Revolutionary War. Henry Gratiot became a major player in lead mining in Wisconsin Territory, and in US relations with the Ho-Chunk nation. He signed treaties with the Ho-Chunk in 1828 and 1829, and with the Chippewa and their allies in 1829.