Delaware Tribe of Indians

Guide to  ancestry, family history and genealogy: birth records, marriage records, death records, census records, and other agency records.

Painting of the Delaware Indians signing the Treaty of Penn with Benjamin West. ]]

The Delaware Indians were originally known as the Lenape or Lenni Lenape Indians, the name they called themselves. The American colonists named them the Delaware Indians.

Clans: Tukwsi-t, the wolf; Pukuwanku, the turtle; and Pele, the turkey

Original homelands: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York. Some later were removed to Oklahoma.

Tribal Headquarters
The Delaware Nation is currently found primarily in western Oklahoma.

Delaware Nation Address P.O. Box 825 Anadarko, OK 73005 Location 31064 State Highway #281 Building 100 Anadarko, OK 73005 Phone: 405.247.2448 Fax: 405.247.9393


 * The Delaware Nation Official Website

The Tribal office of each tribe maintains many records of value to the American Indian researcher. Most of the tribes require enrollment in the tribe before they allow access to the records of its members.

Tribal Population: 1984: Total Enrollment 989.

History
The Delaware Confederacy included the Unami and Unalachtigo

The Delaware or Lenape were forced to cede lands and migrate many times, moving into Ohio in 1755, Kansas, Texas and Indian Territory

Brief Timeline

 * 1600's: First contact was with the Dutch
 * 1638: Swedish lived moved into the Delaware Bay area
 * 1682: Treaty with William Penn.
 * 1700's: Tribal members began to settle along the Ohio River
 * 1789: Some of the tribe removed to Missouri and later to Arkansas
 * 1795 Treaty
 * 1800: Many migrate to Indiana
 * 1820: Some moved to Texas, became known as the Southern band
 * 1824-51: The tribe was under the jurisdiction of the Fort Leavenworth Agency
 * 1832 Treaty
 * 1835: Many members resettled in Kansas
 * 1851-55: The tribe was under the jurisdiction of the Kansas Agency while living in Kansas
 * 1854 Treaty
 * 1855-73: The tribe was under the jurisdiction of the Delaware Agency
 * 1859: Delaware tribal members living in Texas removed to western Oklahoma
 * 1866 Treaty
 * 1867: Tribe began to settle west of the Mississippi River some removed to Canada
 * 1867: Delaware tribal members living in Kansas move to eastern Oklahoma and purchase rights in the Cherokee Nation. In 1890 become Cherokee citizens.
 * 1867-74: The tribe was under the jurisdiction of the Cherokee Agency
 * 1875-80: The tribe was under the jurisdiction of the Union Agency

The Southern Band

In the 1820's some of the tribe moved to Texas, becoming known as the Southern Band of Delaware Indians

The band was under the jurisdiction of the Caddo and Red River Agencies

1847-59: The band was under the jurisdiction of the Texas Agency

1859-78: The band was under the jurisdiction of the Wichita Agency

1878-80: the band was under the jurisdiction of the Kiowa Agency

The Southern Band was under the jurisdiction of the Southern and Central Superintendencies

Additional Reference
Frederick Webb Hodge, in his Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, gave a more complete history of the Delaware tribe, with estimations of the population of the tribe at various time periods. Additional details are given in John Swanton's The Indian Tribes of North America.

Brinton, Daniel Gerrison. The Lenape and their legends: with an anonymous ms. in the archives of the Moravian Church at Bethlehem, Pa.

Brinton, Daniel Gerrison. A Lenape-English dictionary: from an anonymous ms. in the archives of the Moravian Church at Bethlehem, PA.

Ohio History Central article on the Delaware Indians

The Delaware Tribe was under the following jurisdictions

Agencies
Agencies and subagencies were created as administrative offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and its predecessors. Their purpose was (and is) to manage Indian affairs with the tribes, to enforce policies, and to assist in maintaining the peace. The names and location of these agencies may have changed, but their purpose remained basically the same. Many of the records of genealogical value were created by these offices.

The following list of agencies that have operated or now exist in Illinois has been compiled from Hill's Office of Indian Affairs..., Hill's Guide to Records in the National Archives Relating to American Indians , and others.

Agencies are the field offices of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. They recorded most of the records pertaining to individual Indians.

John G. Pratt Papers, 1834-1899 in the Kansas State Historical Society contains records of the Delaware agency, Wyandotte subagency and the Kansas agency FHL films 812762-812765

Piqua Agency

Ohio Agency

Fort Leavenworth Agency

Kansas Agency

Delaware Agency

Cherokee Agency

Union Agency

Caddo Agency

Red River Agency

Texas Agency

Wichita Agency

Kiowa Agency

Records
The majority of records of individuals were those created by the agencies. Some records may be available to tribal members through the tribal headquarters.They were (and are) the local office of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and were charged with maintaining records of the activities of those under their responsibility. Among these records are:


 * Allotment records
 * Annuity rolls
 * Census records
 * Correspondence
 * Health records
 * Reports
 * School census and records
 * Vital records

Reservations
Reservations are tracks of land established by treaty or law for the American Indians to occupy and use.

From the mid-1800s, the official policy of the United States government toward the American Indian was to confine each tribe to a specific parcel of land called a reservation. Agencies were established on or near each reservation. A government representative, usually called an agent (or superintendent) was assigned to each agency. Their duties included maintaining the peace, making payments to the Native Americans based on the stipulations of the treaties with each tribe, and providing a means of communication between the native population and the federal government.

Sometimes, a single agency had jurisdiction over more than one reservation. And sometimes, if the tribal population and land area required it, an agency may have included sub-agencies.

The boundaries of reservations, over time, have changed. Usually, that means the reservations have been reduced in size. Sometimes, especially during the later policy of "termination," the official status of reservations was ended altogether.

The following list of reservations has been compiled from the National Atlas of the United States of America, the Omni Gazetteer of the United States of America , and other sources. There are no current federally-recognized reservations in Illinois.

There are hundreds of Indian Reservations in the United States. Many are federally recognized and supervised. Some are state reservations, administered by the state office of Indian Affairs.

Superintendencies
Superintendencies authorized by the the Bureau of Indian Affairs supervised the local agencies and subagencies.

Michigan Superintendency

St. Louis Superintendency

Central Superintendency

Southern Superintendency

Allotment
Allotment of Land to Delaware Indians 1865. John G. Pratt Papers, 1834-1899 in t he Kansas State Historical Society. FHL film 812767 - 812769

Annuities
1826 Voucher for Annuities Paid Mississippi Territory. The Journal of American Indian Family Research, Vol.7, No. 1 (1986) FHL 970.1 J825j

Census
1862 Census of Delaware Indians FHL Film: 989204

Census rolls various years, Delaware Indians holding citizenship in the Cherokee Nation. FHL|Film: 989204

1883 Census of Wichita Agency Heads of Families. The Tree Tracers, Southwest Oklahoma Genealogical Society, Lawton, OK, Vol. 23 No. 2 (Dec. 1998 - Feb. 1999)

1897-1898 Delaware Indian Census at Kiowa Agency, Oklahoma Territory FHL film: 576900 Items 15 and Item 24

1927 Census, Kiowa Agency, Oklahoma FHL Book Q970.466 B898c or Film 1697766 Item 12

1936 Absentee Delaware Census Roll. The Tree Tracers, Southwest Oklahoma Genealogical Society, Lawton, OK, Vol. 23 No. 2 (Dec. 1998 - Feb. 1999)

Church Records
Gray, Elma E. Wilderness Christians: The Moravian Mission to the Delaware Indians.

Enrollment Records
Delaware Indians, adopted by the Cherokee tribe, rolls dealing with the Dawes Commission

Indian Pioneer Papers
In 1936, the Oklahoma Historical Society and University of Oklahoma requested a writer's project grant from the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in which interviews would be conducted with early settlers in Oklahoma who had lived on Indian land. More than 100 writers conducted over 11,000 interviews and were asked to "call upon early settlers and (record) the story of the migration to Oklahoma and their early life here." The University of Oklahoma Western History Collection has digitized the Indian Pioneer Papers which consists of approximately 80,000 indexed entries arranged alphabetically by personal name, place name, or subject. An index to the Indian Pioneer Papers may also be found at OkGenWeb Oklahoma Genealogy. A separate index of Indians interviewed, including the Delaware, may be viewed at: “Indians in the Indian Pioneer Papers” Two surnames from the Delaware tribe found in the collection are: Ketchum and Zeigler (Ketchum).

Land Records
Allotted land: 55,599.92 acres. Tribal owned land 2,602.64 acres.

School Records
1858 and 1867 List of Delaware Pupils Attending the Baptist Mission School in Kansas Territory. The Journal of American Indian Family Research, Vol. 7, No.1, (1986) FHL call 970.1 J825j

Treaties
Treaty an agreement made by negotiation between two or more nations,to resolve conflict, encourage peace, alliance, and commerce.

1682: Treaty with William Penn


 * 1778
 * 1785
 * 1789
 * 1795
 * 1803
 * 1804
 * 1805
 * 1805
 * 1809
 * 1809
 * 1814
 * 1815
 * 1817
 * 1818
 * 1829
 * 1829
 * 1832
 * 1843
 * 1854
 * 1860
 * 1861
 * 1866

Important Websites

 * Constitution of the Delaware Nation of Oklahoma
 * Brief history of the Delaware Indians in Ohio
 * The Delaware Nation Official Website
 * Official Website of the Delaware Tribe of Indians
 * Delaware Tribe Web Site
 * Delaware Tribe Wikipedia
 * Lenape Wikipedia

Tribe

 * Weslager, C.A., The Delaware Indians: A History, Rutgers University Press (1972), hardcover, 546 pages,

General
For background information to help find American Indian ancestors see For Further Reading.