Sisseton Indian Agency (North Dakota)

The Sisseton Agency is a currently operating agency of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Irs supervising office is the Aberdeen Area Office.

Indian Tribes Associated With This Agency
Sisseton and Wahpeton Sioux

History
The Sisseton Agency was established in 1867 for the Sisseton and Wahpeton Sioux on the Lake Traverse (now Sisseton) and Devil's Lake Reservations. The Devils Lake Agency was separated from Sisseton Agency in 1871.

Agents and Appointment Dates
Benjamin Thompson 1867, Jared W. Daniels 1869, Moses N. Adams 1871, John G. Hamilton 1875, Edward H.C. Hooper 1877, Charles Crissey 1879

Records
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 (for the tribe and tribal members) were created by and maintained by the agencies.

Letters received by the Office of Indian Affairs from the Sisseton Agency, 1867-1880, have been microfilmed by the National Archives as part of their Microcopy Number M234, rolls 824-831. Copies are available at the National Archives and at the Family History Library and its family history centers on their.

Some of the textual records of the Sisseton Agency have been transferred to the Central Plains Regional Archives of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Kansas City. Among their many administrative files are the following records which may be of particular interest to family historians:


 * Allotment records, 1875, 1888
 * Land description ledgers, 1888-1918
 * Annuity payrolls, 1893-1934
 * Census rolls, 1906-1943
 * Heirship records, 1914
 * School census records, 1915-1952
 * Student records, 1930-1931

Some of these records (and perhaps others of the agency records) have been at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City and at their many family history centers.

Reports of Inspection of the Field Jurisdictions of the Office of Indian Affairs, 1873-1900 have been microfilmed by the National Archives as part of Microcopy Number M1070. The reports for Sisseton Agency, 1867-1899, are on rolls 49-50 of that Microcopy set. Copies are available at the National Archives, their Regional Archives, and at the Family History Library and its family history centers (their ).

Microfilm copies of...Narrative and Statistical Reports... for the Sisseton Agency, 1907-1938, are included in National Archives Microcopy M1011, rolls 139-140, available in the National Archives system and in the collections of the Family History Library in Salt Lake City and their family history centers (their ).

Annual Indian Census Rolls were taken at this agency for 1888-1891, 1893, 1895, 1897-1907, 1909-1927, and from 1929 thru 1939. These rolls have been microfilmed by the National Archives as part of their Microcopy Number M595, rolls 507-516. Copies of these records are also available at the National Archives, their Regional Archives, and at the Family History Library and its family history centers (their ). These census rolls are also available online at Ancestry.com's subscription web site.