Federal Directive Protects Indigenous Land Occupancy
A government order instructs land offices to refuse entries by white settlers on land already cultivated by Indigenous people.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Information having been received from the War Department of attempts of white men to dispossess non-reservation Indians along the Columbia River and other places of the land they have for years occupied and cultivated, you are hereby instructed to peremptorily refuse all entries and filings attempted to be made by others than the Indian occupants upon lands in the possession of Indians who have made improvements of any value whatever thereon. In order that the homes and improvements of such Indians may be protected, you are directed to ascertain whether any lands in your districts are occupied by Indian inhabitants. When the fact of Indian occupancy is denied or doubtful, the proper investigation will be ordered prior to the allowance of adverse claims. Where lands are un-surveyed, no appropriation will be allowed within the region of Indian settlements until the surveys have been made and the land occupied by Indians ascertained and defined.
“You are hereby instructed to peremptorily refuse all entries and filings attempted to be made by others than the Indian occupants.”
This rare directive shows federal recognition of Indigenous occupancy rights during the height of the settler-colonial era. It serves as a stark historical counterpoint to the systematic dispossession that defined much of Washington's statehood period.
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