Note 237 — TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR OF NORTH AMERICA, IN THE YEARS 1832, 1833, AND 1834 (continued 5)

For the Big Sioux River, see our volume vi, p. 85, note 30. This branch of the Dakota (or Sioux), mentioned by Maximilian, is known as the Wahpekute, one of the two components of the Santee band of the Sioux. Together with the Mdewakantonwan or Spirit Lake band, they were the Sioux first known to Europeans, being designated by Hennepin as Issati. Their habitat was the upper waters of the Mississippi, and the St. Peter's (Minnesota) River. They wandered toward the Big Sioux River, which was made the boundary by the treaty of 1825 at Prairie du Chien—William Clark and Lewis Cass, commissioners. In this treaty the Big Sioux River is designated as the Calumet, probably because of the proximity of its source to the red pipestone quarries of southwestern Minnesota.—Ed.