Unassigned Lands

The Unassigned Lands in Oklahoma were in the center of the lands ceded to the United States by the Creek (Muskogee) and Seminole Indians following the Civil War and on which no other tribes had been settled. By 1883 it was bounded by the Cherokee Outlet on the north, several relocated Indian reservations on the east, the Chickasaw lands on the south, and the Cheyenne-Arapaho reserve on the west. The area amounted to 1,887,796.47 acres (2,949 miles² or 7,640 km²).

The Indian era

The Treaty of Indian Springs, February 12, 1825, provided for a delegation of Creeks to visit the west in order that

to replace their lands in Georgia. A dispute arose between the Lower Creek Council, which signed the treaty, and the Upper Creek Council, which objected. The dispute led to the killing of General William McIntosh, the chief of the Lower Creeks, and left the treaty in doubt. Despite that, the Creeks were relocated to the west. On February 14, 1833, the Treaty of Okmulgee was signed at Fort Gibson. In it the Creeks finally agreed to cede their lands in the east. Article 2 of the 1833 treaty defined the land chosen under the 1825 treaty as being west and south of the Cherokee lands and bordering the Canadian River on the south and the Mexican border on the west.