OTTAWAS.. an Algonquin tribe who, when first visited by the French explorers, lived in n.w. Michigan, and on the Manitoulin islands, The tribe then consisted of the Keinonelies, Kiskakons, and Sinagos. They were worshipers of the water-god Mira bichi, and of the creator Michabon. "the great hare." On the fall of the Hurons in 1649, that portion of the Ottawas living in the Manitoulin islands, and at Saginaw, crossed the Mississippi, and reached the Sioux territory, from which they soon withdrew, after a war with the Sioux, to Mackinaw. Soon after the foundation of Detroit, a part of the tribe 61 o% up lauds near that point, while the Mackinaw Ottawas went to Arbre Croche. The tribe had always been friendly to the French, and, at the close of the last French war, the Detroit Ottawas joined the conspiracy against the English, which was planned by their chief Pontiac. The whole tribe then counted 1500 persons. They adhered to the English in the revolutionary war, after the .close of which they were parties to the treaties of fort. Macintosh in 1785. and fort Harmar in 1789. After allying themselves with the Miamis in a short war against. the Americans. they made a final treaty of peace in 1795. They soon united with the Ojibways and the Pottawattamies, and in succes
sive treaties ceded large tracts of hind to the United States, reserving for themselves a tract on the Miami, with an area of about 1200 sq. miles. A treaty of 1833 ceded the Michigan lands to the United States in exchange for a tract S. of the Missouri river. In 1836, the Ottawas at Maumee, Ohio, ceded 49.000 acres of their Ohio hinds. The same year the Michigan Ottawas gave up all their lands outside of the reservations. Part of the Maumee Ottawas settled in 1836 upon a tract of 34,000 acres s. of the Osage river. There they founded a prosperous , farming community, and had schools and a Baptist mission. In 186.2 each family was allotted 160 acres, and 20,000 acres were reserved for schools; and in 1867 they were made citizens of the United States. In 1870 they removed to a reservation of nearly 25,000 acres in the Indian territory, n, of the Shaw nees. They number about 130. The Michigan Ottawas live among the Chippewas along the shores of lake Superior. The number of both tribes is between 4,000 and 5,000. There is another branch of the Ottawas in Canada.