The Treaty of St. Louis of 1816 was treaty signed by Ninian Edwards, William Clark, and Auguste Chouteau for the United States and representatives of the Council of Three Fires (united tribes of Ottawa, Ojibwa, and Potawatomi) residing on the Illinois and Milwaukee rivers, signed on August 24, 1816, and proclaimed on December 30, 1816.
The specific land given up is included in Article 1 of the treaty:[1] The said chiefs and warriors, for themselves and the tribes they represent, agree to relinquish, and hereby do relinquish, to the United States, all their right, claim, and title, to all the land contained in the before-mentioned cession of the Sacs and Foxes, which lies south of a due west line from the southern extremity of Lake Michigan to the Mississippi river.
And they moreover cede to the United States all the land contained within the following bounds, to wit: beginning on the left bank of the Fox river of Illinois, ten miles above the mouth of said Fox river; thence running so as to cross Sandy creek, ten miles above its mouth; thence, in a direct line, to a point ten miles north of the west end of the Portage, between Chicago creek, which empties into Lake Michigan, and the river Depleines, a fork of the Illinois; thence, in a direct line, to a point on Lake Michigan, ten miles northward of the mouth of Chicago creek; thence, along the lake, to a point ten miles southward of the mouth of the said Chicago creek; thence, in a direct line, to a point on the Kankakee, ten miles above its mouth; thence, with the said Kankakee and the Illinois river, to the mouth of Fox river, and thence to the beginning: Provided, nevertheless, That the said tribes shall be permitted to hunt and fish within the limits of the land hereby relinquished and ceded, so long as it may continue to be the property of the United States.In exchange the tribes were to be paid $1,000 in merchandise over 12 years.
Some diagonal roads north and west of Chicago line up with the northern boundary established by the 1816 treaty, including two sections of Rogers Avenue, one in the Rogers Park neighborhood and another bordering the Sauganash and North Park neighborhoods;[2] Forest Preserve Drive on Chicago's northwest side; and short Indian Boundary Roads in suburban River Grove, near Grand Avenue, and Melrose Park, near North Avenue.
Indian Boundary Park in the West Ridge neighborhood of Chicago is named in commemoration of the treaty.