Dawes Rolls

More than 95% of the letters received by the Fort Worth Branch of the National Archives relate to the Five Civilized Tribes and most of those pertain to the Cherokee. If you are tracing a Cherokee ancestor, the place to begin is with the Final Rolls of the Five Civilized Tribes (commonly called the Dawes rolls). They contain the names of more than 101,000 people enrolled under an act of Congress of June 27, 1898 (30 Stat. 459) which authorized a Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes (under the chairmanship of Senator Henry L. Dawes) to determine who was eligible for tribal membership and thus entitled to an allotment of land. In 1887 the Federal government embarked on the policy of extinguishing tribal title to land and allotting it to individual Indians so there is generally a similar "final roll" or allotment roll for most tribes. Tracing your ancestry to someone on a "final roll" is usually the key to recognition by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The Dawes rolls only include people who were alive during the 1898-1907 enrollment period. The index to the Dawes roll has been reproduced on roll 1 of National Archives Microfilm Publication M1186 and many libraries in Oklahoma have copies of the index printed by the BIA. If you find your ancestor' s name, their Dawes roll number is the key to various other records. Unlike most other "roll numbers", it was used by the BIA as a means of positive identification (thus it is something like a social security number).

Census Cards and Application Jackets

The Dawes roll number will lead you to a "census card" which contains information about other family members who might have been enrolled, references to earlier rolls used to verify eligibility (such as the 1880 Cherokee census), and the names of the enrollee's parents (which will take you one generation farther back, but no farther). The cards were prepared by the Dawes Commission to enable the staff to keep track of the status of enrollment applications and the originals were hauled around Indian Territory in wagons as the staff gathered applications and took testimony. The cards have also been reproduced on M1186.

For each card there is usually an application jacket which contains transcripts of any testimony taken by the Commission, birth and death affidavits, marriage licenses (sometimes), and correspondence between the Commission and the applicants, their attorneys, and tribal officials. These application jackets are microfilmed as M1301. In general, the more controversial the applicant's claim the thicker the jacket. The jackets for many full-bloods whose claim to membership was not disputed by the tribal government usually contain very little genealogical information.

Land Allotment Jackets

Once a person was enrolled they were eligible to select the land they wanted as their allotment. The amount of land each person received varied from tribe to tribe but generally consisted of a "homestead" which was inalienable for a period of time and "surplus" which was often quickly sold or leased. For each person enrolled, there is an "allotment jacket" which contains an application giving the legal description of the land selected and information about improvements on it and related documents such as plat maps showing the location. The allotment jackets seldom contain much genealogical information. In many cases, the Indian agency supervised the subsequent sale or lease of allotted land but the records relating to these transactions have very little genealogical value.

The fact that an ancestor "got land" in Oklahoma does not prove they were an Indian because many non-Indians bought lots in townsites or purchased "surplus" land from allotted Indians or "unallotted land" directly from the Federal government.

The Dawes Commission rejected the applications of almost two out of every three persons who applied so don't be surprised if your ancestor is not listed in the "final roll". There is no comprehensive index to all the rejected applicants but there are partial indexes to persons rejected as Cherokee or Choctaw. For each rejected applicant there is a "census card" and an "application jacket" but the catch here is that you have to know (or find out) the census card number to find the records.

The best source of information about the allotment of the Five Civilized Tribes is And Still the Waters Run by Angie Debo. For information about allotment of other tribes see The Dawes Act and the Allotment of Indian Lands by D. S. Otis. Most tribal histories also contain a chapter or two about allotment.

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