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Letter from W.G. Ewing to William Medill, May 19 1847: Sheet #10

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Now I am no champion of other mens affairs: and as regards these other claimants I have nothing to do with them, or to say about them, only I presume they feel as we do, anxious to get what is their due.

The Miamis owe & they ought in my opinion to pay, as they have agreed to, viz in three yearly payments or installments. And as far as we are concerned I do hope that the Government will not interdict, will not declare existing contracts, "null & void" will not destroy, but respect & protect the rights of citizens. I am aware that it is an easy matter for any malicious or corrupt man, to assist and injure men whose rights are thus exposed, for it is scarcely possible now to make certain persons beleive that an Indian can honestly get in debt to a white man. All white men's claims are "frauds" and they "rob the Indians of their money & give them nothing for it." If this duty slang & persecution were true as to ourselves, how comes it, that after having traded extensively with the different tribes for twenty five years & sold them in that time between one and two millions of dollars worth of property (a fourth or more of that was imported Woolens), we should now find ourselves in debt in a large amt, for Indian goods in New York, our property, the very homes we live in, under mortgage, interest eating at us every day, and we perfectly unable to pay said debts only as we