They are remembered: Annual sandy lake ceremony honors 1850 tragedy and the resilience of the anishinaabe

Photos and story by Vivian LaMoore, Inaajimowin Editor

Mikwendaagoziwag (They Are Remembered) focuses on the 1850 Sandy Lake tragedy and the struggle of the Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) people to survive amidst forced assimilation. Today, many people, communities, and nations from across the central Great Lakes region, the United States, and Canada come together to honor this story of survival. The annual Mikwendaagoziwag ceremony took place on Wednesday, July 30, 2025, at the Sandy Lake memorial in northern Minnesota.

More than 100 people gathered at a public boat launch to send prayers before setting out on a commemorative canoe paddle from the eastern shore. “There are many tragic things that have happened to Indigenous people and their encounters with European nations, but we pride ourselves in surviving,” said Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission executive director Jason Schlender, a member of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians in Wisconsin.

The event honors the resilience of the Anishinaabe people. In 1850, nearly 400 ancestors of those gathered on the shore perished — not by accident, but as a result of deliberate actions by the federal government in an attempt to force the Ojibwe from their homelands.

Several leaders from the 11 Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) member tribes spoke at the event. Mille Lacs Band Chief Executive Virgil Wind looked around the gathering and commented on the large number of people, saying he was “proud” of the number of people who “chose to come out and spend the day with us today in remembrance of the tragedy that happened here.”

James Williams, Chairman of the Board of Commissioners of GLIFWC, thanked everyone. “It’s always an honor to come here,” Chairman Williams said. “And a very humbling experience to know our ancestors crossed this lake and know what happened to them.”

Misty Shogaabawiikwe Nordin, Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa band member, said, “Looking around and seeing everyone gathered here for the same purpose, right, to acknowledge what had happened and to come together for some healing.”

Chairman Bruce Savage spoke briefly in remembrance and in honor, then lightened the mood by saying the event was, in fact, a competition. He added a reminder to be safe on the water. Roughly 20 members and leaders from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources were also present to pay their respects and offer their memorials.

Participants solemnly and intentionally placed their asemaa into the waters of Sandy Lake before beginning the commemorative journey across the lake. A feast and ceremony followed when all paddlers came ashore at Sandy Lake Memorial Park.

What Led to the Tragedy of 1850?

The roots of the Sandy Lake tragedy trace back nearly two decades earlier. Under President Andrew Jackson, the Indian Removal Act of 1830 established a legal mechanism allowing the president to allocate land west of the Mississippi River to tribes that consented to give up their ancestral homelands.

The Treaty of 1837 ceded 13 million acres in east-central Minnesota and northern Wisconsin to the federal government. In exchange, the Ojibwe were promised a 20-year annuity: annual payments of $9,500 in cash and $19,000 in goods and provisions. This treaty also included language guaranteeing the privilege of hunting, fishing, and gathering wild rice on the ceded lands.

The Treaty of 1842 ceded an additional 10 million acres from Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, with an annual 25-year payment of $12,500 in cash, $10,500 in goods, and other provisions. This treaty also guaranteed Ojibwe hunting, fishing, and gathering rights but included a stipulation stating those rights would last “until they left the area.”

These millions of acres were rich in pine forests and mineral deposits. As more Europeans moved west, demand for lumber and minerals such as copper grew. Business interests and the federal government devised a plan to remove the Ojibwe from the land to make way for mining and logging.

On February 6, 1850, President Zachary Taylor issued an executive order that revoked the land use rights of the Lake Superior Ojibwe and ordered their removal from Wisconsin and Michigan. This action violated existing treaties and was met with firm resistance.

Nearly 400 Ojibwe ancestors perished in 1850 - not by accident, but as a result of deliberate federal policy.

The Ojibwe stood firm, citing the promises made during the 1842 Treaty of La Pointe. They refused to abandon their homelands. In retaliation, Minnesota Territorial Governor Alexander Ramsey devised a cruel plan. Alongside John Watrous, the Indian sub-agent at La Pointe, he spread word that unless the Ojibwe moved to Sandy Lake with their families, they would not receive their annual treaty payments — the very resources they depended on for survival. (Minnesota Historical Society)

The Ojibwe gathered at Sandy Lake, told to expect their payment on October 25, 1850. But payment never came. Instead, the government deliberately delayed both annuities and provisions until the waterways froze over, ensuring the Ojibwe were stranded as winter closed in around them. Conditions at Sandy Lake were overcrowded, food was scarce, and diseases such as influenza and measles spread rapidly. Starvation and illness quickly took hold. A partial annuity payment arrived in mid-December, but it was far too little and too late to help the starving and sick.

Watrous visited the Sandy Lake encampment on December 10 and compiled a report for Ramsey. He wrote that the Ojibwe were suffering from both measles and dysentery and as many as 150 people had died. Bagone-giizhig (Hole-in-the-Day) of the Mille Lacs band also spent time in the camp. He later testified at a public meeting in St. Paul that between four and six people died every twenty-four hours. The rations were rotten as well as inadequate, “the portion for an adult not being sufficient to fill my two hands.” (Minnesota Historical Society.)

Local newspaper, the Minnesota Chronicle and Register, reported that 167 deaths had occurred at Sandy Lake by December 23, 1850. Stories passed down through generations recall that there were not enough coffins, so the dead were wrapped in wiigwaas (birch bark) and laid out. “It looked like snow covering the ground as the survivors cried and they walked away, it is told.”

Hundreds more perished during the journey back to their homelands on foot in the middle of winter. An estimated 230 additional people died along the way, many of them women, children, and Elders.

The Lake Superior Ojibwe continued to resist removal with written petitions and sent a delegation to Washington City (Washington, DC) in 1852. It was not until 1853, when a new administration replaced Ramsey and Watrous, that removal efforts ended. Then, in 1854, the Lake Superior Ojibwe signed a new treaty at La Pointe that promised permanent reservations and on-site annual payments in their homeland.

This tragedy, the result of deliberate federal policies, remains a devastating chapter in Ojibwe history. Yet, out of this suffering came the 1854 and 1855 Treaties that established the Anishinaabe Reservation lands of today and guaranteed the hunting, fishing, and gathering rights of the Ojibwe. The annual Mikwendaagoziwag ceremony ensures that those who were lost are remembered — and that the resilience of the Anishinaabe people is carried forward.