14

Capt James Allen, who had recruited the Mormon Battalion
for Col. Stephen W. Kearny, had arranged a two year
 agreement between the Mormons and the Omaha Indians
for the right to remain on Indian lands for two years. Later
the Oto-Missouri Indians, also living in the vicinity of
Bellevue, said the land did not belong to the Omaha
 Indians, who had come to the vicinity just a year before
 the Mormons -- that it was, in fact, Oto land. When the
 Omaha Indians demanded, about two months after the treaty,
rent for the land the Mormons were using, the Oto quickly
sent a delegation of their own demanding preferential
treatment. Church leaders offered to build a strong
 house for the Omaha Indians on high land where they could
see from afar off the approach of their traditional enemies,
     The Dakota Sioux. Little is known about that building, but there is some evidence to suggest it was built about