The Meshingomesia Cemetry

Chief Meshingomesia was chief of the Miami after the removal of the 1840s when the Miami of Indiana were allowed to stay on their traditional homeland. In 1860, the Chief built the Miami Indian Village School along with a Baptist church on his reservation which was about eight and a half miles long and about 1-mile wide along the north bank of the Mississinewa River a few miles to the Northwest from the town of Marion, Indiana.

Chief Meshingomesia died in 1879 and was buried along with 30 other people who died from a tuberculosis outbreak at the cemetery located on his former reservation where the school house sits today. Upon his death, the reservation was divided up amongst his heirs who over the next 20 years would either sell reservation land or have taking from them by the State of Indiana’s manipulation of property tax laws.

Please Help us Honor our ancestors, the original inhabitants of Indiana!

The Meshingomesia cemetery is owned, operated, and cared for by the Miami Nation of Indians of Indiana. Some of the more recent headstones are in great condition but many of the older headstones are weathered and faded, broken, and have fallen over.

Since the Tribe had its federal recognition illegally taken in 1898, we do not qualify to receive support and grants that federally recognized tribes do. Won’t you please consider  a donation to help the Miami of Indiana preserve the memories of some of Indiana’s original inhabitants and help us honor our ancestors?