This is another photo from the cemetery where Peter H. Weaver and his wife, Martha, are buried. Peter’s gravestone is the one with the flag honoring his service in the War of 1812.
The cemetery isn’t one that gets a lot of traffic. There was no road to it — just a mowed space between two fields on which to reach it. But the place seemed well cared for.
(This map image from the 1878 atlas of Wayne Township, Tippecanoe County, Indiana, is provided by www.historicmapworks.com. You can click on the map to go to the page containing the original image.) It’s several miles west-southwest of West Lafayette.
Sandford Cox had referred to Weaver buying land next to the Burnett Reserve, on the south edge of Wea Prairie. But on this map fragment, it sure looks more like the west edge than the south edge to me. (I’ve used blue to highlight what I take to be the designation for the prairie edge.)
The Burnett Reserve is the area that’s not square with the world, and sure enough, Weaver’s home is just off the north edge. (I’ve drawn a violet-colored oval around the area that contains the house and the cemetery.)
I’ve been trying to learn more about the Burnett Reserve, but so far am not even sure which treaty created it. A recent news article by a Mark A. Smith refers to Abraham Burnett receiving three sections of land in the 1826 treaty, but it’s referring to reserves towards the northeast part of the county, not the west end where this is. In the 1826 treaty the word “section” seems not to mean a square mile — this reserve alone contains four square-mile sections, plus parts of two more.
In maps of Tippecanoe and Carroll counties, I find at least four places identified as Burnett reserves. So I obviously have a lot more to learn about it. Part of the explanation seems to be that other Burnett’s than Abraham (or Abram) received reserves. I’m not sure which Burnett owned this one. (Some information about Abram Burnett can be found in a web site created by descendents.)
One can see from the map that Peter Weaver or his son Patrick Henry Weaver ended up owning a part of this particular Burnett Reserve. And in looking at other maps, I see suggestions that at least one of the other large property owners with a different surname is from the Burnett family, too.
Another minor mystery is the Peter Weaver entries in the GLO land patent database. Weaver was the original buyer of the quarter-section in section 12 that I’ve shaded in yellow. He also bought a little over 5 acres in section 10, according to the database. But there is a problem with that. There are no five acres in section 10. There is only a tiny sliver of land in what would have been section 10 if there had been no Burnett Reserve. It looks like it’s not even one acre’s worth. The land in section 11, where Weaver’s house is located was bought from the government by someone else. That doesn’t necessarily contradict any of the stories about it, though. But the problem with section 10 remains. I’ve checked the scanned images of the certificates themselves for transcription errors, and didn’t find any. One interesting point (well, interesting to me) is that Weaver as well as the buyer of Section 11 are identified as being from Wabash County, Indiana. The stories I’ve read so far about Peter Weaver have him coming from Wayne County. But maybe there was some sort of Wabash County interlude before he came to Tippecanoe County.
Those are some of the types of details I fuss about.
A look at modern maps of suggests there are some potential bike rides if I want to add to my collection of photos where old treaty lines have left marks on the landscapes. These marks are in the form of roads that follow the borders of some of these reserves. We’re hoping to spend a few days in Tippecanoe County this summer, maybe very soon. Another thing I’d also like to do is follow the edge of Wea Prairie to see if it’s still marked by changes in vegetation. Often such transitions are still visible.
