prairie upon which grazed the herds of game or which were readily converted
into fertile

cornfields, affords presumptive evidence that it must have been a favorite
abode of a portion of

that tribe. Two of their villages were very favorably situated, one at the
extreme northern

boundary of the present limits of the county, the other at its extreme southern
boundary.

    The first mentioned was within the limits of the present town of Milton,
on the west shore

of Lake Koshkonong, and upon its immediate bank. The Indian name of this
village was

Tay-e hee-dah. When, in 1834, the government surveyors were there, they described
it as the

  ruins of an old Indian village."  At the beginning of the Black Hawk
war it was found

deserted, but how long previous to that date it had remained so is not known.
Tradition

represents it to have once been populace below Tey-e-hee-dah, at or near
the mouth of the

Yahara. On the west side of Rock river it is probable that there was also
an Indian village

Concerning it, however, there is very little information extant. Still further
down the river, at

the point where the city of Beloit is now located, was the Winnebago village,
called by the early

traders and explorers the Turtle. It was evidently occupied not long anterior
to the commence-

ment of the Black Hawk war, how long is not known with certainty. When the
army under

Gen. Atkinson marched by the point in pursuit of the famous Sac chief, the
dwellings were

found deserted.

    While the Winnebagoes occupied this western Eden-the Rock river valley-undisputed

masters of all its beauty and all its wealth of game and fish, they were
occasionally visited by

adventurous white men, who took up temporary residence among them for purposes
of trade.

Others married among them and became what may be called Indian residents.
Of the latter

class was one Thiebault, a Frenchman, who established himself at the Turtle
village probably

about the year 1824. His cabin is noted in the plat of the government survey
of the township

in 1834. Here he remained until after the arrival of the pioneer settlers
of the county.

    There were many tribes of Indians who claimed to be sole owners of all
the land embraced

in the present State of Wisconsin when it finally came under the jurisdiction
of the United States.

This question of aboriginal ownership of the soil was then found to be inextricably
complicated

by conflicting claims of different tribes to the same land. The Menomonees,
Chippewas,

Ottowas, Winnebagoes, Sacs, Foxes, and Pottawatomies were all located within
the present

boundaries of Wisconsin, and the claims of several different tribes were
frequently found to