Editing Louisiana Purchase (section)

==Formal transfers and initial organization==
France turned over New Orleans, the historic colonial capital, on December 20, 1803, at [[the Cabildo]], with a [[Flag#Hoisting the flag|flag-raising]] ceremony in the Plaza de Armas, now [[Jackson Square (New Orleans)|Jackson Square]]. Just three weeks earlier, on November 30, 1803, Spanish officials had formally conveyed the colonial lands and their administration to France.

On March 9 and 10, 1804, another ceremony, commemorated as [[Three Flags Day]], was conducted in [[St. Louis]], to transfer ownership of [[Illinois Country|Upper Louisiana]] from Spain to France, and then from France to the United States. From March 10 to September 30, 1804, Upper Louisiana was supervised as a military district, under its first civil [[commandant]], [[Amos Stoddard]], who was appointed by the War Department.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Autobiography Manuscript of Major Amos Stoddard|editor-first=Robert A.|editor-last=Stoddard|first=Amos|last=Stoddard|page=67−69|isbn=978-1537593593|publisher=CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform|year=2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Sketches, Historical and Descriptive, of Louisiana|first=Amos|last=Stoddard|page=103|publisher=Mathew Carey|year=1812|isbn= 9780608399270 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HikVAAAAYAAJ&q=commandant}}</ref>

Effective October 1, 1804, the purchased territory was organized into the [[Territory of Orleans]] (most of which would become the state of Louisiana) and the [[District of Louisiana]], which was temporarily under control of the governor and judicial system of the [[Indiana Territory]]. The following year, the District of Louisiana was renamed the [[Louisiana Territory|Territory of Louisiana]].<ref>"The district of Louisiana changed to the territory of Louisiana". See chapter iii, "Treaty Ceding Louisiana to the United States" (1803 ff.), ''Laws of a Public and General Nature: Of the District of Louisiana, of the Territory of Louisiana, of the Territory of Missouri, and of the State of Missouri, Up to the Year 1824'' (Jefferson City MO: W. Lusk, 1842), 6.</ref> New Orleans was the administrative capital of the Orleans Territory, and St. Louis was the capital of the Louisiana Territory.<ref>{{Cite book | last=Olbrich | first=William L. Jr. |date=2004|chapter=The State of Missouri|title=The Uniting States: Louisiana to Ohio|series=The Uniting States: The Story of Statehood for the Fifty United States |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xu4uoI4DimMC&q=New%20Orleans%20was%20the%20administrative%20capital%20of%20the%20Orleans%20Territory,%20and%20St.%20Louis%20was%20the%20capital%20of%20the%20Louisiana%20Territory&pg=PA672 |location=Connecticut |publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-313-33106-0|editor-last=Shearer|editor-first=Benjamin F. |volume=2|pages=672}}</ref>