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ORIGIN:
The Cherokee Indians, a branch of the Iroquois nation,
can trace their history in North Carolina back more than a thousand
years. Originally their society was based on hunting, trading,
and agriculture. By the time European explorers and traders arrived,
Cherokee lands covered a large part of what is now the southeastern
United States.
ORGANIZATION AND CULTURE:
The Cherokee lived in small communities, usually located in
fertile river bottoms. Homes were wooden frames covered with woven
vines and saplings plastered with mud. These were replaced in
later years with log structures. Each village had a council house
where ceremonies and tribal meetings were held. The council house
was seven-sided to represent the seven clans of the Cherokee:
Bird, Paint, Deer, Wolf, Blue, Long Hair, and Wild Potato. Each
tribe elected two chiefs -- a Peace Chief who counseled during
peaceful times and a War Chief who made decisions during times
of war. However, the Chiefs did not rule absolutely. Decision
making was a more democratic process, with tribal members having
the opportunity to voice concerns.
Cherokee society was a matriarchy. The children took the clan
of the mother, and kinship was traced through the mother's family.
Women had an equal voice in the affairs of the tribe. Marriage
was only allowed between members of different clans. Property
was passed on according to clan alliance.
The Cherokee readily adopted the tools and weapons introduced
by Europeans. Desire for these items changed Cherokee life as
they began to hunt animals, not just for food, but also for skins
to trade as well. As the white population expanded conflicts arose.
War and disease decimated the tribe. The Cherokees were eventually
forced to sign over much of their land, first to the British and
then to the United States.
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT:
In the early 1800's, the Cherokees began a period of change.
The Cherokee Nation was established with a democratic government
composed of a Chief, Vice-Chief, and 32 Council Members who were
elected by the members of the tribe. A constitution and code of
law were drawn up for the nation. During this time, Sequoyah invented
a system for writing the Cherokee language. There are 86 characters
in Sequoyah's syllabary, and each is based on individual syllables
in Cherokee words. Any person who could speak Cherokee could also
read and write it after learning the 86 symbols. The Cherokee
Council passed a resolution to establish a newspaper for their
nation. A printing press was ordered, the type cast for the Cherokee
syllabary, and the Cherokee Phoenix was in business.
REMOVAL:
Unfortunately, the Cherokees did not enjoy prosperous times
for long. Gold was discovered on Indian lands in Georgia. Political
pressure was exerted by President Andrew Jackson to confiscate
Indian lands and remove the Cherokees to the West. Numerous injustices
against the Cherokee Nation culminated in the signing of the Treaty
of New Echota. Those who signed the treaty did not have the authority
to represent the entire Cherokee Nation. Nevertheless, the treaty
stood. The Cherokees were taken from their homes, held in stockades,
and forced to move to Oklahoma and Arkansas. Almost 14,000 Cherokees
began the trek westward in October of 1838. More than 4,000 died
from cold, hunger, and disease during the six-month journey that
came to be known as the "Trail of Tears."
EASTERN AND WESTERN BANDS:
Prior to the "Trail of Tears," a small group of Cherokees
in western North Carolina had already received permission to be
excluded from the move west. Those individuals, often called the
Oconaluftee Indians, did not live on Cherokee Nation land and
considered themselves separate from the Cherokee Nation. Permission
for the Oconaluftee Cherokees to remain in North Carolina had
been obtained in part through the efforts of William H. Thomas,
a successful business man, who had grown up among the Cherokees.
For more than 30 years he served as their attorney and adviser.
To avoid jeopardizing their special status, the Oconaluftee
Cherokees reluctantly assisted in the search for Cherokee Nation
Indians who had fled to the mountains to avoid capture. Among
those in hiding was Tsali who had become a hero to many Cherokees
for his resistance to forced removal. Tsali was being sought because
of his role in the deaths of several soldiers. To prevent further
hardships for the Cherokees still in hiding, Tsali eventually
agreed to surrender and face execution. Due in part to Tsali's
sacrifice, many of those in hiding were eventually allowed to
settle among the Cherokees of western North Carolina. This was
to be the beginning of the Eastern Band of Cherokees.
This information was supplied by John Killer who works for
The Smokey Mountains National Park.
Brief History of The Trail of Tears:
Since first contact with European explorers in the 1500s, the Cherokee
Nation has been recognized as one of the most progressive among American
Indian tribes. Before contact, Cherokee culture had developed and thrived
for almost 1,000 years in the southeastern United States--the lower
Appalachian states of Georgia, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, and
parts of Kentucky and Alabama. Life of the traditional Cherokee remained
unchanged as late as 1710, which is marked as the beginning of Cherokee
trade with the whites. White influence came slowly in the Cherokee Country,
but the changes were swift and dramatic. The period of frontier contact
from 1540-1786, was marked by white expansion and the cession of Cherokee
lands to the colonies in exchange for trade goods. After contact, the
Cherokees acquired many aspects of the white neighbors with whom many had
intermarried. Soon they had shaped a government and a society that matched
the most civilized of the time.
Migration from the original Cherokee Nation began in the early 1800s as
Cherokees wary of white encroachment moved west and settled in other areas
of the country's vast frontier. White resentment of the Cherokees had been
building as other needs were seen for the Cherokee homelands. One of those
needs was the desire for gold that had been discovered in Georgia. Besieged
with gold fever and with a thirst for expansion, the white communities turned on
their Indian neighbors and the U.S. Government decided it was time for the
Cherokees to leave behind their farms, their land and their homes.
A group known as the Old Settlers had moved in 1817 to lands given to them
in Arkansas, where again they established a government and a peaceful way of
life. Later they, too, were forced into Indian Territory.
Once an ally of the Cherokees, President Andrew Jackson authorized the
Indian Removal Act of 1830, following the recommendation of President James
Monroe in his final address to Congress in 1825. Jackson sanctioned an
attitude that had persisted for many years among many white immigrants.
Even Thomas Jefferson, who often cited the Great Law of Peace of the
Iroquois Confederacy as the model for the U.S. Constitution, supported
Indian Removal as early as 1802.
The displacement of native people was not wanting for eloquent opposition.
Senators Daniel Webster and Henry Clay spoke out against removal. Reverend
Samuel Worcester, missionary to the Cherokees, challenged Georgia's attempt
to extinguish Indian title to land in the state, winning the case before the
Supreme Court.
Worcester vs. Georgia, 1832, and Cherokee Nation vs. Georgia, 1831, are
considered the two most influential decisions in Indian law. In effect, the
opinions challenged the constitutionality of the Removal Act and the US.
Government precedent for unapplied Indian-federal law was established by
Jackson's defiant enforcement of the removal.
The U.S. Government used the Treaty of New Echota in 1835 to justify the
removal. The treaty, signed by about 100 Cherokees and known as the Treaty
Party, relinquished all lands east of the Mississippi River in exchange for
land in Indian Territory and the promise of money, livestock, and various
provisions and tools.
When the pro-removal Cherokee leaders signed that treaty, they also signed
their own death warrants. The Cherokee National Council earlier had passed
a law that called for the death penalty for anyone who agreed to give up
tribal land. The signing and the removal led to bitter factionalism and the
deaths of most of the Treaty Party leaders in Indian Territory.
Opposition to the removal was led by Chief John Ross, a mixed-blood of
Scottish and one-eighth Cherokee descent. The Ross party and most Cherokees
opposed the New Echota Treaty, but Georgia and the U.S. Government prevailed
and used it as justification to force almost all of the 17,000 Cherokees
from the southeastern homelands.
Under orders from President Jackson, the U.S. Army began enforcement of the
Removal Act. Around 3,000 Cherokees were rounded up in the summer of 1838
and loaded onto boats that traveled the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi, and
Arkansas Rivers into Indian Territory. Many were held in prison camps
awaiting their fate. In the winter of 1838-39, 14,000 were marched 1,200
miles through Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, and Arkansas into
rugged Indian Territory.
An estimated 4,000 died from hunger, exposure and disease. The journey
became an eternal memory as the trail where they cried for the Cherokees
and other removed tribes. Today it is remembered as the Trail of Tears.
Those who were able to hide in the mountains of North Carolina or who had
agreed to exchange Cherokee citizenship for U.S. citizenship later emerged
as the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians of Cherokee, N.C. The descendants
of the survivors of the Trail of Tears comprise today's Cherokee Nation with
membership of more than 165,000
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