Cherokee Life Before The Civil War Essay

In American Indian Stories, University of Nebraska Press Lincoln and London edition, the author, Zitkala-Sa, tries to tell stories that depicted life growing up on a reservation. Her stories showed how Native Americans reacted to the white man’s ways of running the land and changing the life of Indians. “Zitkala-Sa was one of the early Indian writers to record tribal legends and tales from oral tradition” (back cover) is a great way to show that the author’s stories were based upon actual events in her life as a Dakota Sioux Indian. This essay will describe and analyze Native American life as described by Zitkala-Sa’s American Indian Stories, it will relate to Native Americans and their interactions with American societies, it will

The Cherokee people were forced out of their land because of the settler’s greed for everything and anything the land had to offer. Many Cherokee even embraced the “civilization program,” abandoning their own beliefs so that they may be accepted by white settlers. Unfortunately for the Cherokee though, the settlers would never accept them as an equal citizen. A quote from historian Richard White says it very well, “The Cherokee are probably the most tragic instance of what could have succeeded in American Indian policy and didn’t. All these things that Americans would proudly see as the hallmarks of civilization are going to the West by Indian people. They do everything they were asked except one thing. What the Cherokees ultimately

In June, Grant led his expedition on the same route Montgomerie had taken. Sensing another ambush at a pass near the site of Montgomerie's battle, Grant dispatched Marion with 30 men to flush out the Cherokees. Using trees for cover, Marion's detachment cautiously advanced within range of the Cherokees, whereupon the Indians sounded their war cry and fired. By the time the pass was secured, only nine of Marion's men were left. Grant's column proceeded through the pass and engaged the Cherokees for several hours, until the Indians fled. Marion's capture of the pass allowed Grant to create a path of destruction in the Cherokee lands, burning 15 Indian towns and destroying their corn crops. Finally, Chief Attakullakulla, known by some as "Little Carpenter," surrendered.

The death and burials of the Cherokee along the Trail of Tears, will determine if the forced relocation can be considered an act of genocide. However, determining the number of how many people lost their lives on the Trail of Tears is difficult to calculate. An exact death toll of the round-up alone cannot be verified by historians. Most modern historians and other professionals agree on the number 4,000 deaths or one-fourth of the Cherokee Nation (Thornton, 1984). 4,000 deaths, is an estimate determined from the 1835 Census that tallied roughly 16,000 Cherokee in Georgia. Only 12,000 made it to Oklahoma, so the death estimate is 4,000 (Wilkins, 1986). A missionary by the name of Dr. Butler, who traveled with the Cherokee, estimated the death toll using eyewitness accounts and his personal observations along the journey. One traveler from Maine described an encounter of one of the detachments stating, “…we learned from the inhabitants on the road where the Indians passed that they buried fourteen or fifteen at every stopping place, and they make a journey of ten miles per day only on an average,” (Wilkins, 1986). Observations like the traveler’s, were the kind Dr. Butler would use to determine his estimate. Later he did bump his estimate up to 4,600 Cherokee deaths when presented with more evidence. However, the 4,600 is still an estimate and the exact number of lost lives is still unknown.

The American Indian History of the United States is always associated with the Cherokee Indian nation. The Cherokee's were by far the largest and most advanced of the tribes. This man was Hernando de Soto was the first European explorer to come into contact with the Cherokees, when he arrived in their territory in 1540. Then he went and came in contact with Native Americans Cherokee's since many of their ways and customs is my family that the Cherokees occupied a large expanse of territory in the Southeast. Their homeland included mountains and valleys in the southern part of the Appalachian Mountain chain. Their territory stretched from North Carolina to

die. The Red Chief was also in charge of the lacrosse games which were called

With the discovery of the New World came a whole lot of new problems. Native American Indians lived in peace and harmony until European explorers interrupted that bliss with the quest for money and power. The European explorers brought with them more people. These people and their descendants starting pushing the natives out of their homes, out of their land, far before the 1800s. However, in the 1800s, the driving force behind the removal of the natives intensified. Thousands of indians during this time were moved along the trail known as Nunna dual Tsung, meaning “The Trail Where They Cried” (“Cherokee Trail of Tears”). The Trail of Tears was not only unjust and unconstitutional, but it also left many indians sick, heartbroken, and dead.

Cherokee Indians had a hard life during the trail of tears. They were forced to move out of their homes. They had to leave their land and farms. 4,000 Cherokee Indians died of hunger, or exposure of disease. The journey became cultural as the “Trail where they cried” for the Cherokees and other removed tribes.

More than once they addressed memorials to the secretary of war. Whites trying to settle on there land brought about frequent clashes. An Alabama law was passed prohibiting the word of an Indian to be received against a white man in court. “Murders have already taken place, both by the reds and whites. We have caused the red men to be brought to justice, the whites go unpunished. We are weak and our words and oaths go for naught; justice we don’t expect, nor can we get.” In 1833 the secretary of war commissioned Colonel John J. Abert and General Enoch Parson to approach the Natives with a new treaty, ensuring their immediate removal to the West from the oppression of the whites. By then they Creeks utterly in the control of the white men. The had been swindled into selling land they didn’t know the value of, bonds they didn’t understand were taken from them. “They were oppressed by judgments for which they were not liable; while the laws of the state prohibited an Indian from testifying. The first of the emigration began in 1827 and consisted of seven hundred three Creeks. These settled in Fort Gibson, present day Oklahoma. More followed in the next few years with the last travelers in 1829. Right in the middle of a cholera epidemic. The disease was so bad that many actually returned to Alabama. Those that remained risked suffering night raid by

The Cherokee then found favor in their appeal to the Supreme Court (Marshall and Jackson were long time foes), however, Marshall didn't enforce the ruling, and the Cherokee were eventually dissolved due to Jackson's hatred. Some escaped to North Carolina, others took money to leave, and the remaining majority of all were forced from their homes [at bayonet point] to make a long "trek of tears" to their new homes, west of the Mississippi.

Like many other tribes, the Cherokee tribe did not leave their homeland voluntarily. The Cherokee tribe attempted numerous ways to remain on their original land in Georgia. Attempts were made by Senators Henry Clay and Daniel Webster that spoke on behalf of the Cherokee in opposition of their forced migration. (Cherokee Nation Cultural Resource Center, 2014) In addition, in the case Worcester vs. Georgia in 1832, the ruling affirmed the Cherokee’s natural right to stay living on their originally owned land. (Library of Congress Researchers, 2014) The Cherokee had become known as one of the, “Civilized,” tribes and many had learned how to read and write. (Scupin, 2012) However, it eventually became clear that nothing would stop the removal of the Cherokee that was strongly supported by the passing of Jackson’s Indian Removal Act. The unbelievable suffering experienced by Native Americans at that time can be clearly identified in the tragic event known as, “The Trail of Tears,” involving the Cherokee tribe. In 1938, the U.S. Army began carrying out the orders made by President Jackson to begin the forced migration west by the Cherokee tribe. (Cherokee Nation Cultural Resource Center, 2014) Approximately 4,000 of the 17,000 tribe members of the Cherokee tribe force-marched to from their land to live in the newly designated

The Cherokee marched through, biting cold, rains, and snow. Many people died during this trip from starvation, diseases, exposure,

After Lord Dunmore’s War, the Shawnee people were forced to move from their homes. The tribe was split up. A tribe called the Absentee Shawnee migrated to Missouri. Another tribe called the Loyal Shawnee moved to a small reservation in Kansas. Some Shawnee moved to eastern Oklahoma. In 1869, some of the Loyal Shawnee moved onto land given to them by the Cherokee tribe in Oklahoma. Though some Shawnee remained in

In my opinion I think that the Cherokee should move because of the threat from the U.S.invader and the leader of white people already signed the Indian removal law.

Most of us have learnt about the Trail of Tears as an event in American history, but not many of us have ever explored why the removal of the Indians to the West was more than an issue of mere land ownership. Here, the meaning and importance of land to the original Cherokee Nation of the Southeastern United States is investigated. American land was seen as a way for white settlers to profit, but the Cherokee held the land within their hearts. Their removal meant much more to them than just the loss of a material world. Historical events, documentations by the Cherokee, and maps showing the loss of Cherokee land work together to give a true Cherokee