When people tink about the first people in America, they might think of Christopher Columbus or the European colonists; when, in fact, the first people were the Indians. The Cherokee Indians had lived in the lands of what is now the United States for thousands of years before any colonists had ventured over. Little did they know that the new nation that was going to be forming around them, would severely affect the lives of their descendents.
Life before the Trail of Tears but after the arrival of the new Americans was more or less simple for the Cherokees. They spend time hunting and fishing. Some of them even worked on plantations and even own their own slaves, in an effort to accommodate to some of the American ways of living. The main difference between the Americans and the Indians was that the Indians believed that no one should actually own any of the land. The land was only thre for them to use, as they needed. This disaagreement of the people cread some serious issues down the road.
John Ross and Major Ridge were two men who were both part Cherokee, but had slig...
In the essay, “The Trail of Tears” by author Dee Brown explains that the Cherokees isn’t Native Americans that evaporate effectively from their tribal land, but the enormous measure of sympathy supported on their side that was abnormal. The Cherokees process towards culture also the treachery of both states and incorporated governments of the declaration and promises that contrived to the Cherokee nation. Dee Brown wraps up that the Cherokees had lost Kentucky and Tennessee, but a man who once consider their buddy named Andrew Jackson had begged the Cherokees to move to Mississippi but the bad part is the Indians and white settlers never get along together even if the government wanted to take care of them from harassment it shall be incapable to do that. The Cherokee families moved to the West, but the tribes were together and denied to give up more land but Jackson was running for President if the Georgians elects him as President he agreed that he should give his own support to open up the Cherokee lands for establishment.
“Quantie’s weak body shuddered from a blast of cold wind. Still, the proud wife of the Cherokee chief John Ross wrapped a woolen blanket around her shoulders and grabbed the reins.” Leading the final group of Cherokee Indians from their home lands, Chief John Ross thought of an old story that was told by the chiefs before him, of a place where the earth and sky met in the west, this was the place where death awaits. He could not help but fear that this place of death was where his beloved people were being taken after years of persecution and injustice at the hands of white Americans, the proud Indian people were being forced to vacate their lands, leaving behind their homes, businesses and almost everything they owned while traveling to an unknown place and an uncertain future. The Cherokee Indians suffered terrible indignities, sickness and death while being removed to the Indian territories west of the Mississippi, even though they maintained their culture and traditions, rebuilt their numbers and improved their living conditions by developing their own government, economy and social structure, they were never able to return to their previous greatness or escape the injustices of the American people.
To many the trail of tears has no meaning or relevance in their life, but for some the Trail of Tears has great meaning since many of the native ancestors endured the hardships of this time. In the 1830s, Native Americans occupied many acres of land in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, and Florida. The main reason for the Trail of Tears was because the Americans wanted the Indians’ land for themselves so they could raise their cattle, and because of the good soil so they could grow and harvest crops. Their ancestors had lived on and cultivated this land for generations, and by the end of that generation very few Native Americans remained anywhere in the Southeastern United States. Many think that The Trail of Tears was just the “Five Civilized Tribes”, but there were many other smaller tribes involved too. Some tribes agreed to sign, and others were forced into it, but either way it went they all had to leave. Many Native Americans suffered from exposure, disease, and starvation on their way to their destinations, making The Trail of Tears one of the greatest hardships in Native American history.
The Cherokee Indians lived in the south of the Appalachian Mountains for hundreds maybe thousands of years before the
Considering historical evidence, the notion: Native –Americans was not the first inhabitant of America is a complete false. For centuries, history kept accurate and vivid accounts of the first set of people who domiciled the western hemisphere. Judging by those records, below are the first set of Native-American people who inhabited America before the arrival of another human race; the Iroquois: The Iroquois of Native Americans was one of the tribes that lived in America before other people came. Based on historical evidence, it is believed that the Native Americans came from Asia way back during the Ice Age through a land bridge of the Bering Strait. When the Europeans first set foot in America, there were about 10 million Native Americans
Can you imagine walking over 900 miles to find a new home? Native American tribes such as: the Cherokees, Creeks, Seminoles, and etc. were forced from their homes. Many left peacefully and others would not leave without a fight. Native Americans were forced from their homes in Georgia, the Carolinas, and Florida; then, were forced to walk to present-day Oklahoma to find new homes. The Trail of Tears is the worst American tragedy because the Native Americans were forced to leave their homes, to travel across the country just to find a home, to establish their own civilizations, tribe leaders began to betray their tribes, and many died due to the genocide.
1830 saw the instatement of the Indian Removal Act, a forced relocation of several Native American tribes. This spurred what is now known as the “Trail of Tears.” The Five Civilized Tribes, Choctaw, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Muscogee, and Seminole were forced to relocate after resisting assimilation with American civilization. Over 17,000 tribe members were removed and sent to what is now Oklahoma by the order of President Andrew Jackson. Despite the ruling of Chief Justice John Marshall, Jackson set in motion the Trail of Tears. Many perished on the way, and many perished after. (“Q&A: The Trail of Tears”)
The Cherokees would not have been able to survive on their own due to their outdated way of life. “You have lived by hunting the deer and buffalo – all these have been driven westward; you have sold out on the seaboard and moved westwardly in pursuit of them. As they became scare there, your food has failed you; you have been a part of every year without food, except the root and other unwholesome things you could find in the forest.” Deer and buffalo were the Cherokee’s main source of food and they had become scare due to the fact that the Cherokee had hunted fifty thousand deer annually. Deer population plummeted because of the Cherokee’s reliance on European goods with which they traded deerskin for. There was one good that the Europeans had that negatively affected the Cherokees, and that was alcohol. “Frequent wars, too, and the abuse of spirituous liquors, have assisted in lessening your numbers.” Alcohol was consumed in huge quantities by the Cherokee which cause them to fall into drunken stupors which c...
The Trail of Tears was a horrific time in history from the Cherokee Indians. May 18, 1830 was the beginning of a devastating future for the Cherokee Indians. On that day congress officially passed Andrew Jackson’s Indian removal act. This policy granted President Andrew Jackson the right to force the Cherokee tribe consisting of about 13,000 people off of their reservations consisting of about 100 million acres east of the Mississippi River in the Appalachian Mountains and to attend a long and torturous journey consisting of about 1,200 miles within nine months until they reached their new home, a government-mandated area with in present-day Oklahoma. They left their land which was home to the “Five Civilized Tribes” which were assimilated
The removal of the Cherokee Indians from their lands in the southeast is the largest Indian relocation in American history (Sides 362). It was unjust for the Americans to seize Indian land in order to make room for more Americans and immigrants. The Indians had done nothing to deserve this type of brutal treatment. These Indians had no way of fighting back to the Americans, so it was both unfair and unjust. The Trail of Tears, or as Indians called it The Trail where the Wept, was a trail of sickness and despair (Ehle 385). No person should ever have to go through what the Cherokees and other tribes went through. Even though the Americans had some viable reasons to desire the Indian land, they had no right of forcibly removing the Indians out without all of their consent.
Perdue, Theda, and Michael Green. The Cherokee Nation and the Trail of Tears. New York: Penguin Books, 2007. Print.
Before there was a United States of America, there were tribes of Native Americans living off the land. In the southeastern part of the country, the largest group of Native Americans were the Cherokee people (Boulware, 2009). Cherokees are networked through vast kinship lines that separates them from other tribes in the region (Boulware, 2009). They once occupied a territory that ran throughout the Appalachian Mountains (Boulware, 2009). Cherokees spoke a common language known as Iroquoian, different from the surrounding tribes (Boulware, 2009).
I walked into the room on New Year’s Day and felt a sudden twinge of fear. My eyes already hurt from the tears I had shed and those tears would not stop even then the last viewing before we had to leave. She lay quietly on the bed with her face as void of emotion as a sheet of paper without the writing. Slowly, I approached the cold lifeless form that was once my mother and gave her a goodbye kiss.
The Trail of Tears was a hard battled journey for the Cherokee Nation. The Cherokee were driven to move west. They had to compromise and sign treaties, which drove them out of their land by the U.S. government. This was unfair to the Cherokees; the white settlers wanted the land for gold. Trail of tears is historically monumental because it shows the U.S. government cruelty to the Native Americans. It was unfair rights because they basically stole Cherokees land to satisfy their hunger for gold.
As history explains, The Native Americans were the first people on the North American land.