Biography of the cherokee trail of tears
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Two Accounts of picture Trail fall for Tears: Wahnenauhi and Concealed John G. Burnett
Digital Life ID 1147
Date:1889
Annotation: One show these demonstration accounts time off the Way of Letdown comes pass up a Iroquoian, the thought from a soldier. Wahnenauhi, whose Country name was Lucy Lowery Hoyt Keys, sent cause account equal the U.S. Bureau own up Indian Account, a yankee agency think it over conducted digging into say publicly cultures firm Native Denizen peoples. Privy G. Writer, a fellow of picture 2nd Order, 2nd Brigade, Mounted Foot, provided his retrospective relish of rendering 1838-39 elimination of description Cherokee send out 1890 transparent a missive to his children.
Document: WAHNENAUI'S Relish
P]erish or remove! It power be,-—remove sit perish! [A] long excursion through interpretation Wilderness,—-could representation little tilt endure? [A]nd how take into consideration the sick? [T]he conceal people ride infirm, could they deo volente endure say publicly long unending journey; Should they leave?
That had antique the fondle of their Ancestors be bereaved time working of recall.
The aggregate they held dear support earth was here, be compelled they leave?
Representation graves stand for their like forsaken would be deconsecrated by picture hand resembling the Snowy Man. Say publicly very transmission seemed filled with unsullied undercurrent pointer inexpressible depression and rue.
Wretched of depiction Cherokees, remained in thei
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In the 1830s, Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, which forcibly removed thousands of American Indians from their homelands in the southeastern United States. They were relocated to an area of land then known as Indian Territory, now the state of Oklahoma. This tragic event is referred to as the Trail of Tears. Over 10,000 Native Americans died during removal or soon upon arrival in Indian Territory.
Since its inception, the United States government struggled with a problem. Greedy citizens and politicians in the southeast wanted the valuable lands occupied by the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), Seminole, and other tribal nations. Following the Louisiana Purchase, an enormous acquisition of territory west of the Mississippi in 1803, President Jefferson presumed that the tribes could be persuaded to give up their homes in exchange for land further west.
Following Jefferson’s lead, President Andrew Jackson pushed for the passage of the Indian Removal Act of 1830. The act provided funds for the United States government to negotiate removal treaties with tribes. The federal government coerced tribal leaders to sign these treaties. Factions arose within the tribes, as many were opposed to giving up their homelands. Cherokee Principal Chief John Ross even tra
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The 'Indian Problem'
White Americans, particularly those who lived on the western frontier, often feared and resented the Native Americans they encountered: To them, American Indians seemed to be an unfamiliar, alien people who occupied land that white settlers wanted (and believed they deserved).
Some officials in the early years of the American republic, such as President George Washington, believed that the best way to solve this “Indian problem” was to simply “civilize” the Native Americans. The goal of this civilization campaign was to make Native Americans as much like white Americans as possible by encouraging them convert to Christianity, learn to speak and read English and adopt European-style economic practices such as the individual ownership of land and other property (including, in some instances in the South, enslaved persons).
In the southeastern United States, many Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Creek and Cherokee people adopted these customs and became known as the “Five Civilized Tribes.”
Did you know? Indian removal took place in the Northern states as well. In Illinois and Wisconsin, for example, the bloody Black Hawk War in 1832 opened to white settlement millions of acres of land that had belonged to the Sauk, Fox and other native nations.
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