In the early 1800s the Cherokee began to face enormous pressures to cede all of their traditional homelands in the East and to move to other lands far away, west of the Mississippi River. The Cherokee people tried many strategies to avoid removal.
1836 Protest Petition from Cherokee Nation to United States Government. Courtesy of Cherokee Nation Businesses
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ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯ ᏕᎨᏥᎧᎲᏒ ᎤᎵᏁᏨ
In 1828, President Andrew Jackson set about pushing a bill through Congress calling for the removal of the southeastern Native American tribes to lands west of the Mississippi River.
The Indian Removal Act was passed by Congress on May 28, 1830, and quickly sent to President Jackson, who signed the act into law, effectively forcing all southeastern tribes to give up their traditional homelands.
The Cherokee Nation, led by Principal Chief John Ross, resisted the Indian Removal Act, even in the face of assaults on its sovereign rights by the state of Georgia and violence against Cherokee people.
John Ross, ca 1846. Hand-colored lithograph on paper. Courtesy of Oklahoma Historical SocietyᎧᏃᎮᏛ ᏚᎾᏠᎯᏍᏔᏅ ᎢᏤ ᎢᏦᏛᎢ
A small group of Cherokee citizens began to believe they had no choice but to give up their land and move to the west.
New Echota Historic Site, Photograph by Cady Shaw. Courtesy of Cherokee Nation BusinessesBy the 1830s, the Cherokee Nation’s capital was located in New Echota, near present-day Calhoun, Georgia.
New Echota Historic Site, Photograph by Cady Shaw. Courtesy of Cherokee Nation Businesses1 | Portrait of John Ridge
Zoom image Zoom image2 | Portrait of Major Ridge
Zoom image Zoom image3 | Portrait of Elias Boudinot
Zoom image Zoom image4 | Portrait of Stand Watie
Though they had no legal right to represent the Cherokee Nation, some Cherokees signed the Treaty of New Echota with the U.S. government in December of 1835, ceding all Cherokee lands in the East for lands west of the Mississippi River. The signers of the treaty became known as the Treaty Party, and included the prominent tribal members pictured here.
1 | Portrait of John Ridge, 1842. Lithograph by J.T. Bowen. Courtesy of Oklahoma Historical Society 2 | Portrait of Major Ridge, 1837. Lithograph by J.T. Bowen. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution NPG.94.105 3 | Portrait of Elias Boudinot, n.d. Courtesy of Oklahoma Historical Society, Muriel Wright Collection 4 | Portrait of Stand Watie, Ambrotype. Courtesy of Cherokee National Archives, Cherokee Heritage Center
