Page 15

The following data is extracted from Cherokee of the Smoky Mountains.

resort they submitted to Washington a memorial proposing to satisfy Georgia by ceding to her a part of their lands, they to be protected in possession of the remainder for a definite period to be fixed by the United States, after which, having disposed of their surplus lands, they should become citizens of the various States within which they resided.

Their plea might as well have been addressed to the North Star. Bluntly they were told that the only way out of their troubles was for them to give up the land of their fathers and emigrate in a body to the far West.

It would be to the honor of the Government if then and there an end had been made to subterfuge and the bayonets of the ejectors frankly bared. No doubt that would have been Jackson’s way if he had been dictator. But some pretext of bargaining with the Indians had to be found to give color of legality to their banishment. And now a sly politician, in the garb of a Christian minister, steps into the plot.

Among the Cherokees there was a small faction that favored the idea of emigrating. With the leaders of this faction a commissioner, in the person of Reverend J. F. Schermerhorn, drew up the terms of a treaty binding the Cherokee Nation to surrender their whole territory and move west, in consideration of a sum of money and a new territory beyond the Mississippi. The deal, however, could not be concluded until ratified by the Nation in full council assembled. Schermerhorn then visited the Cherokee country and tried for six months to induce the national council to approve this treaty; but he completely failed. The reverend emissary then suggested to the Secretary of War two alternative propositions:

(1) to get the signatures of influential Cherokees by buying up their personal improvements at their own valuation, if any degree reasonable; or (2) to make a treaty with a part of the Cherokees and compel the rest to accept it.

Jackson, although ruthless himself in dealing with the Indians could not stomach this. He replied pointedly that the treaty, if concluded at all, must be procured on fair and open terms, with no special inducement to any individual, high or low, to win his aid or influence, and without sacrificing the interest of the whole to the cupidity of a few.

In October, 1835, the national council of the Cherokees,

Source: Cherokee of the Smoky Mountains

  Go Back