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okee households, it remained among some of the wealthiest families.
Some slave-owning Cherokees shifted their households to In-
dian Territory in the two years between the Treaty of New Echota
and the forced removal campaign. Major Ridge was one of these.
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Such relocations, while not of their own choosing, were at least
more comfortable for all concerned than the deadly marches that
followed. Other slaves shared the fate of their owners and suffered
through the Trail of Tears. John Ross, for example, was not only
the final coordinator of removal, but also a slaveowner who moved
his family and household during some of the most treacherous of
conditions.
Although the Cherokees had watched firsthand as the U.S. sys-
tem failed them, most chose to renew their commitment to certain
institutions inspired by the United States and its colonial predeces-
sors once they reached Indian Territory. One of these was slavery,
and another was the constitution, which enforced this practice. The
close of the U.S. Civil War brought an end to slavery in the Chero-
kee Nation. And the legacy of Cherokee slaveholding, as well as the
Trail of Tears, continues to be felt in the twenty-first century, as the
descendants of freedmen who spoke the Cherokee language, lived
among the Cherokee people, suffered the Trail of Tears along with
their owners, and shared their exile in Indian Territory sue the
Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma to become Cherokee citizens. The
controversy hinges on the issue of blood. Cherokee law denies citi-
zenship to those without Cherokee blood, but the descendants of the
freedmen claim that by culture and by right, they have earned a
place in the nation.8
Tsali
While all of the Cherokees were, in one form or another, vic-
tims of the Trail of Tears, not all were removed to Indian Territory.
In North Carolina, for example, one group had separated from the
Cherokee Nation and lived in an area known as Quallatown, where
they were led by Chief Drowning Bear and his advisor, William
Holland Thomas, a white merchant who had been adopted and raised
by the Cherokees. Thomas acted as a liaison between the Cherokees
and the U.S. government, arguing that the Quallatown Cherokees
were either North Carolina citizens or qualified and willing to
become such, and therefore did not fall under the Treaty of New
Echota. Thomas ultimately succeeded in negotiating safety for the
Quallatown Cherokees. In return, however, he pledged to General
Winfield Scott that this group would not harbor other Cherokees
who sought to elude U.S. forces. This left the Quallatown Cherokees
in the position of either watching their fellow Cherokees be hunted
down, or helping the enemy forces who were doing the hunting.
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62
There were also Cherokees who fled from U.S. troops and
sought to hide in the Smoky Mountains. Their story is the one
immortalized in the contemporary Cherokee, North Carolina, drama
Unto These Hills, and the tale of their escape from removal has
taken on a near-mythic quality. The traditional account of these fugi-
tives and their martyr-savior, Tsali, was captured by early ethnologist
James Mooney in his landmark book Myths of the Cherokees. He
compiled the tale from interviews given by Tsali s surviving son, an
elderly William Holland Thomas, and other Cherokees:
One old man named Tsali, Charley, was seized with his wife,
his brother, his three sons and their families. Exasperated at the
brutality accorded his wife, who, being unable to travel fast, was
prodded with bayonets to hasten her steps, he urged the other
men to join with him in a dash for liberty. As he spoke in Cher-
okee the soldiers, although they heard, understood nothing until
each warrior suddenly sprang upon the one nearest and endeav-
ored to wrench his gun from him. The attack was so sudden
and unexpected that one soldier was killed and the rest fled,
while the Indians escaped to the mountains. Hundreds of others,
some of them from the various stockades, managed also to
escape to the mountains from time to time, where those who
did not die of starvation subsisted on roots and wild berries
until the hunt was over. Finding it impracticable to secure these
fugitives, General Scott finally tendered them a proposition,
through (Colonel) W. R. Thomas, their most trusted friend, that
if they would surrender Charley and his party for punishment,
the rest would be allowed to remain until their case could be
adjusted by the government. On hearing of the proposition,
Charley voluntarily came in with his sons, offering himself as a
sacrifice for his people. By command of General Scott, Charley,
his brother, and the two elder sons were shot near the mouth of
the Tuckasegee, a detachment of Cherokee prisoners being com-
pelled to do the shooting in order to impress upon the Indians
the fact of their utter helplessness. From those fugitives thus
permitted to remain originated the eastern band of Cherokee.9
Many of the details of the Tsali story are not easily verifiable.
The Quallatown Cherokees, to protect their own agreement with the
United States, seem to have helped find Tsali. The facts of the origi-
nal killings, and of any negotiations made by Tsali, are unclear. How-
ever, official reports to Winfield Scott do note that Tsali and
members of his family were executed in November 1838; moreover,
Colonel William S. Foster, whose duty it was to find those responsi-
ble for the deaths of the soldiers, did recommend that the other refu-
gees be allowed to remain in North Carolina. Approximately 1,400
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63
Cherokees did not make the trek West. Of those, more than a thou-
sand were in North Carolina. Less acculturated than many of the
other Cherokees, this group tended to include fullblood purists who
preferred to practice a traditional Cherokee lifestyle rather than
assimilate with U.S. society. This remnant of the Cherokee Nation
formed what is now the Eastern band of Cherokees.
The Cherokee Rose
The story of Tsali has a legendary quality about it, but other
stories from the Trail of Tears take myth a step further, while making
meaningful commentary about the nature of U.S. Indian removal.
One such story is the legend of the Cherokee rose. Widely available
now on everything from postcards to calendars, the tale is a simple
one. As the soldiers forced the Cherokees to march West, the Chero-
kee mothers wept for their dying children. The elders prayed that
some reassuring sign would appear to give them strength. After these
prayers were said, flowers grew from each spot where a Cherokee
mother s tear hit the ground. The story ascribes significance to each
aspect of the flower the white color represents the mothers tears;
the gold centers represent the gold taken from Cherokee national
lands; and the seven petals represent the seven clans of the Cherokee
Nation and to the fact that it grows naturally in the areas through
which the trail routes passed.
Although this story is not properly termed history, it is signifi-
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