We came to Cherokee with the intention that Anne would work at the Cherokee Hospital, which is owned and operated by the Cherokee Indian Hospital Authority, a creation of the Eastern Band Cherokee Indians, recognized as an Indian Nation by the federal government.

We arrived curious about the status of the Cherokee in Carolina, how the people were doing, the condition of the tribal organization, and most of all, why there remained Cherokee in North Carolina after passage of the Indian Removal Act of about 1840.

We have found that the people are doing fine, at least many of them are. Although perhaps the most “Americanized” of Indians in the early 1800’s, the people of Cherokee are proud to maintain many traditions and the Cherokee language. Otherwise they are simply a clannish community of Carolina mountain folk struggling with life’s usual issues.

The tribe operates essentially as a county government with rights for local taxation and receives considerable support from the federal government that recognizes that it treated both the tribe and the Cherokee people rather badly for almost two centuries. In fact, the treatment of the Cherokee by the British government, the American colonists, and the American government was monstrous. The survival of the Eastern Band of Cherokee is a smashing tale of human spirit and endurance in the face of impossible odds.

The Cherokee tell their colorful history in dramatic performances of “Unto these Hills” each summer. This presentation neglects to point out certain blunders made by the Cherokee, the biggest of which was siding with the British during the American Revolution. But mostly the colorful drama correctly points out that they were a people in the wrong place at the wrong time. The place was northern Georgia, western Carolina, and eastern Tennessee. The time was after the arrival of the Europeans.

The Cherokee were at a disadvantage and knew it. They were not a unified tribe except by tradition, and could not establish and defend its tribal lands from this invader. They elected to accept the arrival of more powerful neighbors and establish rights in accordance with the white man’s law. They also adopted much of the conqueror’s customs and gained much increased prosperity from new crops and from use of the horse and iron tools. They suffered too from the arrival of smallpox, which took perhaps a third of their population.

The problem with this approach was that the white man’s government failed utterly to enforce any of the treaties it made with the Indians. King George could proclaim that settlement would stop at the foot of the Blue Ridge, but the settlers kept going, staking claims, and defending them with rifles. It was no wonder that the tribe agreed to fight for the King when he promised that he would allow the tribe to defend its territory?

Their defense of Indian lands, of course, meant the attacking and driving out the settlers. The British rightly thought that such skirmishes would distract the nasty rebels. They did, but not for long. The states of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia each formed a militia to address the “stab in the back” from the Cherokee and to subdue them before the inevitable conflict with the British.

And so in 1776 some 6,000 well-organized and armed troops swept up the foothills, across the high passes of the mountains, and into the homelands of the Cherokee. The method of warfare was simple, annihilate those who might resist, generally any adults, and leave the children to starve or to sell them as slaves. Villages and crops were destroyed. The Cherokee probably had some 600 warriors who could provide no serious contest to this army. The tribe quickly made formal peace, but various renegades initiated skirmishes again in 1780 resulting in further “warfare” against the Cherokee and the reduction of the tribe from its peak of some 20,000 people to only several thousand by the end of the war.

The peace that followed was good for the Cherokee even if the Whites took all of the best land. It would have worked out better if they were only considered to be human. They became civilized, Christianized, and literate, much to the frustration of their white neighbors who still coveted their land. The remaining Cherokee people lived in northern Georgia in the area near the town of Dahlonega. There were so few left, it would have been easy, cheap, and simply proper to recognize their right to the land they now settled. The abuses during the war could be forgiven as within the character of warfare, but for further abuse of the Cherokee there was no longer any excuse unless greed can be considered an excuse!

The Cherokee were now farmers and craftsmen. They lived in houses in towns, wore white man’s shoes and clothes, and went to the Baptist church, but they had no rights. And, it happened that the land they settled on bore a certain richness that was not yet recognized. One day a Cherokee lad found a yellow stone in the stream near his house. His mother sold it discretely, but the secret did not keep. There was gold in Dahlonega!

Georgia reacted smartly, legislating that an Indian may not own land and has no right to testify in any legal matter. These laws provided a license to seize land and to kill Indians. With the first execution of a Cherokee for providing testimony, the Cherokee recognized that the offers of the federal government to go west to “Indian Territory” might have to be accepted.

Legal efforts were made to secure recognition of the Cherokee people as citizens of the United States. The U.S. Supreme Court acted on a first case to declare the Georgia laws unconstitutional, but a new president, Andrew Jackson, commented that the court could interpret the law but had no power to enforce its decision. He said the Indians must go.

Congress, at the behest of Georgia’s legislators, enacted the federal Indian Removal Act. Many of the Cherokee were now ready to go. Several thousand financed their own way to Oklahoma. They arrived safely. The balance of the tribe tried to hold their ground, but the United States Army was sent to capture and forcibly remove them. Most surrendered peacefully. A few fought back.

The famous Tsali and his sons killed two soldiers and fled into the mountains. General Scott who had the unenviable job of rounding up the Indian families and keeping them in “camps” let word out that if the killers were not apprehended, he would search out every cove for hiding Indians. When informed of this, Tsali surrendered to give the others their freedom. He and his sons were convicted by army trial and sentenced to death. He asked to be shot by Cherokee. His neighbor was among those who were part of the firing squad that killed Tsali and his boys.

The army emptied the stockades in November and began the march west. Winter caught the hikers in southern Illinois at the Mississippi, which was too frozen to allow ferrying. Provisions were inadequate. Deaths were from exposure and starvation. Of some 12,000 who started the march, some 4,000 did not make it. The Cherokee call this forced march the “Trail of Tears.”

An indefinite number, perhaps two to four thousand, stubborn Indians had fled northward into the high mountains of Carolina and remained hidden in the backwoods there for more than a decade of fugitive poverty. The gold was picked out of Georgia and the discovery of much more in the West dampened American interest in Cherokee lands.

It happened that a Cherokee chief had adopted a twelve-year-old white orphan, one William Thomas. As Indian as he was, he was damned legal, could vote. He could also own property. He became an attorney and a North Carolina politician. Eventually, acting as agent for Indians who saved cash to purchase their lands, he took title of much of what is now known as the Qualla Boundary. It is the property that includes and surrounds Cherokee, North Carolina. He also successfully brought court actions that a decade later would provide cash compensation to the Eastern Cherokee for lands taken from them.

Unfortunately, this progress was interrupted by the Civil War in the 1860s. Mr. Thomas, a good southern politician, became a colonel and established a Cherokee brigade. The Cherokee lost this war too, but this time the government allowed them and all confederate soldiers to return home with their rifles. Mr. Thomas was not well and was in debt. He died that way and the creditors wanted his property – including the homesteads of all of the Cherokee whose property was in the name of colonel Thomas!

All was not lost. The Cherokee finally collected payment from the United States for the settlement that Mr. Thomas had obtained before the war. The funds received were used to pay the creditors. Now the Indians were allowed to take title in the name of the tribe. And so it remains today. Cherokee are also now citizens of these United States, but only Cherokee tribal members may “own” property within the Boundary.

The population is again up to about 15,000 people in five counties of western North Carolina. Whereas, at the time of European settlement most Cherokee people were “slender” and suffered periodic starvation, today obesity and diabetes are major health problems. Alcoholism and drug abuse are significant problems within the tribe. Some of its people still harbor resentment against whites and the government for past abuses, but most consider themselves to be quite American and simply want to make their way in the world.

Although the rationale for continued federal programs is questionable – one cannot make up for past abuses by conferring special benefits on descendents of those who were damaged - and such benefits may in the long run be detrimental to the economy and well being of the community, they are in place as compensation for what was taken from these people.

The tribe has a casino, the profits of which support tribal operations, including the Cherokee Hospital, and provide twice-a-year payments to tribal members. These payments make many vacation trips possible. They also lead some tribal members to the emergency room when they use their benefits to overindulge and suffer the consequences. Wealth does not always bring happiness.

Life goes on in Cherokee. We watched the tribal council meet in the “council chambers” courthouse to enact a budget. The tribe has its own schools as an alternative to the public schools. It has only been a few decades since the government boarding schools were shut down. Some still have bitter memories of these institutions that were designed to eliminate tribal customs and languages.

We have met one woman whose grandfather went to school in Carlisle, Pennsylvania – the old Carlisle Indian School that became the U.S. Army War College center. He played football with Jim Thorpe and captured the heart of a German-American woman and brought her home to Cherokee, further integrating the society. Our lady commented that she had the German look while her siblings appeared more Native American.

The tourists come to Cherokee every summer on their way to Great Smoky Mountains National Park. They may stop in Cherokee at the shops, see the museum, visit the “Indian Village” or even go to see “Unto these Hills. They might think it quaint that the government established a reservation here in the high mountains. Few understand that the Eastern Band of Cherokee is here by its own devices having survived one of the ugliest episodes of American history.

The Cherokee do love their mountain lands. Their ancestors lived on the bottoms, but today’s Cherokee must settle for the coves in the high country. It is Cherokee land, and the Cherokee of the present and of the future will decide what to do with it. Amen.

Note: I have written this from memory of my researches, but I believe I have correctly stated the important facts. The perspectives of the various writers color all of the histories of the Cherokee, and nowhere have I seen a history that covers all the elements of the establishment of the Qualla boundary, the so-called Cherokee Reservation. I find this history to be a wonderful, if heart-wrenching, story. May we learn from it to use caution in our judgments? It is strange, but this week Sadam Hussein went on trial for his efforts to exterminate the Kurds. He says he did this because the Kurds were a rebel force interfering with Iraq’s war with Iran. The United States used exactly the same excuse to justify its efforts to exterminate the Cherokee people in the 1700’s. While Mr. Hussein’s recent extermination project was just as wrong, it is somewhat ironic that the United States is supporting his prosecution for it.