Trail of Tears Timeline

1830 - The Indian Removal Act

1832 - Creek Removal

1831 - Cherokee Nation v. Georgia

1832 - Worcester v. Georgia

• The Indian Removal Act was passed on May 28, 1830.
• It authorized the president to grant unsettled land to the Native Americans west in exchange for the land they were living on currently to be given to the country. All costs for resettlement would be provided by the government.
• If they didn't want to leave, they had to assimilate into the life and laws of settlers.
• Some tribes went peacefully, but others protested the act.

1831 - The Choctaw Removal

• 7 years before, the Creek tribe had signed a treaty that would give their land in Alabama and Georgia for land in the West. President John Quincy Adams declared the treaty invalid , and the Creeks drafted a new one. The Treaty of Cusseta stated the the Creeks would give up all their land east of the Mississippi and that the government would pay all removal expenses. It also said that no Creeks would be forced out.
• The Creeks were divided. Some wanted to move West while others where determined to stay in the East. There were also settlers that had alreayd moved onto Creek land, causing arguments.
• In 1836, the U.S. Army forced thousands of Creeks to march to Indian Territory.
• This was a blatant violation of the Treaty of Cusseta, which had guaranteed that no Creeks would be forced against their will. This is just what the U.S. government did.

• There was a Supreme Court case between the Cherokee Nation and the state of Georgia in March 1832 involving a missionary who was living with the Cherokees named Samuel A. Worcester. Georgia imprisoned him for refusing to follow the law that required all whites living on Indian land to make an oath of their loyalty to the state.
• Supreme Court Judge John Marshall ruled that Indian tribes should be treated as nations. He also said that state laws can't have any force on the territories living with them.
• Georgia refused to follow his ruling and continued to force Cherokees out, while President Andrew Jackson didn't do anything to enforce the ruling. He said, " Mr. Marshall has made his ruling; now let him enforce it."

• In previous years, Georgia had been very opposed to having the Cherokees in the state. They made laws that stripped Cherokee citizens of their rights and gave the state permission to force Cherokee to leave if they wanted the land.
• Cherokee leaders went to court asking for an order that stopped these laws. They argued that the Cherokee Nation was a foreign nation and should not be subjected to the laws.
• The Supreme Court said that the Cherokee Nation wasn't a foreign state because it still lay within U.S. boundaries, so they couldn't take the case. They ruled that they didn't have the power to hear the case and that it couldn't be resolved.

Creek leader talking to Andrew Jackson

• The Choctaw tribe were the first to suffer from the Indian Removal Act. They had signed the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek with the United States, which said that the United States could have their land while they moved west.
• Choctaw from Mississippi were forced to travel to Oklahoma, then known as just Indian territory, in below freezing temperatures and flooding.
• Their removal took 3 years, since 1/3 of the nation would be moved each year according to the treaty.

A political cartoon depicting how the U.S. treated the Cherokee Nation and all Native Americans by putting the Indian Removal Act in place.

Samuel A. Worcester, the missionary convicted by Georgia

Choctaw Indidans traveling in the winter.

William Wirt, the attorney who represented the Cherokee in this case.

1832 - Treaty of Payne's Landing

1838 - Cherokee Removal Begins

Osceola, a Seminole leader, driving a knife through the treaty.

• The Seminoles signed the Treaty of Payne's Landing in May 1832, stating that they would give up their land in Florida to the United States and move onto Creek land to become part of their tribe. The government forced them to sign this treaty and also made them sell their cattle to them too.
• Chiefs of the tribe went back to Florida and told the tribe that they were forced to sign this treaty, so Seminoles were refusing to leave Florida.

1839 - End of Cherokee Removal

• The U.S. government used the treaty as justification for forcing out almost 17,000 Cherokees over 2 years.
• Federal troops came to Georgia to march thousands of Cherokees at gunpoint to Oklahoma during the summer. They faced starvation, cold, and diseases.
• In November, they also took many onto boats that went up the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi, and Arkansas Rivers into Indian Territory.
• Thousands were imprisoned in prison camps awaiting their fate.
• John Ross was a Cherokee chief who was against the removal.
• He led the last group of travelling Cherokees on the Trail near the end of 1838 and into 1839.
• His wife, Quati, was one of the many Cherokees who died on the trail.

• The last group of Cherokees reached Fort Gibson in March of 1839.
• This trail was over 800 miles long.
• Over 5,000 Cherokees died on what they called "Nu na da ul tsun yi," or "the place where they cried."
• The Trail of Tears is known as one of the most cruel and inhumane events in American history.

Another group of Cherokees traveling to the West.

Dade Massacre Reenactment in 2013 in Florida

1835 - Dade Massacre

Cherokee Indians traveling to the Indian Territory on the Trail of Tears.

U.S. Marines looking for Seminoles

Depiction of the Dade Massacre

• The Dade Massacre was the start to one of the largest wars between the United States and an Indian tribe.
• On December 28, 1835, black warriors and Seminoles destroyed sugar plantations along the St. John's River, and Florida's largest industry.
• They also ambushed the U.S. army while they were marching from Ft. Brooke (Tampa) to Ft. King.

1835 - Second Seminole War

1835 - The Treaty of New Echota

1837 - Chickasaw Monetary Removal

Cherokees signing the treaty

• The Second Seminole War was one of the longest and most expensive wars the United States had against Native Americans. It was 7 years long and cost about $30 million.
• The Seminoles proved to be hard to subdue. In many of the battles in this war, the U.S. had been attacked forcefully by them and they refused to back down.
• The U.S. got over 4,000 Seminoles to cross the border by using force. A few hundred were still hiding in the Everglades, but the government gave up on trying to move them.

• A group of about 100 Cherokees known as the Treaty Party signed this treaty with the United States stating that they would give all their land east of the Mississippi to the U.S. in exchange for land in the Indian Territory and the promise of money, livestock, tools and other benefits.
• The Cherokees never saw the $5 million they were promised. It was used by the government on the land they were removed from.
• Many of the Cherokees didn't agree with this treaty, and when they finally reached Oklahoma, the members of the Treaty Party were killed.

• Unlike the other Native American tribes, the Chickasaw were very well adjusted to living the way of the settlers. Most of them were successful business owners.
• Because of this, they were able to pay for their own removal and travel during the least harsh months.
• In January 1837, Chickasaw leaders signed the Treaty of Doaksville with Choctaw leaders. The Chickasaw bought a portion of Choctaw land in Indian Territory for $530,000.

Trail of Tears Timeline

By Tanzila Morshed

Chickasaw Indians walking in considerably better weather than other tribes could to the West.