The Trail of Tears
The struggle of the Native Americans is a dark chapter of US history - and in the 1830s the Federal Government forced thousands off their land
There’s always something of an ironic take to be heard when white Americans get annoyed about immigrants coming to their country. For decades, people worldwide came to the USA hoping to live the American dream.
Many Americans are descendants of these people, and they also seem to gloss over or be completely ignorant that a whole native population called the USA home centuries before Europeans started arriving across the Atlantic Ocean.
Native American tribes lived peacefully and with nature and the land, making sure to use every bit of an animal they killed. They were efficient and respectful of the world they lived in. Still, by the 1830s the Federal Government had made significant changes- and by the end of the decade Native Americans had been forced off land that their families had occupied and cultivated for generations.
Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, and Florida were all states that Native Americans had called home. However, the government, operating on behalf of the white settlers, forced thousands of Native Americans into a designated territory which was near the Mississippi River.
This treacherous walk of hundreds of miles became known as the ‘Trail of Tears.’ The name comes from a quote given to an Alabama newspaper by a Choctaw leader, who described it as a “trail of tears and death.”
The trail was a brutal example of white settlers showing they were hell-bent on claiming Native American land for their own. Southern states passed laws to limit the rights of Native Americans in the same decade as the Trail of Tears took place.
The Indigenous people of America had been subjected to hardship for decades, with even George Washington, the first President, suggesting that they were an issue- but one that he believed could be solved by educating the Native Americans in European-style ways of life.
Across the 1830s thousands of Native Americans from the Cherokee tribe from all ages travelled nearly 800 miles to the new land the government assigned for them. The land they left behind was sold off to white farmers, and their journey to the forced new home was fraught with danger in an unpredictable environment.
One point that must be added here is that among the number who died were around 200 black slaves. Although small, some Native Americans owned slaves and they considered themselves to be superior to black people.
It wasn’t until 1839 that the removal of the Native Americans along the trail was completed. It was estimated that 4,000 Cherokees died on the journey, this was roughly one-fifth of the tribes' entire population.
America was and still is a cultural melting pot, and to a vast extent, this makes it fascinating. However, among the interesting history are cruel chapters that are dark and disturbing. The eradication of the Native American people is a stain on America which is up there with slavery.
Events such as The Trail of Tears are chilling reminders of what humans can do to one another, and how the forced removal of native population was so easily signed into legal legislation. As the 19th century wore on and gave way to the 20th century, it became more apparent how easy this was to do- and how entire groups of people would support it or stand by as governments made it happen.
