The Wild West 3: Trail of Tears

No part of the animal went unused. As we've always heard, the meat fed them, and the pelts clothed and sheltered them. Even the bones could be used both for weapons and tools. Although cultures sometimes varied, they shared similar rituals. Some followed leaders instead of rulers, and above all, a sense of community was stronger than individualism. The people marked the seasons and celebrated their triumphs and losses together. In their mind, the land and the animals that roamed it sacred and

life giving. Across North America, some eighteen million indigenous people lived in harmony with nature, earth and sky, water and animals. The Native Americans believed that they were at one with all of it. Others, though, felt that they were above it. To them, nature was something to conquer. In fourteen ninety two,

Christopher Columbus arrived in the Caribbean. A little over a century later, Europeans landed on the shores of North America in droves, bringing their own cultures, and they also brought disease. You have to remember the native populations had no prior exposure to things like smallpox, chicken pox, typhoid, leptospirosis, influenza, or bubonic plague. Those were European illnesses, not global things,

and the results were devastating. Smallpox had one of the highest mortality rates of them all, and it spread like wildfire. Half of the entire Cherokee population died from smallpox during an outbreak in seventeen thirty eight. Twenty years later, half the Cataba tribes succumbed. European settlers traveled across the country, and everywhere they went they carried the disease. Some historians estimate that smallpox killed roughly ninety percent of indigenous tribes

across the continent. Folks back then didn't have a clear view on how disease worked, though, and so settlers took the death toll as a sign from the heavens. In their minds, God himself had chosen them to tame and inherit the land, and he was clearing the way. Plymouth, Massachusetts settler William Bradford wrote in horrific detail of the slow and miserable deaths that God had bestowed on the Native Americans. Disease rendered them unable to care for themselves

or their families. Entire communities starved or became dehydrated. God, he wrote, was good. He had provided for the English by killing others. Please tell me that you can see the hypocrisy in that. And while these diseases also killed plenty of settlers, they mostly had immunity from prior exposure and didn't take long before Europeans quickly learned that spreading the disease was an effective weapon against the Native Americans, and if they killed off the indigenous people, they could

take over their land. Correspondence between British Commander and Chief Sir Jeffrey Amherst and Colonel Henry Bouquet discussed spreading diseases as a warfare tactic. So when an outbreak of smallpox hit Fort Pitt in seventeen sixty three, the British gifted local tribal leaders with blankets from the fort's smallpox ward in the hopes of infecting them. It all sounds incomprehensible, and it was. But unfortunately for the indigenous people, the

newcomers had a few more plans. Settlers wanted the land and all that it offered for their own. Only one thing stood in their way, the people already living there. And if disease wouldn't kill off the Native Americans, they would simply come up with even more sinister methods to do it. I'm Aaron Mankee, and welcome to the wild West. When colonists wanted more land for farming, they took it, often by force. And I need to make this clear.

This isn't biased propaganda. This is documented, historical fact. The story tells itself, and the story is tragic and dark. Far too many looked upon the Indigenous people as inconsequential. They saw their religions and beliefs as inferior to their own, and when tribes fought back or resisted, that made them the savages. It didn't matter to many of the settlers

if the Native Americans had fought at their sides. During the French and Indian War in seventeen fifty four, they still pushed those tribes off their own land and then forced them farther and farther west. When the war ended in seventeen sixty three, King George the Third made a surprising announcement. Native Americans had a right to keep their

sacred land. No longer could English settlers travel across the indigenous territory west of the Appalachian Mountains, and no longer could they steal the indigenous people's land and take it for their own. The king acknowledged the tribes who fought alongside England, and his proclamation sought to end the fraud and abuse that the indigenous peoples had suffered. Native American

sovereignty was to be protected, he said so. The Crown actually dedicated troops to protect the border between the colonists and the Native Americans. Indigenous people gathered by the thousands in Niagara to celebrate. They vowed to be at peace with their British neighbors. But the king's declaration angered many of the colonists. They believed that they had fought for that land and it was theirs for the taking. As

a result, most settlers simply ignored the proclamation. Once the revolutionary war was over, there was a new government to write new laws designed to take Indigenous place, and yes, while they did acknowledge that the land belonged to the Native people, they claimed that such uncivilized and savage peoples were incapable of managing it well. They didn't stop and remember that the tribes had managed perfectly well for thousands of years before the first Europeans ever set foot in

North America. So the new United States government granted themselves the right to supervise Native American land in seventeen eighty six. They offered reservations granting the Indigenous people who chose to move there and live on them the ability to govern the land as an independent nation decline, and while there would be conflict, greed for more and more land pretty

much guaranteed that even the newest treaties wouldn't last. Americans kept pushing westward, forcing more Native Americans off their land as they expanded, and although President James Monroe expressed concern for the plights of Indigenous people, his administration continued to remove those living in states north of Ohio, often with

bloody and devastating results. Some pushed back Chief dacumsa of the Shawnee tribe tried to control the number of settlers taking over his people's ancestral territory, but military officer William Henry Harrison forced them north. When the War of eighteen twelve broke out, Tacumsa and the Shawnee naturally sided with the British, and they weren't alone, but the American military

played dirty. They would specifically seek out tribes that were at war with each other and then become allies with one of the sides to help them decimate the other. It wasn't about finding allies, though, it was about lowering the overall Native American population to prevent them from resisting colonization, and all along the United States continued to make treaties with Native Americans in an effort to appear peaceful, but conflicts and the ever present threat of violence between Indigenous

people and settlers remained a regular occurrence. Given their dwindling populations any increasing number of settlers with ample weapons, some tribes felt that they had no choice but to accept. If they rejected these offers, they would be attacked. At least in acceptance, there was a chance they might find some safety for their people. Unfortunately, those promises weren't worth much.

The US Senate refused to ratify treaties, leaving most tribes without a voice or recourse to prevent their removal or eradication. Seeing no viable way to avoid deadly attacks on their people, many tribes reluctantly gave in. The Cherokee, however, did not. The Cherokee language has some similarities to tribes who once lived in the Great Lakes region. They spoken the Iroquoian family of languages, indicating that they might have once lived

in northern areas. Harmony and balance with nature were essential to the Cherokee. To them all, life possessed a great and intelligent spirit. When they hunted, they asked for the animal's forgiveness. When they harvested plants, they took only what

they needed, often leaving three of every four plants. They settled in the hills that make up the modern American states of North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and South Carolina, and when a few Europeans began settling in that same area, the Cherokee accepted their new neighbors, but the shift in power between colonists and the British changed that relationship. The Cherokee started to notice how the white settlers began treating

other tribes. The destruction and genocide they witnessed prompted them to try a different approach to their survival. By adopting more European practices and ingratiating themselves with their new neighbors, The Cherokee hoped to find peace. Their life and their land depended on striking a balance between their own heritage

and this new European culture. During the War of eighteen twelve, they even offered their warriors to fight against the British, and their assistance proved highly beneficial to General Andrew Jackson's success. Friendship and and bravery, though wouldn't be enough to save the Cherokee people. Their new allies would soon betray them.

In eighteen twenty eight, General Andrew Jackson rose to the presidency. Unfortunately, that same year, settlers discovered gold on Cherokee land in Delanaga, Georgia, and it would be the Cherokee people's demise. They'd be wrong if they expected President Jackson to be thankful for

their help. In his rise to the presidency, Jackson and the administration ignored signed treaties American officials, held lotteries and gave away ancestral land to white prospectors, all without the Cherokee people's consent, and then the State of Georgia stripped away the Cherokee people's rights. After June first of eighteen thirty,

the government forbade them to conduct tribal business. The Cherokee could no longer mine on their own land, and the state deemed any and all laws pertaining to the Cherokee nation were null and void, even denying them the right to testify in American court. John Ross wouldn't let his people be silenced, nor would he allow the government to take his people's homeland. Although not fully Cherokee, Ross had

affluents that most Cherokee did not. His father had provided his children with excellent schooling, hiring a teacher before sending them to other schools and academies. He never forgot his roots, though, while he wore American clothing, Ross celebrated his native heritage and grew up with traditional Cherokee customs thanks to his mother and grandmother. His father had been a Scottish trader,

and Ross had followed in his footsteps. Owning a trading post helped Ross become more successful than most men, regardless of his race. The experience made Ross a good businessman. He and other Cherokee men who helped the Americans fight against the British in the War of eighteen twelve had done so without pay, not out of choice, but because the military only paid white soldiers. The settlers may have considered Ross a lesser American, but the Cherokee people welcomed

his mixed heritage. Ross's education, his business experience, and his familiarity with the tribe earn him a spot as the tribe's negotiator with the US government. President Jackson's address to the public in eighteen thirty came as a blow to the Cherokee. He and his administration made it clear that they intended to remove Indigenous people from their ancestral land.

Jackson insisted that removing Native Americans was an act of generosity and kindness because it would prevent further conflicts with settlers. The president stated that the government would be generous enough to give the Cherokee people large amounts of territory, not where they already lived, though, but elsewhere. He also added that their removal would finally give the Indigenous people happiness and suggested that perhaps they might also give up their

savage habits and become more Christian. Jefferson even claimed that he envied the Cherokee that away from white civilization, they'd be permitted to purchase land. Ultimately, it didn't matter that the Chairoerocke already had large amounts of land and were perfectly happy living there before it was stolen from them. Of course, Ross had heard enough. He traveled to Washington, hoping to stop the government from stealing the land his

people rightfully owned. What happened next, though, has left a permanent stain on American history. John Ross thought about how to handle the situation. What he hadn't considered was opposition from a former ally, Major Ridge. Together they had shared a lot of history, working together to build a stronger bond between settlers and the Cherokee nation. But now Ridge had begun urging the Cherokee to pack up and leave. To him, getting something for the tribe was better than

getting nothing. But it wasn't the path forward that Ross had envisioned for his people. Other politicians chimed in, of course, all wanting the same thing, the removal of the chaerity Muskogee, Seminole, Choctaws, and other tribes from the land that the white settlers wanted, and in the spring of eighteen thirty, Congress announced that this theft was necessary and that staying would be detrimental

to their well being. Officials claimed that removal was a good thing instead of what it really was, a not so thinly veiled threat. One New York representative even claimed that he was in full support of the bill, offering refuge to Native Americans leaving of their own free will. The Cherokee and other tribes, of course, had no choice

or free will. Compatriot David Crockett voiced his opinion that the removal was unjust and wicked, but when he staunchly opposed the bill, his colleagues warned him that supporting the Native Americans would ruin him and his career. Ross also arrived to speak his own mind. In his Washington speech to officials, He stated that if all men were created equal, then his people and other tribes should have an equal voice.

But Congress made their answer to Ross's question of equality crystal clear when they passed the Indian Removal Act on May twenty sixth of eighteen thirty in Georgia, white settlers celebrated. The Cherokee and others, however, were left in tears. Although the politicians had dismissed his arguments and please, John Ross

continued to advocate for his people. Instead, Congress went back on their word from previous treaties, and they also refused to pay the Cherokee Nation for the land they intended to take. So Ross took the Cherokee people's plight to the Supreme Court and at persistence, almost paid off. On March third of eighteen thirty two, the Court's ruled that according to the prior treaties, Georgia had no authority regarding Cherokee land. As you might expect, the Georgians, who were

looking to take over the valuable territory were outraged. Ross's former ally, Major Ridge, continued to work behind his back. He began treating to gushiations with the Jackson administration without approval from the Cherokee Nation. In fact, when it was all said and done, not one tribal official had been

allowed to sign Ridge's treaty. Six years later, in eighteen thirty eight, over fifteen thousand Cherokee petitioned the document by then, many settlers had begun to sympathize with their Native American neighbors. Ralph Waldo Emerson appealed to the administration, urging them to prevent an outrage against the Cherokee people. Many empathetic settlers recalled how one of the Cherokee, a man named Junalusca, had saved Andrew Jackson's life during the War of eighteen twelve.

They reminded Jackson of how he had declared his friendship toward that Cherokee for and I quote as long as the sun shines and the grass grows. Instead, Jackson sent General John E. Wool to recruit thousands of volunteers to forcibly remove the Cherokee, But during Wull's time with the tribe, he realized the government had misled the American people regarding

the treaty. Wool began to fear the worst. He would be forced to remove the people that he had come to care about from their own homes by gunpoints if necessary. When he expressed his concerns for the Cherokee people, Wool was promptly relieved of his post. The annihilation of the Cherokee people came in eighteen thirty eight. US troops stormed into homes during the evening meal, shoving bayonets at anyone who defied them. Troops took anything of value they could carry,

and those who resisted were beaten. Soldiers herded the Cherokee people, children at play and adults at work in the fields, and forced them like cattle into holding camps. If anyone tried to flee, the troops shot and killed them. Civilians followed the example of the soldiers, too, ransacking homes and taking whatever the soldiers might have missed. They stole their horses in livestock and then went into the fields with shovels, digging up Native American graves to rob the dead of valuables,

and those holding camps were filthy. Dysentery spread among the prisoners. Soldiers assaulted the women, starving, malnourished, and severely dehydrated. Those who survived in tournament were forced to march westward in June of eighteen thirty eight. Those who were transported by trains fared no better either, as they were overcrowded, allowing disease to spread quickly. The summer heat quickly became unbearable, and the Cherokee people begged the troops to wait until

fall to continue the trek westward. The soldiers granted the request, although they continued to keep them in squalid conditions and interment camps. That fall, they walked through torrential rains and mud for nearly four months. There would be no stopping this time, and when winter came, the young and old alike were forced to continue on foot, despite the bitter cold and harsh blizzards. Every time they stopped there were burials.

Clean water and food were in short supply. One Cherokee man lost a member of his family every day for five days straight, first his mother, then his father, finally his brothers and sisters. The Cherokee had once stood proud, Now along the trail to Oklahoma, they walked in a silence that was only broken by the whales of suffering women, children, and men. The government cared so little about the welfare of the indigenous people they were displacing that they didn't

even count how many had died. Sadly, mortality was highest among the elderly and the children. According to one missionary doctor who traveled with them, twenty percent of those who set out that previous June never made it to Oklahoma. Although they had been forcibly relocated over one thousand miles from their home, those who survived were determined to rebuild. In August of eighteen thirty nine, the Cherokee elected Ross as their principal chief. He served his people faithfully for

another twenty seven years. Life moved forward as best it could. The Cherokee people constructed new new schools, new homes, and even built a courthouse. But despite their new life, they never forgot the land of their ancestors. And as hard as it is to hear, the Cherokee weren't the only people group to suffer on the Trail of Tears. In eighteen forty, the government forced tens of thousands of other Native Americans off of their ancestral lands and move them

out to Oklahoma. This time, of course, they promised to honor their treaty. This time, they said, all the tribes living there would do so forever undisturbed. But just as before, the indigenous people had no choice in the matter. They could fight and suffer greatly, or give in and suffer just slightly less. John Ross never stopped petitioning Washington, DC to pay the Cherokee for the land the government had stolen. Even when his health began to fail in eighteen sixty six,

he continued to advocate for his people. He passed away on August first of that year, unsuccessful. Naturally, America continued to push westward. Eighteen oh seven that land in Oklahoma, the land that had been promised to the Native Americans as theirs forever undisturbed, was reduced to make room for

more settlers. Some Cherokee did manage to stay behind on their original land, though those living in small areas in North Carolina, for example, There the mountains and hills weren't useful to cotton farmers and were overlooked or written off Further south. A few Seminole tribes also managed to evade the removal efforts, and some smaller groups within the Chickasaw and Choctaw nations stayed behind, but overall those that remained

were definitely in the minority. All told, its estimated that approximately one hundred thousand Native Americans were forced from their land and relocated to Oklahoma, opening up a land grab for white settlers. In the winter of eighteen thirty one, the US Army threatened the Choctaw tribes with force if they weren't willing to surrender their homeland. When they resisted, soldiers swept in and removed them at gunpoint and in chains.

The Choctaw people were made to walk the Trail of Tears all the way to Oklahoma, and just like the Cherokee and others, they too receive barbaric treatment. The US government provided for their soldiers, of course, but not the Choctaw. They had to get food and water wherever they could along the way, and five years later, in eighteen thirty six, three thousand, five hundred of the fifteen thousand Creek people who were driven from their lands did not survive the

journey to Oklahoma. The government also removed several tribes along the East Coast as a result. The historic Trail of Tiers covers over five thousand miles and spans several routes and nine states, and is now overseen by the National Park Service. Today, there are three bands of Cherokee tribes nationwide, the Eastern Band located in western North Carolina, the United Kitawa Band in Oklahoma, and the Cherokee Nation and Telequah, Oklahoma.

For the most part, though the lives of Native Americans and the trail of tears have largely been forgotten, which is tragic because the situation is just as dire today, from education and employment to other basic human needs. Native peoples exist in what is called an asterisk nation, an abandoned population of human lives deemed to be invisible. The story of those who are forced to walk the trail of tears is a difficult one to hear, and I want to thank you for taking the time to revisit

it with me today. A lot of history has the power to make us feel uncomfortable, but the solution is never to cover it up or avoid it. Shadows might be a guarantee given human nature's tendency toward evil, but shadows, as we all know, don't do so well when dragged

out into the light. Sadly, there are plenty more shadows where that one came from, and we've pulled together one last story to demonstrate that stick around through this brief sponsored break, and my teammate Ali Stead will tell tell you all about it.

no more threatening than furry, lumbering cows. In the distance, six bison came into view. Cody knew the wind behind them would alert the beasts, but the fact did little to worry him. The men had the quickest horses around, not to mention the best guns. All were supplied by the US Army. While it might seem odd that the US Army would front horn, horses and weapons for what were essentially rich city slickers looking to shoot bison on a trophy hunting expedition, it really wasn't, you see. It

wasn't about the bison at all. It was about the Native Americans whose very lives depended on these animals. Troops were told to kill the bison, every last one of them, because dead bison were dead Native Americans. At one time, tens of millions of the great beasts roamed the land. Standing at nearly six feet at the shoulder and weighing up to two thousand, four hundred pounds, Bison were made for survival. They can run at speeds of up to

thirty five miles an hour. They protect their young, and during winters, their broad shoulders and strong necks can easily push snow aside to forage for food. And for the record, it is bison, not buffalo. Buffalo never roamed to the American West. Bison and buffalo are members of the same family bow, but they are distinctly different animals. For the Cheyenne, Lakota, Cree, and other Native American tribes, bison were everything. They provided food,

and their hides could be used for shelters. The animals were never killed for sport, and Native Americans only hunted what they needed. They used every part of the bison. To the indigenous people, bison were life givers. When they thrived, the indigenous people thrived, and to Generals William T. Sherman and Philip Sheridan, that was the problem back East during the Civil War, they'd implemented scorched earth. When it came to the Native Americans, they intended to take it a

step further. Gold had brought settlers from the east in large numbers. In fact, white settlers now outnumbered the indigenous people nearly three to one, and indigenous tribes were obstacles in conquering the west, finding gold, and settling on native land to farm. During the winter of eighteen sixty eight to eighteen sixty nine, Sheridan relentlessly destroyed the Cheyenne people's food, shelter,

and live stock. He showed no mercy, killing the warriors and leaving the women and children to the whims of his soldiers. During an attack in November of eighteen sixty eight, nearly seven hundred men under the command of George Armstrong Custer were ordered to kill the men and their horses, torched the village, and bring back the women and children. During the Washita massacre, troops used women and children as human shields, and as terrible as that was, it wasn't

even the worst part. Custer's men killed many of the survivors without a hint of remorse or mercy. The chief and his wife tried to flee, and soldiers shot them in the back while Custer, Sherman, and Sheridan continued their mission of genocide, Cody continued to slaughter the bison. Loads of hunters packed into cars heading west for sport hunts. Railroads advertised hunting by rail men aimed out the windows and shot the bison as the trains passed by the herds.

Trains moved onwards, leaving dead or fatally injured bison to rot on the prairies, and the men on board they congratulated each other on the annihilation, perhaps of both the bison and the Native Americans. Hunter Orlando Brown boasted he'd brought down six thousand of the bison himself. Thankfully, the Texas legislature stepped in to protect the bison from extinction, though Sheridan opposed protective legislation, stating his men had done more to settle the vexed Indian question and had been

instrumental in destroying Native Americans' commissary. Hunters continued their attempts to completely exterminate the American bison, photographing themselves on a mountain of bison's skulls. Bison numbers dwindled to three hundred or maybe a thousand at the most, and Native Americans were forced into treaties that were unfavorable and onto reservations. With the establishment of Yellowstone Park in eighteen seventy two, the park set out to protect the land and the

animals living there. Today, through those protections, bison numbers have reached nearly two hundred thousand, and in twenty sixteen, the bison joined the bald Eagle as a national symbol. There's still work to be done to prepare what was nearly destroyed.

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