The Cherokee removal (May 25, 1838 – 1839) was part of the broader Indian removal policy affecting multiple American Indian groups across the U.S. South, Midwest, Southwest, and Plains regions. The removal of the Cherokee occurred according to the terms of the 1835 Treaty of New Echota and resulted in the forced displacement of an estimated 15,500 Cherokees and 1,500 African-American slaves from the U.S. states of Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama to the West. This event was part of a larger pattern in which various Native American nations—including the Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee (Creek), and Cherokee—were removed reluctantly from their ancestral lands.
The Cherokee removal represented one of the most significant forced displacements in American Indian history during this period. Unlike some other removals that were voluntary or met with armed resistance, the Cherokee removal was executed as a direct consequence of a treaty signed in 1835. The removal process itself spanned from May 25, 1838 through 1839, involving the systematic transportation of tens of thousands of people westward.
The removal resulted in devastating human losses. It is estimated that 3,500 Cherokees and African-American slaves died en route during the forced displacement. The Cherokee people came to refer to this removal using terms such as Nu na da ul tsun yi (the place where they cried) and Tlo va sa (our removal), reflecting the profound trauma and loss experienced during this period. This removal remains a significant and tragic chapter in both Cherokee and American history, illustrating the human cost of Indian removal policies.
The early republic period saw the United States move from the weak Articles of Confederation to the federal Constitution ratified in 1788, with the Bill of Rights added in 1791. George Washington served two terms as president (1789–1797), establishing precedents for executive authority, and the federal capital moved permanently to Washington D.C. in 1800. The Louisiana Purchase (1803) doubled the nation's territory for roughly $15 million, opening vast trans-Mississippi lands to American expansion. The War of 1812 against Britain ended inconclusively but produced a surge of American national identity and eliminated most British support for Indigenous resistance east of the Mississippi. The Northwest Indian Wars (1785–1795) and the Creek War (1813–1814) broke Indigenous confederacies that had resisted US expansion. The Missouri Compromise of 1820 temporarily balanced slave and free states as the nation expanded westward, but embedded the contradiction of slavery in every subsequent territorial debate.
c.3,500 Cherokee and African-American slave deaths en route
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