by Marjorie J. Lowe (Author)
From the time of the Louisiana Purchase in 1804, plans were formulated to peacefully remove the five tribes residing in the southeastern United States to west of the Mississippi. To accomplish this task, various rolls and census records were taken of individual heads of households in order to persuade the signers of treaties. In the case of the Cherokee Tribe, once the Treaty of New Echota was signed in 1835, the federal government developed a means of compensating those who would be removed. They evaluated the improvements on the land to determine what would be lost by the forced removal to the west. On 28 February 1839, the U.S. Senate, 25th Congress, 3rd Session Report from the Secretary of War was read and ordered to be printed. Data abstracted from this report constitutes the first part of this work which contains the full names of persons employed, duties, appointed date, sum paid, appointed by whom, and remarks. Some of those employed had Cherokee wives, others were mixed-blood Cherokees, but most were non-Cherokees. The second section lists the Cherokee heads of households and the amount of each evaluation. Cherokee citizens who were enumerated on the Cherokee 1835 U.S. Federal Census are noted in the index. A bibliography and a surname index add to the value of this work.