A. The Five Civilized Tribes
In the late 18th century, White Americans thought of Native Americans as a savage community of people that needed to be educated. George Washington for example believed that Indians were equals but that their society was inferior due to the lack of similarities to European colonies where they were in their eyes, civilized and organized. Popular thought of Native Americans in the 18th century was that they were in fact savages but this did not transcend further.
Up until this point, white Americans had only used Native Americans as soldiers to fight in the French American War and in the American Revolution. Many fought hoping to obtain treaties from the American government but most of these promises were broken.
By the 19th century, Andrew Jackson and most white Americans wanted Native Americans to move west of the Mississippi because they considered they were in the way of white expansion. So by the 19th century, popular thought of white Americans towards Indians went from “they are savages that should be educated”, to “they are savages that are in the way and need to move”. Now, Native Americans were in the way of what they believed was American expansion and the ability to increase their land to grow cotton and other crops.
Andrew Jackson had been involved in the issue of Indian removal approximately 10 years before he ever got elected for presidency. Indian removal had been a great part of his political agenda and this created many supporters in the South and not so many in the North. His way of approaching Native removal was quite aggressive and can be best appreciated in his First Annual Message to Congress, on December 8, 1829:
“This emigration should be voluntary, for it would be as cruel as unjust to compel the aborigenes to abandon the graves of their fathers and seek home in a distant land. But they should be distinctly informed that if they remain within the limits of the States they must be subject to their laws.”
Basically, he gave them a warning to simply leave or succumb to white American rule or they will be forced out, as history later shows with the Indian Removal Act.
The whites favor removal because first of all they considered Native Americans were a people that would never be able to be civilized. So they didn’t believe in integrating them into white American society but rather removing them and relocating them as far as possible. But the more important reason is that they wanted them far away because they considered Native Americans were in the way of expansion and in the way of economic growth for white Americans.
This is a very good picture of how the tribes looked like and some of them looked very much like a combination of white with indian and some spaniard too specially the Choctaw tribe man.
The Trail of Tears
The Trail of Tears was the forced relocation of Native Americans, including many members of the Choctaw, Creek, Chickasaw, Cherokee, and Seminole nations among others in the United States from their homelands to Indian Territory which is now present day Oklahoma. Numerous Native Americans traveled in the winter time and suffered from exposure to harsh weather conditions, starvation and diseases. Many of them died en route and were buried in unmarked graves. (Elish 9) Brinkley states "In the harsh new reservations in which they were now forced to live, the survivors never forgot the hard journey. They called their route 'The Trail Where They Cried,' the Trail of Tears."
"Indian Territory the land west of the Mississippi River that was set aside by the Indian Intercourse Act of 1834 for relocated Native American tribes. The land, which included the area in present-day Oklahoma north and east of the Red River, Kansas, and Nebraska, came to be known as Indian Territory, though it was never an organized territory as others were. The term is also used more specifically to denote the area to which the Five Civilized Tribes (Choctaw, Creek, Seminole, Cherokee, and Chickasaw) were forced to move by treaties between 1820 and 1845." (Oxford) The Choctaws were the first to move to Indian Territory starting in 1830 and by 1834, most of them had settled in. They were pressured by federal authories who used treaty terms to have them removed. The Creeks began their journey from 1836-1837. The Chickasaws were next to be removed in 1837. Lastly, the Cherokee nations joined them in 1838. The government figured that Indian Territory was far enough away from white settlers and that most whites would consider the land unhabitable.
One tribe decided not to move along with the others. This tribe was the Seminole tribe. Just like the other tribes, they signed a treaty under pressure and agreed to move within three years time. Almost all of them relocated but they were a few that absolutely refused. They defended their tribe with the utmost tenacity. This became known as the Seminole War and lasted from 1835-1842. Finally, the government gave up on trying to relocate the Seminoles and the war ended. Because of the war, the Seminole population was reduced by 40 percent. (Clark 328) As a result of the Seminole's persistance, their removal was never completed.
These two pictures show the trail of tears route and an art painting from the Cherokee tribe describing what they had to endure in their travels.
The Black Hawk War
In May of 1832 Hostilities began with the Sauks, Meskwakis, and Kickapoos against the U.S. Federal troops. These hostile intentions were brought due to a treaty signed in 1408. During the nineteenth century America was expanding westward and the government was purchasing as many of the indian lands as they could. This treaty gave the United States the Sauk and Meskwaki lands for a price of course. Now these tribes have already been displaced befor this treay and now are being bought out to move again. In 1804 William Henry Harrison negotiated this treaty in St, Louis and by 1828 the government ceded the land from the tribes allowing for new white settlement.
This former treaty is what helped ignite this war. The fights began when Black Hawk and fellow Sauks, Meskwakis, and Kickapoos attempted to reclaim all their lost land in Illinois. Federal troops demanded the tribes to withdrawl but they refused. Battles began on May 14, 1832 where Black Hawk and his band of brothers defeat the militia at the battle of Stillman’s Run. The rest of the war consisted of small battles and skirmishes. Although in southwestern Wisconsin the militia had a major conflict with the indians at Wisconsin Heights before finally beating the Tribes and Black Hawk at the Battle of Bad Axe in August. Although at this time the American forces had weakened numbers of soldiers due to the cholera epidemic. After the conclusion of the war Black hawk and eight other leaders were imprisoned and most other native Americans remained in the area. The aftermath of this event was large losses of lives for the indians and around seventy settlers and soldiers were killed for the colonists. Also losts of lands for the indians and more settlements for the white settlers resulted in most tribes.
Black Hawk Native American
Resources for the text used
Brinkley, Alan. American History. 13th Edition. Volume 1. Boston: McGraw Hill Higher Education, 2009. 247. Print.
Clark, Blue. Indian Tribes of Oklahoma. Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma Press, 2009. 328. Print.
Elish, Dan. The Trail of Tears. New York: Benchmark Books, 2002. 9. Print.
"Indian Territory." The Oxford Essential Dictionary of the U.S. Military. 2001. Retrieved December 04, 2010 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O63-IndianTerritory.html
James Lewis, Ph.D. The Lincoln Library. http://lincoln.lib.niu.edu/blackhawk/