Chapter 8: The War of 1812 (45.08)

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By: Dr. Bill Ambrose

The War of 1812

The War of 1812, with its English instigation of outrages on the western front, brought Jefferson back into the Indian political arena.

Source: https://picryl.com/media/sketch-of-fort-pickering-during-war-of-1812-24d51e

Writing to Alexander von Humboldt in 1813:

You know, my friend, the benevolent plan we were pursuing here for the happiness of the aboriginal inhabitants in our vicinities. We spared nothing to keep them at peace with one another. To teach them agriculture and the rudiments of the most necessary arts, and to encourage industry by establishing among them separate property. In this way they would have been enabled to subsist and multiply on a moderate scale of landed possession. They would have mixed their blood with ours and been amalgamated and identified with us within no distant period of time. On the commencement of our present war, we pressed on them the observance of peace and neutrality, but the interested and unprincipled policy of England has defeated all our labors for the salvation of these unfortunate people. They have seduced the greater part of the tribes within our neighborhood, to take up the hatchet against us, and the cruel massacres they have committed on the women and children of our frontiers taken by surprise, will oblige us now to pursue them to extermination, or drive them to new seats beyond our reach.

Treaty of 1816

On March 22, 1816, the Cherokees signed a treaty with the United States deeding the last of the Cherokee land in South Carolina, a triangular wedge on the far-western extent of its established boundary. The Cherokee Nation had helped the United States in the Creek War.

Area 21

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, & 21.

Many Cherokees were killed and wounded; much Cherokee property had been damaged. The treaty negotiations had included payment of damages for the Cherokees’ efforts along with request for removal of American intruders onto Cherokee land. The treaty discussions involved allowing for more American access across Cherokee land, and for opportunities for Cherokees to build and maintain “stands” (taverns) along the commercial roads through the nation.

Area 22

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, & 22.

Area 22 represents 4,000,000 acres (GIS calculations indicate the area was actually 3,519 square miles or 225,2160 acres) that were claimed by 3 Indian tribes, all at the same time! The end of the Creek wars, after the battle at Horseshoe Bend, Gen. Jackson demanded a cession of 23,000,000 acres from the Creeks for starting “an unprovoked, inhuman and sanguinary war waged by the hostile Creeks against the United States.”

The negotiation at Fort Jackson determined that the Cherokees and Chickasaws both claimed four million of the 23,000,000 acres demanded by Jackson from the Creeks as punishment for the war. Negotiators for President Madison stood up against Jackson’s demands and awarded those 4,000,000 acres to the Cherokees.

The Jackson Treaty

The previously described Treaty of March 22, 1816, formalized the Cherokee claim to that land located south of the Tennessee River and east of the Coosa River, Jackson declaring the boundary settlement as a “wanton, hasty, useless thing” that he intended to “undo it.” Jackson took advantage of treaty negotiations with the Cherokee on Sept. 14, 1816, to secure that 4,000,000-acre cession by bribing eight Cherokee chiefs to sign the treaty, now known as the “Jackson Treaty.”

In an effort to protect themselves from the death penalty for ceding more Cherokee land, the twelve-member Cherokee delegation required the Cherokee National Council had to ratify the treaty. See the image above labeled Area 21 for the 4,000,000 acre “Jackson Treaty” land and location. These lands now lay in the states of Alabama and Mississippi.

Treaty of 1817

Four separate tracts of Cherokee land were transferred to the United States through the Treaty of 1817. Negotiated at the Calhoun Agency on the Hiawassee, this treaty targeted Cherokee removal by exchanging Cherokee lands in the East for western lands, where virgin hunting grounds offered supposedly a better quality of life.

Area 23

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, & 23.

Indeed, the Cherokee ceded four tracts for an equivalent acreage of land on the White River in Arkansas adjacent to the Osage Nation. That land had to be west of the 1817 Cherokee Boundary Line as drawn on the 1826 Anthony Finley map. Before 1817, 3,700 Cherokee had moved to the waters of the Arkansas River onto lands of equal acreage as these 4 tracts shown as Areas 23, 24, 25, and 26.

Area 24

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, & 24.

Area 25

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, & 25.

Area 26

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS)

Source: MoTrailofTears.com Geographic Information System (GIS) Missing Areas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 10A, 10B, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, & 26.

The Cherokee Council refused to ratify this 1817 Treaty. The United States moved ahead with its terms and conditions, making more intense the infighting within the Cherokee Nation between those willing to remove west of the Mississippi River and those who wished to stay in the East.

Next: Chapter 9: United We Stand – Divided We Fall (45.09)

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