Cherokee Removal and Eastern Band Survival

Federal and state pressure on Cherokee land intensified after the Indian Removal Act of 1830. The Treaty of New Echota provided the asserted legal basis for removal, and United States troops confined and expelled thousands of Cherokee people in 1838 and 1839 in the forced migration remembered as the Trail of Tears.

Not every Cherokee person was removed. Some residents of western North Carolina held individual land or received permission to remain, and others escaped or returned. With legal and financial assistance from William Holland Thomas, these communities secured land that became central to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.

Thirteen Moons fictionalises this history through Will Cooper and the chief called Bear.