Native American Involvement In The Civil War

Twentysix years following their population decreasing by a fourth, having their land taken away, and being moved hundreds of miles aways from their old homes, the Cherokee found another challenge to attend to. The Cherokee nation was forced to choose between supporting the United States, a nation who had wronged them before, and the Confederate States of America, a group of rebels. Following the United States government’s abandonment of Native American reservations, the Cherokee were forced to align themselves with either the United States or the Confederate States of America. After extensive discussion the Cherokee chose to enter the Civil War with the Confederates. It is important to note that the Cherokee were not that special for entering

The Pequot War was the first brutal war on the North American continent, and the first war fought between the Native Americans and the English settlers. The whole war began, because the Englishmen, like always, became greedy and wanted more land and more profitable trade. The homeland of the Pequot tribe, was modern day Connecticut. The tribe had an estimated population of 2,200 members, and they based their everyday lives off of maize, hunting, and even fishing (Pequot, 2012). For a period of time, the English settlers and the Native American tribe lived peacefully with a fair-trading system and they helped each other, but that did not last long. One reason for the Englishmen coming to the North American continent, was to spread the faith of Christianity. Believing that God had given the English settlers the right to settle in the new-found land, they saw great opportunities to convert the “savages” to their Christian ways (Pequot, 2012). The English settlers began invading the Pequot’s territory, and almost completely pushed them off of their land. “There were disputes over property, livestock damaging Indian crops, hunting, the selling of alcohol to Indians, and dishonest traders” (1636- The Pequot War, n.d.). Not only did the Pequot’s have issues with the English settlers, they were always on bad terms with the Narragansett tribe as well. The tribe separated into two parts, the “pro-English and pro-Dutch” (Colonialwarsct.org). This event made the Indians very weak,

The existence of the Indian nations as distinct independent communities within the limits of the United States seems to be drawing to a close.... You are aware that our Brethren, the Choctaws, Chickasaws and Creeks of the South have severally disposed of their country to the United States and that a portion of our own Tribe have also emigrated West of the Mississippi--but that the largest portion of our Nation still remain firmly upon our ancient domain....Our position there may be compared to a solitary tree in an open space, where all the forest trees around have been prostrated by a furious

In May of 1830 President Andrew Jackson passed the Indian Removal Act. This act was intended to expand the Americas into Indian territory and then relocate them west of the Mississippi. The “Five Civilized Tribes,” that included the Seminoles, Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks, and the Cherokees. All these tribes went voluntarily except for the Cherokee.

The Native Americans lost many people during the war. It happen during ‘Black Hawk War’, when Chief Black Hawk led two groups, the Sac and the Fox Indians, back to their home in Illinois because they “found their western country unacceptable…” (356). However, the Illinois militia drove the Indians into Wisconsin and

The American Civil War was fought between the Unions, from the northern region of America, and the Confederacy, from the southern region of America. A war that was started because of slavery and fought between western europeans and incidentally people who live on the land such as Native American. The battles fought were all over the land in America. So, if a territory was on the land, then the people who lived there would inevitably get involved with the war. Battles were fought on indian territory, and as a result many Native Americans got involved in with the Civil War. The reason why Native Americans got involved in the Civil War was

The mid 1800’s bore witness to one of our nation’s greatest shames, an act nearly as terrible as that of slavery itself. There had always been tension between the native populations of the Americas and the Europeans since the very first settlers arrived, yet 1830 saw one of the worst acts perpetrated on the native populations by the newly formed United States. During the war of 1812, Andrew Jackson oversaw several defeats of Native American forces when he was General which seized hundreds of millions of acres of land, and ended the chance of a British-backed Native American confederacy in the Midwest. Later when he took the office of President, Jackson continued his mission of providing ‘national security’ to the States by pressuring congress to pass the “Indian Removal Act.”

In Mr. Hauptman book he writes of how important the Eastern Band of Cherokee and the Catawba of South Carolina were to the Confederacy. The Cherokee had over four hundred men led by William Holland Thomas, a white man who had been adopted by the Cherokee when he was a child. With Thomas's leadership they prevented Union attacks along Confederate communication and rail links. They also intimated Union supporters in east Tennessee and western North Carolina. The Cherokees did so well that they were allowed to keep some land in western North Carolina along the Tennessee border. The Catawba were dependent on whites and became the first to join the South as infantrymen. They also worked to capture runaway slaves trying to make their way North.

Only 2,000 Cherokee at the time voluntarily left, and 16,000 Cherokee remained. Under the command of General Winfield Scott, the last were rounded up at gunpoint and forced from their homes taking with them virtually nothing but the clothes they had on. They were kept under poor conditions in internment camps where they were to be held until departure the next day. Before the march, many Indians, perished in the camps from starvation and disease at the hands of the cruel soldiers. The mass departure took place in the middle of the winter taking with it the lives of thousands of Cherokee. The bitter cold and lack of proper clothing brought disease to many of the Indians, and the lack of food as well contributed to the fatalities that happened along the way. In an account from an exile Indian, he writes, “People feel sad when they leave Old Nation. Women cry and make sad when friends die, but the say nothing and just put heads down and keep on going towards West.” (Takaki 97) This atrocity and sad account in which 4,000 Cherokee Indians died was known as “The Trail of Tears“. By 1837, Jackson was successful in the removal of 46,000 southeastern Indians achieved by force and

In relating the account of Native American tribes amid the Civil War, a large portion of the examination concentrates on the "Five Civilized Tribes" of the Southeast: the Cherokees, the Streams, the Choctaws, the Chickasaws, and the Seminoles. A large number of the essential records, for example, letters. Also, speeches that survived the War are written in English. Since the bigger tribes, for example, the Cherokees and Brooks, favored the Alliance, the lion 's share of exploration has fundamentally concentrated on including them.

In the early period in the history of Ohio, a war waged for many years. While this did include violent conflicts, the goal of the war was not for strategic land gain or access to trade routes. Rather, this was a war for a culture. In The Shawnees and the War for America, Colin Calloway describes this war. Native American tribes, particularly the Shawnee, had lived and thrived as a civilization for a thousand years prior to the arrival of the European settlers to the Ohio region. These Europeans had a vision of Ohio that was controlled completely by the Europeans. A land of vast trading networks that would prove extremely profitable for their mother countries. While many Native American groups gave in to this vision, the Shawnees in Ohio did

Indian removal is still imbedded into the Native American people at this time. There was still a lot of tension between Native’s that were pro-removal, and those who were against it. For the most part, the stance an Indian took on removal dictated where they stood on the Civil war. The pro-removal side of Indians sided with the Confederate army, and the Indians against removal such as Chief John Ross sided with the Union army. Many Indian tribes fought in the civil war consisting of the Delaware, Creek, Cherokee, Seminole, Kickapoo, Seneca, Osage, Shawnee, Choctaw, Lumbee, Chickasaw, Iroquois, Powhatan, Pequot, Ojibwa, Huron, Odawa, Potawatomi, Catawba, and Pamunkey [City of Alexandria ].Only a few tribes fought on the side of the Confederates, which were the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Catawba, and Creek. There was roughly twenty thousand Native American’s that fought in either the Union or Confederate army’s [City of Alexandria]. No matter what side they were fighting for, Indians on both sides looked to gain the same thing out of adding their chosen side. By fighting with the whites, Natives were looking to end discrimination, end removal from their

A large part of the formation of our country and Western society involved interaction with tribes of Native Americans that inhabited North America well before Europeans settled it. It started with Spanish conquistadors and explorers, then British colonies which would mold and change into the revolutionized American Colonists. Along this succession, the Indian tribes on the east coast experienced extreme prejudice, regime changes and war. Among these tribes are the Cherokee. The Cherokee were at the forefront of Indian-European relations. They remained strong in the southeast, despite war and epidemic. The Cherokee underwent significant culture changes yet not always by choice. War and disease tore apart the Cherokee as well other tribes but

Native American removal from the southern portion of the United States was no doubt a tragic and unjust venture that resulted in many Natives losing their homelands. Interestingly, when this forced move is talked about in American history, Natives are still painted in the artificial picture of savage, uncivilized beings according to the American perception. However, these tribes that were forced to move from their homelands in order to make way for white Americans were far from uncivilized even in the American standard. These tribes are what is called the “five civilized tribes” and each one had adopted the “white man’s way of living”. These tribes were the Choctaw, Chicksaw, Creek, Seminole, and Cherokee and each had morphed into the new American society set up by whites in their own unique ways. Despite each

This idea is supported by the PowerPoint presentation “Lecture 6 – Native Americans; the Civil War and Activity in the Trans-Mississippi West” when Dr. Sylvester asserts that the chronology of the, “So-called Indian Wars followed the end of the Civil War and have long been used to justify continual treaty violations, forced removal of Native Americans from tribal lands, and enforcement of land distribution to whites under the Homestead Act.” (Sylvester Slide 5). Overall, the effects of the Civil War were prevalent and profound upon the West when history records the fight for what conquering people thought was right and within their attitudes and perspectives, especially when the frontier was seen as a place for fresh starts and independence by any means necessary to achieve power and control of the