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Alexander Mcgillivray
After the Revolution, McGillivray used his growing influence within Creek society to resist Georgia's attempt to confiscate three million acres of land and to otherwise protect what he viewed as the sovereign rights of the Creek people. -
Sequoyah
Sequoyah invented a system of eighty-four to eighty-six characters that represented syllables in spoken Cherokee. -
William McIntosh
McIntosh negotiated and signed the Treaty of Indian Springs, signing away all Creek lands in Georgia and thereby defying most of the reforms that he had encouraged and the laws that he had helped write. -
John Marshall
Although Chief Justice John Marshall ruled in Cherokee Nation v. Georgia that the Cherokees should receive the protection of the U.S. government, the state of Georgia continued to encroach upon Cherokee lands. -
Worcester v. Georgia
In the court case Worcester v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court held in 1832 that the Cherokee Indians
Samuel Worcester, a missionary, defied Georgia through peaceful means to protest the state's handling of Cherokee lands. He was arrested several times as a result. With a team of lawyers, Worcester filed a lawsuit against the state that went all the way to the Supreme Court, where he finally won his case. Samuel Worcester constituted a nation holding distinct sovereign powers. -
Dalone Georgia Goldrush
The Dahlonega area was part of the Cherokee Nation when European settlers first arrived. A few miners were women, and some were farmers supplementing their incomes with gold. So much gold was extracted that the U.S. Congress chartered a Branch Mint at Dahlonega in 1835, which produced $6 million worth of gold coins before closing in 1861. -
Trail Of Tears
The Cherokee Nation subsequently divided between those who wanted to continue to resist the removal pressure and a "Treaty Party" that wanted to surrender and depart for the West. After Major Ridge Hand-colored lithograph of Major Ridge, a Cherokee leader who helped establish the Cherokee system of government. The soldier, politician, and plantation owner is remembered for signing the Treaty of New Echota (1835), which ceded Cherokee lands to the U.S. government and authorized Cherokee removal. -
John Ross
John was the principal chief of the Cherokee Indians. He was forced to lead the Cherokees through the tragic removal period.
