When Hernando de Soto reached southern Appalachia in 1530 he found the Cherokee, an Iroquoian-speaking people living across what is now Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. By the early nineteenth century the Cherokee, together with the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, and Seminole, had adopted many European customs and were collectively called the “Five Civilized Tribes.” Intermarriage with Europeans, Blacks, and other Native peoples produced many families of mixed ancestry, some of whom drifted outside tribal authority and federal record-keeping. Researchers can often verify family traditions of Cherokee heritage through the Cherokee Muster Rolls of 1835 – 1838.
From President Thomas Jefferson’s administration onward, federal policy encouraged the Cherokee to surrender their southeastern homelands and move west of the Mississippi River. Small parties left for Arkansas Territory after 1817 and for the future Oklahoma after 1828, becoming the “Old Settlers” or “Western Cherokee.” Another Cherokee group tried to establish a home in Spanish Texas but, after expulsion in 1839, also joined the Old Settlers.
Three developments in 1828 fixed removal as national policy:
- discovery of gold on Cherokee land in Georgia,
- a Georgia statute asserting state jurisdiction over that land, and
- Andrew Jackson’s presidential victory on a platform that promised Indian removal.
Congress passed the Indian Removal Act on 28 May 1830. When the Supreme Court ruled in Worcester v. Georgia on 03 Mar 1832 that the Act violated Cherokee sovereignty, President Jackson allowed Georgia to ignore the decision.
To calculate costs of removal, the Office of Indian Affairs created the “Henderson Roll,” an 1835 census of Cherokee living east of the Mississippi. That list anchors the Cherokee Muster Rolls series.
Factions within the Cherokee Nation
- Treaty or Ridge Party: Led by Major Ridge, this minority signed the Treaty of New Echota on 29 Dec 1835 without authority from the elected leadership.
- National or Ross Party: Principal Chief John Ross headed the majority that opposed cession of tribal lands. Despite their protest, the United States Senate ratified the treaty on 23 May 1836.
Three Phases of Removal
| Phase | Years | Key Details |
|---|---|---|
| Self-directed removal | 1835 – 1837 | Ridge Party members left individually or in government detachments. |
| Military roundup | Spring 1838 | Troops under Gen. Winfield Scott swept through Georgia, gathered Cherokee into camps, and sent them by river to Indian Territory. |
| Cherokee-run migration | Autumn 1838 – winter 1839 | Chief Ross oversaw one steamboat and twelve wagon detachments of about 1,000 people each. This journey, remembered as the Cherokee Trail of Tears, lacks extensive federal documentation; researchers must rely on tribal, missionary, and contemporary civilian sources. |
Roughly 13,000 people traveled west during these phases. In Indian Territory they merged with the Old Settlers to form the Cherokee Nation West.
The Eastern Band
An estimated 1,500 to 2,000 Cherokee evaded removal. Those who regrouped along the Oconaluftee River in North Carolina became the Eastern Band. Their reservation, the Qualla Boundary, was secured when William Holland Thomas purchased land on their behalf. Federal agents compiled several post-removal rolls for these survivors and for small Cherokee communities that remained in Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, and Washington, DC. The first census of these Eastern Cherokee was taken in 1884 and is called the Hester Roll.
Cherokee Muster Rolls
The numbering of the muster rolls below is determined by when I transcribed them and has nothing to do with their official naming, but serves as a method for me to delineate them. The list of muster rolls below is not yet complete. We are aware of several unpublished, privately-held lists and are attempting to gain access to them in order to transcribe them.
1835 Henderson Roll
This is the 1835 Cherokee East of the Mississippi Census or otherwise known as the Henderson Roll. In 1835, the Cherokee Nation contained almost 22,000 Cherokees and almost 300 Whites connected by marriage. This roll enumerates 16,000 of those people under 5,000 different families. These families primarily resided in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee. While not neccessarily a muster roll, it provides a basis for names of Cherokees who were residing in the East before the bulk of the movement west we know as the Trail of Tears.
1838 Cherokee Muster Roll 1
This muster roll details the arrival of Lt. Deas and a group of 81 Cherokee families to the West on 1 May 1838. While most were from the Northern Georgia area, some like William Davis and Robert Brown were from Alabama, and others like the Timberlake’s were from Tennessee.
1838 Cherokee Muster Roll 2
This 1838 muster roll documents the journey of 1,072 Georgia Cherokees from Rosses Landing to Indian Territory, culminating with 635 survivors arriving on September 7, 1838. The official count recorded on July 23 noted 763 individuals, accounting for 144 deaths, 289 desertions, and 2 births along the Trail of Tears. The detailed enumeration lists 91 family groups, suggesting many of the missing were likely enslaved individuals whose descendants later became Cherokee freedmen.
1838 Cherokee Muster Roll 3
This muster roll list includes 170 Cherokee families who emigrated from Arkansas with B. F. Curry in 1838. It details family heads and counts for males and females across two different age groups, over and under 25.
