In 1896-1897 the Kern-Clifton Roll was created to fill in the omissions of the Wallace Roll. Genealogists not finding their Cherokee ancestor in the Kern-Clifton Roll, should search the Wallace Roll to ensure that this ancestor was not one of those originally identified by the John Wallace census. This census of the Freedmen and their descendants of the Cherokee Nation taken by the Commission appointed in the case of Moses Whitmire, Trustee of the Freedmen of the Cherokee Nation vs. The Cherokee Nation and the United States in the Court of Claims at Washington, D. C., the said Commission being composed of William Clifton, William Thompson and Robert H. Kern, the same being made from the testimony taken before said Commission in the Cherokee Nation between May 4th and August 10th, 1896.
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Cherokee Freedmen
The Cherokee Freedmen were African Americans, both enslaved and free, who were associated with the Cherokee Nation during the 19th century. The term primarily refers to the descendants of enslaved people who were owned by the Cherokee. But it also refers to those of mixed African and Cherokee ancestry, who were freed after the Civil War.
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