Question

Describe the plight of the Native Americans East and West of the Mississippi river.

Answer 1

In 1820 120 thousand Native Americans lived east of the Mississippi River, by 1844 fewer than 30 thousand were left there.

As the US pushed the boundaries of its territory East and West the Native Americans suffered. President Andrew Jackson passed the Removal Act on the Congress in 1830, the bill forced Native Americans to leave the US and settle in “Indian Territory” west of the Mississippi River. Americans needed more land for white settlement, army and militia patrols supervised the tribes.

The Cherokee tribes did not agree with the bill and challenged it, thousands of federal soldiers entered the territory and forced them to relocate. It was on this moment that the “Trail of Tears” happened, Cherokees were forced to march a thousand miles into Indian Territory and about 4 thousand of them died. The Indians were not provided with adequate supplies and many died due to disease and starvation. Some estimate that close to 100 thousand Native Americans lost their lives and their homelands in the series of forced migrations that lasted through the 1840s.