UKB Cherokee History Contributed by Linda Simpson greyoaks@brightok.net -------------------------------------------------- USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent ot the contributor, the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. -------------------------------------------------------------------- During pre-Columbian: The KEETOOWAH people preferred to live in the mountains and along streams in harmony with nature . The KEETOOWAH people led simple lives . Searching for food occupied most of their time. They obtained food, shelter, clothing and other needs from nature's bounty by hunting, gathering, and farming. The men were first and foremost warriors and hunters. They provided meat for their families, protected their households and their communities. They made war against their enemy tribes. They also performed tribal, political and religious duties. The women managed household duties, provided meals, gathered food, and tended to the crops and made their family's clothing. Agriculture matched hunting and gathering in importance to their economy. Economic life was enriched by commerce with other neighboring tribes. They traded deerskins, pots, war implements and copper. At this time the Indian tribes lacked several items compared to the Europeans. They depended on their own physical power. They had no large domesticated animals such as horses or cows. Indian tribes had domesticated dogs to guard their settlements, to hunt and pull sleds to move goods over land. The KEETOOWAH people believed religion and law were the same; the priest was the legal figure and the people were governed by the laws of the spirits. The Clan Law or Blood Law was the social structure for the KEETOOWAHS and practiced in a matrilineal arrangement, passing from the mother to the children. If a tribal member committed a crime such as murder, the Clan of the victim would avenge the death under the supervision of the oldest family member. If the slayer could not be found, a brother of the perpetrator could be substituted as a sacrifice to the law of retaliation. If this was not done, the spirit of the victim would not pass into the spirit world and would haunt the family. The KEETOOWAHS practiced a mixed system of private and public punishment. The KEETOOWAHS had different Chiefs during certain times. During times of war their leaders were called Red Chiefs and in times of peace they were called White Chiefs. The Anglo Contact: When Hernando DeSoto discovered the KEETOOWAH people in 1540, there were sixty different and independent villages with each having a separate government and leaders. The whole tribe came together only in times of war and ceremonies. The tribal life was unchanged as late as 1710. When the White man's influence arrived it was slow at first but then spread rapidly. This created major changes with the tribal leadership shifting from priest to warrior. The Whites brought diseases and many KEETOOWAH people died of mainly smallpox. Fur trading was the most instrumental in creating change. The warriors became hunters and served as agents for fur trading. The tribal members pursued material possessions and wealth. They began purchasing farm animals, and equipment. Tribal members understandably were quickly drawn to trade goods. They had always relied on stone, wood, and other essentials. European goods of metal, glass and cloth were truly revolutionary innovations to the KEETOOWAH people. They saw the advantage of European goods and quickly came to value and demand the new materials. With the tribe dependent on the European existence, the economic base greatly changed the structure of the KEETOOWAH life. The people became literate in the English language, attended schools in the east, then returned to assume leadership positions in the tribe, and this created additional changes. The U.S. Government began negotiating with only the mixed-bloods, which formulated the United Cherokee Nation in 1777. The westward migration: Opposition to the rapid changes in the tribal governmental structure resulted in the migration of many traditional groups. Chief Dragging Canoe and one thousand of his fullblood followers migrated to the western part of Tennessee and later to the State of Arkansas. The KEETOOWAH life was so structured that an opposing political faction was permitted to physically remove themselves from the main tribal government. Such removal occurred several times in the KEETOOWAH/Cherokee history. The majority of those who voluntarily moved to Arkansas were the conservative hunter element who desired to maintain the old traditional culture. The main tribe back east was rapidly drifting away from the traditional way of life through the influence of schools and the educated tribal leadership. The Arkansas lands where the KEETOOWAH'S settled belonged to the Osage tribe, whose claims had not yet been extinguished by the United States. The Osage objected to the KEETOOWAH presence, and the KEETOOWAHS were compelled to fight to maintain the land. For the first 20 years or more the KEETOOWAHS were in constant threat by the Osage. The treaty of 1817 with the United States exchanged the lands in Tennessee for the lands in Arkansas. This gained the KEETOOWAHS a definite title to a territory. The treaty of 1819 established the boundaries. In the Spring of 1819 Thomas Nuttall, a Naturalist, came up the Arkansas River, and gave his account of the KEETOOWAHS as he found them at that time. Quoting Nuttall "In going up the stream there were houses and farms on both banks of the River. The houses were decently furnished, and their farms were well fenced and stocked with cattle. They had everything they needed: food, clothes, water and good land." end of quote. At this time the KEETOOWAHS numbered 4 to 5 thousand members. In 1820 the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission established Dwight Mission, at the mouth of Illinois Creek, on the bank of the Arkansas River in what is now Pope County Arkansas. The name Dwight Mission was given in remembrance of Timothy Dwight, a Yale President and pioneer Organizer of the American Board. In 1822 Sequoyah visited the KEETOOWAH people to teach them the knowledge of his great invention. The invention of the alphabet or (commonly known as the Syllabaries) it had an immediate and wonderful effect on the KEETOOWAH peopleÕs development. Sequoyah is the only man in history to invent a written language single handily. This remarkable man never attended school and in all his life never earned to speak, read, or write the English language. On account of the remarkable adaptation of the Syllabary to the KEETOOWAH/Cherokee language, it was only necessary to learn the characters to be able to read at once. There were no schoolhouses or teachers, however the whole tribe were able to read and write in their own language. Sequoyah took up permanent residence with the KEETOOWAH people living somewhere in the area between present-day Scottsville and Russellville. By the Treaty of 1828 the KEETOOWAH people were forced to exchange their lands in Arkansas for lands in Oklahoma. The KEETOOWAHS moved to Indian Territory in Oklahoma ten years prior to the forced removal (commonly known as the "Trail of Tears") of the Cherokee Nation. The KEETOOWAH people had a great part in shaping this western part of Arkansas. The KEETOOWAHS went on to adopted a written constitution in 1828. During the Civil War the KEETOOWAHS sided with the Union. They fought against the mixed blood Cherokees who sided with the confederates. The word "KEETOOWAH" is the name which my people have always called themselves. The word "Cherokee" has no meaning in the language of my people. It is derived from a Muscogan Language and its meaning is the "inhabitant of the cave country." The word "KEETOOWAH" means "PRINCIPAL PEOPLE." The Legend and The Prophesy. The following legend of the KEETOOWAH people, which dates back to the beginning of time, has been passed orally by each generation. Upon the creation of the KEETOOWAH people, the Creator gave them mysterious powers and placed them in large settlement on an island located in the Atlantic Ocean. There were other tribes on the island which attacked the KEETOOWAH people, and the KEETOOWAHS were victorious. Another tribe watched the fierce fighting from a mountain top. The leader of the tribe watched the valley ascend toward the Heaven. The smoke divided into three paths midway in the ascension an eagle was seen holding three arrows in its claws. The leader asked his warriors if the smoke and eagle were visible to them and they replied they were. The tribal leader then told his warriors not to attack the KEETOOWAH people because they were the Creators people and they were very powerful. The tribe came down from the mountain and made friends with the KEETOOWAH people. In later years, some of the medicine men of the tribe became selfish and used their powers to harm their own people. The Creator gave the powers to the medicine men to be used in the best interest of all the people. Other tribal members prayed to the Creator for direction and the Creator heard their prayers. The instruction was to move their fire away from the island and the medicine men. After the departure, the island sank into the ocean. The people migrated north and settled in the southeastern part of what is now the United States. Many years later, again the medicine men became selfish and committed crimes against their own tribal members. The people gathered to discuss the solution to this problem and it was decided that seven medicine men, one from each of the seven clans, would travel to a mountain top and pray The seven medicine men went up to the mountain top and prayed. Soon a messenger from the Creator appeared and told them the Creator had heard their prayers and had great sympathy for them. The messenger told the medicine men their tribe would be called "KEETOOWAH" from that day forward. The messenger revealed to them that a "white ball" would arrive from the east which would be an enemy to the people. The grandchildren of the KEETOOWAHS would point their feet to the west and great hardship would be placed upon them at the edge of the prairie. Their blood and families would be divided and the enemy would not respect the KEETOOWAH people. The messenger revealed that a young leader would lead the KEETOOWAH people back to the east. However, if the KEETOOWAH people chose not to follow the Creator 's direction, they would continue further west to a sea of water and disappear forever. The Creator said, "If the KEETOOWAH people are destroyed or become extinct, then the end of the world will follow." The move back to east: The UNITED KEETOOWAH BAND OF CHEROKEES are the only landless tribe in this country. This recognition is based on Congressional legislation, Bureau of Indian Affairs policies and the Federal Courts rulings made over the past several years. They have all ruled the KEETOOWAHS do not have a land base or a jurisdictions area. The only alternative the KEETOOWAH'S had was to move away from Oklahoma. This is what prompted the KEETOOWAHS to request the BIA to approve the UKB to establish a land base outside of Oklahoma and back to the east in Arkansas. The BIA central office in Washington DC gave approval on June 23, 1994 to establish a land base outside of Oklahoma into Arkansas. The KEETOOWAHS now have established a land base and also an office in Waldron, Arkansas.