On This Long Journey Page 6

  June 17, 1838

  Under light guard, by permission of the officer in command, ten Cherokees went to the river and were baptized. It was a solemn and impressive service. The whites in attendance were much moved.

  June 20, 1838

  Reverend Butler is among those who have attempted to call attention to our suffering in this camp and the dozen or so others throughout what was once our Nation. He obtained a copy of the order sent on June 17 by General Scott in response to the accounts being circulated that we were poorly attended. Here are Scott’s words:

  It is, I learn, reported that throughout this country, the Indians collected in camps for emigration are sickly and dying in great numbers. I mention this to contradict it. The Indians are very generally in good health, and so are the troops. Please cause this to be officially announced.

  In spite of General Scott’s order, three died today in our camp. Two baby girls and an elderly Negro woman. I assisted in their burial. It was difficult to break the hard, dry earth.

  June 25, 1838

  Those held in our camp number, as I count them today, 638. But it is hard to keep an accurate count. In these few weeks seventeen have died. Most were infants and old people. The weakest among us are the first to perish. More Cherokees are being driven in each day, collected from the further points of our nation.

  Some who arrived today told of being herded across the Chickamauga River. Though we go to the water at the start of any of our old ceremonies, the rivers are known to also be places of danger. Our old tales speak of water monsters such as the Uktena, who hide beneath the surface and drag down the unwary. The river must always be approached with care and respect. But, at the Chickamauga, there was no time for care. Bayonets and clubs and curses were at their backs. A dozen Cherokees drowned in that crossing.

  Another group was brought all the way from North Carolina, forced to walk more than two hundred miles beneath the boiling sun. A number of them could not keep up with the line of march and fell behind. One man told of hearing rifle shots behind him as these stragglers were dispatched by impatient soldiers.

  It seems that not one Cherokee will be allowed to remain. The land must be cleansed of us like soil washed from a pale hand. I am much discouraged today, and my jaw is swollen and aching greatly.

  My mother has given me herbs gathered from the forest. I am to chew them and pack them into my sore gums. The officer in charge of the camp allows the women to leave the camp to get firewood and gather food plants if they promise to return. He has learned that he can always trust any Cherokee to come back once they have made such a promise. Tomorrow, if I feel better, I shall describe what it is like in Camp Cherokee. It is not a good place.

  June 30, 1838

  I did not feel better the next day. I had a fever and was insensible. My mother bathed my forehead with cool cloths and held me in her arms as I shivered from the cold. Somehow she managed to make a soup and feed it to me.

  Food is a problem here in Camp Cherokee. On first arrival, many of our people refused to accept the government food. The children, with their pitiful cries of hunger, were the first to eat. After a few days, there was not enough. The traders given the contracts to provide food for us provide less than they are paid for, or deliver spoiled food that cannot be eaten. Today a barrel of crackers was opened. All were blue with mold. Even the hungriest of us could not eat them. Also, some of the unspoiled rations are strange to our people who are used to fresh food from their farms or the forest.

  My mother tells me that a sack of coffee beans was given to some of our people who had not seen coffee before. Instead of grinding the beans to make a drink, they took the coffee beans and boiled them and tried to eat them. Those who ate that bitter soup became very sick.

  It is also hard to cook with the white flour, which is not at all like ground corn. Here again, some of our women tried cooking the flour into a soup. The result was impossible to eat. Were it not for those like my mother who gather from the surrounding countryside the wild foods, people would be starving here.

  July 1, 1838

  More of my strength has returned. I was well enough to walk about today. So I shall describe this place. We are within a great stockade pen with high walls and no roof. One could throw a stone from one side to the other, but more than seven hundred people are now kept in here. It is hard to walk without tripping over someone’s outthrust legs as they try to sleep, often on the bare ground. Some have made rude shelters from sticks and bark, using blankets to make walls for their tiny huts set up helterskelter. People are trying their best to help each other.

  There is much courtesy, yet also much despair. It is not just the heat and crowding. It is not just the fact that the very young and the very old grow weaker each day. It is also the uncertainty.

  This is only one of dozens of camps and forts and collection points set up throughout our Nation. Many here have been separated from their loved ones. Some were taken captive as they walked upon the roads or worked in their fields. Others saw their children run and hide in the woods while they themselves were marched away. To his great credit as a Christian, the officer in charge has allowed some of those parents to go out on parole to seek their lost children, giving them a certain amount of time for their search.

  Though we are in captivity, it is still a Sunday. The Christian ministers among us, both Cherokee and white, held services. But my walk so tired me that I was unable to attend.

  July 2, 1838

  Still no rain has fallen. The sun burns down upon us. The heat of so many bodies crowded together makes it hard to breathe at times. To get drinking water, we must go to the river. The water in the river has grown lower.

  The water is so low that the plan of sending all our people west by boat no longer seems possible, according to one young Tennessee soldier who stops to speak with me now and then. We have learned which of the soldiers we must avoid — the ones who tend to abuse our people with words or subtle blows. This young Tennessean is not one of them. Though rough-hewn, he treats every Cherokee with courtesy.

  His name is Will. I believe that he is about my own age and in some ways he reminds me of my friend Otter, whose own English name was William. Perhaps it is the way this young white man turns to look sideways at me or the way he moves his hands that makes me think of my lost friend. Because of that resemblance, I have taken to calling him White Will. At another time or another place he and I might have been friends.

  White Will told me today that his father fought at the Horseshoe and other battles in the War of 1812. The Cherokees were always by his side or leading the charge against the enemy.

  “Pa said the Cherokees was the bravest and the best men there,” White Will said.

  “What are we now?” I asked him.

  His face became as red as a boiled crawfish, and he walked quickly away.

  July 3, 1838

  White Will sought me out today as I sat with my journal in my lap. Here there is little to do but sit. Somehow, that sitting makes me more weary than the work about our farm ever did. I am so tired that it is hard to lift this pen.

  “Are ye writin’ about what it be like hereabouts?” White Will asked.

  I held out my journal to him. “You can read what I have said if you like.”

  His face turned that same crimson hue again, and he shook his head. He looked around to see if anyone else could hear us and then crouched down beside me to tell me that he could not read a word. Nor write, neither, he added, though that was scarcely necessary.

  I said nothing in return. What could I say?

  White Will stood up. I stood with him. There was something on his mind other than a confession of illiteracy. Leaning close and still whispering, he asked if he might ask a favor of me. “I shall give ye favor for favor in return,” he added quickly.

  “Yes?” I said.

  He then asked if I might help him write to hi
s ma and pa, putting down what he said onto paper. In return he would tell me more about how things were hereabouts, things I could put down into my book. Then he thrust out a hand. “Deal?” he asked.

  “Deal,” I said, and we shook on it.

  White Will’s Letter

  July 3, 1838

  Dear Ma and Pa,

  I am writing you this letter from the camp. Actually, I am not writing it myself. A friend is helping me with the writing down of it. He is an educated man and knows a lot. I know you are not reading this yourselves. I expect that you have gotten the preacher or Mr. Redfern at the store to do the reading aloud. Whoever is helping by reading this aloud, I do thank you most kindly.

  Now that I am writing, I am not sure I have much to say except that I am well and that this is awful hard duty. It is not fair what is happening here. Some days it makes me feel like I want to cry for these poor folks who are Indian but are living just like we do. That is, they were living that way before we drove them off of their farms. Some of them are even Baptists like us. Doesn’t that beat all? They have services every Sunday, so you don’t have to worry about my not remembering church here. Their singing is very fine.

  Tomorrow we shall celebrate our Day of Independence. I wish I could be at home to see the parade.

  I hope that I will be able to come home soon.

  Your loving son, Private William Bertram

  July 4, 1838

  Today was their Independence Day. It was not ours.

  July 5, 1838

  Things White Will has told me:

  More than 9,000 Cherokees are now in the camps.

  The army brought in a good many of them, but far more came in peacefully on their own because our chiefs told them to do so.

  Some other places where Cherokees are being held are Rattlesnake Spring (about 600), Mouse Creek (about 2,500), Bedwell Springs (about 1,000), Gunstocker Spring (2,000 or so), Chetooee (1,300), about 700 here and 700 or more on the ridge east of the agency.

  About 3,000 Cherokees have been transported west since 1835, counting those sent last year and two parties this spring.

  The rivers are getting so low that it will be hard to send more by boat.

  General Scott acted in too great a haste to gather us up. The secretary of war had agreed to John Ross’s request that we be allowed to at least get our crops in first. Secretary of War Poinsett sent General Scott guidelines. The Cherokees were only to be collected just before they were to be transported. October, when the summer’s heat was past, was the best time to do that. It took Poinsett’s letter two weeks to get to Scott. By then he had already gathered most of us into the camps and could not release us.

  I asked White Will how it was that he knew so much. He did not turn crimson this time, but his voice was gruff as he said, “I be not able to read, but m’ Pa taught me ter be a good listener.”

  Because his duties include serving the officer in charge, White Will has overheard all of these things.

  July 6, 1838

  I have never understood better why mosquitoes and biting flies were one of the plagues of Egypt. They are so plentiful in the air that one cannot draw a breath without swallowing half a dozen of them. Wherever one’s skin is not protected by clothing, one is covered with lumps from their bites.

  The smell of Camp Cherokee is that of a swamp. Though we have tried to keep our quarters clean, it is hopeless with so many and so many sick. Each day, more are carried out to be placed in the earth in shallow graves. No Cherokee can own any of this land except in death, and it is so often the very young and the very old. If we survive, we may be a Nation without children or elders.

  July 7, 1838

  News of the last of the three parties sent west under guard this June. A small group of Cherokees on that journey tried to run away. They were finally recaptured in the woods near here and brought to our camp. All were near starved, bruised, bleeding from wounds sustained in their flight. One of their number was so determined to not be sent west again that he had hurled himself over a cliff to avoid capture.

  Some had been so beaten by the soldiers who captured them that the poor wretches suffered broken bones, though their only resistance was to run, not fight. General Scott’s orders to his men may have forbade unkindness to our people, but a good part of his troops have paid no attention to such commands.

  July 8, 1838

  I am thankful for the health of my mother and sisters and for my own health. But I am not thankful for the salt pork. Or the water they give us to drink. We do not drink the foul water as some do, but persist in only drinking water after it has been boiled. We cook all our food with care. My mother says the sickness comes from the water and the bad food and that cooking it will kill the sickness. Her words are echoed by the white missionaries who act as doctors, but not everyone listens.

  Twelve died this week past. One was a woman in childbirth. The baby also perished. Among those twelve who died was one white child, the infant daughter of Reverend Butler. Most of the children still alive have whooping cough.

  July 9, 1838

  Fourkiller’s Story

  Fourkiller is a light-skinned man in his late thirties. His blue eyes are evidence of the Scotsman who was his grandfather. He had a good job working in DeKalb County for the new Western & Atlantic Railroad along with fifty or more other Cherokees. Blue eyes or not, he had a Cherokee name and was taken from his work to be imprisoned in a camp.

  He is one of those who survived escape and recapture. His aim was to reach the hills and mountains of North Carolina, where there are many caves and deep woods to hide him. Also the Oconoluftee Cherokees live there. They are citizens of North Carolina and as such have not been compelled to give up their homes. It is rumored that others of our people, especially those poorer Cherokees most removed from white ways, have already sought refuge in the mountains. When someone here in Camp Cherokee, which many of our people now call “Camp Captured,” tells of a missing family member, it is sometimes said that the person must have escaped to the hills. They are safe in the hills, we say. They are held by the hills. Yet I know that most of them must in fact be numbered among the dead.

  Fourkiller’s group, over a thousand Cherokees, left by wagon on June 17. All went fairly well until they reached Waterloo, Alabama, where they were told to climb on board the flatboats. They knew of the awful conditions onboard those flatboats. They had no wish to starve and suffer in that way.

  “Three hundred of us threw down our baggage and took to the woods,” Fourkiller said. Then he laughed. “In the woods those white men were like little children. If we had wanted we could have knocked them over the head and taken their weapons as they stumbled through the brush.”

  Fourkiller has now changed his plans. He will no longer make for North Carolina. Instead, when he escapes again he will find laborer’s clothing and make his way back to DeKalb County, where his old job awaits him.

  “I will call myself John Campbell,” Fourkiller said. “They will not send a Scotsman to the Indian Territories.”

  July 10, 1838

  Four more men and three women were baptized today. One of the women had lost both her infants to the fevers. She wept with joy at the thought that she would see them again in the life to come. I wept also, but not from joy. There are so many losses every day that the flow of our tears must now equal that of the waters of Babylon, where the exiled Israelites sat down. It is hard not to lose myself in sorrow and give up as have some of our people. My pen is like a lifeline that I must hold lest I, too, be washed away. So I continue to write.

  Our good ministers are now worried that they have been too successful. So many wish to attend their services that they have begun building a small place of worship outside the stockade wall. However, it is rumored that some of those white men who are higher up wish to punish them. The white men who come into the compound almost every day to sell whiskey have c
omplained about the Christians. The Indian Christians among us have taken oaths that they shall not drink and they shall encourage others to avoid spirituous liquor. Many of our people, who have seen the wounds we inflict upon ourselves and others when we are drunk, agree with them. This is not good for the business of the whiskey sellers.

  July 11, 1838

  White Will has given me two things today, and I have written another letter for him. He also asked me about our Cherokee ball game, having learned from someone that I was regarded as a great ballplayer. We talked for some time about the game. Both of us almost forgot where we were until the time came for the guard to be changed and our numbers counted to see if any had escaped.

  The first thing White Will brought was news. The delegation sent by our chiefs to General Scott was successful. No further removals will take place until the fall. Also, John Ross has returned from Washington and is visiting each of the camps. He will be here at Camp Captured this coming week.

  The second thing was a copy of General Scott’s orders to his troops that were posted on May 17, 1838. I have mentioned them before in this journal, but now with this copy at hand I can record them exactly. Here is what Old Fuss and Feathers wrote:

  ORDERS. NO.25

  HEAD QUARTERS, EASTERN DIVISION

  CHEROKEE AGENCY, TEN. MAY 17, 1838

  The Cherokees, by the advances which they have made in christianity & civilization, are by far the most interesting tribe of Indians in the territorial limits of the United States. Of the 15,000 of those people who are now to be removed — (and the time within which a voluntary emigration was stipulated, will expire on the 23rd instant —) it is understood that about four fifths are opposed, or have become averse to a distant emigration; and altho’ none are in actual hostilities with the United States, or threaten a resistance by arms, yet the troops will probably be obliged to cover the whole country they inhabit, in order to make prisoners and to march or to transport the prisoners, by families, either to this place, to Ross’ Landing or Gunter’s Landing, where they are to be finally delivered to the Superintendent of Cherokee Emigration. . . .