The first inhabitants of the continent of America are the Native Indians and Alaskans. These indigenous people inhabited North, Central and South America. According to historians, it is estimated that 18-20 million Native Americans lived in the country called the United States when Europeans first arrived. According to the 2010 Census, approximately 5.2 million people in the United States identified as American Indian or Alaska Native. Today, it is estimated that 60% of Native Americans are living in poverty.
According to the book, The Negro Pilgrimage In America, by C. L. Lincoln, the history of the United States began with the settlement of Indigenous people before 10,000 BC. Numerous cultures formed. Native Americans, also known as American Indians, Indians, Indigenous Americans and other terms, are the indigenous people of the United States. The arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492 started the European colonization of the Americas. Indigenous people lived in what is now the United States for thousands of years and developed complex cultures before European colonists began to arrive, mostly from England, after 1600.
When English colonists arrived in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607, Native Americans had thrived on the land for thousands of years. Millions of indigenous people were scattered across North America in hundreds of different tribes. Between 1622 and the late 19th century, a series of wars known as the American-Indian Wars took place between Native Americans and American settlers over land control.
According to Lincoln, prior to 1776, the first English settlement in America was established at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. The English colonies were desperate for labor to clear the forests and cultivate the land. He wrote, “There was a short-lived attempt to use Indians as laborers, and hundreds were enslaved. The Indians didn’t adapt to large-scale farming operations and many died in the fields. The search for labor then focused on white Englishmen who were brought to the colonies as indentured servants or “bondsmen.” These bondsmen were poor and many were taken from European debtor’s prisons, others were convicted felons.” Unlike African’s, they were not chattel slaves.
According to historians, when Andrew Jackson was elected president in 1828, he enacted the Indian Removal Act. He met with opposition from many people, including future president Abraham Lincoln and Tennessee Congressman Davy Crockett. Most European Americans favored the act. In the South, the settlers were eager to get rid of the “Five Civilized Tribes.” They lived in the South and were Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole. The act was debated in Congress and passed on May 26, 1830. On this Second Annual Message to Congress on December 6, 1830, he stated, “It gives me pleasure to announce to Congress that the benevolent policy of the Government, steadily pursued for nearly thirty years, in relation to the removal of the Indians beyond the white settlements is approaching a happy consummation. Two important tribes have accepted the provision made for their removal at the last session of Congress, and it is believed that their example will induce the remaining tribes to seek the same obvious advantages.”
At the beginning of the 1830’s approximately 125,000 Native Americans lived on millions of acres of land in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida. Their ancestors had cultivated this land for generations. White settlers wanted to grow cotton on their land and the federal government forced them to leave their homelands and walk hundreds of miles on a deadly journey across the Mississippi River.
Around 1831 and 1832 the Supreme Court ruled that the Cherokees had a right to stay on their lands. President Andrew Jackson sent federal troops to forcibly remove almost 16,000 Cherokees who had refused to move westward. In May 1838, American soldiers imprisoned them in camps and approximately 1,500 died. The remaining Cherokees began an 800 mile forced march to Oklahoma. This journey is known as the Trail of Tears. Approximately 4,000 Cherokees died.
Prior to becoming president, Andrew Jackson served in the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate. He represented my home state of Tennessee. He was a wealthy slave owning planter. He served in the military and led troops during the Creek War (1813-1814). On May 22, 1819, he was one of the three founders of Memphis, Tennessee, the city of my birth. This controversial and racist man used federal forces against people who didn’t support his idea of what an American should look like, yet he is revered today. His home, The Hermitage, is a historical plantation and museum, located on Plantation Drive that is located approximately 10 miles east of downtown Nashville, Tennessee. Millions of people flock to see the home of this racist man.
In 1929, Charles Curtis, a man with Native American heritage, was Vice President to President Hoover. He was a member of the Kaw Nation and born in the Kansas Territory. Prior to being elected Vice President, he served in the United States House of Representatives and the Senate. He was the first multiracial person to serve as Vice President of the U.S. until the inauguration of Kamala Harris on January 20, 2021.
Chucalissa Indian Village is located in T.O. Fuller State Park in Memphis. When I was in high school, my classmates and I took field trips to this amazing and historical village and museum. The site features a Mississippi mound complex, nature trails, hands on archaeology labs, and exhibits that explore the history and lifestyles of Native Americans. It is a National Historic Landmark.
History is complicated and painful, especially for people of color. It supports the fact this land we call the United States of America was forcibly stolen from Native Americans by European settlers. The world’s richest country was built out of a combination of stolen land, immigrant indentured labor, and black slave labor.
Francie Mae. January 31, 2021.
References
Charles Curtis. Wikipedia. Accessed January 21, 2021.
Andrew Jackson. Wikipedia. Accessed August 8, 2020
C.Eric Lincoln. November 1967. The Negro Pilgrimage In America. Bantam Pathfinder Books.
Creek War 1812. Wikipedia. Accessed August 8, 2020
Trail of Tears. History. Com Editors. Original November 9, 2009. Updated July 7, 2020.