Cherokee Memories

I am a Cherokee Indian. My name is Wicapi-Wakan which means first born daughter.

          Before the white man came, I lived in North Carolina. My memories of that time will always remain close in my heart.

        My people lived in log houses that the men built. We traveled by canoe, walking, and later on by horses. Or food consisted of meats and vegetables, like fish, deer, wild turkey, bear, squash and beans. We lived and ate off the land that we call Mother Earth. We took care of her and in return she took care of us. The men hunted, cut down trees to make canoes, built houses, made bows, arrows, spears, tomahawks, and prepared for planting. The women made clothes, planted seed and harvested the crops. The children had jobs to do also. The girls would pound corn, gather nuts and berries, prepare food, and make beautiful bead work, and pottery to hold water and food. We sewed our clothes with the sinew of animals using fishbone needles. The girls learned household duties form their mother’s teachings and by watching their mothers at work.

            The boys would learn how to hunt for our food and become great warriors.

      The children when they had time would play a hoop game which they would try to throw a dart through a moving hoop, or they would play Lacrosse.

    When the white man came, our way of life changed dramatically. We lost half of our population by the diseases they brought to us, such as smallpox. We were treated badly by the white men and our villages were often under attack by them.

      Then gold was discovered in our land and then the greedy white men rushed in to steal our lands away form us.

        In 1930, the one that they tell us is the Great White Father in Washington signed the Indian Removal Act, which meant we were forced to leave the land of our ancestors and travel to a foreign land called Okalahoma. The forced leave took place in the year 1938 when the militia quickly forced us from our homes, dragging us, beating us, whipping us, or using their bayonets to push us along. Many of us were separated from our children, parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters. We were not allowed to gather up our possessions. The white men took over our homes and our precious land.

    We were rounded up and forced to walk to Tennessee where we were herded into stockades. From there we were forced to march into the new Indian Territory called Okalahoma. We hardly had any food or protection from the elements and certainly no protection from the brutality of the soldiers, many of whom thought that the only good Indian was a dead Indian. They scorned us, and called us dirty heathen.

My people suffered horribly. Some managed to escape, but I do not know what has become of them. Some were so full of grief of being forced to leave their lands, their freedom that they committed suicide along the way. 4,000 of my people died on this forced march from disease, hunger and pure exhaustion during this 1000 mile march to Okalahoma.

  My heart longs to return to the home of my ancestors. My heart longs for the days of old.

  The white man has tried his best to destroy my people but we have survived and we will continue to survive.