In the darkness of the night guided by the moon, our people migrated from the approaching United States forces to Cherokee Nation. This was before Oklahoma was a state and before the removal of our people on the Trail of Tears. Word had reached father from the spring gathering of Manataka where all nations meet for council. Manataka. (2009). Many of the other tribes had been uprooted from their birth lands and word was spreading through the people that tribal Chiefs were in council with the Great Father of the English. Territories were being annexed and treaties broken.

My parent’s birth place lay along the banks of the Tennessee River where crops and livestock flourished and our people numbered in the thousands. Three hundred of our people migrated with our family and followed my father’s word along the river ways to the great Arkansas River. The tribe built beautiful homes and farms in the new territory only to be told to move again when the European settlers came but in the meantime the lands along the river were wooded and bountiful in game. Deer, turkey and buffalo took shelter in the hills and hollers of the mountains and gave our people plenty to eat and many hides for clothing. The people were happy for a short time.

The sickness came when I was waist high to my father. Scarlet Fever took my mother. My older brother and sisters survived but they would bear no children and I somehow escaped the illness, as did my father. There had never been sickness in father’s years as a leader in our village; our medicine man had no cure for he did not know this sickness so my father traveled to the mission to seek medicine for his family and people.

The people from the mission took me to live at a school even though our village had a fine school and learning system they told me that life would be better for our people if we learned to act like they did, if we changed our ways then all people would live in peace. My brother and sisters joined me after they were well enough to travel but we never spoke to our father again. We do not know what became of him or our village, we only heard the stories. I was still very young when I was taken away from my people to learn the new way so it was easy for me to adjust and shed all distinguishable actions and beliefs of my people. My older brother had a harder time accepting the new ways but he eventually did learn to be an American. He later went to higher education and became a doctor who served in English wars.