On This Long Journey

by Joseph Bruchac

  January 16, 1838

  A cold, clear day. Preacher Tsan slept in our barn and departed this morning to continue his rounds. For breakfast we had flat corn dumplings that my mother had placed out overnight so that they would freeze. I believe that there is a special taste to frozen corn dumplings that is like no other. Tsan agreed with me, for he ate twice as many dumplings as I did, which appeared to please my mother and my sisters greatly. Tsan is quite the favorite with my sisters. He, in turn, is always teasing them and brings them small presents such as the blue hair ribbons he gave them on this visit.

  After breakfast Tsan and I talked more about Kooweeskoowee. Kooweeskoowee, “the Powerful White Bird,” is our great chief’s Cherokee name. It is by that name that Tsan always refers to him. I myself often think of our chief by his other Cherokee name of Tsan Usdi, “Little John.”

  Tsan reminded me of the story about John Ross’s return from Washington, where he had been pleading our case in the spring of 1835. While our chief was away, the Georgia Guard took possession of our chief’s plantation, evicting his wife and children. Chief Ross now lives near Red Clay in a small two-room cabin made from logs.

  Somehow, that story of loss became one of triumph as Preacher Tsan remembered it. It was proof yet again of Tsan Usdi’s undying devotion to our Nation. We sat then for a time without speaking, sharing our pride in the honor of John Ross.

  February 1, 1838

  I have finally received a letter from one of my friends and schoolmates who was part of the wagon train of Cherokees that left for the western lands last October. My friend, Mary Timberlake, now in the western lands, has given me the good news that all of my other mates survived that awful trek. However, she has urged me, above all, to remain here.

  Soon after leaving Calhoun, Tennessee, trouble began. People became sick from drinking stagnant water and eating sour grapes by the roadside. So many were ill that the caravan halted more than a week. People began to die, especially children and the old. Among the many buried by the roadside was old Chief Dreadful Waters, one of the signers of the Treaty of 1817, which promised us our lands forever.

  Mary obtained a list of the illnesses suffered by our people from Dr. Lillybridge, the physician accompanying those poor emigrants. Colds, influenza, sore throats, coughs, pleurisy, measles, diarrhea, bowel complaints, fevers, toothaches, wounds from accidents and fighting. Whiskey drinking was the cause of all the fights and many of the accidents.

  When they finally arrived at Fort Gibson, the land on which they were to settle had already been given to Creek Indians arrived two years before. There is still trouble with Osage Indians who harry and raid the new settlers.

  “Unlike our own travails,” Mary wrote me, “the John Ridge and Elias Boudinot families traveled the trail ahead of us in fine carriages. They arrived in good health and excellent spirits, after having paid a courtesy call on General Jackson at his Hermitage home. They are ensconced in most lordly fashion upon the best land in the Territory, feted and favored by the commander at Fort Gibson.”

  The name of that man I once admired — when he used his pen in the service of our people — is there in that letter written by my dear friend. It seems that he and the others who betrayed our Cherokee Nation by signing the treaty of Removal are being rewarded for their treachery. I do not wish to ever write his name again, so I shall refer to him, if the need arises again, as E. B.

  February 14, 1838

  Finally caught the Fox that was raiding the hens. Used a snare to do so, set beside the loose board where he made his entrance. Apologized to his spirit for the necessity of taking his life and promised I would treat his skin with respect and return his bones to the forest.

  It was the animals who sent diseases to our people long ago when we treated them with disdain, hunting them almost to extinction. So my mother explained to me when I was young, reminding me that the plants then offered themselves as medicine to cure those ills. However, respect for the animals we hunt is both prudent and wise.

  Snaring and strangling was rather an ignoble fate for the Fox. I would have preferred to shoot him, but could not do so. I no longer have my grandfather’s gun. The military authorities have begun, with more vigor than before, to collect all Cherokee weapons. I wrapped the gun tightly in deerskin, which will protect it from rot and rust, then went deep into the hills to a certain hollow tree in a place I know. The gun remains there. I shall retrieve it when a better day dawns for our people.

  March 3, 1838

  Dry weather continues. No rain has fallen.

  We are going ahead with our usual chores at the end of the winter, getting ready to plant our corn. We trust that John Ross will again win a postponement of the Removal. We try to live our lives in an everyday fashion. But we are worried. Only the very young, like my little sisters, seem unaware of what it all means. They are excited by the comings and goings of so many men in uniform on horseback and afoot. Ruthie has taken to counting the soldiers as they pass by. Her count reached 507 on this day alone. More and more troops are continuing to arrive.

  The forts have grown in number. We are quite surrounded, like hostages in our own land. At the end of each day I see how my mother stands, her eyes on the setting sun. That direction, the direction of the Darkening Land, is the way the whites wish us to go. It is also, in our old beliefs, the direction of death.

  March 5, 1838

  The Feeler visited me again last night. I was by myself, sitting on the porch, looking at the new moon. One moment I was alone, and the next he was there beside me.

  “Wahuhu,” the Feeler whispered, drawing my attention to the distant call of a screech owl. “He warns us that the enemies are close.”

  I nodded my agreement.

  The Feeler then looked up at the new moon. I looked with him. In our old beliefs, Sun and Moon are beloved grandparents. They were given the charge to look after human beings after Galoneda, the Supreme Power, made the world. I tried to remember the way the old people say we should speak to the moon at this time. But I could not. As if reading my mind, the Feeler spoke for both of us.

  “Edudu,” he said to the new moon, “Maternal Grandfather, we greet you. When it will be like this again, still we will be seeing each other.”

  March 6, 1838

  Still no rain.

  Chief Hildebrand has left for Washington. He carried with him the petition protesting Removal and the fraudulent Treaty of New Echota. It has been signed by more than 15,000 Cherokees. The petition will be given to John Ross and presented to Congress.

  Spent some time after working in the cornfield playing sticks with Bear in the Water, Crow Caller, and Snake Killer. Otter is not well and could not join us. Began coughing hard two days ago and could not get up from his bed today when we went by and called him out to join us. His mother is worried.

  Did well in sticks. Almost every time I threw the four sticks up into the air, they fell in my favor with the rounded sides up. We played for buttons, and I won them all. The others teased me, saying I only won because the Feeler has given me special good luck medicine. My happiness at playing well and their teasing were all half hearted. We kept thinking of Otter, missing his jokes and his laughter.

  We Cherokees have seen this sickness before. Some of the many soldiers who have arrived here were coughing in a similar way. Though this sickness makes white men ill, they usually recover. But when our people get this coughing sickness, they often die. Our old medicines do not work against it. Even the white doctors have a hard time curing us.

  I am very worried about Otter. Before I went off to the Mission School, he was my closest friend. I have always called him brother.

  March 8, 1838

  Last night I heard the owl calling again in the nearby woods. Its call was from the direction of the Darkening Land. This morning the news came, brought to our house by Snake Killer. My friend and brother Otter died last night.

>   April 18, 1838

  Have not written since Otter’s death. I say to myself that it is because I am too busy with the spring planting and work about the farm. But I also know that my heart is sick from the loss of my friend and the terrible feeling that ever more losses lie ahead.

  It seems as if every other length of our fences must be replaced, and I am still splitting rails. Though I have grown better at the job, it is still tedious work, made more difficult by the dryness. Due to the conditions of drought, there is much dust and the crops have grown slowly.

  I opened this journal many times, but was unable to think of anything to say. Now, however, I must write. The new military commander has been appointed. Just as Chief John Ross expected, it is General Scott. Our chief is meeting with him now in Washington, but General Scott will soon arrive to take charge of his troops here.

  It seems as if the soldiers are everywhere now. Perhaps there are 10,000 of them. They have built more stockades with walls sixteen feet high. Our people watch as they build them, knowing those grim walls are meant not to protect the troops but to pen us in like cattle.

  April 19, 1838

  Received a packet of northern newspapers sent me today by Reverend Worcester — The Boston Patriot, The Liberator, and the New York Commercial Advertiser. One contained another of John Howard Payne’s letters in support of our people. For more than three years he has tried to help our people, even being jailed by the Georgia Guard on one occasion. He is now with John Ross in Washington, both of them meeting with Joel R. Poinsett, the new secretary of war. Their aim, I am told by Reverend Worcester in his accompanying letter, is to convince the secretary of war that any roundup of our people should not be done until the autumn so that we may at least bring in our harvest.

  April 20, 1838

  About John Payne

  Met Mr. Payne two years ago. A true gentleman with a broad, intelligent forehead, a sensitive smile, and eyes that are both bright and mild. Also has a fine voice, as one might expect of a composer. I told him that I admired his song and had learned the playing of it while at the Mission School. His response was modest, saying that he had but dashed it off, never expecting it to be so greatly popular.

  Mr. Payne told me that though the world has sung his song and nearly every heart is familiar with the melody, he had been a wanderer from his boyhood. He then laughed and told me how when he and Chief Ross were jailed by the Georgia Guard to keep them from going to the meeting where the Treaty of New Echota was signed, the sheriff began humming his song. Mr. Payne then said to the jailer, from behind the iron bars, that he had written that song. His hope was to strike up a conversation and perhaps stir enough fellow feeling to lead to their release.

  Mr. Payne then shook his head ruefully. “The man’s response,” he said, “was a rough oath, followed by another chorus.”

  “It is the best song I have ever heard,” I told Mr. Payne. “It touches the very heart of what we Cherokee feel.”

  Here are its words:

  Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,

  Be it ever so humble there’s no place like home!

  A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there,

  Which, seek through the world, is ne’er met with elsewhere:

  Home! Home! sweet, sweet Home!

  There’s no place like Home!

  There’s no place like Home.

  April 22, 1838

  Preacher Tsan visited yesterday. Helped me split rails all day. In the evening we sat on the porch and talked quietly while my mother was at her spinning wheel and my sisters were helping her. The pleasant sound of the spinning wheel can be heard from nearly all Cherokee homes, whether humble cabins or grand mansions — both of which exist in good number among our people.

  Long ago, we did not have cloth for our garments but dressed in deerskins. It would take the skin of four deer to clothe one man. We welcomed the cloth brought by the white traders. It was much easier to make clothing. We even adopted the style of wearing cloth about our head in a turban, as did the Creeks and other southern Indians. It makes us rather resemble Hindoos than the western tribes with their feathered headgear. Or at least that is what John Howard Payne, who has traveled to far lands, has assured me. With the spinning wheel, we could make our own cloth and not rely only upon the white traders. In so many ways we Cherokees have become the very model of Thomas Jefferson’s perfect American: gentlemen farmers, self-sufficient upon our own land.

  Although John Ross still hopes that the government of the United States will give us justice, Preacher Tsan no longer believes this will happen, saying that money, not justice, rules in Washington; that the Senate ratified the lying Treaty of New Echota was proof of it.

  I reminded him that it was by only a single vote and that many of the senators had taken up our cause. But Tsan would not be moved from his argument. One vote or one hundred, it mattered not. Just as it did not matter that only twenty of our people signed that treaty or that none of them were empowered by our Nation to do so. Paper — whether it is money or lying treaties — means more to Washington than human lives.

  My anger showed itself in my actions. I stabbed my knife deeply into the wood plank before me.

  Tsan placed his hand gently upon my arm to calm me. I understood. We Cherokees had given our solemn word. Even though we might feel angry and betrayed, we would never again take up the hatchet. Our actions would prove to the world that we were not savages.

  But who now are the savages? I thought. Who, indeed?

  April 26, 1838

  General Scott is on the move. He will arrive soon and set up his headquarters at New Echota, our former capital.

  April 29, 1838

  Still very dry weather. The water in the creeks and rivers is as low as it would usually be in late summer. Fortunately, neither our spring nor our well have gone dry.

  Spent my free time reading the poems of John Milton today. For some reason I was drawn to Paradise Lost. As soon as I began to read, I found myself lost in its grand lines. Time flew by as I read, and when I lifted my head from its pages, the entire afternoon had passed.

  On reflection, I cannot help but picture the serpent who deceives the good, innocent Adam and his wife as Old Hickory, President Andrew Jackson himself. Who, among us, were the ones to accept that fatal apple? Will the angel with his fiery sword soon appear to drive us out of Eden?

  May 12, 1838

  The worst has happened. Scott has issued an order for our immediate Removal. All must hasten to prepare for emigration and come forward so that we may be transported. His address, dated May 10, has been posted widely throughout the Cherokee Nation.

  May 15, 1838

  A few of our people are following the orders of General Scott. Carrying what possessions they can, they are making their way to one of the three collection points. They are along the rivers at Gunter’s Landing, Ross’s Landing, and Cherokee Agency. Although the waters are low in the Tennessee, they plan to take us west on flatboats.

  Many of my people, like my mother, have made no preparations for leaving.

  “We shall trust in Kooweeskoowee,” my mother says. “John Ross has a plan.”

  Our second chief, George Lowrey, has remained here in our Cherokee Nation while John Ross fights for us in Washington. Whenever he speaks, he echoes my mother’s words. He also reminded us of the words spoken in council by the old warrior Woman Killer, who died not long after speaking these words that many of us know by heart.

  “My companions,” Woman Killer said, “men of renown, in council, who now sleep in the dust, spoke the same language and I now stand on the verge of the grave to bear witness to their love of country. My sun of existence is fast approaching to its setting, and my aged bones will soon be laid in the bosom of this earth we have received from our fathers, who had it from the Great Being above. When I sleep in forgetfulness, I hope my bone
s will not be deserted by you.”

  Chief Lowrey has assured us that John Ross is still negotiating and having some success. The secretary of war himself has promised that there will be no forcible roundup of our people before the fall, when it is more practical to travel.

  The great majority of our people speak no English, have no great plantations, and live closer to our old ways. They have little or no knowledge of all that is happening. All they have is their deep love for this land and their trust that our leaders, especially Tsan Usdi, will abide by the will of our people.

  I observed this today when I spoke to a friend of mine. His name is Standing Turkey. His family numbers ten and they farm land along the Hiwassee River. He and three others in the family are readers of Cherokee. He and his brother are mechanics, and the four women in their family are weavers. Though their place is small, it has fine soil, good water, a small herd of cattle. It is much coveted by the white men who have been surveying it with hungry eyes.

  Standing Turkey was on his way to the blacksmith to have a tool mended. He greeted me as we passed on the road. I turned and followed him. Neither of us spoke for half a mile or so as we walked together.

  “You are still filling your book with words?” he said to me at last, motioning with his chin at the journal under my arm.