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Featured Route: Trail of Tears Route
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History of the Trail of Tears
The Cherokee Tribe originally lived in the area around the Great Smoky Mountains, near modern day Chattanooga, TN. The growing non-native population in the eastern United States prompted the federal government to pass the Indian Removal Act in 1830. This law allowed for the forced removal of the Cherokee to uninhabited lands west of the Mississippi River. In 1835, the Cherokee leaders, under pressure, signed the Treaty of New Echata, trading their native land for lands in modern-day Oklahoma.
In 1838, the federal government began a forced removal of the Cherokee despite significant opposition from the tribe, and disputes on the validity of the authorizing laws. More than 15,000 Cherokee passed through southern Illinois on their Trail of Tears.
The Illinois portion of the Trail of Tears was one of the harshest. The Cherokee arrived in Illinois during winter, were trapped by frozen rivers, and banned from camping in many places by hostile local residents. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of the travelers died in southern Illinois.
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