Chapter 5
The Native Americans
Discovery by Columbus
Christopher Columbus discovered America in 1492. However, it took over a hundred years before the European immigrants started to come to the new continent. When they first arrived, they met the Native Americans. These people were called Indians. The Spaniards called them so because they thought they had come to India.
The Native Americans are split up in tribes. These are called nations. Each nation had their own area where they lived. They lived from hunting, fishing and some farming.
Nobody owned land as a private person. Just like the air, land was common property. The Natives said it belonged to the Great Spirits. Europeans were used to land being something you could buy and sell. When they came to America, they took the land. They put up fences and called it theirs.
After a while all the land along the Atlantic coast was on European hands. The immigrants started to move westwards in search of new land. This had great consequences for the Native people. They were slowly pushed further west. Sometimes they tried to fight back and stop the immigrants from moving. However, the Europeans had guns and came in such large numbers that the Natives didn’t stand a chance.
Government pushed the Natives away
In 1830 the Government in Washington passed a new law called the Indian Removal Act. As a result the Natives were forced to move west of the Mississippi River. About 18 000 Cherokees started on the long road from Tennessee and Georgia to Arkansas and Oklahoma. Some of them had horses, but most of them walked. This happened in the winter of 1838/39. Cold weather made it even worse. It’s being said that only 12 000 people were alive at the end of the trip.