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Treaty

Cherokee (Western) at Washington, DC (1828)

In 1828 the Western Cherokee gave up their Arkansas lands for seven million acres farther west, a guaranteed outlet and payments.

Signed
May 6, 1828
Senate
Ratified
Land given up
about 4.1 million acres
Promises
1 of 2 broken or only partly kept
The land in this treaty’s record. Open on the map

What happened

On 6 May 1828, at Washington, Secretary of War James Barbour signed a convention for the United States with chiefs and head men of the Cherokee Nation West of the Mississippi. The treaty says the United States wished to secure the Cherokee a permanent home that no territory or state would ever surround or press upon. It also says the Cherokees' present location in Arkansas was unfavorable, and that they wanted to be free of Arkansas Territory.

The United States defined Arkansas's western boundary and guaranteed to the Cherokee forever seven million acres between the Arkansas and Canadian rivers, plus a perpetual outlet west. It promised to run the lines by 1 October, remove white persons from the Cherokee side, pay for abandoned improvements, and pay fifty thousand dollars after their removal within fourteen months, plus education money, a printing press and other sums. Eastern Cherokees who wished to move west were promised a rifle, blanket, kettle and tobacco for each family head, along with a payment for property left behind.

In Article 7 the chiefs and head men agreed to surrender to the United States, and leave within fourteen months, all their lands in Arkansas secured by the 1817 treaty and the 1819 convention. Article 9 reserved a tract for the military near Fort Gibson.

The page lists a proclamation on 28 May 1828. In 1833 the two sides signed a supplementary treaty that redrew the boundaries.

What was promised, and what happened

  • Partly kept

    Guarantee seven million acres west of Arkansas, with a perpetual outlet west, to the Cherokee forever. (Art. 2)

    not embraced within the limits or boundaries fixed in this present supplementary treaty treaties.okstate.edu

  • Not known

    Pay the Cherokee fifty thousand dollars after their removal within fourteen months. (Art. 5)

    the sum of fifty thousand dollars treaties.okstate.edu

Good to know. The reasons given, an unfavorable location and avoiding future removal costs, are the treaty's own framing.

Summarized with AI assistance from 5 sources and checked against their words; not yet reviewed by historians or by the nations. Report an error

What the sources say, and how this was checked

Well supported by the sources below.

  1. The United States agree to possess the Cherokees, and to guarantee it to them foreverTreaty with the Western Cherokee, 1828, Tribal Treaties Database
  2. the sum of fifty thousand dollarsTreaty with the Western Cherokee, 1828, Tribal Treaties Database
  3. to give up, and they do hereby surrender, to the United States, and agree to leave the same within fourteen monthsTreaty with the Western Cherokee, 1828, Tribal Treaties Database
  4. a home that shall never, in all future time, be embarrassed by having extended around it the linesTreaty with the Western Cherokee, 1828, Tribal Treaties Database
  5. This supplementary to a former treatyTreaty with the Western Cherokee, 1833, Tribal Treaties Database

Research notes. The text gives its own reasons (unfavorable location, avoiding future removal costs). The 1833 supplementary treaty redrew the boundaries. Treaty text uses 'Cherokees' for the people.

What the treaty did to the land

About 4.1 million acres given up. Each shape is a numbered area in the federal government’s 1899 record of land cessions.

What happened next

Everything the record holds about this land and this treaty, in order: what earlier agreements said, what this one did, and what the United States, the courts and the nations did afterwards.

Who is doing the work today

The nations connected to this treaty come first, then groups returning land and defending treaty rights. Support goes directly to them.

This history belongs to living nations. Start with them:

Native legal and land defense, nationally

Gifts go straight to each organization; this atlas takes nothing. Listing is not endorsement: how organizations are listed.

Sources

  1. treaties.okstate.edu/treaties/treaty-with-the-western-cherokee-1828-0288reference work
    May 6, 1828. | 7 Stat., 311. / scan: 288 TREATY WITH THE WESTERN CHEROKEE, 1828.

Shapes are approximate and are not legal descriptions of land, title or jurisdiction.