Fraudulent land-acquiring
A series of fraudulent, land-acquiring
treaties were imposed on the Cherokee in the 1830s.
The Treaty of New Echota (1835), in
which a small tribal faction sold 2.83 million ha (7 million acres)
of Cherokee land, required their removal westward within 3 years.
The vast majority of the Cherokee Nation repudiated this document, but under Gen.
Winfield SCOTT, most remaining Cherokee were
driven from their land and forcibly marched to Arkansas and Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) in
1838-39. About 4,000 of the more
than 15,000 Cherokee involved died of disease and exposure.