Trail of Tears Cherokee

The area around Cedartown Big Springs was first inhabited by the Cherokee Indians, who valued its abundant spring water and cedar trees and lived there peacefully until May 26, 1838, when militiamen began a forced roundup under the 1830 Indian Removal Act. Eighty soldiers established Camp Cedar Town there as a military post, and over the course of a month more than 200 Cherokee men, women, and children were captured and held captive before being forced to travel to deportation camps in Tennessee and later farther west. This land became part of the Trail of Tears, where Cherokee people mourned the loss of the land they loved and the lives lost along this trail paved with tears.

Cedartown, Georgia · United States