Long-Ago Stories of the Eastern Cherokee

by Lloyd Arneach

  The first quarrel of the Cherokee was with a tribe from the east. Finally, the chiefs of the two tribes met in council to settle the quarrel. They smoked the pipe and quarreled for seven days and seven nights.

  The Great Spirit was displeased because people are not supposed to smoke the pipe until they make peace. As He looked down on the old men sitting with their heads bowed, He decided to do something to remind all people to smoke the pipe only when making peace.

  The Great Spirit turned the old men into grayish flowers, which we now call “Indian Pipes,” and made them grow wherever friends and relatives have quarreled. He made the smoke hang over the mountains until all people all over the world learn to live together in peace.

  SPEARFINGER

  We had monsters in our culture. Some of these were shape-shifters, or those who could change their shapes to look like anybody they wanted to. This shape-shifter looked like a little old lady in her normal shape. Her skin looked like regular skin, but it was as hard as stone. Arrows would hit her and bounce off; spears would hit her and break. She could change her entire shape except for her right index finger. This finger was a little longer than normal. This was how she got her name: “Spearfinger.” She was a monster because she lived on human livers. She always kept her finger hidden with a robe over her right wrist, or a basket over her right wrist and her finger hidden down in the basket so no one could see it.

  If she could get close to people she would stab them with her finger and they would seem to go to sleep. She would open the bodies, take out the livers and cause the bodies to heal up. In a little while the people would wake up. They would feel no pain and wouldn’t know what had happened. In a few days, they would take sick and die. Everyone would know that Spearfinger had taken their livers.

  Spearfinger was always roaming the woods looking for her next meal. If she saw young people in the woods, she might say, “Come here little ones. I have some honey in this basket and you can eat it while I comb your hair.” If the children had been properly trained by their parents not to talk to strangers in the woods, they would run away.

  In the fall of the year, the Cherokee would burn the leaves off the mountains to get at the nuts underneath. When Spearfinger saw the smoke rising into the sky, she would know the Cherokee were out on the mountains and she had a chance for another meal. When someone went into the woods by himself, the others never knew if the person coming back was the same one or if it was Spearfinger who had taken his shape.

  Spearfinger killed so many of the Cherokee that finally they held a great council. All of the Wise Men and Warriors met for days trying to figure out a way to stop Spearfinger. After a long while they came up with a plan they thought would work.

  They made sure all the people stayed in their villages, and then the Warriors went far back into the mountains. They selected a path that led far back into the Great Smoky Mountains. They dug a deep pit and covered it with branches and leaves so it looked like a part of the path. They built a large fire by the side of the path and hid themselves in the bushes.

  Spearfinger looked out of her lair from far back in the Great Smoky Mountains and saw the smoke. She started down the path, looking for another meal. She carried her basket over her right wrist.

  Soon the Warriors heard someone coming down the path singing a song. Around a bend in the path came a little old woman with a basket over her right wrist. They quietly watched as she walked down the path and stepped out on the branches. The branches broke and dropped her into the pit. When Spearfinger hit the bottom of the pit, she jumped to her feet and started screeching and yelling and clawing at the side of the pit.

  The Warriors quickly surrounded the pit and looked down on Spearfinger. When Spearfinger looked up and realized that it was the Cherokee who had tricked her, she became more enraged and clawed even harder at side of the pit. The Warriors realized she would be able to claw her way out of the pit in a short while. They started shooting arrows and throwing their spears down at her.

  The arrows would bounce off and the spears would break when they hit her. Spearfinger laughed and told them what she would do to them when she got out of the pit. Then a little bird flew over the pit and sang a song that sounded like the Cherokee word for heart. They took this as a sign to aim at her heart. Again, the arrows bounced off and the spears broke.

  They caught the bird and clipped his tongue. The Cherokee know this bird as a liar. When it sings near a home it doesn’t mean a loved one is coming home. Then another bird flew down into the pit and landed on Spearfinger’s right hand next to her index finger. They took this as a sign to aim at her right hand. When they did, they saw Spearfinger’s face change from anger and rage to fear and terror because her heart was contained in the palm of her right hand and she always kept her right fist tightly closed to protect it.

  Finally, an arrow struck her at the base of her index finger and she fell over dead. And that is the story of Spearfinger.

  THE TRAIL OF TEARS

  In the late 1820s gold was discovered in north Georgia near a town called Dahlonega. At that time, the Cherokee were living in north Georgia. It was thought that there was more gold on Cherokee lands. The governor of Georgia was trying to get the Cherokee moved out of Georgia, and he asked the government in Washington for help. Andrew Jackson was president at the time. He signed into law the Indian Removal Act, which called for the removal of all of the Indians who lived east of the Mississippi to the West.

  White settlers started moving onto Cherokee lands. They claimed the land for themselves and started charging Cherokee rent for their own land. The Cherokee appealed to the state of Georgia for help and the governor refused to help them. They then turned to the Department of Justice in Washington for help. The U.S. Supreme Court Justice Marshall ruled that Georgia was wrong and that U.S. government troops should be sent in to help the Cherokee.

  President Jackson refused. He said, “Justice Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it!” No U.S. troops were sent in.

  The Cherokee refused to move to the West. The government in Washington sent in an Indian agent, whose specialty was getting treaties signed by Indian tribes. He was called Reverend Schermerhorn. His assignment was to get a treaty signed by the Cherokee agreeing to move to the West. He went among the Cherokee telling them that the Great White Father in Washington wanted to give them all of this level land west of the Big Muddy, which is what we called the Mississippi. They wouldn’t have to try and farm the steep mountainsides anymore. They needed to come to a meeting at New Echota, Georgia, and sign a piece of paper to get their land.

  The Cherokee leaders realized what Schermerhorn was trying to do. They went among their people telling them not go to this meeting. They tried to tell them that they didn’t know what Schermerhorn was really trying to get them to do. But, as always, there was a small group of people who did not listen. This group went to the meeting and signed their names to the paper.

  Schermerhorn immediately sent the paper to Washington. Cherokee Chief John Ross left for Washington also. He talked to everyone who would listen. He told them that the majority of his people did not sign this paper, that none of their major leaders had signed the paper and that it had been signed by only a handful of people who didn’t know what they were signing.

  But the paper was sent to the U.S. Senate and they voted to accept it as being signed by the Cherokee Nation by only one vote. When word reached the Cherokee that the treaty had been accepted, a group of Cherokee immediately left for Indian Territory in Oklahoma. The rest stayed where they were.

  Six months passed, and then a year passed, and nothing happened. The Cherokee thought Washington had forgotten about them. Washington was still having trouble with Indians out West.

  Then, in the spring of 1838, federal troops showed up in Cherokee country. They built stockades and then started rounding up the Cherokee. The troops learned that if they came in the early morning they could catch all of the family at home before they went o
ut to do their chores. They moved so quickly that a father might have been milking the cow when the troops showed up and he would only have time to turn the cow out into the pasture and grab what he could carry in his hands. Then he and his family would be driven down the trail. Sometimes, before they were taken out of sight of their home, other whites would enter to ransack the house, drive the livestock out of the pasture and set fire to the house.

  Many times the soldiers would use their bayonets to move the people down the trail. One small family had been rounded up and was moving down the trail. The family’s leader was an old man named Tsali. His wife, Wiloni, was old and couldn’t move very fast. The soldiers used their bayonets to keep her moving faster. The family spoke to each other in Cherokee, which the soldiers didn’t understand. They decided that farther on down the trail, they would give a signal and then would jump the soldiers and take their weapons. Farther down the trail the signal was given and the family turned on the soldiers. In the struggle, one of the soldiers was shot and killed. Tsali and his family grabbed the soldier’s weapons and fled into the mountains.

  General Winfield Scott was responsible for moving the Cherokee out West. When he heard that a soldier had been killed by the Cherokee, he sent word to our tribal council, telling them that if Tsali and his family did not come in and give themselves up to be executed, all of the Cherokee who were hiding in the mountains would be shot on sight as “outlaws.” The tribal council sent word to Tsali to come in.

  Tsali brought his family in. His youngest son was taken aside because of his age. The rest of his family was lined up and the soldiers lined up Cherokee warriors opposite them. Soldiers put weapons in the hands of the warriors and they were forced to shoot Tsali and his family. This was to show the Cherokee that they could not stand against the might of the U.S. government. The removal of the Cherokee had begun.

  Our elders realized they would never see their beloved homelands again, and some of them just lay down and died. The family would move off to the side and dig a shallow grave as best they could with their hands and sharpened sticks. They would then pile stones high on top of the grave. This would protect it from animals and make it easier to find. They hoped one day to come back, find the grave and put a proper marker on it.

  In the heat of that summer, and the snow and ice of that winter, four thousand of my people—nearly a quarter of the entire Cherokee Nation—died and were buried in nameless graves. We call it the “Trail Where They Cried.”

  You know it as the “Trail of Tears.”

  WHY THE TURKEY GOBBLES

  Now, the Turkey had heard the Grouse give his good yell in the ballgame, and the Turkey wanted to have a good yell like the Grouse. So he went to the Grouse and asked the Grouse to teach him how to yell.

  The Grouse agreed, but he said, “You have to give me something if you want me to teach you.”

  Turkey said, “Well, what do you want?”

  And the Grouse said, “Give me some of your feathers.”

  Turkey gave him some feathers, and the Grouse put them around his neck, and then he started teaching the Turkey his yell.

  Every morning they would get together and practice the Turkey’s yell. Finally, the Turkey felt that he was ready. So, the Grouse went through the valley telling all the animals to listen the next morning. Early the next morning, the Turkey and the Grouse went up on a ridge. The Grouse jumped up on a hollow log and beat his wings against it to get everybody’s attention. Then, Turkey jumped up on the log, cleared his throat and took a deep breath. He was so excited because he knew that everybody was listening.

  But he couldn’t yell, and all that came out was, “Gobble, gobble, gobble.”

  That’s why the Turkey gobbles. The Grouse kept the Turkey’s feathers and they form a ring around his neck to this day.

  WHY THE TERRAPIN’s SHELL IS CRACKED

  The Possum and the Terrapin met to hunt for food. They went through the forest searching for food. They found a persimmon tree that was heavy with fruit. The Possum climbed the tree to reach the fruit. Then the Possum selected a fruit for himself and tossed another down to the waiting Terrapin. After a while the Possum would not even look down when he dropped the fruit. He knew the Terrapin would take his time getting to the fruit on the ground. The Terrapin would always thank him for dropping the fruit down to him.

  Then Possum realized he hadn’t heard Terrapin thank him for a while. He looked down and there was a big Wolf standing over the Terrapin. When Possum pulled off another fruit and dropped it, the Wolf quickly grabbed it before it hit the ground. He would then stand over Terrapin and wait for another. Terrapin was not saying anything because the big Wolf could crush his shell with his jaws.

  Possum moved to another branch as he thought how he could help Terrapin. He grabbed another fruit and dropped it. The Wolf dashed over and snatched it out of the air. Possum now knew what he would do. He kept dropping fruit as he searched the tree. Finally, he saw a large green persimmon. He pulled it loose and dropped it. The Wolf dashed over and snatched this out of the air also, but this green one was too large and lodged in his throat. The Wolf tried to dislodge the persimmon but he had been too greedy and tried to swallow before he realized how large it was. The persimmon choked the Wolf to death.

  The Terrapin waited until he was sure the Wolf was dead. Then he took out his knife and cut off the Wolf’s ears. He dried and shaped them so he could use them as spoons. He put a hole in them, ran a thong through the hole and put the thong around his neck. That was how he carried the wolf’s ears around with him.

  It was the custom among the people in those days to put gruel out beside the door for anyone to eat if they were hungry. The Terrapin came to a home and decided to eat. He used the Wolf’s ear as a spoon. People saw this and started talking. The Terrapin had killed a Wolf! The Terrapin continued on and soon he came to another home. Word had spread faster then the Terrapin could walk.

  These people had heard the story and wanted to see for themselves if it was true, so they invited the Terrapin to eat. He took the ears from around his neck and used them once more as a spoon. The people watched in amazement. It was true! Word was spreading before the Terrapin had finished eating. In a little while, Terrapin was full. He thanked the people and started on his way.

  By this time, word had reached the Wolves. They called the pack together with their howls. When all of the pack had gathered, they were told what had happened. They all set out through the forest to seek revenge on the Terrapin for killing a member of their pack.

  The Terrapin knew when he heard the howling that the pack was gathering to seek revenge on him. He started out as fast as he could go to find safety. It wasn’t long before the Wolves picked up his trail. Their howls were not far away. The Terrapin came to the edge of a high cliff with a river far below. He could hear the Wolves rushing through the forest. As the Wolves burst out of the forest they saw the Terrapin and their snarls made his blood run cold. They would tear him to pieces! He had to choose: wait for the Wolves to tear him apart or take his chances with the cliff.

  Terrapin jumped off the edge of the cliff. The Wolves dashed to the edge of the cliff and watched silently as the Terrapin fell into the river. The impact was so great that the Terrapin’s shell was broken into many pieces. As the Terrapin sank under the waters, he sang a medicine song that pulled his shell back together and mended it. He sank to the bottom of the river and started walking. He slowly walked out of the river on the other side. His shell showed where it had been pulled back together and healed. You can still see where it was healed to this day.

  UKTENA

  The Cherokee fought many battles with the Shawano. In one battle, they caught a great Shawano medicine man. His name was “the Groundhog’s mother.” The Cherokee tied him up and were getting ready to torture him. The Shawano begged for his life and told the Cherokee that if they would spare his life, he would get the great crystal of the Uktena.

  The crystal was in the forehead of th
e great Uktena serpent. If a medicine man could get the crystal, it would make him the greatest medicine man ever known. But to meet the Uktena meant that the person would die. The Cherokee told the Shawano about this. He laughed and said that he was not afraid. His medicine was strong! They told him they would spare his life if he would bring back the crystal. The Shawano quickly agreed.

  The Uktena was a great serpent and would wait in ambush in remote and hidden places. Uktena had learned that the Cherokee would use the mountain gaps to travel from valley to valley. He would select the darkest gaps with many places to hide and he would wait for them there. The Cherokee told the Shawano about the Uktena’s ambushes.

  The Shawano went to the northern border of Cherokee country. There, he found a great Blacksnake that was larger than any that had ever been seen before. He said, “Hah! You are too small!” And he continued searching.

  He went to another gap, and there he found a great Moccasin Snake—the largest anyone had seen. But when people asked him about it later, he said it had been too small to notice.

  At another gap he found a Green Snake, and he called the people to come see the pretty Green Snake. When they got to the gap, they saw a huge Green Snake with coils that overflowed the gap. They ran away in terror.

  At another gap he found a great Lizard, but it was not what he wanted so he paid it no attention.

  He traveled south, and at the Frog Place he found a great Frog sitting in the gap. When the people came to see it, again they ran away in terror. He laughed at them for running away from a Frog and continued on.

  At other places he found great monsters of all kinds, but they were not what he was looking for and he continued searching. He went to the Leech Place on the Hiwassee and thought that the Uktena might be hiding in the deep pool. He dived into the waters and great Fish would rush at him and turn away. He saw many other monsters under the water, but they were not what he was looking for so he came out of the water and continued to the south. Finally, he found the Uktena asleep on a mountain.