Vero - Wikipedia - User contributions [en]

Isaac Bickerstaff

2025-08-28T00:52:24Z

2600:4040:2F83:7300:F6E7:9C1F:9AF1:1761: wording cleanup

{{Short description|Pseudonym used by Jonathan Swift}}
{{about||the real Anglo-Irish playwright of the 1760s|Isaac Bickerstaff (playwright)|Swift's friend who also used the name|Richard Steele|the Scottish poet who also adopted the name|Allan Ramsay (poet)}}
'''Isaac Bickerstaff Esq''' was a pseudonym used by [[Jonathan Swift]] as part of a hoax to predict the death of then-famous [[Almanac]]-maker and [[astrologer]] [[John Partridge (astrologer)|John Partridge]].

"All Fools' Day" (1 April, now known as [[April Fools' Day]]) was Swift's favourite holiday, and he often used this day to aim his satirical wit at non-believers in an attempt to "make sin and folly bleed". Disgruntled by Partridge's sarcastic attack about the "''infallible'' Church" written in his 1708 issue of ''Merlinus Almanac'', Swift projected three letters and a eulogy as an elaborate plan to "predict" Partridge's "''infallible'' death" on 29 March, the anniversary of the famous 1652 "[[Black Monday]]" eclipse, widely seen as discrediting to astrology.

The first of the three letters, ''Predictions for the Year 1708'', published in January 1708, predicts, among other things, the death of Partridge by a "raging fever". In the second letter, ''The Accomplishment of the First of Mr. Bickerstaff's Predictions'', published in March 1708, Swift writes not as Bickerstaff but as a "man employed in the [[Inland Revenue|Revenue]]", and "confirms" the imaginary Bickerstaff's prediction. To accompany ''The Accomplishments'', Swift also published an [[elegy]] for Partridge in which, typical of Swift's satire, he blames not only Partridge, but those who purchase the Almanacs as well:

{{poemquote|Here, five Foot deep, lies on his Back,
A Cobler, Starmonger, and Quack;
Who to the Stars in pure Good-will,
Does to his best look upward still.
Weep all you Customers that use
His Pills, his Almanacks, or Shoes;
And you that did your Fortunes seek,
Step to his Grave but once a Week:
This Earth which bears his Body's Print,
You'll find has so much Vertue in't,
That I durst pawn my Ears 'twill tell
Whate'er concerns you full as well,
In Physick, Stolen Goods, or Love,
As he himself could, when above.}}

The hoax gained immense popularity, and plagued Partridge to the true end of his life. Mourners, thinking him dead, often kept him awake at night by crying outside his window. Accounts of an undertaker arriving at his house to arrange drapes for the mourning, an elegy being printed and even a gravestone being carved, culminate in Partridge publishing a letter aspriring to have the last word and proclaiming (and reclaiming) himself as living. In 1709 Swift, writing as Bickerstaff for the last time, published ''A Vindication of Isaac Bickerstaff'', in which he abandoned any real attempt to maintain the hoax but disputed Partridge's public letter, saying, "There were sure no man alive ever to writ such damned stuff as this." He went on sarcastically to reason that "Death is defined by all Philosophers [as a] Separation of the Soul and Body. Now it is certain, that the poor Woman, who has best Reason to know [Partridge's wife], has gone about for some time to every Alley in the Neighbourhood, and swore to the Gossips, that Her Husband had neither Life nor Soul in Him."

==Later influence==
Later in 1709, [[Richard Steele]] bolstered the release of his new paper ''[[The Tatler (1709 journal)|The Tatler]]'' by naming the fictitious Isaac Bickerstaff Esq. as editor. ''The Tatler'' had occasional contributions from Swift, although largely written by Steele and [[Joseph Addison]].

[[Benjamin Franklin]] based the persona of "Poor Richard", the author of ''[[Poor Richard's Almanack]]'', on Swift's Bickerstaff character.<ref>{{cite journal|title=The Character of Poor Richard: Its Source and Alteration|first=John F.|last=Ross|journal=PMLA|volume=55|issue=3|date=September 1940|pages=785–794|doi=10.2307/458740|jstor=458740|publisher=Modern Language Association}}</ref>

In [[Jules Verne]]'s 1895 novel ''[[Propeller Island]]'', the governor of the titular island is named Cyrus Bikerstaff, in tribute to Swift's character.

[[H. P. Lovecraft]] used the pseudonym "Isaac Bickerstaffe [sic], Jr." in 1914 for a series of letters to the editor of ''The Providence Evening News'', refuting the predictions of an astrologer the paper published.<ref>''H. P. Lovecraft Collected Essays, Volume 3: Science'', edited by [[S. T. Joshi]]. New York: [[Hippocampus Press]], 2005, pp. 11, 260-72.</ref>

The Canadian caricaturist Don Evans (born Toronto, 1936) published in 1975–85 three volumes of cartoons under the pseudonym Isaac Bickerstaff. He lives in Orillia, Ontario, where he is active in local politics.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.orilliapacket.com/2014/07/18/evans-looking-for-return-to-council|title = Simcoe County News - Latest Daily Breaking News Stories}}</ref> Personal archives including 300 drawings are at the University of Calgary.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.ucalgary.ca/lib-old/SpecColl/bickers.htm|title = Canadian Literary and Art Archives - Isaac Bickerstaff}}</ref>

In the novel ''[[The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society]]'' (2008) and its [[The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (film)|eponymous 2018 film adaptation]], the lead character, author Juliet Ashton, writes under the pen name Izzy Bickerstaff.

Adam J. Smith and Jo Waugh of ''[[The Conversation (website)|The Conversation]]'' and [[Patricia Casey]], writing for the ''[[Irish Independent]]'', have suggested that fictional Twitter user [[Titania McGrath]], created by comedian and ''[[Spiked (magazine)|Spiked]]'' columnist Andrew Doyle, was influenced by Bickerstaff.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://theconversation.com/titania-mcgrath-twitter-parody-of-wokeness-owes-a-lot-to-satirists-of-the-18th-century-113312|title=Titania McGrath: Twitter parody of 'wokeness' owes a lot to satirists of the 18th century|last1=Smith|first1=Adam J|last2=Waugh|first2=Jo|date=15 March 2019|website=[[The Conversation (website)|The Conversation]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190319121735/https://theconversation.com/titania-mcgrath-twitter-parody-of-wokeness-owes-a-lot-to-satirists-of-the-18th-century-113312|archive-date=19 March 2019|url-status=live|access-date=14 April 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.independent.ie/opinion/comment/patricia-casey-how-titania-woke-me-to-the-social-justice-warrior-crusade-37943164.html|title=How Titania 'woke' me to the social justice warrior crusade|last=Casey|first=Patricia|date=23 March 2019|website=[[Irish Independent]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190401150121/https://www.independent.ie/opinion/comment/patricia-casey-how-titania-woke-me-to-the-social-justice-warrior-crusade-37943164.html|archive-date=1 April 2019|url-status=live|access-date=14 April 2019}}</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{wikisource|Portal:The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers}}
*[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2644 ''Isaac Bickerstaff, physician and astrologer''] by [[Sir Richard Steele]]
* [http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/bickerstaff.html Museum of Hoaxes: The Predictions of Isaac Bickerstaff]
* [http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=955 The Extraordinary Astrologer Isaac Bickerstaff] from damninteresting.com

{{Jonathan Swift}}

{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bickerstaff, Isaac}}
[[Category:British literature]]
[[Category:Literary forgeries]]
[[Category:Collective pseudonyms]]
[[Category:Jonathan Swift]]

Sequoyah

2025-08-27T01:40:47Z

2600:4040:2F83:7300:F6E7:9C1F:9AF1:1761: /* Syllabary and Cherokee literacy */wording cleanup

{{short description|Cherokee polymath and creator of the Cherokee syllabary}}
{{Other uses}}
{{multiple issues|{{Citation style|date=November 2022|details=John B. Davis' work, "The Life and Work of Sequoyah", is extensively quoted, sometimes with a citation and sometimes not.}}
{{Page numbers needed|date=November 2022}}}}
{{Use dmy dates|date = January 2020}}
{{Infobox person
| native_name = {{lang|chr|ᏍᏏᏉᏯ}} / {{lang|chr|ᏎᏉᏯ}}
| native_name_lang = Cherokee
| image = Henry Inman - Sequoyah - Google Art Project.jpg
| caption = Portrait of Sequoyah by [[Henry Inman (painter)|Henry Inman]]
| birth_date = {{circa}} 1770
| birth_place = [[Tuskegee (Cherokee town)|Tuskegee]], [[Overhill Cherokee|Cherokee Nation]] (near present-day [[Knoxville, Tennessee]])<ref name="Wilford-2009"/>
| death_date = {{Death year and age|1843|1770|08}}
| death_place = [[San Fernando de Rosa]], [[Coahuila]], Mexico (near present-day [[Zaragoza, Coahuila]], Mexico)
| nationality = [[Cherokee]], [[United States|American]]
| other_names = George Guess, George Gist
| occupation = {{hlist
| [[Silversmith]]
| [[blacksmith]]
| [[educator]]
| [[warrior]]
| [[politician]]
| [[inventor]]
| [[linguist]]
}}
| spouse = {{marriage|Sally Benge|1815}}
| parents =
| children = 2
}}
{{Contains special characters|Cherokee}}

'''Sequoyah''' ({{IPAc-en|s|ə|ˈ|k|w|ɔɪ|ə}} {{respell|sə|QUOY|yə}}; {{langx|chr|ᏍᏏᏉᏯ}}, {{transliteration|chr|Ssiquoya}},{{efn|As he himself signed his name.}} or {{lang|chr|ᏎᏉᏯ}}, {{transliteration|chr|Sequoya}},{{efn|As it is often spelled in Cherokee.}} {{IPA|chr|seɡʷoja|pron}}; {{circa}} 1770 – August 1843), also known as '''George Gist''' or '''George Guess''', was a Native American [[polymath]] and [[Constructed script|neographer]] of the [[Cherokee Nation]].

In 1821, Sequoyah completed his [[Cherokee syllabary]], enabling reading and writing in the [[Cherokee language]]. One of the first North American Indigenous groups to gain a written language, the Cherokee Nation officially adopted the syllabary in 1825,<ref>{{Cite web |title=Cherokee Traditions {{!}} Language & Literature |url=https://www.wcu.edu/library/digitalcollections/cherokeetraditions/Language/ |access-date=2024-05-04 |website=www.wcu.edu}}</ref> helping to unify a forcibly divided nation with new ways of communication and a sense of independence.<ref name="Encyclopedia Britannica-Sequoyah">{{Cite web |title=Sequoyah {{!}} Biography & Facts |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sequoyah |access-date=2021-03-19 |website=Encyclopedia Britannica}}</ref> Within a quarter-century, the Cherokee Nation had reached a [[literacy]] rate of almost 100%, surpassing that of surrounding [[European Americans|European-American]] [[settler]]s.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Spring |first1=Joel H. |title=Deculturalization and the struggle for equality : a brief history of the education of dominated cultures in the United States |date=2004 |publisher=McGraw |edition=Fourth |page=26}}</ref>

Sequoyah's creation of the Cherokee syllabary is among the few times in [[recorded history]] that an individual member of a pre-literate group created an original, effective [[writing system]]. It is believed to have inspired the development of 21 scripts or writing systems used in 65 languages in North America, Africa, and Asia.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Unseth |first1=Peter |date=1 January 2016 |title=The international impact of Sequoyah's Cherokee syllabary |url=https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/wll.19.1.03uns |journal=Written Language & Literacy |volume=19 |issue=1 |pages=75–93 |doi=10.1075/wll.19.1.03uns |issn=1387-6732 |access-date=11 February 2022|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

Sequoyah was also an important representative for the Cherokee nation; he went to Washington, D.C., to sign two relocation-and-land-trading treaties.<ref name="Oklahoma History">{{Cite web|title=Sequoyah {{!}} The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture|url=https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=SE020|access-date=2021-03-19|website=www.okhistory.org}}</ref>

==Early life==
{{multiple image | direction = vertical | width = 250
|image1=Timberlake-map-toskegee.jpg
|alt1=Simple line drawing of a map of Toskegee
|image2=Map of Tennessee highlighting Monroe County.svg
|alt=Map of Tennessee counties with Monroe County highlighted
|caption2=An 18th-century map of Toskegee and the contemporary location of Monroe County in Tennessee}}Few primary documents describe facts of Sequoyah's life. Some anecdotes were passed down orally, but these often conflict or are vague about specific times and places.

Sequoyah was born in the Cherokee town of [[Tuskegee (Cherokee town)|Tuskegee]], Tennessee, around 1778. [[James Mooney]], a prominent [[Anthropology|anthropologist]] and [[historian]] of the Cherokee people, quoted a cousin as saying that as a little boy, Sequoyah spent his early years with his mother. In the people's matrilineal kinship system, children were considered born into their mother's family and clan, and her male relatives were most important to their upbringing. His name is believed to come from the Cherokee word {{Lang|chr-latn|siqua}} meaning "[[Domestic pig|hog]]". Historian John B. Davis says the name may have been derived from {{Lang|chr-latn|sikwa}} (either a hog or an [[opossum]]) and {{Lang|chr-latn|vi}} meaning "place, enclosure".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Davis |first=John B. |date=1930 |title=The Life and Work of Sequoyah |url=https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc2191740/ |journal=Chronicles of Oklahoma |language=English |volume=8 |issue=2 |pages=149–180}}</ref> This is a reference either to his childhood deformity or to a later injury that left Sequoyah [[Disability|disabled]]. According to a descendant of his, he was born with the name ''{{Lang|chr-latn|Gi sqwa ya|italic=no}}'' ("there's a bird inside"). After repeatedly failing to complete his farm duties, his name was changed to Sequoyah ("There's a pig inside").<ref>{{cite web |last=Vaughn |first=Trista |date=8 August 2018 |title="Searching for Sequoyah" interviews UKB Member |url=https://www.ukb-nsn.gov/post/searching-for-sequoyah-interviews-ukb-citizen-1 |publisher=United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians}}</ref>

His mother, Wut-teh, is debated to be either the daughter, sister, or niece of a Cherokee [[Tribal chief|chief]]. Historians believe her to be related to the chiefs who have been identified as the brothers [[Old Tassel]] and [[Doublehead]]. [[John Watts (Cherokee chief)|John Watts]] (also known as Young Tassel) was a nephew of the two chiefs, so it is likely that Wut-teh and Watts were related in some fashion. Due to native customs, Sequoyah learned everything from his mother, such as the Cherokee language and his first job of a tradesman.<ref name="National Geographic Society-2019">{{Cite web|date=2019-11-13|title=Sequoyah and the Creation of the Cherokee Syllabary|url=http://www.nationalgeographic.org/article/sequoyah-and-creation-cherokee-syllabary/|access-date=2021-03-19|website=National Geographic Society}}</ref>

Sources differ as to the identity of Sequoyah's father. Davis cites Emmet Starr's 1917 book, ''Early History of the Cherokees'', as saying that Sequoyah's father was a Virginian fur trader from [[Swabia]] named Nathaniel Guyst, Guist, or Gist. Other sources state that his father could have been an unlicensed German peddler named George Gist, who entered the Cherokee Nation in 1768, married, and fathered a child. Another source identified his father as [[Nathaniel Gist]], son of Christopher Gist, who became a commissioned officer with the [[Continental Army]] associated with [[George Washington]] during the American Revolution. Gist would have been a man of some social status and financial backing; [[Josiah C. Nott]] claimed he was the "son of a Scotchman". The ''[[Cherokee Phoenix]]'' reported in 1828 that Sequoyah's father was a half-blood and his grandfather a white man.

The ''New Georgia Encyclopedia'' presents another version of Sequoyah's origins, from the history ''Tell Them They Lie: The Sequoyah Myth'' (1971), by Traveller Bird, who claims to be a Sequoyah descendant. Bird says that Sequoyah was a full-blood Cherokee who always opposed the submission and assimilation of his people into the white man's culture. The encyclopedia noted that Bird presented no documentary evidence of his assertions, but his account has gained some credibility in academic circles.

In any case, the father was absent before Sequoyah was born. Various explanations have been proposed, but the reason is unknown. Wuh-teh did not marry afterward. Sequoyah had no siblings, and his mother raised him alone. According to Davis, Sequoyah never went to school and never learned English. He and Wuh-teh spoke only Cherokee. As a youth, he spent much of his time tending cattle and working in their garden, while his mother ran a trading post.

Sequoyah became lame early in life; how, when, and where are not known. Some reports indicate this may have been caused by injury in battle; others say the cause was a hunting accident. Davis wrote that an early issue of the ''Cherokee Advocate'' said he "was the victim of a hydrarthritic trouble of the knee joint, commonly called 'white swelling'." One doctor speculated that he had "[[Anasarca|anascara]] [''sic'']". In any case, lameness prevented him from being a successful farmer or warrior.

Despite his lack of schooling, Sequoyah displayed much natural intelligence. As a child, he had devised and built milk troughs and skimmers for the dairy house that he had constructed. As he grew older and came in contact with more white men, he learned how to make jewelry. He became a noted silversmith, creating various items from the silver coins that trappers and traders carried. He never signed his pieces, so there are none that can be positively identified as his work.

Sequoyah may have taken over his mother's trading post after her death, which Davis claimed occurred about the end of the 18th century. His store became an informal meeting place for Cherokee men to socialize and, especially, drink whiskey. Sequoyah developed a great fondness for alcohol and soon spent much of his time drunk. After a few months, he was rarely seen sober, neglecting his farm and trading business, and spending his money buying liquor by the keg.

Eventually, he took up new interests. He began to draw, then he took up blacksmithing, so he could repair the iron farm implements that had recently been introduced to the area by traders. Self-taught as usual, he made his own tools, forge, and bellows. He was soon doing a good business either repairing items or selling items he had created himself. His spurs and bridle bits were in great demand because he liked to decorate them with silver. Although he maintained his store, he both stopped drinking and stopped selling alcohol.

Sequoyah came to believe that one of white people's many advantages was their written language, which allowed them to expand their knowledge, partake in many forms of media, and have a better network of communication. The Cherokees' disadvantage was having to rely solely on memory. This sparked his interest in wanting to create some form of a written language for the Cherokee nation.<ref name="Encyclopedia Britannica-Sequoyah"/>

By 1809, Sequoyah is believed to have started developing what became his Cherokee syllabary, in hopes of unifying the Cherokee nation and making them more independent. In 2008, archeologist Kenneth B. Tankersley (Cherokee Nation) of the University of Cincinnati found carvings from the syllabary in a cave in southeastern Kentucky, where Sequoyah is known to have had relatives. This cave was the traditional burial site of a Cherokee chief, Red Bird. Some 15 identifiable Cherokee syllabary symbols were found carved into the limestone, accompanied by a date of 1808 or 1818. In addition, there were [[petroglyphs]] that appeared to include ancient Cherokee symbols, in addition to bears, deer and birds.

=== Move to Alabama ===
[[File:Horseshoe bend map.jpg|alt=Map of battle lines|thumb|After moving to Alabama, Sequoyah took part in the [[Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)|Battle of Horseshoe Bend]].]]It is unclear when Sequoyah moved to Alabama from Tennessee. Many Cherokee began migrating there even before ceding their land around Sequoyah's birthplace in 1819, as they were under continual pressure by European-American settlers. Some sources claim he went with his mother, though there is no confirmed date for her death. Others have stated that it was around 1809 when he started his work on the Cherokee syllabary. Another source claims it was in 1818.{{Cn|date=March 2024}} However, this date is too late, because Sequoyah was already living in Alabama when he enlisted in the army.{{Original research inline|date=March 2024}}

In 1813–1814, Sequoyah served as a warrior of the Cherokee Regiment, commanded by Colonel Gideon Morgan, at the [[Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)|Battle of Horseshoe Bend]] against the "[[Red Sticks]]" (Creek, or Muskogee, renegades). His white comrades called him either George Guess or George Gist. The battle was part of the [[Creek War]], launched by traditional [[Muscogee|Creek]] during the [[War of 1812]] to assert their power within the people and expel the [[European Americans|European-Americans]].

While serving, Sequoyah witnessed the disadvantages of not having a written language. Unlike the white soldiers, he and his fellow Cherokee warriors could not write letters to home, read their military orders, or write down any events or thoughts that occurred during their service. This deepened his determination to create a reading and writing system for the Cherokee language.

In 1817, Sequoyah signed a treaty that traded Cherokee land in the southeast for land in Arkansas. But in 1819, he backed out of the treaty, which resulted in the loss of his first Alabama home, leading him to move to [[Willstown (Cherokee town)|Willstown]] (modern-day Fort Payne), Alabama.<ref name="Oklahoma History"/>

=== Life after the creation of the syllabary ===
Sequoyah completed his syllabary in 1821. It was not immediately accepted by the Cherokee nation, but soon spread. In 1824, Sequoyah was awarded a medal from the Cherokee National Council and also moved from Alabama to Arkansas.

Four years later, he was one of the "[[Old Settlers|Old Settler]]" delegates that went to Washington, D.C., to sign the treaty that exchanged the Cherokee land in Arkansas for [[Indian Territory]] (modern-day Oklahoma).<ref name="Oklahoma History" />

In 1829, Sequoyah settled in present-day [[Sallisaw, Oklahoma]], with his wife and daughter. In 1838, the Cherokees from the southeast were moved to Indian Territory under Chief [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]]. After this, Sequoyah set out to unite the 16 other Old Settlers with the Ross Party because they already had established their own government. In 1839, Sequoyah and the 16 other Old Settlers and about 15 representatives of the Ross party signed the Act of Union, thereby creating a new Cherokee constitution.<ref name="Oklahoma History" /><ref>{{Cite web|last=Chavez |first=Will |title=1839 Cherokee Constitution born from Act of Union|url=https://www.cherokeephoenix.org/news/1839-cherokee-constitution-born-from-act-of-union/article_5621e3f8-f65c-5990-8af2-c889b21b0abc.html|access-date=2021-03-19|website=cherokeephoenix.org|date=26 August 2014 }}</ref>

Soon afterward,{{When|date=April 2025}} Sequoyah went to Mexico in search for Cherokees who had migrated there. He was hoping to spread his teachings of the syllabary and convince the migrated Cherokees to move to Indian Territory.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Sequoyah|url=http://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-2159|access-date=2021-03-19|website=Encyclopedia of Alabama}}</ref>

==Syllabary and Cherokee literacy==
As a silversmith, Sequoyah dealt regularly with European Americans who had settled in the area. He was impressed by their [[writing]], and referred to their correspondence as "talking leaves". He knew that the papers represented a way to transmit information to other people in distant places, which his fellow American soldiers were able to do but he and other indigenous people could not. A majority of the Cherokee assumed that writing was either sorcery, witchcraft, a special gift, or a pretense; Sequoyah accepted none of these explanations. He said that he could invent a way for Cherokees to talk on paper, even though his friends and family thought the idea was absurd.<ref name="Davis-1930">{{cite journal|last=Davis|first=John B.|url=http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles/v008/v008p149.html|title=The Life and Work of Sequoyah|journal=Chronicles of Oklahoma|year=1930|volume=8|access-date=20 November 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171028175529/http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles/v008/v008p149.html|archive-date=28 October 2017|url-status=dead|issue=2}}</ref>

===Creation===
{{Main|Cherokee syllabary}}
[[File:Cherokee syllabary Sequoyah's original order.png|thumb|left|Sequoyah's syllabary in the order that he originally arranged the characters]]
Around 1809, Sequoyah began creating a system of writing for the Cherokee language. Initially, he pursued a [[Pictogram|pictograph]] or [[Logogram|logographic]] system, where every word in the language had a character or symbol. Turning his attention away from his agricultural fields, which endangered his survival, his friends and neighbors thought he had lost his mind. His wife is said to have burned his initial work, regarding it to be [[witchcraft]], a notion shared by some of his peers.<ref name="National Geographic Society-2019" /> Ultimately, he realized that the pictograph approach was impractical because it would require too many pictures to be remembered.

He then tried making a symbol for each idea, but this also proved impractical.

Sequoyah's third approach was to develop a symbol for each syllable in the language. He used the Bible as a reference, along with adaptations from English, Greek, and Hebrew letters. By 1821, he had created a set of 86 symbols (later streamlined to 85), each depicting a consonant-vowel sequence or a syllable of the Cherokee language. The symbols can be written in a chart layout, with the columns being each vowel and the rows being each consonant.<ref name="Wilford-2009">{{cite news|author=Wilford, John Noble|date=22 June 2009|title=Carvings From Cherokee Script's Dawn|work=New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/23/science/23cherokee.html|access-date=23 June 2009}}</ref>

===Teaching the syllabary===
Sequoyah's six-year-old daughter, Ayokeh (also spelled Ayoka),<ref name="Wilford-2009"/> was the first person to learn it. News spread that they had created a new way to communicate, and they were charged and brought to trial by the town chief.{{Why|date=April 2025}} Sequoyah and Ayokeh were separated{{When|date=April 2025}} but still communicated by sending letters to one another. In time, the warriors overseeing the trial, along with the entire town, came to believe that Sequoyah had truly created a new form of communication—and they eagerly asked him to teach it to them.<ref name="National Geographic Society-2019"/>

He traveled to the Indian Reserves in the [[Arkansas Territory]], where some Cherokee had settled west of the Mississippi River. To demonstrate the value of his syllabary, Sequoyah invited each local leader to say a word aloud. He carefully wrote each one down, then called in his daughter to read the words back. Impressed and intrigued, the leaders agreed to let Sequoyah teach the syllabary to a few members of the community. The lessons took several months, during which rumors circulated that he might be practicing sorcery. When the training was complete, Sequoyah conducted a final test: he dictated a letter to each student and then read aloud their dictated responses. This successful demonstration convinced the western Cherokee that he had indeed created a practical and powerful writing system.

When Sequoyah visited the eastern tribes, he carried a sealed envelope containing a written speech from a Cherokee leader in Arkansas. By reading the speech aloud, he convinced the eastern Cherokee of the value of his system. From there, the syllabary quickly spread, taught across Cherokee towns and villages throughout the East.<ref>{{cite news|author=G. C.|date=13 August 1820|title=Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet|volume=1|work=Cherokee Phoenix|number=24}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Boudinot|first=Elias|date=1 April 1832|title=Invention of a New Alphabet|journal=American Annals of Education}}</ref>

By 1830, as many as 90% of Cherokees were literate in their own language.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lewis |first=Aimee |title=Cherokee Nation |url=https://www.ou.edu/gaylord/exiled-to-indian-country/content/cherokee-nation |access-date=2024-11-20 |website=www.ou.edu |language=en-US |quote=At the time of its removal [beginning in 1830-1838], the Cherokee Nation was well-established with a successful government, an agricultural economy, a tribal religion and spoken and written languages. The tribe had a 90 percent literacy rate.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Buchanan |first=Jim |date=2023-08-02 |title=Celebrating the ongoing fight to keep the Cherokee language alive |url=https://www.thesylvaherald.com/history/article_5a4a6574-314c-11ee-a316-67a8592c409e.html |access-date=2024-11-20 |website=The Sylva Herald |language=en}}</ref>
[[File:Cherokee Syllabary Chart.png|thumb|289x289px|A syllabary chart read left to right]]

===Use in official documents and print===
[[File:Cherokeephoenix-5-1828.png|225px|right|thumb|''Cherokee Phoenix'', 1828]]
In 1825, the Cherokee Nation officially adopted the writing system, making them one of the first indigenous groups to have a functional written language. By the end of the year, the Bible and hymns were translated into Cherokee. In 1826, the Cherokee National Council commissioned George Lowrey and David Brown to translate and print eight copies of the laws of the Cherokee Nation in the Cherokee language.

In 1828, religious pamphlets, educational materials, and legal documents were all made using the syllabary. A newspaper was founded, the ''[[Cherokee Phoenix]],'' the first bilingual newspaper in North America.<ref name="Encyclopedia Britannica-Cherokee">{{Cite web|title=Cherokee language {{!}} Description & Facts|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cherokee-language|access-date=2021-03-19|website=Encyclopedia Britannica}}</ref> This newspaper helped maintain unity within the dispersed Cherokee Nation by providing them with their own network for communication and information sharing.

The syllabary was used for over 100 years to make newspapers, books, religious texts, and almanacs (calendars).<ref name="Omniglot">{{Cite web |title=Cherokee language, writing system and pronunciation |url=https://omniglot.com/writing/cherokee.htm |access-date=2021-03-19 |website=omniglot.com}}</ref>

When the Cherokee Nation purchased their first printing press, some of Sequoyah's handwritten symbols needed to be modified. To make the symbols clearer, they were replaced by adaptations from the Roman alphabet and used in the syllabary from that point on.<ref name="Encyclopedia Britannica-Cherokee"/>

==Life in Indian Territory==
After the Nation officially adopted his syllabary in 1825, Sequoyah traveled to Cherokee lands in the Arkansas Territory, where he established a [[blacksmith]] shop and a salt works. He also continued to teach the syllabary to anyone eager to learn.

In 1828, Sequoyah traveled to Washington, D.C., as part of a delegation negotiating a treaty for land in the planned Indian Territory. While there, he sat for a formal portrait painted by [[Charles Bird King]] (see image at the top of this article), in which he holds a copy of the syllabary in his left hand and smokes a long-stemmed pipe. During his visit, Sequoyah also met with representatives from other Native American tribes. Inspired by these encounters, he resolved to create a universal syllabary that could be used across different tribes. Pursuing this vision, he journeyed into areas of present-day [[Arizona]] and [[New Mexico]] to meet with western tribes.

In 1829, Sequoyah moved to a location on [[Big Skin Bayou]], where he built [[Sequoyah's Cabin]] that became his home for the rest of his life. It was declared a [[National Historic Landmark]] in 1965.<ref>{{Citation |last=Joseph Scott Mendinghall |title=National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Sequoyah's Cabin |date=9 December 1975 |url={{NHLS url|id=66000634}} |publisher=National Park Service |format=pdf}} and {{NHLS url|id=66000634|title=''Accompanying 4 photos from 1975.''|photos=y}} {{small|(1.11 MB)}}</ref> (The present-day city of Sallisaw, Oklahoma, developed near here.) The house was operated by the [[Oklahoma Historical Society]] until it was purchased by the [[Cherokee Nation]] on 9 November 2016.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2016/11/10/cherokee-nation-purchases-sequoyahs-cabin-oklahoma-historical-society-166402|title=143 Years Later, Apology for a Wrongful, and Public, Hanging|date=24 November 2012}}</ref>

In 1839, as the Cherokee Nation remained bitterly divided over the issue of removal to Indian Territory, Sequoyah joined forces with [[Jesse Bushyhead]] in an effort to reunify the Nation. Representing the Western Cherokee, Sequoyah, and representing the Eastern Cherokee, Bushyhead made a joint appeal at a tribal council meeting in Takatoka on June 20, 1839. Their efforts succeeded, with the council approving by voice vote the call for a new national meeting to address reunification. This gathering ultimately led to the creation of the Act of Union and the drafting of a new Cherokee Constitution.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Chavez |first=Will |title=1839 Cherokee Constitution born from Act of Union|url=https://www.cherokeephoenix.org/news/1839-cherokee-constitution-born-from-act-of-union/article_5621e3f8-f65c-5990-8af2-c889b21b0abc.html|access-date=2021-03-19|website=cherokeephoenix.org|date=26 August 2014 }}</ref>

==Final journey and death==
[[File:Map-of-Zaragoza-Coahuila-México.jpg|thumb|1885 map of Zaragoza, Coahuila, México. Notice in parentheses (S. Fernando de Rosas).]]
Sequoyah dreamed of seeing reunification of the splintered Cherokee Nation. In the spring of 1842, he began a trip to locate other Cherokee bands who were believed to have fled to Mexico and attempted to persuade them to return to the Cherokee Nation, by then mostly residing in Indian Territory. He was accompanied by his son, Teesy (Chusaleta), as well as other Cherokee men identified as Co-tes-ka, Nu-wo-ta-na, Cah-ta-ta, Co-wo-si-ti, John Elijah, and The Worm:<ref name="Davis-1930"/>

{{Blockquote|text="In the summer of 1842, influenced perhaps by a desire to explore the Western prairies, and become acquainted with his Red Brethren, who roam them free and untrammlled {{sic}}, Se-quo-yah, having loaded several pack horses with goods, visited, in company with a number of Cherokees, the [[Cumanche]] Indians. After remaining with them some time, he made his way with a son and two or three other Cherokees, into Northern Mexico, toward Chi-hua-hua, and engaged a while in teaching the Mexicans his native language."|title=''Mississippi Democrat'', Carrollton, Mississippi, Wednesday Morning, January 22, 1845<ref>
{{cite news
| title = Se-quo-yah, or George Guess
| newspaper = Mississippi Democrat
| date = 22 January 1845
}}
</ref>}}

Sometime between 1843 and 1845, he died due to an estimated respiratory infection during a trip to San Fernando de Rosas in Coahuila, [[Mexico]]. A letter written in 1845 by accompanying Cherokee stated that he had died in 1843:<ref name="Davis-1930" />

{{blockquote|
Warren's Trading House, Red River, 
April 21st, 1845. 
We, the undersigned Cherokees, direct from the Spanish Dominions, do hereby certify that George Guess of the Cherokee Nation, Arkansas, departed this life in the town of San-fernando in the month of August, 1843, and his son Chusaleta is at this time on the Brasos River, Texas, about thirty miles above the falls, and he intends returning home this fall. Given under our hands the day and date written. 
 
STANDING X ROCK (his mark) 
STANDING X BOWLES (his mark) 
WATCH X JUSTICE (his mark) 
 
WITNESSES 
Daniel G. Watson 
[[Jesse Chisholm]]
}}

The village of San Fernando de Rosas was later renamed as [[Zaragoza Municipality, Coahuila|Zaragoza]].

In 1938, the [[Cherokee Nation]] [[Principal Chiefs of the Cherokee|Principal Chief]] [[J. B. Milam]] funded an expedition to find Sequoyah's grave in Mexico.<ref>[http://www.gslis.utexas.edu/~landc/bookplates/34_1_Milam.htm J. B. Milam, McFarlin Library, University of Tulsa.] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060111210839/http://www.gslis.utexas.edu/~landc/bookplates/34_1_Milam.htm |date=11 January 2006 }} ''Libraries & Cultures: Bookplate Archive.'' 2001 (retrieved 23 June 2009)</ref> A party of Cherokee and non-Cherokee scholars embarked from [[Eagle Pass, Texas]], in January 1939. They found a grave site near a fresh water spring in [[Coahuila]], Mexico, but could not conclusively determine the grave site was that of Sequoyah.<ref name="Meredith">Meredith, Howard L. (1985).''Bartley Milam: Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation.'' Muskogee, OK: Indian University Press, p. 47. {{ISBN|0-940392-17-8}}</ref>

In 2011, the ''Muskogee Phoenix'' published an article relating a discovery in 1903 of a gravesite in the [[Wichita Mountains]] by Hayes and Fancher, which they believed was Sequoyah's. The two men said the site was in a cave and contained a human skeleton with one leg shorter than the other, a long-stemmed pipe, two silver medals, a flintlock rifle and an ax. However, the site was far north of the Mexican border.<ref>{{cite news|last=Mullins|first= Jonita|newspaper= Muskogee Phoenix|title=Sequoyah's gravesite remains unknown|date= 13 November 2011|access-date= 6 April 2013|url=http://muskogeephoenix.com/local/x899731031/Sequoyah-s-gravesite-remains-unknown}}</ref>

==International influence==
Sequoyah's work has had international influence, encouraging the development of syllabaries for other previously unwritten languages. The news that an illiterate Cherokee had created a syllabary spread throughout the United States and its territories. A missionary working in northern Alaska read about it and created the syllabary that has become known as [[Cree syllabics]]. This syllabic writing inspired other indigenous groups across Canada to adapt the syllabics to create writing for their languages.<ref name="Unseth-2016"/>

A literate Cherokee emigrated to [[Liberia]], where he discussed his people's syllabary. A [[Bassa language]] speaker of Liberia was inspired to create his own syllabary, and other indigenous groups in West Africa followed suit, creating their own syllabaries.<ref name="Unseth-2016"/>

A missionary in China read about the Cree syllabary and was inspired to follow that example in writing a local language in China. The result of the diffusion of Sequoyah's work has been the development of a total of 21 known scripts, which have been used to write more than 65 languages.<ref name="Unseth-2016">{{cite journal |last1=Unseth |first1=Peter |title=The international impact of Sequoyah's Cherokee syllabary |journal=Written Language & Literacy |date=20 December 2016 |volume=19 |issue=1 |pages=75–93 |doi=10.1075/wll.19.1.03uns |url=https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/wll.19.1.03uns|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

==Legacy==
[[File:Sequoya alphabet.jpg|thumb|150px|Carnegie Museum of Art, Architecture Hall, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Sequoyah Alphabet]]
Due to Sequoyah's contributions and achievements in Cherokee history, there are statues, monuments, museums, and paintings dedicated in his honor across the United States and in various genres.

Science:
* The genus of the coast redwood (''[[Sequoia sempervirens]]'') is named after Sequoyah.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Muleady-Mecham |first1=Nancy E. |title=Endlicher and Sequoia: Determination of the Etymological Origin of the Taxon |journal=Bulletin, Southern California Academy of Sciences |date=August 2017 |volume=116 |issue=2 |pages=137–146 |doi=10.3160/soca-116-02-137-146.1 |s2cid=89925020 |url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/part/292140 }}</ref>

Museums:

* The Carnegie Museum of Art, Architecture Hall, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Sequoyah Alphabet
* The Sequoyah Birthplace Museum in Monroe County, eastern Tennessee, features his life and Cherokee culture.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Simlot |first=Vinay |date=November 8, 2022 |title=After decades, Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians asks federal government to return land |url=https://www.wbir.com/article/news/local/eastern-band-of-cherokee-indians-asks-feds-to-return-land/51-ae73a74b-abfc-4d24-8566-220a2afccbc8 |access-date=2022-11-09 |work=WBIR News 10}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://sequoyahmuseum.org/|title=Sequoyah Birthplace Museum – Sequoyah Birthplace Museum}}</ref>
* In 1964, Sequoyah was inducted into the [[Hall of Great Westerners]] of the [[National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum]]<ref>{{cite web|title=Hall of Great Westerners|url=https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/hall-of-great-westerners/ |access-date=22 November 2019|website=National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum}}</ref>

Paintings and pictures:

* Artist [[Henry Inman (painter)|Henry Inman]] painted a portrait of Sequoyah ca. 1830; it now hangs in the United States [[National Portrait Gallery (United States)|National Portrait Gallery]]<ref>{{Cite web|title=Sequoyah|url=https://npg.si.edu/object/npg_NPG.79.174 |access-date=2020-03-11|website=npg.si.edu}}</ref>
* Sequoyah is pictured on the reverse of the 2017 [[Sacagawea Dollar]] coin

Statues and memorials:

* Oklahoma gave a [[Sequoyah (Ream)|statue of Sequoyah]] to the [[National Statuary Hall Collection]] in 1917. This was the first statue representing a Native American to be placed in the hall. It was created by [[Vinnie Ream]], and is displayed in the Capitol rotunda in Washington, D.C.<ref>{{cite web|title=Explore Capitol Hill|url=http://www.aoc.gov/capitol-hill/national-statuary-hall-collection/sequoyah |access-date=4 April 2013|publisher=Architect of the Capitol}}</ref>
* A monument honoring Chief Sequoyah of the Cherokee Nation was dedicated in September 1932 at [[Calhoun, Georgia]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Monument honoring Chief Sequoyah of the Cherokee Indian Nation. Calhoun, Georgia. September 1932.|url=http://digitalcollections.library.gsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ajc/id/533 |access-date=4 November 2016|website=Atlanta Journal-Constitution Photographic Archive|publisher=Georgia State University Library}}</ref> 34.530286°N 84.936806°W
* 1939, a bronze panel with a raised figure of ''Sequoyah,'' by [[Lee Lawrie]], was erected in his honor at the [[Library of Congress]]
* A Sequoyah memorial was installed in front of the [[Museum of the Cherokee People]] in North Carolina

Landmark:

* [[Sequoyah's Cabin]], where he lived during 1829–1844 in the Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory, was designated a [[National Historic Landmark]] in 1965 in Oklahoma.
Other:
* On 20 December 1980 the [[United States Postal Service]] issued a 19¢ stamp in his honor in the [[Great Americans series]].<ref>{{cite web |date=2014-11-20 |title=Georgia on Stamps |url=http://georgiainfo.galileo.usg.edu/stamps/ |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141120013238/http://georgiainfo.galileo.usg.edu/stamps/ |archive-date=2014-11-20 |access-date=2021-08-18 |website=GeorgiaInfo}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |date=2020-05-08 |title=Sequoyah |url=https://postalmuseum.si.edu/exhibition/the-american-indian-in-postage-stamps-profiles-in-leadership/sequoyah |access-date=2021-08-18 |website=National Postal Museum}}</ref>
* Addressing the exalted place Sequoyah holds in Cherokee imagination, the Cherokee composer and musicologist [[Jack Kilpatrick (composer)|Jack Kilpatrick]] wrote: "Sequoyah was always in the wilderness. He walked about, but he was not a hunter. I wonder what he was looking for."<ref name="Meredith" />
* [[Johnny Cash]] sang about Sequoyah in his 1964 song "[[Bitter Tears: Ballads of the American Indian|The Talking Leaves]]".<ref>{{cite web |title=Songs of Renown: Johnny Cash "The Talking Leaves" |url=https://thestringer.com.au/songs-of-renown-johnny-cash-the-talking-leaves-3212 |website=thestringer.com.au |language=en-AU |date=4 December 2015}}</ref>
* Sequoyah briefly appears as a character in ''[[Unto These Hills]]'', an [[outdoor drama]] that has been performed in [[Cherokee, NC]] since 1950.

In 1824, the General Council of the Eastern Cherokee awarded Sequoyah a large silver medal in honor of the syllabary. According to Davis, one side of the medal bore his image surrounded by the inscription in English, "Presented to George Gist by the General Council of the Cherokee for his ingenuity in the invention of the Cherokee Alphabet." The reverse side showed two long-stemmed pipes and the same inscription written in Cherokee. Sequoyah was said to wear the medal throughout the rest of his life and it was buried with him.{{Cn|date=March 2024}}<gallery widths="154" heights="200" perrow="5">
File:Sequoyah NSHC.jpg|Statue of Sequoyah in [[United States Capitol]]
File:Sequoyah Denkmal, North Carolina.jpg|Sequoyah Memorial in front of the Cherokee Museum in [[North Carolina]]
File:Sequoyah-Lawrie-Highsmith.jpeg|Bronze panel featuring ''Sequoyah'' (1939), by [[Lee Lawrie]]. Library of Congress [[John Adams Building]], Washington, D.C.
</gallery>

== Contemporary use of Cherokee ==
Cherokee is mainly spoken in Oklahoma, North Carolina, and Arkansas; between 1,500 and 2,100 people actively speak Cherokee in these three main areas. A 2018 survey states that there are 1,200 Cherokee speakers who live in the Cherokee nation of Oklahoma, 217 speakers in Eastern North Carolina, and 101 speakers in the [[United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians|United Keetoowah]] tribe of Cherokee in Arkansas, and that the majority of the Cherokee speakers are people over 40.<ref name="Omniglot"/>

Today, in the Cherokee nation (northeast Oklahoma) the syllabary is present on street signs and buildings, is the co-official language with English, and is taught in schools in Oklahoma and North Carolina. The Cherokee nation in the 21st century is trying to integrate this language into people's daily lives. Their goal is to increase immersion programs in schools, encourage older Cherokee members to teach the younger generations, and in 50 years (as of 2008) to have about 80% more fluent Cherokee speakers.{{Cn|date=March 2024}} People of all ages are taught the language, parents and adults, children in schools, and it is offered at several universities in Oklahoma and North Carolina.<ref name="Omniglot"/>

During the time when white settler [[Indian removal|Indian Removal]] policies removed indigenous tribes from their lands, a process now known as the [[Trail of Tears]], the use of the Cherokee language dropped dramatically. Use of any indigenous language in the government-run [[Indian boarding schools]] resulted in some kind of physical punishment.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Lowe |first=John |date=October 2002 |title=Cherokee Self-Reliance |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/104365902236703 |journal=Journal of Transcultural Nursing |volume=13 |issue=4 |pages=287–295 |doi=10.1177/104365902236703 |pmid=12325243 |s2cid=30299719 |issn=1043-6596|url-access=subscription }}</ref> In the late 20th century, there was a revitalization of the Cherokee language with programs, run by three sovereign Cherokee tribes, and online courses.<ref name="Encyclopedia Britannica-Cherokee"/>

==Namesake honors==
* A small Mississippian arrowhead found throughout the Midwest and upper south was named Sequoyah by James Brown in 1968.
* The [[Sequoia (genus)|Sequoia]] trees in California were named ''Sequoia gigantea'' in 1847 by Austrian biologist [[Stephan Endlicher]]. While it was assumed that this was in honor of Sequoyah, this hypothesis has been questioned.<ref>Lowe, Gary D. 2012. Endlicher's sequence: the naming of the genus ''Sequoia''. ''Fremontia'' 40, nos. 1 & 2: 25–35.</ref> Twenty-first century research in Austria has established that Endlicher, also a published linguist, was familiar with Sequoyah's work.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Muleady-Mecham|first1=Nancy|title=Endlicher and Sequoia: Determination of the Entymological (''sic'') Origin of the Taxon Sequoia|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200723063057/https://scholar.oxy.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3250&context=scas|archive-date=2020-07-23|url=http://scholar.oxy.edu/scas/vol116/iss2/6/ |journal=Bulletin of the Southern California Academy of Sciences|access-date=15 March 2025|volume=116|issue=2|pages=137–146|doi=10.3160/soca-116-02-137-146.1 }}</ref> See [[Chief Sequoyah (tree)|Chief Sequoyah]], a Sequoia tree in [[Sequoia National Park]].
* A crystalline chemical compound found by distilling the needles of the trees was described by [[Georg Lunge]] and Th. Steinkaukler in 1880 and named [[sequoiene]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k90691m |title=Berichte der Deutschen chemischen Gesellschaft zu Berlin|first=Deutsche chemische|last=Gesellschaft|date=1 July 1880}}</ref>
* The caterpillar of the sequoia-borer moth, a sesiid moth, was named ''[[Bembecia sequoiae]]''.<ref name="Davis-1930"/><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=D2M_RRYDDecC&pg=PA68 Scheidt, Laurel. ''Hiking Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks.'' Guilford, CT: Globe Pequot Press, 2002: 68]. {{ISBN|978-0-7627-1122-2}} (retrieved through Google books, 23 June 2009)</ref>
* During the [[Sequoyah Constitutional Convention]] in 1905, the proposed [[State of Sequoyah]] was named in his honor, and merged with [[Oklahoma Territory]] to form the new State of Oklahoma in 1906.<ref name="Davis-1930"/><ref>Mize, Richard, [http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/S/SE021.html "Sequoyah Convention] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131016035543/http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/S/SE021.html |date=2013-10-16 }}," ''Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture''. (accessed May 30, 2010)</ref><ref>Wilson, Linda D., "[http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/S/ST025.html Statehood Movement]," ''Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture''. (accessed May 30, 2010)</ref>
* The name of the district where Sequoyah lived in present-day Oklahoma was changed to the Sequoyah District in 1851. When [[Oklahoma Enabling Act|Oklahoma was admitted to the union in 1906]], that area was recorded as [[Sequoyah County, Oklahoma|Sequoyah County]].<ref name="Davis-1930"/>
* [[Sequoyah Research Center]] is dedicated to collecting and archiving Native American writing and literature.
* [[Mount Sequoyah]] in the [[Great Smoky Mountains]].
* Mount Sequoyah in [[Fayetteville, Arkansas]], was named in honor of him after the city donated the top of East Mountain to the Methodist Assembly for a retreat.
* The [[Sequoyah Hills, Tennessee|Sequoyah Hills]] neighborhood of [[Knoxville, Tennessee]].
* The [[Tennessee Valley Authority]] [[Sequoyah Nuclear Plant]] was named for him.
* The Sequoyah Marina on Norris Lake in Tennessee, upstream from [[Norris Dam]] on the Clinch River.
* The [[USS Sequoia (presidential yacht)|USS ''Sequoia'']] was a yacht officially used for decades by American presidents (it is now privately owned).
* Sequoyah Caverns and Ellis Homestead is in [[Valley Head, Alabama]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.sequoyahcaverns.com/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19991127232257/http://sequoyahcaverns.com/ |url-status=usurped |archive-date=27 November 1999 |title=Sequoyah Caverns and Ellis Homestead}}</ref>
* Sequoyah Country Club, Oakland, California<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.sequoyahcc.com |title=Welcome to Sequoyah Country Club |access-date=2 September 2010}}</ref>
* [[Sequoyah Council]] – A Scouting America Council located in Northeast Tennessee.
* The [[Sequoyah Book Award]] is chosen annually by students in Oklahoma.
* The [[macOS Sequoia]]
* Many schools have been named for him, including
** Sequoyah High School, (now a middle school) Doraville, Georgia (Designed by architect John Portman)
{{div col|colwidth=30em}}
:*[[College of the Sequoias]], [[Visalia]], California
:*[[Sequoyah High School (Georgia)]], Canton ([[Cherokee County, Georgia|Cherokee County]]), Georgia
:*[[Sequoyah High School (Tahlequah, Oklahoma)|Sequoyah High School (Oklahoma)]], a Native American boarding school in Tahlequah, Oklahoma
:*[[Sequoyah High School (Tennessee)]], Madisonville, Tennessee
:*[[Sequoia High School (Redwood City, California)]]
:*Sequoya Elementary School, Tahlequah, Oklahoma
:*Sequoyah Elementary School, Shawnee, Oklahoma
:*Sequoia Junior High School, Simi Valley, California
:*Sequoyah Elementary School, Tulsa, Oklahoma
:*Sequoia Elementary School, San Diego, California
:*Sequoya Elementary School, Russellville, Arkansas
:*Sequoya Middle School, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma
:*Sequoya Elementary School, Derwood, Maryland
:*Sequoyah School, Pasadena, California
{{div col end}}

==See also==
* [[History of writing]]
* [[Bob Benge]], Cherokee leader
* [[Old Tassel]]
* [[List of people who disappeared mysteriously: pre-1970|List of people who disappeared]]
* [[Hastings Shade]] (1941–2010), fifth-generation direct descendant of Sequoyah
* [[Tahlonteeskee (Cherokee chief)]]
* [[Tenevil]]
* [[Uyaquq]]

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Bibliography==
{{Refbegin|30em}}
*Bender, Margaret. (2002) ''Signs of Cherokee Culture: Sequoyah's Syllabary in Eastern Cherokee Life''. Chapel Hill: [[University of North Carolina Press]].
*Feeling, Durbin. ''Cherokee-English Dictionary: Tsalagi-Yonega Didehlogwasdohdi''. Tahlequah, Oklahoma: Cherokee Nation, 1975: xvii
*Holmes, Ruth Bradley; Betty Sharp Smith (1976). ''Beginning Cherokee: Talisgo Galiquogi Dideliquasdodi Tsalagi Digoweli.'' Norman: [[University of Oklahoma Press]]. {{ISBN|0-8061-1362-6}}.
*Foreman, Grant, ''Sequoyah'', University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK, 1938.
*Langguth, A. J. ''Driven West: Andrew Jackson and the Trail of Tears to the Civil War''. New York, Simon & Schuster. 2010. {{ISBN|978-1-4165-4859-1}}.
*McKinney, Thomas and Hall, James, ''History of the Indian Tribes of North America''. (Philadelphia, PA, 1837–1844).
*McLoughlin, William G., ''After the Trail of Tears: The Cherokees' Struggle for Sovereignty 1839–1880''. University of North Carolina Press. Chapel Hill. 1993. {{ISBN|0-8078-2111-X}}.
*{{Cite book |title=The world's writing systems |date=2007 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-195-07993-7 |editor-last=Daniels |editor-first=Peter T. |location=New York |editor-last2=Bright |editor-first2=William |pages=587–592 |first=Janine |last=Scancarelli |chapter=Cherokee Writing}}
{{Refend}}

==External links==
{{Commons category}}
{{Americana Poster|Sequoyah}}
* [http://www.wcu.edu/library/DigitalCollections/CherokeePhoenix/Vol1/no24/pg2col1a-2a.htm "Invention of the Cherokee Alphabet"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150322051150/http://www.wcu.edu/library/DigitalCollections/CherokeePhoenix/Vol1/no24/pg2col1a-2a.htm |date=22 March 2015 }}, ''Cherokee Phoenix'', 13 August 1828
* [http://www.tiro.com/syllabics/Cherokee/Sequoyah.html "Sequoyah"], Tiro Typeworks
* [http://ngeorgia.com/ang/Sequoyah(a.k.a_George_Gist) "Sequoyah (aka George Gist)", a North Georgia Notable]
* [http://www.cherokee.org/ The Cherokee Nation Official Website]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110508105121/http://www.cherokee.org/PressRoom/Downloads/3/Default.aspx "The Official Cherokee Font"] at the Cherokee Nation Official Website
*{{Cite AmCyc|wstitle=Guess, George |short=x}}
* [https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/sequoyah "Sequoyah"], [[NCpedia]]

{{Cherokee}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sequoyah}}
[[Category:1770s births]]
[[Category:1843 deaths]]
[[Category:1840s missing person cases]]
[[Category:18th-century Native American people]]
[[Category:19th-century American inventors]]
[[Category:American blacksmiths]]
[[Category:American writers with disabilities]]
[[Category:American silversmiths]]
[[Category:Creators of writing systems]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation people (1794–1907)]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation politicians (1794–1907)]]
[[Category:Missing person cases in Mexico]]
[[Category:Native Americans in the War of 1812]]
[[Category:People from Knox County, Tennessee]]
[[Category:People from Tennessee in the War of 1812]]
[[Category:People of the Creek War]]
[[Category:Native American tribal government officials in Indian Territory]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation military personnel (1794–1907)]]
[[Category:American politicians with disabilities]]

Elias Boudinot (Cherokee)

2025-08-27T01:04:26Z

2600:4040:2F83:7300:F6E7:9C1F:9AF1:1761: wording cleanup

{{short description|American Indian leader (1802–1839)}}
{{for|his son|Elias Cornelius Boudinot}}
{{Use American English|date=June 2021}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2021}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Elias Boudinot
| native_name = ᎦᎴᎩᎾ ᎤᏪᏘ
| native_name_lang = chr
| image = Elias Boudinot (1802–1839).jpg
| caption = Muriel Wright Collection, [[Oklahoma Historical Society]]
| other names = Buck Watie
| birth_date = 1802
| birth_place = Oothcaloga, [[Cherokee Nation (1794–1907)|Cherokee Nation]] (present-day [[Calhoun, Georgia]]), U.S.
| spouse= {{plainlist|
* {{marriage|[[Harriet R. Gold Boudinot|Harriet Boudinot]]|1823|1836|end=died}}
* {{marriage|Delight Boudinot|1837}}
}}
| children = [[Elias Cornelius Boudinot|E. C. Boudinot]] (son)
| death_date = {{death date and age|1839|6|22|1802|mf=y}}
| death_place = [[Park Hill, Oklahoma|Park Hill]], Cherokee Nation West (present-day [[Oklahoma]]), U.S.
| resting_place = Worcester Mission Cemetery, Park Hill, Oklahoma, U.S.
| relatives = [[Stand Watie]] (brother)
| signature = Elias Boudinot signature.jpg
}}
'''Elias Boudinot''' ({{langx|chr|ᎦᎴᎩᎾ ᎤᏩᏘ|translit=Gallegina Uwati}}; 1802{{spaced ndash}}June 22, 1839; also known as '''Buck Watie''') was a writer, newspaper editor, and leader of the [[Cherokee Nation]].<ref name="Ricky2000">{{cite book|author=Donald B. Ricky|title=Encyclopedia of Mississippi Indians: Tribes, Natives, Treaties of the Southeastern Woodlands Area|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nca4e2mZzWgC|access-date=15 November 2012|year=2000|publisher=North American Book Dist LLC|isbn=978-0-403-09778-4|pages=44–45}}</ref> He was a member of a prominent family, and was born and grew up in Cherokee territory, now part of present-day Georgia. Born to parents of mixed Cherokee and European ancestry and educated at the [[Foreign Mission School]] in [[Connecticut]], he became one of several leaders who thought that [[acculturation]] was critical to Cherokee survival. He was influential in the period of removal to [[Indian Territory]].

In 1826, Boudinot had married [[Harriet R. Gold Boudinot|Harriet R. Gold]], the daughter of a prominent New England family in [[Cornwall, Connecticut]]. He met her while a student at the FMS in town. Following his cousin [[John Ridge]]'s marriage to a local woman there in 1825, Boudinot's marriage was controversial and opposed by many townspeople. But to protect their future children, the Cherokee National Council had passed a law in 1825 enabling the descendants of Cherokee fathers and white mothers to be full citizens of the Cherokee. (Formerly, they had no official place in the [[matrilineal]] tribe, as children belong to their mother's [[clan]] and people, and the white women were outsiders.) The Boudinots returned to Cherokee homelands (now in Georgia) to live at New Echota. They reared their six children as Cherokee.

Boudinot, with numerous other leading Cherokee, particularly those who had been educated outside the tribe, thought that removal was inevitable in the face of the numbers of United States settlers encroaching on their lands. He and several allies signed the [[Treaty of New Echota]] in 1835, seeking to gain the best conditions for their people. Cession of communal lands was adamantly opposed by [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]], the Principal Chief, and the full-blood members of tribe, who comprised the majority. The following year, the tribe was forced to cede most of its lands in the Southeast, and remove to west of the Mississippi River in [[Indian Territory]] in the late 1830s.

After Harriet died in 1836, Boudinot moved with his children to Indian Territory. After Removal, in June 1839 he and three other Treaty Party leaders were assassinated there by members of the Ross faction, known as the National Party. The orphaned Boudinot children were sent to be raised by his parents-in-law in Cornwall, Connecticut, which was believed more safe. They attended school there. After Boudinot's son [[Elias Cornelius Boudinot|E. C.]] was educated, he returned west, settling in [[Fayetteville, Arkansas]]. He became an attorney and active in tribal and Democratic Party politics. He represented the Cherokee Nation in the Confederate Congress as a non-voting delegate.

Boudinot appears as a character in [[Unto These Hills]], an [[outdoor drama]] that has been performed in [[Cherokee, NC]] since 1950.

==Early life and education==
''Gallegina'' was born in 1802 into a leading Cherokee family in their territory. (It is now present-day Georgia.) He was the eldest son of nine children of Uwati and Susanna Reese, who was of mixed Cherokee and European ancestry. When Uwati converted to Christianity, Boudinot took the name of David Uwatie (later he dropped the "u" from his name.) Gallegina's younger brothers were ''Degataga'', better known as [[Stand Watie]], who served with the [[Confederate Army]] during the [[American Civil War]] and served as Principal Chief (1862-1866); and Thomas Watie. They were the nephews of [[Major Ridge]] and cousins of [[John Ridge]].

Gallegina Watie, the Ridges, [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]], and [[Charles R. Hicks]] and his son Elijah Hicks, came to form the ruling elite of the [[Cherokee Nation (19th century)|Cherokee Nation]] in the early nineteenth century. All were of [[mixed race]] and had some European-American education; the tribal chiefs had worked to prepare these young men to deal with the United States and its representatives.

Gallegina's Christian education began in 1808, at the age of 6, when Boudinot studied at the local [[Moravian Church|Moravian]] missionary school. In 1812, he joined the Spring Place school, in what is now [[Murray County, Georgia|Murray County]]. Around this time, Cherokee leaders were petitioning the government for aid to educate their children, as they wanted to learn aspects of white civilization.<ref name="parins-3">Parins, p. 3</ref>

[[Elias Cornelius]], an agent from the [[American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions]] (ABCFM), came to the community and served to support local education and recruit older students to study in the North. In 1817, the ABCFM opened the [[Foreign Mission School]] in [[Cornwall, Connecticut]] for educating promising students from foreign, non-Christian cultures, as well as Native American cultures. In 1818, Cornelius selected Gallegina Watie, [[John Ridge]], and a few others to go to the [[Foreign Mission School]]. On the journey there, they were introduced to Virginia statesmen [[Thomas Jefferson]] and [[James Monroe]].

In [[Burlington, New Jersey]], the young men met [[Elias Boudinot]], president of the [[American Bible Society]] and a former member and president of the [[Second Continental Congress]]. He and Watie impressed each other, and Watie asked Boudinot for permission to use his name, which he gave. When enrolled at the Foreign Mission School, Watie started using the name Elias Boudinot, which he kept for the rest of his life.<ref name="parins-3" />

In 1820, Boudinot officially converted to Christianity, attracted to its message of universal love. His Christian belief informed his later work with the Cherokee Nation. In 1824, Boudinot collaborated with others in translating the [[New Testament]] into Cherokee and having it printed in the [[syllabary]] created by [[Sequoyah]].

==Marriage and family==
While studying in Connecticut, Boudinot met [[Harriet R. Gold Boudinot|Harriet Ruggles Gold]], the daughter of a prominent local family who supported the Foreign Mission School. Her family often invited Boudinot and other Native American students to their home. After Boudinot returned to Cherokee Nation because of illness, he courted Harriet by letter.

His cousin [[John Ridge]] also attended the school and in 1824 married a local young woman. This caused considerable controversy in Cornwall, as many townspeople opposed the marriage. After the Ridges' return to New Echota to live, in 1825 the National Council passed a law providing full Cherokee citizenship to children of a Cherokee father and white mother.<ref name="Yarbough">Yarbough, Fay. "Legislating Women’s Sexuality: Cherokee Marriage Laws," ''Journal of Social History'' 38 (2004), p. 388</ref>

In the Cherokee [[matrilineal]] kinship culture, children traditionally belonged to the mother's clan and took their status from her people. The Cherokee had long absorbed the mixed-race children of Cherokee mothers and white fathers (usually fur traders). But, the children of Ridge and Boudinot would have had no place in the Cherokee society without the Council's new law, as white women were outsiders and their children would not be considered Cherokee.<ref name="Yarbough"/> Historian Theresa Strouth Gaul wrote that the law was inspired by Ridge's marriage and Boudinot's engagement; as the young men were elite Cherokee, it protected the status of their future children.<ref>Gaul, (2005), p. 16</ref>

When Boudinot and Gold first announced their engagement, it was strongly opposed by her family and the Congregational Church. There were also local protests. Gold persisted and finally gained her parents' permission. The couple were married on 28 March 1826 at her home.<ref>Parins, pp. 5–6</ref> Local hostility to the marriage, the second between a Cherokee student and a white woman, forced the closing of the Foreign Mission School.<ref name="Pulley"/><ref>Langguth, (2010), p. 58.</ref><ref>Yarbrough, Fay. "Legislating Women's Sexuality: Cherokee Marriage Laws," ''Journal of Social History'' 38 (2004), p. 388</ref><ref>Gaul, Theresa Strouth, Ed. ''To Marry an Indian: The Marriage of Harriett Gold and Elias Boudinot in Letters, 1823–1839.'' Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2005, p. 16</ref>

The Boudinots returned to New Echota to live. They had six surviving children: Eleanor Susan; Mary Harriett; William Penn; Sarah Parkhill, Elias Cornelius; and Franklin Brinsmade. Five of the children later married and had families of their own.<ref>Gaul, Theresa Strouth, (2005), p. 146</ref>

Harriet Boudinot died in August 1836, likely of complications from childbirth; she died some months after her seventh child was [[stillborn]].<ref>Gabriel, Ralph Henry. ''Elias Boudinot Cherokee and His America.'' Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1941, p. 158</ref>

==Career as editor==
After his return to New Echota, in 1828 Boudinot was selected by the General Council of the Cherokee as editor for a newspaper, the first to be published by a Native American nation. He worked with a new friend [[Samuel Worcester]], a missionary and printer. Worcester had new type created and cast for the new forms of the Cherokee [[syllabary]]. In 1828, the two printed the ''Cherokee Phoenix'' in Cherokee and English. While planned as a bi-lingual newspaper, the ''Phoenix'' published most of its articles in English; under Boudinot, about 16 percent of the content was published in Cherokee.

The journalist Ann Lackey Landini believes that Boudinot emphasized English in the newspaper because the Cherokee Nation intended it to be a means to explain their people to European Americans and prove they had an admirable civilization.<ref>Landini, Ann Lackey; ''The Cherokee Phoenix: The Voice of the Cherokee Nation, 1828–1834,'' PhD dissertation; The University of Tennessee; Knoxville, TN; 1990</ref> At the same time, the Council intended it to unite the Cherokee through the Southeast. The ''Phoenix'' regularly published new laws and other national Cherokee political information in the paper.

Between 1828 and 1832, Boudinot wrote numerous editorials arguing against [[Indian Removal|removal]], as proposed by Georgia and supported by President [[Andrew Jackson]]. After Congress passed the [[Indian Removal Act]] of 1830, federal pressure on the Cherokee increased. Jackson supported removal of the Cherokee and other Southeastern peoples from their eastern homelands to [[Indian Territory]] west of the Mississippi in order to make land available for European-American development. Over a roughly four-year period, Boudinot's editorials emphasized that Georgia's disregard of the Constitution and past federal treaties with the Cherokee would not only hurt Cherokee progress in acculturating, but threatened the fabric of the Union. Boudinot's articles recounted the elements of Cherokee assimilation (conversion to Christianity, an increasingly Western-educated population, and a turn toward lives as herdsmen and farmers, etc.) He criticized the "easy" way in which treaty language was distorted by Indian Removal advocates for their own purposes.<ref>"Selections from the 'Cherokee Phoenix' – The Cherokee Editor"; Perdue, Theda, editor; ''The Writings of Elias Boudinot,''; The University of Tennessee Press; Knoxville, TN; 1983; pp. 87–53.</ref>

In 1832, while on a speaking tour of [[Northern United States|the North]] to raise funds for the ''Phoenix,'' Boudinot learned that, in ''[[Worcester v. Georgia]],'' the [[Supreme Court of the United States|US Supreme Court]] had sustained the Cherokee rights to political and territorial sovereignty within Georgia's borders. He soon learned that President Jackson still supported Indian Removal. In this context, Boudinot began advocating for his people to secure the best possible terms with the US by making a binding treaty of removal, as he believed it was inevitable. His changed position was widely opposed by the Cherokee.

The National Council and [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]], the Principal Chief, opposed removal, as did the majority of the people. Former allies in the Cherokee government turned against Boudinot and other "treaty advocates," who included John Ridge and Major Ridge. Opponents attacked the men's loyalty and prevented their speaking in councils. Ross denounced Boudinot's "toleration of diversified views in the ''Cherokee Phoenix'' and forbade Boudinot from discussing pro-removal arguments in the paper. In protest, Boudinot resigned in the spring of 1832.<ref>Wilkins, Thurman. ''Cherokee Tragedy: The Story of the Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People,'' pp. 235–237, 242–244. London: The Macmillan Company, 1970.</ref> Ross' brother-in-law, Elijah Hicks, replaced Boudinot as editor.<ref>Langguth, p. 197</ref>

In 1959, he was inducted into the [[Georgia Newspaper Hall of Fame]] in recognition of his newspaper work.<ref name=Smyly>{{cite news|title=Ike Scored On Secret Fund Use |author=Smyly, John | newspaper=Atlanta Constitution | pages=1, 5 | date=February 21, 1959 | url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/54544950/ike-scored-on-secret-fund-use-pages-1/ | via=newspapers.com | access-date=July 1, 2020 }}</ref>

==Literary works==

===''Cherokee Phoenix''===
The first newspaper published by a Native American tribe gave a "voice to the American insiders" who had been forced to become "outsiders".<ref name="parins-9">Parins, p. 9</ref> The premier edition of the newspaper was called the ''Tsalagi Tsu-le-hi-sa-nu-hi''; it was printed on 21 February 1828.<ref name="parins-9" /> The ''Cherokee Phoenix'' office regularly received correspondence from about 100 other newspapers, published far and wide, because it was so respected throughout the United States and Europe.{{Citation needed|date=April 2011}} In 1829, the second edition of the ''Cherokee Phoenix'' was named the ''Cherokee Phoenix and Indians’ Advocate,'' indicating Boudinot's ambition to influence people outside the tribe. Boudinot regularly wrote editorials related to Indian Removal.

==="An Address to the Whites" (1826)===
Boudinot delivered this speech in the [[First Presbyterian Church (Philadelphia)|First Presbyterian Church]] in Philadelphia on May 26, 1826. He described the similarities between the Cherokee and the whites, and ways in which the Cherokee were adopting aspects of white culture. Boudinot was fundraising for a Cherokee national academy and printing equipment for the newspaper, support for "civilizing" the Cherokee. Following the speech, he published his speech in a pamphlet by the same title. "An Address to the Whites" was well received and "proved to be remarkably effective at fund-raising".<ref name="Pulley">[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/ArticlePrintable.jsp?id=h-626 Pulley, Angela F. "Elias Boudinot"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121021122910/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/ArticlePrintable.jsp?id=h-626 |date=October 21, 2012 }}, ''The New Georgia Encyclopedia online</ref>

==Influence on Indian Removal==
The Indian removal policy was a result of the [[Georgia Gold Rush|discovery of gold in Cherokee territory]], the growth of the cotton industry, and the relentless European-American desire for land in the Southeast. European Americans resented Cherokee control of their lands, and conflicts increasingly arose. The [[Indian Removal Act|Indian Removal Act of 1830]] called for all Indian peoples living east of the Mississippi River to be removed and sent west beyond the river. While the majority of the Cherokee led by Chief [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]] opposed the act, Boudinot began to believe that Indian Removal was inevitable. He thought the best outcome was for the Cherokee to secure their rights through treaty, before they were moved against their will. Boudinot used all of his writing and oratory skills to influence Indian Removal policy, but many within the nation opposed his viewpoint. He criticized the popular principal chief John Ross, who opposed his ideas. Ross had ordered Boudinot to stop publishing his views favoring removal in the newspaper.

In 1832, Boudinot resigned as editor of the ''Cherokee Phoenix,'' giving his reasons his inadequate salary, personal health problems, and the inability of the Cherokee Nation to provide sufficient supplies to run a national newspaper. However, in a letter to John Ross, he indicated that he could no longer serve because he was unable to print what he believed to be true about the dangers to the people from continuing to oppose removal. Ross and the council accepted the resignation and appointed Elijah Hicks to run the newspaper. Although Hicks was a good businessman he had no newspaper experience. The ''Cherokee Phoenix'' soon declined and ceased publication on 31 May 1834.<ref>Woodward, p. 172.</ref>

==Removal to Indian Territory==
Boudinot and Treaty Party leaders signed the [[Treaty of New Echota]] (1835) in New Echota, Cherokee Nation (now [[Calhoun, Georgia]]) ceding all Cherokee land east of the Mississippi River. Although this was opposed by the majority of the delegation and lacked the signature of the Principal Chief [[John Ross (Cherokee chief)|John Ross]], the US Senate ratified the treaty. Afterward, faced with open enmity among the Cherokee, many of the signatories and their families migrated to [[Indian Territory]], where they located with the "Old Settlers", who had gone there in the 1820s.

During 1838 and 1839, the US Army enforced the Removal Act and evicted the Cherokee and their [[slaves]] from their homes in the Southeast. They forced most of them west into [[Indian Territory]] (in eastern present-day Oklahoma). The Cherokee referred to their journey as the [[Cherokee Trail of Tears|Trail of Tears]].

After his wife's death in 1836, Boudinot needed to relocate both himself and the children. He sent their son, Cornelius, to live with a family in Huntsville, Alabama, where he could be treated for his condition by a doctor. Another son traveled west with the Ridge family. The rest of the children were enrolled in school at Brainerd, where they could stay when Elias left the territory. Elias himself first went north to visit Harriet's parents. After that, he joined a group that included John Ridge and traveled to the Western Cherokee Nation, it was established by "Old Settlers" in the northeast quarter of what is today Oklahoma. Two months later he wrote to Harriet's parents that he had married Delight Sargent, a New England woman who had been a teacher at New Echota.<ref>Langguth, p. 259.</ref> Impoverished, he received $500 from the [[American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions]] (thanks to persuasive argument from Samuel Worcester) to build a modest house a quarter mile from the Worcesters in [[Park Hill, Oklahoma|Park Hill]].<ref>Langguth, p. 266</ref> Reunited with his longtime friend, Boudinot returned to his vocation as a translator of the Gospel.

The "Old Settlers" and John Ross' supporters failed to agree on unification following the Nation's removal to Indian Territory. Some Ross supporters met secretly to plan assassinations of Treaty Party leaders over the hardships of the Removal and to eliminate them as political rivals in a way which would intimidate the Old Settlers into submission.<ref>Wilkins, Thurman. ''Cherokee Tragedy: The Story of the Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People,'' pp. 229–339. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1986.</ref> On June 22, 1839, a group of unknown Cherokee assassinated Boudinot outside his home. They killed his cousin and uncle, John and Major Ridge, the same day. His brother [[Stand Watie]] was attacked but survived.<ref>Peyer, Bernd C. "Elias Boudinot and the Cherokee Betrayal," in ''The Tutor’d Mind: Indian Missionary-Writers In Antebellum America,'' Amherst: [[University of Massachusetts Press]], 1997, pp. 212–213</ref>

Though Ross denied any connection to the killings, Stand Watie blamed the Principal Chief. After these murders followers of Watie and Ross engaged for years in violent conflict and retaliation. Watie killed a man whom he had seen attack his uncle Major Ridge; he was acquitted on the grounds of self-defense. At his trial, he was represented by his nephew, E. C. Boudinot. He had become a lawyer in Arkansas after having been raised by his mother's family and educated in the East following his father's assassination.<ref>{{cite book |author= James W. Parins |title= Elias Cornelius Boudinot: A Life on the Cherokee Border |series= American Indian Lives |publisher= University of Nebraska Press |year= 2005 |isbn= 978-0-8032-3752-0 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=YuaSjyiVc1YC }}</ref>{{page needed|date=April 2016}}

The violence lasted into 1846, when the US negotiated a tenuous peace treaty. The deep bitterness contributed to tribal divisions during the [[American Civil War]]. The post-removal factionalism and violence compounded the misfortune of the Cherokee Nation.<ref>Franks, Kenny A. ''Stand Watie and the Agony of the Cherokee Nation,'' Memphis, Tennessee: Memphis State University Press, 1979, pp. 56, 103</ref>

During the Civil War, the Nation split into two factions. Stand Watie and his supporters, the majority of the Nation, sided with the [[Confederate States of America|Confederacy]] (he served as an officer in their army, along with other Cherokee.) Ross and his supporters sided with the Union. Many Union people had to leave Indian Territory during the war for their own safety. They returned after the Union victory, and Ross was the only chief recognized by the US.<ref>Franks (1979), ''Stand Watie'', pp. 115–193</ref>

==See also==
*[[Timeline of Cherokee removal]]
*[[Treaty of New Echota]]

==Notes==
{{reflist}}

==References==
{{Div col|colwidth=30em}}
*[http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/triumphnationalism/expansion/text3/addresswhites.pdf Boudinot, Elias; Essay: "An Address to the Whites"], National Humanities Center.
*[http://www.cherokeephoenix.org/ ''The Cherokee Phoenix,'' 1828–present], Official Website
*Carter, Samuel; ''Cherokee Sunset''; Doubleday; Garden City, NY; 1976.
*Dale, Edwards Everett; ''Cherokee Cavaliers – Forty Years of Cherokee History as Told in the Correspondences of the Ridge-Watie-Boudinot Family''; University of Oklahoma Press; Norman; 1939.
*Garrison, Tim Alan. [http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2722 "Cherokee Removal”] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051228190253/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2722 |date=December 28, 2005 }}, ''The New Georgia Encyclopedia''.
*Gaul, Theresa Strouth, editor; "Elias Boudinot; and Harriett Gold Boudinot; Introduction", ''To Marry an Indian: The Marriage of Harriett Gold and Elias Boudinot in Letters, 1823–1839''; University of North Carolina Press; Chapel Hill; 2005; pp 1–76.
*Hutton, Frankie, and Barbara Straus Reed; ''Outsiders in 19th-Century Press History: Multicultural Perspectives''; Bowling Green State University Popular Press; Bowling Green, OH; 1995.
*Langguth, A. J. ''Driven West: Andrew Jackson and the Trail of Tears to the Civil War''. New York, Simon & Schuster. 2010. {{ISBN|978-1-4165-4859-1}}.
*{{cite book | author= Parins, James W. | title= Elias Cornelius Boudinot A Life on the Cherokee Border | series= American Indian Lives | publisher= University of Nebraska Press | year= 2005 | isbn= 978-0-8032-3752-0 | url= https://books.google.com/books?id=YuaSjyiVc1YC}}
*{{cite journal |last1=Perdue |first1=Theda |title=Rising from the Ashes: The Cherokee Phoenix as an Ethnohistorical Source |journal=Ethnohistory |date=1977 |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=207–218 |doi=10.2307/481695 |jstor=481695 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/481695 |issn=0014-1801|url-access=subscription }}
*Pulley, Angela F; [https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/elias-boudinot-ca-1804-1839; "Elias Boudinot"], ''The New Georgia Encyclopedia''.
*Wilkins, Thurman; ''Cherokee Tragedy: The Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People''; University of Oklahoma Press; Norman; 1986; {{ISBN|0-8061-2188-2}} (1989 paperback edition).
*Woodward, Grace Steele. ''The Cherokees.'' University of Oklahoma Press. Norman; 1963. {{ISBN|0-8061-1815-6}} (1986 paperback edition).
{{Div col end}}

==External links==

* {{Find a Grave}}
* [http://www.paulridenour.com/swatie.htm Stand Watie and Elias Boudinot Family]


{{Cherokee}}
{{Portal bar|Biography|Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Journalism|United States}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Boudinot, Elias}}
[[Category:1802 births]]
[[Category:1839 deaths]]
[[Category:People murdered in 1839]]
[[Category:19th-century American journalists]]
[[Category:19th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:19th-century American newspaper publishers (people)]]
[[Category:19th-century Native American people]]
[[Category:19th-century American translators]]
[[Category:People assassinated in the 19th century]]
[[Category:American male journalists]]
[[Category:American newspaper founders]]
[[Category:American people of Welsh descent]]
[[Category:Assassinated newspaper editors]]
[[Category:Assassinated American people]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation people (1794–1907)]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation male writers]]
[[Category:Cherokee Nation writers]]
[[Category:Converts to Christianity]]
[[Category:Murdered Native American people]]
[[Category:Native American journalists]]
[[Category:Native American people from Georgia (U.S. state)]]
[[Category:Native American tribal government officials in Indian Territory]]
[[Category:People from Calhoun, Georgia]]
[[Category:People murdered in Oklahoma]]
[[Category:Translators of the Bible into indigenous languages of the Americas]]