1830s–1838Reputable sourceWell documented
The Trail of Tears
On the timeline · around 1830s–1838 ·
What happened
Under the Indian Removal Act of 1830, the U.S. government forced tens of thousands of Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek), Seminole, Chickasaw, and Choctaw people from their homelands in the Southeast to territory west of the Mississippi. On the Cherokee removal of 1838, thousands died of cold, hunger, and disease along what became known as the Trail of Tears.
Why it matters
The forced removals were an act of ethnic cleansing that devastated Native nations and remain one of the darkest chapters in American history — the human cost of the nation's westward expansion.