CD-ROM-African-Cherokee connections: Reconstructed families from the Miller Roll applications

Excellent source on CD-ROM! In May 1905 the Eastern Cherokee were awarded one million dollars as reparation for violations of various treaties, mainly those of 1835-1836 and 1846. In order to qualify for a share of this money the claimants had to be alive on 28 May 1906 and had to prove that they were either a descendant of an Eastern Cherokee, or had been living at the time of the treaties involved. 48,847 claims were filed with the commission established to disburse the funds. This present study concentrates on those claimants who were of African descent claiming Cherokee connections. All but one or two of these claimants were rejected because most had been slaves of the Cherokees and were not deemed to have been party to the treaties. Many of them seem to have established some blood connection to the Eastern Cherokees and were still rejected if one or more of their ancestors had been slaves. Several family groups, especially those who settled in Indiana, were descendants of free blacks who left the Carolinas rather than become slaves. One group lists several family members who returned to Africa to settle in Liberia. Every claim number that mentioned an individual is included in the notes for that individual. The basic source for this study was the 348 rolls of microfilm "Cherokee (Eastern) Applications of U. S. Court Claims, 1906-1909" (NARA M1104, rolls 1-348) and the 12 microfilm rolls of "Cherokee (Eastern) Enrollment by Guion Miller (NARA M685, rolls 1-12). Additionally, many of the claimants and their families were checked against the US Federal Census records for 1910, 1900, and several groups were followed back into the 1880 and 1870 records. The third source used extensively in this reconstruction was "Index to the Cherokee Freedman Enrollment cards of the Dawes Commission 1901-1906" by Jo Ann Curls Page, published by Heritage Books. 2002, CD, Searchable, Adobe Acrobat, v5, PC and Mac, 8550 pp.