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[Two c. 1845–1849 Bond Certificates of the Cherokee Company of North Carolina, from the time of the Indian Removals].
[Two c. 1845–1849 Bond Certificates of the Cherokee Company of North Carolina, from the time of the Indian Removals].
[Two c. 1845–1849 Bond Certificates of the Cherokee Company of North Carolina, from the time of the Indian Removals].

[Two c. 1845–1849 Bond Certificates of the Cherokee Company of North Carolina, from the time of the Indian Removals].

Dating from the time of the Indian Removals, two certificates or bonds issued by the


The two bonds have not been filled in or issued, but note the company’s establishment by the legislature on January 10, 1845 and provide datelines for “184[blank].”

As Native Americans and technical parties to the Treaty of New Echota (referred to on the bond as “the Cherokee Treaty of 1835”), Cherokees in North Carolina could not own land. Through their agent and, since 1839, white chief, William Holland Thomas (1805–1893), the North Carolina settlements of Cheoah and Quallatown were incorporated as the Cherokee Company to protect these lands for Cherokees who did not want to remove to the Indian territories of the far west.

By 1848, Thomas had secured Federal recognition of the Eastern Band of the Cherokees and their claim to treaty awards. The certificates or bonds refer specifically to “55,000 acres of land, and $100,000 in claims on the United States, provided for under the Cherokee Treaty of 1835, owned by the Company.”

Unusual nineteenth century printed financial history ephemera connecting Native Americans of North Carolina with adopting and assimilating the Westernized ethnocentric perspective of land ownership, investment, and property rights. It is unknown to us if the company ever successfully issued any of these bond certificates.


Description: [Two c. 1845–1849 Bond Certificates of the Cherokee Company of North Carolina, from the time of the Indian Removals].

[Thomastown, North Carolina? c. 1845–49]. [2]pp. 15¼ x 10¾ inches. Half sheet from a single folio with two partly-printed bond certificates, each printed on one side. Decorative type borders; cream-colored wove paper. Fold lines, creases, light spotting; very good.

[371910]

Refs. Denson, Demanding the Cherokee Nation (University of Nebraska Press, 2004). Thomas, William Holland | NCpedia accessed online June 2013.


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