Local History
Texas Cherokee Removal Historical Markers: The Nation That Built Towns and Was Expelled
Seven Texas historical markers trace the Cherokee villages of East Texas, the 1836 treaty, the Battle of the Neches, and the forced removal of 1839.
Photo: Brandy Vailes / Unsplash. Pine forest trail.
Drive US 69 south out of Jacksonville and the pines close in on both sides of the road. Somewhere in those trees, a nation of farmers and blacksmiths built villages that stood for twenty years. Texas has more than 16,000 official historical markers, and seven of them trace what happened to those villages. RoadHistorical is a Texas historical preservation platform that puts those markers in your hand while you drive. This article walks you through the Cherokee arrival in East Texas, the treaty, the battle, and the expulsion of 1839.
A Treaty Signed in 1836, Voided by the Senate
Chief Samuel Benge stands near Jacksonville in Cherokee County. Benge led Cherokee people in Texas through the 1830s. He sat at the table in early 1836 when Sam Houston, John Cameron, and John Forbes came to negotiate.
The deal was simple. The Cherokee would stay neutral during the coming war with Mexico. In return they'd hold specific lands in East Texas. Benge signed, and the treaty required him to move his people east across the Neches River into what's now Cherokee County.
The Cherokee kept their end of it. They stayed out of the revolution. Then the Republic of Texas senate nullified the treaty, and everything that followed came out of that vote.
Chief Samuel Benge marker, Jacksonville, TX
Chief Bowles' Last Homesite sits outside Alto, about 25 miles south. The man the marker names answered to several names. Duwali to his own people. Bowl, Bold Hunter, and Chief Bowles to the Texans.
Near this spot in 1839, Bowles got word of President Mirabeau B. Lamar's order to remove the Cherokee from Texas. He was 81 years old. He mobilized his people to resist rather than walk out.
Chief Bowles' Last Homesite, Alto, TX. Find it in RoadHistorical before your visit.
Little Bean Built a Village and Held It Twenty Years
Little Bean's Cherokee Village stands near Rusk in Cherokee County. In the winter of 1819 and 1820, Chief John Bowles led about sixty Cherokee families out of Arkansas into East Texas. One of them, a leader named Little Bean, put down a settlement near this site.
They stayed two decades. That's long enough to clear fields, raise children, and bury elders. The marker records that they remained until 1839, when the Republic of Texas forced the tribe to move to Oklahoma.
Little Bean died that same year. He's thought to be buried somewhere near the village he built. The land opened to Anglo settlers after that, and the marker names the early owners: Reza J. Banks and Lewis Rogers.
Little Bean's Cherokee Village, Rusk, TX. Find it in RoadHistorical before your visit.
Two Days on the Neches, July 1839
Battle of the Neches stands along I-20 near Van in Van Zandt County. The marker points to a site 15 miles southeast. That's where the main engagement of the Cherokee War happened on July 15 and 16, 1839.
Roughly 800 Native fighters faced 500 troops of the Republic of Texas. Delawares and Shawnees fought alongside the Cherokee. The Republic sent its senior men into the field. Vice President David G. Burnet took an active part in the fighting. So did Albert Sidney Johnston, the secretary of war.
Chief Bowles died on the second day. He was carrying a sword Sam Houston had given him.
Battle of the Neches marker, Van, TX
Cherokee Chief Bowles marks the ground where he fell. Texas put it up in 1936 on CR 4923 near Edom. The inscription is blunt in the way 1936 markers often are. It calls the fight the last engagement between Cherokees and whites in Texas.
Cherokee Chief Bowles, Edom, TX. Find it in RoadHistorical before your visit.
The Road They Left On
Cherokee Exodus from Texas stands at 721 State Highway 31 West in Chandler, Henderson County. It compresses the whole arc into one paragraph. White settlers drove the Cherokee out of the eastern states. They reached East Texas and had settled in by 1820. In 1822 they asked Mexico for title to the land and got nothing.
The marker counts the dead from the July 15 and 16 fight northwest of Chandler. Two Texans. Eighteen Cherokee, including Bowles. The survivors retreated into what's now Oklahoma.
Cherokee Trace near Longview in Gregg County marks the road itself. Cherokee travelers blazed it in 1821, running from near Nacogdoches up to the White River in Arkansas. They slashed trees, cleared the path, and planted Cherokee roses along it. They set camps at the springs.
Sam Houston rode it into Texas. David Crockett used it, and so did thousands of immigrants after him. In June 1839 the Cherokee walked out of Texas on the trail they had cut themselves.
Cherokee Trace, Longview, TX. Find it in RoadHistorical before your visit.
How RoadHistorical Finds These Markers
Most of these markers sit on county roads with no street address and no parking lot. Discovery Mode handles that. Turn it on and the app notifies you as you drive past a marker, so you catch the ones you never knew to look for.
The AI Tour Guide answers what the plaque can't. A 1936 marker gives you two sentences. Ask the guide who Duwali was, or why the senate voided the treaty, and you get the context the bronze left out. Offline mode keeps all of it running in East Texas, where cell coverage drops out between towns.
Start Discovering Texas History Today
RoadHistorical is free to download on iPhone and Android. Download it here and turn on Discovery Mode before your next drive. Android users can download RoadHistorical from Google Play.
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