My name was Mary Cobb and I was married to Walter S.
Agnew before the Civil War.
I was born in Georgia on May 19, 1840. My mother was a
Cherokee woman and my father was a white man. I was only four years
old when my parents came to the Indian Territory and I am now
ninety-three years old.
My mother and father died when I was but seven years
old and I was raised by an aunt, my mother’s sister. I never attended
school and my education is practical except what I was taught by my
husband.
My parents did not come to the Territory on the “Trail
of Tears” but my grandparents on my mother’s side did. I have heard
them say that the United States Government drove them out of Georgia.
The Cherokees had protested to the bitter end. Finally the Cherokees
knew that they had to go some place because the white men would kill
their cattle and hogs and would even burn their houses in Georgia.
The Cherokees came a group at a time until all got to the Territory.
They brought only a few things with them traveling by wagon train.
Old men and women, sick men and women would ride but most of them
walked and the men in charge drove them like cattle and many died
enroute and many other Cherokees died in Tennessee waiting to cross
the Mississippi River. Dysentery broke out in their camp by the river
and many died, and many died on the journey but my grandparents got
through all right.
I have heard my grandparents say that after they got
out of the camp, and even before they left Georgia, many Cherokees
were taken sick and later died.
The Cherokees came through Tennessee, Kentucky, part of
Missouri and then down to Indian Territory on the “Trail of Tears”.
Some Cherokees were already in the country around
Evansville, Arkansas, before my grandparents came. They called them
Western Cherokees. It was in 1838 when my grandparents came and I
heard them say it was in the winter time and all suffered with cold
and hunger.
My mother and father remained in Georgia about six
years after Mother’s folk’s came on the “Trail of Tears” and Mother
worried continually about her parents. Then when I was four years
old, I with my parents and other kin, came west to join my
grandparents. I don’t know why the Government let Mother stay longer
than the rest of the Cherokees in Georgia unless it was because she
married a white man. We came by wagons to Memphis, Tennessee. At
Memphis we took a steamboat and finally landed at Fort Gibson, Indian
Territory, in June, 1844. I don’t know how long it took us to come
from Memphis nor do I remember the names of the towns we came through
but I have heard my folks say that we had to change boats two or three
times because the rivers became shallow and we had to change to
smaller boats.
After our arrival at Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, we
met our kinspeople in the Flint District and settled in the Territory
a short way from Evansville, Arkansas. It was in the Flint District
and around Fort Gibson that I grew to be a young lady.
