[2] When this area became part of the United States under the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, many of the resident Indian tribes wanted to emigrate to less hostile environs.
[7] Between 1840 and 1843, elements of the Mexican militia, led by Vicente Cordova, fought a guerrilla war against the Anglo settlers,[8] using warriors from remnant groups of displaced tribes, primarily Cherokee but including some Yowani Choctaw.
He approved the Treaty of Birds Fort, which brought an end to hostilities, especially for the Cherokee residing at Monclova, Mexico under Chicken Trotter.
In the early 20th century, several members of the Yowani Choctaw, led by William Clyde Thompson of Texas,[15] relocated to the Chickasaw Nation in Indian Territory.
They wanted to be included in registration for the Dawes Commission Final Rolls as citizens by blood of the Choctaw Nation and recognized by the federal government.
[16] A long political struggle ensued between 1898 and 1909, as the Choctaw leaders of Indian Territory did not want the long-absent Yowani to receive any of their land.
[17][better source needed] Thompson pursued a legal challenge, appealing the government's action ultimately to the United States Supreme Court.
"[21] The Yowani Choctaw were associated by name with the village where they were living when French traders from the La Louisiane colony encountered them.
[citation needed] Over time, the Yowani band expanded its territory westward to the eastern dividing ridge of Bogue Homa, then northward as far as present-day Pachuta Creek.
[citation needed] By 1764, a group of Yowani had moved west into Louisiana, where they established contact with the Koasati and Caddo indigenous peoples.
[citation needed] In the late 19th century, the American anthropologist James Mooney listed the Yowani as one of the 13 divisions of the Caddo Confederacy.
[1] At the time that the Yowani ventured into Louisiana, the territory had been under Spanish control since 1763, when France ceded it after defeat by Great Britain in the Seven Years' War, fought both in Europe and North America.
After Napoleon briefly attempted to re-establish control over Saint-Domingue, with visions of empire in North America, he sold the mainland territory in 1803 to the United States as what they called the Louisiana Purchase.
Spain agreed to allow several Indian tribes, including the Yowani Choctaw and the Alabama-Coushatta, to relocate to the neighboring Spanish colonial province of Texas.
During the period between 1810 and 1836, many of the relocated tribes, including the Yowani Choctaw, were often subject to attacks from the Comanche who roamed the western part of Texas.
This area had been established during Indian Removal of the 1830s, when the US forced tribes from the East to west of the Mississippi River, exchanging lands and arranging payments or annuities in some instances.
[23] The Yowani remaining in east Texas joined with other remnant peoples to form a part of what is now recognized as the Mount Tabor Indian Community.
They concluded a treaty at Bowles Village on February 23, 1836, between the Cherokee and Twelve Associated Tribes and the provisional Texas government.
After 1837, the Yowani combined settlements to form a single village on Attoyac Bayou in extreme southeastern Rusk County.
[33] While his petition was pending in the Republic legislature, Chicken Trotter and several other Cherokee were involved in an altercation with three white men near Nacogdoches.
Unable to catch up to Chicken Trotter and his group, the vigilantes attacked the nearby Yowani village, massacring some eleven Choctaw men, women, and children.
Throughout Lamar's term as president, the Republic of Texas conducted a policy of attrition against various groups of Natives, including those under Chicken Trotter.
[37] The Mount Tabor Indian Community formed following the purchase of 10,000 acres of land in Rusk County by Benjamin Franklin Thompson in the spring of 1844.
Many enlisted in the Confederate Army as part of the Cherokee Mounted Rifles under Stand Watie, who was commissioned as a high-ranking officer.
Only during the period of registration in the Dawes Rolls under the Commission, when members registered to be eligible for allotments of communal land, did a number of Choctaw take the opportunities available and move north.
[44] Cherokee who remained in Texas were no longer recognized formally as part of a tribe or as Native Americans by the Federal Government.
In 1972 Judge Foster T. Bean,[45] an original enrollee on the Guion Miller Roll,[46] took over as Chairman of the Texas Cherokees and Associate Bands.
He was replaced by Cheryl Giordano of Arp, who is of Choctaw-Chickasaw descent and had previously served as Operations Coordinator on the Executive Committee.