January 11, 1006

As the large group of Western Cherokees traveled to Mexico’s border in small groups of Cherokee families, they established small villages all of the way down and across the Rio Grande River and on further southwest.

One such village was settled by 63 Cherokees and named Mount Clover. I have many times wondered if Mount Clover was a part of Monclova, Mexico. At any rate, it would not have been too many miles from Monclova. Monclova, Mexico is a very old ancient city.

During the 1930 census that Mrs. Allen conducted in the City of Aubrey, I recognized the family names were spelled the same way as the families that left the Cherokee nation.

The Methodist Church was organized in Aubrey (Onega) only ten or fifteen years after the large group of traveling Cherokees traveled through the area. The church was established in 1858 and was used as a free school of Denton County and a Methodist Church. It was available for church services every week and for three months of the year it was home to the free school.

The school children had to help their families in these hard times and only went to school for three months of the year. The students worked at their chores when they weren’t in school

Many of the tribe members didn’t remain with the traveling group, because they found that it wasn’t as easy to raise enough food in the short periods they settled in an area to continue.

During this period of the late 1830's and early 1840's, there were approximately 800 families of the Western Cherokee Nation that decided that they had not received their fair share of the money that was appropriated by the federal government for purchase of their former homes. Chief Ross and his crew of 46 manipulators went to Washington to receive the handout.

The Starr brothers went to Washington to take care of their business of liquidating the leadership that was stealing funds from the Western Cherokeees. Already a large group had already gone to Mexico. George Guess (Sequoyah) and his crew of friends had decided to go to Mexico and return so that they could help him present the newly adopted alphabet. The new system was easier to use and helped educate the Indians more quickly and easily. It was adopted and was in place when the Starr brothers returned to Indian Territory. They found Chief Sequoyah gathering a large group of Cherokees who were moving to Mexico. His purpose of going to Mexico was to encourage the Cherokees already in Mexico to return to the Indian Territory and help build the Cherokee Nation.

The group of Indians that were following Chief Sequoyah included James and Ezekiel Starr, the Thornes, Quesenberrys, Robersons, and John Rogers, Tidmores who were relatives of the Quesenberrys, Charles Rees and Tessie Guess, ( a son of Sequoyah), Joseph M. Lynch, Dr. J.L. Thompson, Matthew Moore, John Hornage, Jess Mayfield and John Bell.

The Quesenberrys made the trip because of curiosity.

The 3,800 Cherokees began their gradual trip to the Preston Crossing. The uprising of the Cherokees in the late 1830's and 1840's caused the Indians to migrate. They were unhappy with John Ross and the results of his politic antics in Washington D.C. Ross was continually favoring himself and the eastern Cherokees. A delegation of Cherokees left Evansville, Arkansas in September of 1840 to go to the Preston Road Crossing which was north of where Denison is now.

The Coffey Trading Post had already began a lively business with the Cherokees as they ventured on to the southwest from the trading post. As they moved southwest they met up with the Kickapoos and Comanches. They found that the other Indians had a good market for hoes and gardening tools.

The Cherokees then followed the waters of the Trinity River. They gathered in small groups of three or four families and scattered out into this area that soon was to become Onega. Onega was not an acceptable name for the local area as were Tioga, Mingo, Watauga, and Saginaw. The frightened Cherokees didn’t like the name Onega because it indicated that the area was full of Indians. The Cherokee were trying to present themselves as white because they were trying to avoid death. We must realize that Denton and Dallas and other towns as we know them today had not yet been built when the caravan of Cherokees were making their journey to the southwest.

The Indians were especially talented in sending messages by smoke signals and the code of signals was universally accepted, however, few knew the art of this communication method.

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