While COVID-19 and its impact on the Cherokee Nation dominated headlines in 2021, Cherokee Phoenix readers also honed in on history, art, food and mystery throughout the year.
FORT SMITH, Ark. â The deadliest day in U.S. Marshal Service history took place April 15, 1872, near the town of Christie in Adair County, which was located in the Cherokee Nationâs Goingsnake District.
The gunfight between a marshal posse and CN citizens took place at a schoolhouse being used as a courthouse to try the case of CN citizen Ezekial âZekeâ Proctor.Â
âThis is definitely one of the stories the museum wants to tellâ¦not just from the marshalâs side of it but from the Cherokee Nationâs side of it because we really want to find the whats and whys and hows, and thereâs a reason we refer to this as âThe Tragedy of Goingsnakeâ and not âThe Goingsnake Massacre,â David Kennedy, U.S. Marshals Museum in Fort Smith curator, said. âThis was the bloodiest gunfight that ever took place in the American west that the military wasnât involved in.â
FORT SMITH, Ark. â The deadliest day in U.S. Marshal Service history took place April 15, 1872, near the town of Christie in Adair County, which was located in the Cherokee Nationâs Goingsnake District.
The gunfight between a marshal posse and CN citizens took place at a schoolhouse being used as a courthouse to try the case of CN citizen Ezekial âZekeâ Proctor.Â
âTragedy at Goingsnakeâ occurred 149 years ago
âThis is definitely one of the stories the museum wants to tellâ¦not just from the marshalâs side of it but from the Cherokee Nationâs side of it because we really want to find the whats and whys and hows, and thereâs a reason we refer to this as âThe Tragedy of Goingsnakeâ and not âThe Goingsnake Massacre,â David Kennedy, U.S. Marshals Museum in Fort Smith curator, said. âThis was the bloodiest gunfight that ever took place in the American west that the military wasnât involved in.â