Gm CHEROKEE NATION OF INDIANS. 
money of the Qualla boundary of $18,250, from which should be de- 
ducted the sum of $6,500 paid by the Indians to Johnston, with interest 
thereon to the date of the award, amounting in the aggregate to $8,486. 
The award also finds that Terrell and his bondsmen are responsible 
to the Cherokees for an unaccounted-for balance of $2,697.89, which 
should also be deducted from the amount due Thomas, leaving a net 
balance due from the Indians on the purchase money of the Qualla 
boundary of $7,066. “Upon the payment of this sum the award declares 
they should be entitled to a conveyance from Johnston of the legal title 
to all the lands embraced within that boundary.! 
To enable the Indians to clear off this lien npon their lands, Congress, 
upon the recommendation of the Indian Department, provided by the 
terms of an act approved March 3, 1875,? that the funds set apart by 
the act of July 29, 1848, should be applied under the direction of the 
Secretary of the Interior for the use and benefit of the Eastern Band of 
Cherokees. Specifically these funds were to be used in perfecting the 
titles to the lands awarded to them and to pay the costs, expenses, and 
liabilities attending their recent litigations, also to purchase and ex- 
tinguish the titles of any white persons to lands within the general 
boundaries allotted to them by the court and for the education, improve- 
ment, and civilization of their people. This was done and the Indians 
April 3, 1875. : 
?United States Statutes at Large Vol. XVIII, p. 447. 
‘A short time prior (September 11, 1874) to the filing of the award of the arbitrators 
in the case of the Indians vs. Thomas, an agreement was made between the parties 
in interest to refer certain matters of dispute between Thomas and Johnston to the con- 
sideration and determination of the same arbitrators. As the result of this reference 
an award was made which showed that there was due from Thomas to Johnston upon 
three several judgments the sum of $33,887.11. Upon this sum, however, credits to 
the amount of $15,552.11 (including the $6,500 with interest paid to Johnston by the 
Cherokees under contract of September, 1869) were allowed, leaving the net amount 
due to Johnston $18,335, which sum he was entitled to collect with interest until paid, 
together with the costs taxed in the three judgments aforesaid. The arbitrators 
further found that Johnson held sheriff’s deeds for considerable tracts of land which 
had been sold as the property of Thomas and which were not included among the 
jauds held by him in trust for the Indians. These tracts Johnston had bought in by 
reason of clouds upon the title and “ forbiddals” of the sales at a merely nominal figure. 
It was therefore declared that these sherifis’ deeds should be held by Johnston only 
as security for the payment of the balance due him on the judgments in question and 
for the costs taxed on each. It was further directed that Terrell and Johnston should 
make sale of so much of the lands embraced in the sherift’s deeds alluded to (exclud- 
ing those awarded to the Cherokee Indians either as a tribe or as individuals) as 
would produce a sum sufficient to satisfy the above balance of $18,335 with interest and 
costs. 
Following this award of the arbitrators Mr. Jobuston submitted a proposition for 
the transfer and assignment of these judgments to the Eastern Band of Cherokees. 
Based upon this offer, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs reported to the Secretary of 
the Interior June 2, 1875, that the interests of the Indians required the acceptance of 
