he choctaw nation and the irish famineIn 1847 the Choctaw people sent 170 US dollars to Irish women and men who were locked in the grip of the potato famine. This remarkable gesture is all the more poignant when one considers the plight of the Choctaw people themselves. They, along with many other Native American tribes, had been forcibly removed from their land by the US government, and made to march thousands of miles across America to be “relocated”. The route became known as the “Trail of Tears”, owing to the thousands of people who died from starvation and exhaustion along the way.
Despite their own hardships, and upon hearing about the Irish Famine, the Choctaw people felt compelled to do something.