Before Europeans arrived, the Cherokee were one of the largest Indigenous groups in the Southeast, with about 20,000 people living in the southern Appalachians. They relied on local resources and were strong in trade, especially in pelts. Despite losses from disease and war, they used diplomacy to play European powers against each other. Although they lost land after wars in the 1760s and the American Revolution, they kept much of it until the U.S. forcibly removed them in the 1800s during the Trail of Tears.

The Cherokee once claimed parts of present-day West Virginia but gave them up in treaties by 1770. They had limited involvement in the Ohio Valley, with most activity coming from Overhill towns in East Tennessee.

Many in West Virginia claim Cherokee ancestry, possibly due to the Cherokee’s popularity in past centuries, hidden African-American roots, or Cherokee men moving here for work in the late 1800s and early 1900s.