Elias Boudinot - Park Hill, OK - Oklahoma Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

The Worcester Missionary Cemetery in Park Hill is the burial site for missionaries and their wives who worked with the Cherokee Nation in the 1800's. At the southwest corner of this cemetery stands a granite marker placed by the Oklahoma Historical Society in 1964 commemorating Elias Boudinot who was influential at the time of the removal of the Cherokee Nation from Georgia to Indian Territory.

This is a granite marker, about seven feet high, with a circular top showing the Seal of the Cherokee Nation and the date September 6, 1839. Beneath this seal, the story of Elias Boudinot is engraved:

"ELIAS BOUDINOT - Kilakeena "Buck" Watie / 1802 - 1839. A son of Oo-Watie and Susanna Reese Watie. Educated at Moravian Mission, Spring Place, Georgia and at Cornwall Mission, Connecticut. He became known as "Elias Boudinot," this name adopted from that of his friend, a noted leader in New Jersey. He made his home at New Echota, the Cherokee capitol in Georgia, where he served as Clerk of the Cherokee Nation Council (1825-1828); and was editor of the Cherokee Phoenix newspaper and translator of Biblical works in association with the Rev. Samuel A. Worcester.

"Elias Boudinot, his brother Stand Watie, and relatives, the Ridges, and other tribesmen signed the Treaty of 1835 at New Echota, providing for the removal of all the Cherokee to the Indian Territory. Here in the west, Boudinot again served with Rev. Worcester in the work of the Park Hill Mission Press, near which he was assassinated June 22, 1839 by enemy tribesmen, ostensibly for having signed the New Echota Treaty. Burial was near the spot where he fell, his grave covered by a large slab of stone with no inscription.

"One who knew him spoke of Elias Boudinot as a Cherokee of honor, an ernest (sic) Christian, a man of exceptional ability and fine intellect whose life was devoted to the vision of advancement and well being for all the people of the Cherokee Nation.

"Erected by the Oklahoma Historical Society 1964."

County: Cherokee Record Address:: S. Park Hill Road Park Hill, OK US 74451 Web site if available: [Web Link] Rate the Site: Date Erected: 1964 Sponsor (Who put it there): Oklahoma Historical Society

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