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Population history

John R. Swanton enumerates 201 Cherokee villages and towns. The Cherokee had 6,000 warriors (and therefore around 30,000 people) in years 1730–35 according to J. Adair. In 1738 they also had 6,000 warriors, but down to 5,000 in 1740 (according to Ga. Hist. Coll., II). Colonel James Oglethorpe confirms that they had 5,000 warriors in 1739 (Ga. Coll. Rec., V). Also according to Ga. Coll. Rec., V an epidemic reduced them "by almost one-half" in 1738, but this source doesn't specify how numerous they were before the epidemic. Perhaps this source exaggerates the casualties caused by that epidemic, and in fact it killed just around 1,000 warriors. Arthur Dobbs estimated the Cherokee warrior strength in 1755 at 2,590 (but W. Douglas at about the same time reported 6,000 warriors). In 1761 soon after the end of the Anglo-Cherokee War there were 2,300 warriors according to J. Adair. By year 1768 their number recovered back to 3,000 warriors, and B. R. Carroll in "Historical Collections of South Carolina" also reported that they had 3,000 warriors. By 1819 there were 4,000 warriors (and therefore around 20,000 people - including about 5,000 to the west of the Mississippi). George Catlin estimated 22,000 Cherokees in 1832, before their removal. But according to a report by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs dated November 25, 1841, the number of Cherokees who had already been removed west of the Mississippi (to Oklahoma, Indian Territory) was 25,911. Henry Schoolcraft reported 21,707 Cherokees in 1857. Indian Affairs 1861 reported 22,000. Enumeration published in 1886 counted 23,000 Cherokee in Oklahoma (Indian Territory) as of year 1884. Indian Affairs reported in 1890 around 25,000 among the Western Cherokee (in Oklahoma) and in years 1884 and 1889 around 3,000 among the Eastern Cherokee. The Cherokee national census of 1890 in Oklahoma gave the total number of the nation under Cherokee law to be 25,978. In 1900 there were 35,000 in Oklahoma. According to James Mooney (quoted by Frederick Webb Hodge) the majority of the earlier estimates of the Cherokee population are probably too low as the Cherokee occupied so extensive a territory that only a part of them came into contact with the Whites. Indian Affairs 1910 reported that in 1910 the Cherokee in Oklahoma contained 41,701 people, including 36,301 by blood, 286 by intermarriage and 4,917 freedmen. While the census of 1910 counted 31,489 Cherokees.

In the 2020 census a total of 1,130,730 people claimed Cherokee ancestry. However the percentage of full-blood individuals is probably very low considering that the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians reported having only 395 full-blood members. Perhaps there is a larger number of full-blood individuals among the United Keetoowah Band and among the Cherokee Nation.