Tiana Rogers – A Mysterious Marriage

Tiana Rogers, also known as Tiana Houston, was a Cherokee woman who had a relationship with Samuel Houston. Tiana was born in 1799 in the Cherokee Nation (East) to John Rogers, a white man, and Jennie Due, a Cherokee woman. She married David Gentry, a white man, around 1820, and they had two children who died young. After David’s death, Tiana married Sam Houston in a Cherokee ceremony around 1830.

Sam Houston, a former governor of Tennessee, had known Tiana’s family since childhood. He was granted Cherokee citizenship in 1829 and married the widowed Tiana Gentry the following year. They lived together in the Cherokee community near Fort Gibson, Oklahoma, where they operated a trading post. However, their relationship ended when Houston left her and went to Texas in 1833.

Tiana later married another white man named Sam McGrady, but they apparently separated before her death from pneumonia in 1838 or 1839. There are different claims regarding her final resting place. Some believe she was originally buried at Wilson Rock Cemetery, and her remains were later moved to Fort Gibson National Cemetery.

It’s important to note that there are controversies and varying accounts surrounding Tiana’s relationship with Sam Houston, as well as uncertainties about her Native American name. It is also difficult to qualify the Cherokee marriage between Sam and Tiana, as he didn’t obtain a divorce from Eliza Allen until after he’d moved on to Texas, and was preparing to marry Margaret Lea. The available information we do have is based on historical records, accounts, and interpretations from different sources.