An excellent article about the history of the Cherokee and the history of the United States. READ IT ALL!
I did an extensive genealogy project for a family that lived in Cherokee County and can say, without DNA testing, that there was intermarriage between some of the family and the local tribe, before and after the Trail of Tears, but I don't know that anyone who didn't go to live with the tribe has bothered with DNA testing. One of the "White" family married a man on the rolls. However, another couple married and had land in the area prior to the first missionary church...and do not appear on the rolls.
EXCERPT:
The Cherokee tradition of exogamous marriage, or marrying outside of one’s clan, evolved during the 17th and 18th centuries as Cherokees encountered Europeans on a more frequent basis. Some sought to solidify alliances with Europeans through intermarriage.
It is impossible to know the exact number of Cherokees who married Europeans during this period. But we know that Cherokees viewed intermarriage as both a diplomatic tool and as a means of incorporating Europeans into the reciprocal bonds of kinship. Eighteenth-century British traders often sought out Cherokee wives. For the trader, the marriage opened up new markets, with his Cherokee wife providing both companionship and entry access to items such as the deerskins coveted by Europeans. For Cherokees, intermarriage made it possible to secure reliable flows of European goods, such as metal and iron tools, guns, and clothing. The frequency with which the British reported interracial marriages among the Cherokees testifies to the sexual autonomy and political influence that Cherokee women enjoyed. It also gave rise to a mixed-race Cherokee population that appears to have been far larger than the racially mixed populations of neighboring tribes...
