Black-Dutch identifying as "Black Dutch" may have originated during and after the 1830s Indian Removal era. {citation needed} They may have attempted to "pass" and avoid being removed to Indian Territory or stigmatized by what became a majority Anglo-American society. Some Native Americans, mainly from the Five Civilized Tribes of the Southeast, claimed "Black Dutch" or "Black Irish" heritage in order to purchase land in areas which United States treaties and other laws had reserved for people of European descent. Once they owned the land, such families who had escaped forced removal would not admit to their Native American heritage, for
Dutch West Indian Americans Dutch West Indian Americans Dutch West Indian Americans or Dutch Antillean Americans are Americans of Dutch Antillean descent. According to the 2010 Census Bureau figures there 54,377 Americans under the category of "Dutch West Indian". In the 2000 US Census, the number of Americans reported whose origins are in the Dutch West Indian was of 35,359. In this Census (and to difference of the 2010 US Census whose Dutch West Indian ethnics were not mentioned of individual way) a total of 1,970 people affirmed just be of Aruban descent, while only 352 people claimed descent from people of St. Maarten.