Cherokee ancestor in the "wrong" place? Help!?

Question:

Cherokee ancestor in the "wrong" place? Help!?

There is a rumor going around in my extended family that my great grandfather was Cherokee. So I decided to get onto the free trial with ancestry.com and see if I could find some info about him. I know that he was born in 1860 and died in 1926. He is frequently listed as "mulatto" on cencus reports. His wife's name was "India" and lot of my aunts and uncles refer to her as "Indy".
But they both seem to fall out of the sky into the 1870 census report. They were listed as living in north eastern North Carolina. If he was Cherokee, wasn't he far away from his homelands? All the Cherokee I see listed were from western NC and Tenesee and Oklahoma. I found info that stated that he could have been adopted and his name could have changed, and so forth. How would I go about finding out another name to look him up? And how would I go about finding out India's maiden name?

I am so stuck!

Additional Details

4 months ago
I spent my whole 2 week trial with ancestry.com trying to figure out this information, and got absolutely nowhere. Now my trial has ended, but I may decide to purchase a subscription because I really want to know about my family.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: 4 months ago
I spent my whole 2 week trial with ancestry.com trying to figure out this information, and got absolutely nowhere. Now my trial has ended, but I may decide to purchase a subscription because I really want to know about my family.