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Source
Cherokee Removal: Forts Along the Georgia Trail of Tears
Draft Report By Sarah H. Hill Under a joint partnership between
The National Park Service and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources/Historic Preservation Division
Funded by The National Park Service Challenge Cost Share Program
March 2005
Currently available (February, 2014) at:Murray County Museum.com
Related
- Person:John Cowan (12)
Extract
In 1803, the Secretary of War succeeded in persuading the Cherokee Nation to grant permission for a wagon road “not to exceed sixty feet in width” to originate at two sites on Cherokee land, Tellico and Southwest Point (later Kingston), Tennessee, and to run through the Cherokee Nation to the Georgia town of Athens. The purpose of the road was
- to connect dispersed white settlements,
- to provide Tennesseans access to southern markets at Augusta and Savannah, and
- to create entryways into the Cherokee Nation.
Most of the Nation opposed road construction but by offering James Vann and other prominent Cherokees “a proper inducement,” Agent Return Meigs gained their support for the road.
Cherokees reserved the right to control and receive revenue from all ferries and tolls, and to construct inns and public houses or stands along the road. By the time of removal, a considerable number of Cherokees had become relatively wealthy from road-related businesses. Prominent among the entrepreneurs were those who had signed the road agreement: Charles Hicks, Pathkiller, James Vann, and Black Fox. Vann and Hicks resided in Cherokee Georgia.
According to the agreement “one ferry shall be kept at Southwest point, one at Tellico, and one at the river Chatahuchee where the said road shall cross the said river.” In addition, “the Cherokee Nation shall establish houses of entertainment on the said road at three places to wit at Southwest point, Tellico, and Chatahuchee, at the ferries aforesaid.”
Soon after, James Vann became the first ferry owner as well as the first owner of a public stop in Cherokee Georgia, both on the Federal Road at the Chattahoochee River. An early traveler reminds us that ferries were still somewhat unusual. “In the course of two or three days, we came to a river, which was crossed by means of a ferry-boat, the first that I have ever seen. It was a broad, shallow, flat- bottomed thing, with a double floor built of very thick planks, having space enough for a large wagon and team, and making one think of an ordinary plank bridge turned bottom upwards. A rope of twisted hide was stretched across the river and fastened to a tree on each side. The flat was pulled across by means of this rope.”
Soon after the road agreement was signed, Col. William Barnett and Brig. Gen. Buckner Harris of Jackson County wrote to Tennessee governor John Sevier in their capacity as commissioners responsible for laying off the road. Presuming that the Secretary of War had informed Sevier of the appropriate procedures, Barnett and Harris proposed meeting the Tennessee commissioners at James Vann’s house on August 15th. Sevier promptly agreed to the meeting and wrote Tennesseans Joseph McMinn, Samuel Wear, and John Cowan to attend. Work soon began surveying and building the federal road.
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