Day 16 Spring City - Tennessee

I started the day with a short detour along the banks of the Tennessee river passing on the way a small river boat being used as a floating restaurant. The reason for the detour, was to visit the reconstructed fort at Southwest point, it was hot already, just after 10 am, and it was 84 degrees, with 74% humidity, so i made straight for the visitor center, to cool off, as i was already sweating after just a mile and a slight climb, and to get some background info. The inside was filled with the usual collection of coins and broken bits of pottery, as well as a model of how the fort would have looked, all a bit of a guess, because none of the original structures remain, and all the records about the place had been moved to Washington, where we Brits apparently had a little bit of a bonfire during the spat we had with our Colonial brothers in the 1770's, which all started, i believe because someone in Boston had a Tea party, and someone else forgot to bring some cake, or something like that, anyway...... Sorry!

I got chatting to the chap who works there, and he gave me all the background stuff i needed, which is hardly surprising cos thats what he is there for. So i learnt things like; no battles were ever fought at the fort (!), it was established to house a detachment of troops whose job, it was (surprisingly), to protect the interests of the Cherokee and Creek nations, who lived across the river, and had been persuaded to stop killing the 'palefaces' as long as they would stop trying to settle on their bit of 'turf', which incidentally included the site of the fort. A deal was struck between both parties where by, the Indian nations would give up the prime spot for the fort as long as certain conditions were meet, ''We give white man this land, for him build tepee for his braves, as long as him make Kingston capital of this State'', White man ''Okee dokee Chiefie, no problem, you give us this land for the fort, we make sure no palefaces try to settle down as they make their way along this new road we have just built through your land to Nashville, and we will make this the Capital'' ( In whisper aside to aide) ''All we have to do, is play along, we'll have a meeting sometime in the Courthouse, and than adjourn it back to Knoxville away from these savages''.

Who Fought at the Fort?

And so it was settled for a while things went something like:-

'Knock, Knock'

''Scuse me Captain, me and my mates would like to take our wagons, livestock and families to ..... aah.........Nashville, along this road through all this nice fertile land that doesn't belong to anyone''

Captain of Fort ''Ok my lad, so long as you don't try to settle along the way''

''What sir?, me sir?, no sir''

''What's in that big bag marked CORN SEED?''

''What bag?,....Oh, that bag!.....thats for ....Emm....... feeding the chickens when we get to.....Nashville, .... yes, thats it''

''OK then, but I'd better send along some of my troops, with you,so theres no funny business''.

And thats how it went for a few years, until in a cost cutting exercise, someone suggested ''This is all to much trouble, and a waste of manpower. Why don't we round up all these dammed Cherokee, and march them down to Oklahoma, where they can deal with them, then we wont need the fort at Kingston, and we can shut it down''.

And thats what they did, it was called 'The Trail of Tears', and a lot of them died on the way.

Then i set off, had another flat tire, missed a turning, meet a very nice man called Ed, went back to his place to stay and meet his wife, where they feed me fried chicken and corn, and he helped me plan the rest of the trip,cos he'd done the transam last year......but thats all another story!