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APPALACHIAN WEEKEND 2005

Did you know | Places to Visit |  Books | Driving Tour

Driving Tour of Cherokee Locations and Points of Interest In and Around Gilmer County, GA

Ellijay, GA
Site of a Cherokee Indian village and bears an Indian name meaning "earth green there." The Cherokee Indians were the inhabitants of Gilmer County until white settlers arrived.

Sanderstown, GA
Located one mile north of Talking Rock was named for the Cherokee chief, George Sanders, who had an entertainment house there.

Fort Gilmer State Historical Marker
Located on Old U.S. 411 four miles north of Carters, GA
Site of Fort Gilmer, built in 1838 to garrison U.S. troops ordered to enforce the removal from this region of the last Cherokee Indians under terms of the New Echota treaty of 1835.


Whitepath
Located 5 miles north of Ellijay around mile marker 15 on the north side of Hwy 515 was an Indian gathering place. Home of the Cherokee Chief Whitepath. Whitepath and Chief John Ross tried to prevent the takeover of Cherokee land by the State of Georgia even though Georgia had already dispersed the land in the 1832 Land Lottery. Four years later Whitepath and the Cherokee began "Trail of Tears." Whitepath died on the journey.

Fort Hetzel
East Ellijay
Fort Hetzel housed an estimated 1100 Cherokee from the area. Held in the fort for nearly 6 months with little food and no sanitation, many Native Americans died. More died on the march, which began down the Dahlonega to Tennessee Road roughly following Route 52 west of Ellijay. Some letters seem to indicate that the road was improved specifically for the forced march.

New Echota Cherokee National Capital
1211 Chatsworth Hwy NE, Calhoun, GA
Located on Ga 225, NE of Calhoun
The first edition of the Cherokee Phoenix rolled off the presses at New Echota in 1828 using the alphabet that Sequoyah developed.

New Echota Cemetery
South of Ga 225 on Newtown Ch Rd, just west of New Echota

Trail of Tears State Historical Marker,
New Echota State Historic Site, Gordon County, Ga.





Track Rock Gap State Historical Marker
Located on Track Rock Rd. 2.3 miles south of U.S. 76, 6 miles east of Blairsville
One of the best-known of the petroglyph, or marked stone, sites in Georgia. The six table-sized soapstone boulders contain hundreds of symbols carved or pecked into their surface. Archaeologists have speculated dates for the figures fom the Archaic Period (8,000 to 1,000 B.C.) to the Cherokee Indians who lived here until the 19th Century. No one knows the exact meaning of the symbols or glyphs which represent animals, birds, tracks and geometric figures.

Chief Vann House and State Historical Marker
Located at Ga. 52 Alt. and Ga. 225 at Spring Place, GA
Built of locally made brick in 1804, this house, the finest in the Cherokee Nation, was the home a Town Chief, James Vann, son of a Scotch trader, Clement Vann, and his wife, a Cherokee chieftain's daughter. Restored to its original grandeur, it is a monument to the culture of the Cherokees.

Epworth
An Indian Council Ground was held at Epworth--called (in English translation), the Fightingtown Campground. There the Indians met for matters of government and for their games such as lacrosse.

Fort Chastain
Where Star Creek and the Toccoa River converge near Morganton (an area now under Blue Ridge Lake) was the site of a fort for gathering the Indians before deportation on the Trail of Tears.

Fort Mountain State Park
A stone wall of mysterious origin. From this wall, one has an unobstructed view of surises and sunsets across the Piedmont to the south. Cherokees built stone walls and this wall is described in Cherokee legends.

Funk Heritage Center
Reinhardt College, Waleska, GA
The Funk Heritage Center focuses on the history and art of the Southeastern Indians and European settlers.

The Chieftains Trail
The Chieftains Trail is a 200 mile driving tour through Northwest Georgia that highlights our extensive Native American history. The estimated time to complete the entire tour is 2.5 days.

Each of the six stops along the trail is designed to highlight a specific area of Native American heritage. Woodland Indians built the enigmatic wall at Fort Mountain State Park, Moundbuilders the ceremonial and burial mounds at Etowah Indian Mounds State Park, Cherokee homes of Major Ridge and James Vann, the Cherokee Capital of New Echota. The Funk Heritage Center is the newest addition to the trail, combining information on the society and culture of all the Native American tribes that inhabited Northwest Georgia. For more information and sites, check out their website at http://chieftainstrail.com/ 

For more information about other Cherokee Trails and driving tours, check out Cherokee Heritage Trails Guidebook by Barbara Duncan. You can find a copy at the Craddock Center.

References:
http://www.ngeorgia.com
Ethlene Jones
Carl Vinson Institute, University of Georgia
 

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 This page was last updated 09/26/2006