Clover Bottom

Dr. James Hoggatt and Mary Ann Hoggatt built an Italianate mansion at Clover Bottom in 1858 or 1859 as the centerpiece of a 1,500-acre plantation. In 1860 the Hoggatts held sixty enslaved people there. One of them, John McCline, was enslaved here as a child, escaped in 1862 and later worked as a drover for the Union Army. Mary Ann's half-brothers were Andrew Jackson Donelson and Daniel Smith Donelson. Meredith Gentry, a former congressman, died here in 1866. The state bought the property in 1948, and a state history agency has occupied it since 1994.

What the plaque says

Clover Bottom In 1780, the Gower party, tending Middle Tennessee's first cotton and corn crop, were killed or captured by Indians. On nearby Stone's River some flatboats were built for Aaron Burr's abortive expedition. The famous match races between Andrew Jackson's "Truxton" & Capt. Jos. Erwin's "Plowboy" were run on racetrack in river bottom, 1805-06.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Andrew Jackson's Hermitage — 2.4 mi
  Andrew Jackson's cotton plantation east of Nashville, where visitors can walk to the quarters, Alfred's Cabin and the Enslaved Cemetery as well as the mansion.
• Ryman Auditorium — 8.2 mi
  The 1892 brick tabernacle in downtown Nashville that was the Grand Ole Opry's home from 1943 to 1974, now a National Historic Landmark and working concert hall.
• National Museum of African American Music — 8.2 mi
  A downtown Nashville museum, opened in 2021, tracing gospel, blues, jazz, rhythm and blues and hip-hop through Black history from 1619 to 2016.
• Fort Negley — 8.3 mi
  The largest inland stone fort of the Civil War, built in 1862 on St. Cloud Hill by more than 2,700 conscripted Black laborers, hundreds of whom died.

More markers nearby

• The Hermitage — 1.8 mi
• Tulip Grove — 2.4 mi
• Old Hickory Village — 4.7 mi
• Buchannan's Station — 5.1 mi