Charleston on the Hiwassee

Before the war made Charleston a bridge town, the Army used it to empty the Cherokee homeland. Soldiers built Camp Cass in 1834 on the federal Cherokee Agency's site. After the Treaty of New Echota, which most Cherokee refused to honor, General Winfield Scott took command here in 1838. By July 25 more than 4,800 Cherokee prisoners were held in camps around the fort, Rattlesnake Springs among them. Drought ended the plan to send them by river, and whooping cough and dysentery killed several people a day. The last of twelve groups left December 5, 1838.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Cherokee Trail of Tears State Park — 17 mi
  The Blythe Ferry landing at the mouth of the Hiwassee, where Cherokee and Muscogee people camped in 1838 to cross the Tennessee River, made a state park in June 2026.
• Rhea County Courthouse — 21 mi
  The 1891 Dayton courthouse where John T. Scopes was tried in July 1925 for teaching evolution, with the second-floor courtroom restored and a trial museum in the basement.
• Ocoee Whitewater Center — 22 mi
  The Forest Service site on the Ocoee River in Cherokee National Forest that hosted the 1996 Olympic canoe slalom, on a river that TVA dams and releases by schedule.
• Red Clay State Historic Park — 23 mi
  The last seat of the Cherokee Nation before removal, where eleven general councils met from 1832 to 1837, now a state park with a council house replica, a sacred spring and an eternal flame.

More markers nearby

• The Henegar House — 0.3 mi
• Nancy Ward — 9.3 mi
• Civil War in Polk County — 9.6 mi
• Masonic Female Institute — 11 mi