John Crawford Vaughn

Vaughn raised the 3rd Tennessee Infantry from Monroe County in 1861 and was promoted to brigadier general in 1862. He fought Unionist factions in Scott County and was routed at Morristown in October 1864. After the war he was indicted for treason, moved his family to Georgia, then came home to Sweetwater and served in the state Senate, where he was Speaker from 1871 to 1873. In 1874 he pleaded guilty to defrauding a widow's pension and paid a $1,000 fine. He died in Georgia the next year, aged 51.

What the plaque says

John Crawford Vaughn February 21, 1824-September 10, 1875 Born in a house which stood here. Captain in the 5th Tenn. Inf., Mexican War; organizer and first commander of the 3rd Tenn. Inf., CSA, whose first action was the first Battle of Manassas. Promoted brigadier general, he was captured at Vicksburg July 4, 1863; on exchange commanded the cavalry brigade which in 1865 escorted President Jefferson Davis on his flight from Richmond. Speaker of the Tennessee Senate in 1871. He died near Thomasville, Ga., and is buried there.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Sequoyah Birthplace Museum — 9.2 mi
  The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians' museum on Tellico Lake, near the town where Sequoyah was born, telling how he built the Cherokee syllabary and what the Tellico Dam drowned.
• Fort Loudoun State Historic Park — 9.6 mi
  A reconstructed 1756-57 British fort on the Little Tennessee River in Overhill Cherokee country, besieged in 1760 and surrendered on August 9 of that year.
• Fort Southwest Point State Historic Park — 25 mi
  A reconstructed 1797 federal fort on a knoll at the meeting of the Clinch and Tennessee rivers, headquarters of Cherokee agent Return J. Meigs, a state park since July 2026.

More markers nearby

• Estes Kefauver — 0.6 mi
• Hiwassee College — 2.6 mi
• Lost Sea — 4.1 mi
• Sequoyah — 8.8 mi