Joseph Brown

The marker tells Joseph Brown's story from one side. He was captured on a river journey toward the Cumberland settlements in 1788 and held for a year at Nickajack, one of the Lower Towns where Dragging Canoe's Chickamauga Cherokee had relocated after refusing the 1777 peace. In September 1794 Brown guided a militia force under Major James Ore across Monteagle Mountain. Many villagers had fled to Running Water Town, but the militia left about 70 dead and destroyed both towns. The attack ended the Chickamauga period, and the 1798 Treaty of Tellico took more land.

What the plaque says

Joseph Brown About 1/2 mile east Joseph Brown lived. Enroute to the Cumberland Settlements by river from North Carolina in 1788, he was captured by Indians from Nickajack Cave. He escaped and in 1792 led the Ore expedition back to destroy the town. Settling here, he was one of Maury Co.'s leading citizens. First County Court met here, 1807.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• The Mink Slide and East 8th Street — 2.9 mi
  Columbia's Black business and church district south of the courthouse square, where on the night of February 25, 1946 a white mob gathered and Black veterans stood guard.
• James K. Polk Home and Museum — 3.0 mi
  The 1816 brick house in Columbia where Polk practiced law and campaigned for the legislature, now a museum that also tells of the people the Polk family enslaved.
• Gordon House and Ferry Site — 16 mi
  A brick house of 1818 beside the Duck River at milepost 407.7 of the Natchez Trace Parkway, where a Chickasaw partner and a Tennessee captain ran a ferry and an inn.
• Henry Horton State Park — 19 mi
  A Duck River park on Governor Henry Horton's former farm in Marshall County, with a mill ruin from 1845, kayak floats and the grave of a governor the House declined to impeach.

More markers nearby

• Hood & Schofield, November 24, 1864 — 2.6 mi
• Thomas Hart Benton — 2.8 mi
• The Reverend Edmund Kelly — 2.9 mi
• Freedmen's Savings Bank and Trust Company — 3.1 mi