Long Island of the Holston

Long Island sits in the Holston River at Kingsport, about four miles long and up to half a mile wide. The Cherokee name is Amoyeli Gunahita, and for thousands of years it was a sacred council and treaty ground. It lay on the Great Indian Warrior Path and served as neutral ground for settling disputes between peoples. It was declared a National Historic Landmark District in 1960.

Settlers wanted it. In March 1775 Daniel Boone began clearing the Wilderness Road from the island with a party of axmen, while Richard Henderson's company negotiated for Cherokee land at Sycamore Shoals. The Treaty of Long Island in July 1777 confirmed that the Cherokee still owned the island while they gave up claims to east Tennessee land that settlers already occupied. John Donelson's flatboat flotilla left from here in December 1779 for the Cumberland. On January 7, 1806, Henry Dearborn bought the island from the Cherokee for the United States, and Richard Netherland later built a plantation on it.

Industry, mainly Eastman Chemical, occupies much of the island, and most of it is private. In July 1976 the City of Kingsport returned 3.61 acres of what it called sacred Cherokee ground, on the island's western end, to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. Visitors can park at Boatyard Park on Netherland Inn Road and cross a footbridge to the island, where a stone monument names Cherokee clans. Treat it as the sacred ground it is. The Netherland Inn, built as a salt boatyard in 1802 and an inn from 1818, stands on the same road.