Chattanooga began here. Between 1813 and 1816 John Ross, a Cherokee businessman who became Principal Chief in 1828, set up a ferry and warehouse on this bank of the Tennessee River. From 1819 to 1838 the river was the line between Cherokee land to the south and United States land to the north. Ross opposed the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Treaty of New Echota, and his efforts to stop both failed.
The landing became a designated departure point for deportation. In May 1837 about 350 Muscogee (Creek) people who had taken refuge in the Cherokee Nation were rounded up at gunpoint and put on boats here. In 1838 it was a holding camp and launching point for the first three detachments of Cherokees forced out on the Trail of Tears. More than 1,300 people in the first two were crowded onto flatboats pulled by steamboats. In the third, 1,072 people crossed the river on Ross's swing ferry and walked to Waterloo, Alabama, to board boats. Officials recorded 216 deaths in those three groups.
Today the landing is a riverfront park at the downtown end of the 13-mile Tennessee Riverwalk, with a river pier, an amphitheater and an art installation that recognizes Cherokee culture. The National Park Service publishes a seven-mile driving tour that follows the Trail of Tears out of Chattanooga, and it starts here. In 1863 a pontoon bridge at the landing carried supplies on the Cracker Line, the route that broke the siege of the city. The aquarium and the Walnut Street Bridge are within walking distance.
The closest stops worth working into your route
Roadside plaques and monuments within a short detour