Fort Blount

Fort Blount stood at a key Cumberland River crossing on Avery’s Trace in northern Tennessee, an important route linking eastern and middle Tennessee in the 1790s. After frontier violence increased, Sampson Williams built a blockhouse here under Governor William Blount’s orders, and in 1794 it was replaced by the larger stockaded Fort Blount. Garrisoned briefly by militia and then U.S. regulars, the post was abandoned by 1798. The site later became Williamsburg, an early Jackson County seat that declined after the county seat moved in 1818. Archaeology has located the fort and revealed artifacts and structures that preserve this frontier crossing’s military, civic, and much older prehistoric history.

Tennessee · United States