Watauga Old Fields - Elizabethton, TN
Posted by: 
vhasler
N 36° 20.926 W 082° 12.629
17S E 391382 N 4023313
The Watauga Association was the first organization of white settlers west of the mountains from North Carolina.
Waymark Code: WM9WYJ
Location: Tennessee, United States
Date Posted: 10/07/2010
Views: 13
Mentioned in two different places in the travel guide:
"A boulder monument on the courthouse lawn marks the spot where the Watauga Association was organized in 1772."
and
Isolated in a mountain wilderness and almost entirely ignored by North Carolina, the people of the Watauga Settlements soon felt the lack of organized government. In 1772 they formed the Watauga Association and elected five magistrates to make and administer law. The records of the Association are lost and little is known about it. It is certain, however, that the Watauga constitution was the first to be written and adopted by independent white Americans."
----- TENNESSEE - A Guide to the State (third printing 1949)
The monument continues to reside on the street corner in front of the Carter County Courthouse.
The plaque reads:
WATAUGA OLD FIELDS
Where the Watauga Association was formed in 1772, being the first place west of the Alleghenies where men joined together in the written compact for civil government and for the preservation of the ideals of liberty.
The thirteen commissioners elected were
Charles Robertson
James Smith
George Russell
James Robertson
Jacob Brown
Jacob Womack
Zach Isbell
William Bean
Robert Lucas
John Sevier
John Jones
William Tatham
John Carter
Erected by the Tennessee Daughters of the American Revolution, October 1923.