Cleveland, Tennessee
Cleveland is the county seat of, and largest city in, Bradley County, Tennessee.[10] The population was 47,356 at the 2020 census.[11] It is the principal city of the Cleveland metropolitan area, Tennessee (consisting of Bradley and neighboring Polk County), which is included in the Chattanooga–Cleveland–Dalton, TN–GA–AL Combined Statistical Area.
Cleveland is the seventeenth-largest city in Tennessee and has the fifth-largest industrial economy, having thirteen Fortune 500 manufacturers.[12][13]
History[edit]
Early history[edit]
For thousands of years before European encounter, this area was occupied by succeeding cultures of indigenous peoples. Peoples of the South Appalachian Mississippian culture, beginning about 900–1000 CE, established numerous villages along the river valleys and tributaries. In the more influential villages, they built a single, large earthen platform mound, sometimes surmounted by a temple or elite residence, which was an expression of their religious and political system.
This area was later part of a large territory occupied by the Cherokee Nation, an Iroquoian-speaking people believed to have migrated south from the Great Lakes area, where other Iroquoian tribes arose. Their public architecture was known as the townhouse, a large structure designed for the community to gather together. In some cases, these were built on top of existing mounds; in others the townhouse would front on a broad plaza. Their territory encompassed areas of Western North Carolina, western South Carolina, southeastern Tennessee, northeastern Georgia, and northern Alabama.[14]
The first Europeans to reach the area now occupied by Cleveland and Bradley County were most likely a 1540 expedition through the interior led by Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto. Based on their chronicles, they are believed to have camped along Candies Creek in the western part of present-day Cleveland on June 2, 1540.[15] They encountered some chiefdoms of the Mississippian culture in other areas of South and North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia. Some writers have suggested that the de Soto expedition was preceded by a party of Welshmen, but there is no supporting evidence and historians consider this unlikely.[15]
During and after the American Revolutionary War, more European Americans entered this area seeking land. They came into increasing conflict with the Cherokee, who occupied this territory. The Cherokee had tolerated traders but resisted settlers who tried to take over their territory and competed for resources.[1]
Because of being defeated in repeated attacks by Americans, in 1819 the Cherokee ceded the land directly north of present-day Bradley County (and north of the Hiwassee River) to the U.S. government in the Calhoun Treaty. In 1821 the Cherokee Agency—the official liaison between the U.S. government and the Cherokee Nation—was moved to the south bank of the Hiwassee River in present-day Charleston, a few miles north of what is now Cleveland.[16] The Indian agent was Colonel Return J. Meigs.
By the 1830s, white settlers had begun to move rapidly into this area in anticipation of a forced relocation of the Cherokee and other Southeast tribes. Congress had passed the Indian Removal Act in 1830, under President Andrew Jackson's direction.[1] In 1832, the Cherokee moved the seat of their government to the Red Clay Council Grounds in southern Bradley County. Some Cherokee had already moved to the West, where they were known as Old Settlers until reunification of the Nation. It operated there until the Cherokee removal in 1838, part of the larger forced migration of Cherokee to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma). This became known as the Trail of Tears. The former Cherokee seat is now preserved within Red Clay State Park.
The removal was initiated by the Treaty of New Echota on December 29, 1835, although the majority of Cherokee leaders had not approved it. In the Spring of 1838, removal operations by the US military began. Headquarters for the removal were established at Fort Cass in Charleston. In preparation, thousands of Cherokees were rounded up and held in internment camps located between Cleveland and Charleston. Two of the largest were at Rattlesnake Springs.[17] Blythe Ferry, about 15 miles (24 km) northwest of Cleveland in Meigs County, was also an important site during the Cherokee removal.[1]
The legislative act on February 10, 1836, that created Bradley County, which was named for Colonel Edward Bradley of Shelby County, Tennessee, authorized the establishment of a county seat. It was to be named "Cleveland" after Colonel Benjamin Cleveland, a commander at the Battle of Kings Mountain during the American Revolution.[1] The legislative body appointed to govern the county was required to meet in nearby Chatata Valley until a site was chosen for the county seat.[18]
By a one-vote majority on May 2, 1836, the commissioners chose "Taylor's Place," the home of Andrew Taylor, as the county seat, due largely to the site's excellent water sources.[18] Taylor, who had married a Cherokee woman and constructed a log cabin on the site next to a spring, had been given a reservation at the site.[19] A permanent settlement had been established there in 1835, and became a favored stopping place for travelers.[20] The other proposed location for the city was a site a few miles to the east, owned by a wealthy Cherokee named Deer-In-The-Water.[19]
Cleveland was formally established as the county seat by the state legislature on January 20, 1838.[21] That year the city was reported to have a population of 400; it was home to two churches (one Presbyterian, the other Methodist), and a private school for boys, the Oak Grove Academy. The city was incorporated on February 4, 1842, and elections for mayor and aldermen were held shortly afterward on April 4 that year.[22]
While the overwhelming majority of early inhabitants of Cleveland earned their living in agriculture, by 1850 the city also had a sizeable number of skilled craftsmen and professional people.[20] On September 5, 1851, the railroad was completed through Cleveland.[23] After copper mining began in the Copper Basin in neighboring Polk County in the 1840s, headquarters for mining operations were established in Cleveland by Julius Eckhardt Raht, a German-born businessman and engineer.[24] Copper was delivered from the basin to Cleveland by wagon, where it was loaded onto trains.[20] The city's first bank, the Ocoee Bank, was established in 1854.[25]
Civil War[edit]
While bitterly divided over the issue of secession on the eve of the Civil War, Cleveland, like Bradley County and most of East Tennessee, voted against Tennessee's Ordinance of Secession in June 1861.[26] The results of the countywide vote were 1,382 to 507 in favor of remaining in the Union.[27] Bradley County was represented by Richard M. Edwards and J.G. Brown at the 1861 East Tennessee Convention in Greeneville, an unsuccessful attempt to allow East Tennessee to split from the state and remain part of the Union.[28]
Cleveland and Bradley County were occupied by the Confederate Army from June 1861 until the fall of 1863.[29] Despite this occupation, locals remained loyal to the Union, and placed a Union flag in the courthouse square in April 1861, where it remained until June 1862, when it was removed by Confederate forces from Mississippi.[27] Confederate forces also seized control of the copper mines in the Ducktown basin and the rolling mill in Cleveland owned by Raht.[30] Throughout the war both Union and Confederate troops would pass through Cleveland en route to other locations, which led to many brief skirmishes in the area.[31] The most deadly event in Bradley County during the Civil War was a train wreck near the Black Fox community, a few miles south of Cleveland, that killed 270 Confederate soldiers.[32]
Some significant Civil War locations in Bradley County include the Henegar House in Charleston, in which both Union and Confederate generals, including William Tecumseh Sherman, used as brief headquarters; the Charleston Cumberland Presbyterian Church, also in Charleston, which was used by Confederate forces as a hospital;[33] and the Blue Springs Encampments and Fortifications in southern Bradley County, where Union troops under the command of General Sherman camped on numerous occasions between October 1863 and the end of the war.[34] Troops under the command of Sherman also reportedly camped in 1863 near Tasso, a few miles northeast of Cleveland, on multiple occasions.[35]
No large-scale battles took place in and around Cleveland, but the city was considered militarily important due to the railroads. On June 30, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln sent a telegram to General Henry W. Halleck, which read, "To take and hold the railroad at or east of Cleveland, Tennessee, I think is as fully as important as the taking and holding of Richmond."[36] The railroad bridge over the Hiwassee River to the north was among those destroyed by the East Tennessee bridge-burning conspiracy in November 1861.[37]
On November 25, 1863, during the Battle of Missionary Ridge in Chattanooga, a group of 1,500 Union cavalrymen led by Col. Eli Long arrived in Cleveland. Over the next two days they destroyed twelve miles of railroad in the area, burned the railroad bridge over the Hiwassee a second time, and destroyed the copper rolling mill, which Confederate forces had been using to manufacture artillery shells, percussion caps, and other weaponry.[38] This would prove to be a major blow to the entire Confederate army, as approximately 90% of their copper came from the Ducktown mines.[39] The next day Long's troops were attacked by a group of about 500 Confederate cavalrymen led by Col. John H. Kelly, and quickly retreated to Chattanooga.[40]
The defeat of Confederate forces in Chattanooga resulted in Union troops regaining control of Cleveland and Bradley County by January 1864, and they retained control for the remainder of the war. Within a few days of the Battle of Missionary Ridge and Long's raid, several Union units, including members of the 9th Indiana Infantry Regiment, arrived in Cleveland.[41] Additional Union troops arrived in the area in the summer of 1864, and between May and October 1864 a Union artillery unit was stationed downtown, with headquarters established at the home of Julius Eckhardt Raht. During this time as many as 20,000 Union troops at a time camped in the fields surrounding the house in preparation for Sherman's Atlanta Campaign.[42] Union troops also established two forts, Fort McPherson and Fort Sedgewick, located at Hillcrest Memorial Gardens and Fort Hill Cemetery, respectively, on the highest points of the ridge south of downtown. They successfully repelled an attempted raid by Confederate Gen. Joseph Wheeler on August 17, 1864.[43]
Most of the Union troops stationed in Bradley County left in the summer of 1864 as part of the Atlanta campaign. From this point, Confederate sympathizers conducted guerrilla attacks against Unionist families in Cleveland and surrounding areas, continuing until after the war was over.[44] Members of the Army of Tennessee attempted to destroy a passing Union train near Tasso in the spring of 1864, which instead resulted in the destruction of a Confederate train.[45] The Civil War resulted in much damage to Cleveland and Bradley County, and much of the area was left in ruins.[46]
Parks and recreation[edit]
Several public recreational parks are located within or near Cleveland.[115] They are all maintained by the Cleveland Parks and Recreation department. They allow a variety of activities, and some organized sports teams compete at them. The Cleveland/Bradley County Greenway is an approximately 4.4 mile long greenway path which follows South Mouse Creek from downtown to neighborhoods in the northern part of the city.[116] Other facilities include the Bradley County Park, Kenneth L. Tinsley Park, Greenway Park, Mosby Park, Deer Park, College Hill Recreation Center, Johnston Park, Leonard Fletcher Park, Taylor Spring Park, Cleveland Family YMCA, and the South Cleveland Community Center.
Media[edit]
Newspapers[edit]
The Cleveland Daily Banner is the town's newspaper. The paper was first published in 1854.[126] Additionally, the Chattanooga Times Free Press, a paper based in Chattanooga, also serves as a primary source of news for Bradley County residents.
Radio[edit]
Several radio stations located within Chattanooga and neighboring cities serve Cleveland, along with others licensed to Cleveland, which are listed below:[127]
