In early July 1838 a forced column of Cherokee walked west along the line of Lauderdale County Road 14, the old Waterloo Road, which now crosses the Natchez Trace Parkway. They were the detachment of Captain G. S. Drane. Drought had left the Hiwassee and Tennessee rivers too low for the boats the removal was meant to use, so on 17 June the detachment set out on foot from the Chattanooga area, a march of about 250 miles to the river landing at Waterloo, Alabama, about ten miles west of the parkway.
It began with about 1,070 people, poorly equipped, according to a historical marker in Huntsville; the National Park Service gives the same figure. Around 300 escaped between Bellefonte and Woodville. On 26 June the rest refused to go on, and militia under Drane were ordered to move them. The National Park Service traces their route along present US 72 to Florence and then along County Road 14 to Waterloo, which they reached in miserable condition on 10 July. There they were put on boats, and the river failed them too: the boat ran aground on the Arkansas River near present-day Morrilton, and the party finished overland, following the trail of an earlier detachment. It disbanded in present-day Oklahoma on 5 September 1838. Drane reported 146 deaths.
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34.8774, -87.8948
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