Download or read book Photograph of the Great Spring at the Red Clay Site at Red Clay State Park in Bradley County, Tennessee written by and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This photograph is of the Great Spring at the Red Clay site at Red Clay State Park in Bradley County, Tennessee. The Great Spring, also known as the Blue Hole Spring, is a natural spring that not only supplied the Cherokees who met here with potable water, but was also a sacred and spiritual place for them. By 1832, the state of Georgia had refused the Cherokee the right to hold council meetings unless the meeting dealt with treaties that gave away their lands. The Cherokee decided to move their capital from New Echota, Georgia across the state line to Red Clay, Tennessee because the state of Tennessee did not prohibit the Cherokees from meeting together. Thus, Red Clay became the sear of the Cherokee government in 1832 and lasted until the removal of the Cherokees to the west in 1838. Red Clay was composed of 11 general councils and the meetings were attended by up to 5000 people. It was at Red Clay that the Cherokee learned that they had lost all of their land and would be removed to the west. Red Clay consists of the sacred Blue Hole Spring, a reconstructed council house, and several reconstructed homestead buildings. Red Clay is also the home to the Eternal Flame, lit on April 6, 1984. The Cherokees took hot coals from their council fire at Ted Clay on the Trail of Tears. The flame was later taken to Cherokee, North Carolina in the 1950s but was returned to Red Clay in 1984. This was the first symbolic step unifying the Eastern Cherokees with the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma since their removal in 1838. Today Red Clay State Historical Park is not only a historical site, but is also an interpretive site on the Trail of Tears.