page_title: Jacob Brown Grant Deeds
section_title: Jacob Brown Purchase Tract #2
hierarchical_section_title: Jacob Brown Grant Deeds / The Jacob Brown Purchases / Jacob Brown Purchase Tract #2
caption_attribution_description: English: The map depicts the Jacob Brown Grants within the watershed of the Nolichucky river in East Tennessee
context_page_description: The Jacob Brown Grant Deeds, also known more simply as the Nolichucky Grants, were transactions for the sale of land by the Cherokee Nation to Jacob Brown. The transaction occurred at Sycamore Shoals on the Watauga River on March 25, 1775. The Jacob Brown grants were for two large tracts along the Nolichucky River some of which had been previously leased from the Cherokee.
context_section_description: A tract of land lying on Nonachuchy River, below the mouth of Big Limestone, on both sides of said river, bounded as follows, joining the rest of said Brown's purchase. Beginning on the south side of said river, below the old fields that lie below the said Limestone, on the north side of Nonachuchy Mountain, at a large rock; thence north 32 deg. West of the mouth of Camp Creek, on the south side of said river; thence across said river; thence north-west to the dividing ridge between Lick Creek and Watauga or Holston; thence up the dividing ridge to the rest of said Brown's land; thence down the main fork of Big Limestone to its mouth; thence crossing the river a straight course to Nonachuchy Mountain; thence down the said mountain to the beginning.
  None of those shown as witnesses appear on the Path Grant Deed or the Charles Roberson Grant deed. Shown as "Witness the warriors" were Joseph Vann and Richard Henderson, both of whom were present at the signing of the Path Grant Deed and the Great Grant Deed. Richard Henderson was the purchaser of both properties and Joseph Vann, who was titled Linquester, was the official translator for the Crown and considered trustworthy by both parties.   Joseph Vann who was noted present on the Path Grant Deed and the great Grant deeds as well was a half Indian and had served as interpreter for Cameron the British Agent to the Cherokee.
  The presence of Henderson and Vann yield credence to the belief that the Brown Grants were drawn and signed at Sycamore Shoals. In the diary of Richard Henderson, for the date of March 25, 1775 there is no mention of his presence under an oak tree on the Nolichucky that was some twenty miles to the southwest of Sycamore Shoals on the Watauga River.
  Thus, the caption on the Tennessee Historical Marker noted above  commemorating Jacob Brown likely confuses the event of the lease trading in 1772 and the purchase trading in March 1775. It was the bargaining for the lease of the Nolichucky property in 1772 with the Cherokee that likely took place under the Big Oak Tree near Jacob Brown's trading post. The Warrant #652 drawn by John Carter on April 22, 1779 some four years after the deed was signed, indicated the treaty was held on the property at the mouth of Cherokee Creek.
  The Jacob Brown Grant Deed was some what hastily drawn after learning of the other successful transactions, especially that of the Charles Robertson grant, there was not time for an accurate survey while all the parties were assembled and in the mood for business. Thus a description for the property was developed based on geographical features of mountains, creeks, the Nolichucky River and a watershed. This procedure for formally describing North Carolina boundaries was the approved method at the time.
  Generally, the Jacob Brown properties that include both parcel #1 and parcel #2 are bounded on the north by the ridgeline including the present day Fodder Stack and the highpoint Chimney Top Mountain ridge. This ridgeline separates the drainage of the Holston river on the north from the Nolichucky river on the South.  The grant southern boundary are the mountains defining the Tennessee/ North Carolina border and separating the drainage of the Nolichucky river from that of the French Broad river. On the eastern extremity the boundary is the ridge crest that defines the watershed between the Nolichucky and the Watauga rivers extended southward from a point near the present day Boone Dam to the readily definable point of the head of Indian Creek that is today Sam's Gap. On the west the grant line definition is not so clearly defined but can be taken as a line northward from the high point on the state line above the present day Hot Springs NC northward to the western  end of the aforementioned Chimney Top ridge line.
caption: The map depicts the Jacob Brown Grants within the watershed of the Nolichucky river in East Tennessee
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