William’s Island

William’s Island is a Tennessee historical marker in Hamilton County.

Hamilton Co, TN 27A, at junction w/road to Baylor School

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Named for a pioneer occupant, this island was the site of an Indian village and probably of an 18th Century French trading post. Here, on May 31, 1862, James J. Andrews, leader of the Andrews Raid, was captured following his escape from jail in Chattanooga. He was hanged in Atlanta, June 7.

TodayHistorical map

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Barry Lawrence Ruderman Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

Historical maps covering this location

1856 · Alabama. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1862 · Johnson's Kentucky & Tennessee (1862) (Barry Lawrence Ruderman Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1864 · Kentucky And Tennessee (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1891 · Middle Tennessee Campaign. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1896 · Map of the Battlefields of Chattanooga and Wauhatchie (E. E. Betts, Chickamauga and… (Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division)

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For example, one family's tree showed the Articles of Confederation marker in Pennsylvania standing under a mile from where William Gabby lived in the 1760s.

What that marker records spans 1777 to 1789, overlapping William Gabby's years there.

From one family's 77-marker roster

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Marker text and location from the Tennessee Historical Commission, as the Commission publishes them on its marker map.

William’s Island

Historical maps covering this location

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