Twelve years later, the first permanent settlement in Tennessee was made upon the waters of the Watauga in the northeast corner of the State. This little community became, soon afterwards, the Watauga Association, a practically independent government, with a written constitution; indisputably the first of the kind that was formed on this continent, by men of American birth, and inspired by American sentiment. Its leaders were James Robertson, afterwards the founder of Nashville, a typical Scotch-Irish pioneer; John Sevier, afterwards the first Governor of Tennessee, a man of mixed Anglo-Saxon and Huguenot descent, and of extraordinary abilities, who became a resident of Knoxville; and John Carter, presumably descended from the noted Virginia family of that name, many of whose descendants are citizens of Knoxville. About the year 1787, the settlements having extended gradually down the Holston, we find James White living upon the site of Knoxville and owning, then or later, much of the land now covered by the city. If traditionary statements are to be trusted, a part at least of the first house erected by James White is still standing, its original sturdy and loopholed logs protected and preserved by a sheathing of boards. The name first given the settlement was “White’s Fort.” In 1790, North Carolina having ceded her possessions west of the Alleghanies to the United States, the “Territory of the United States South of the River Ohio” was created, and President Washington named as its Governor his friend William Blount, of North Carolina. In 1791, Governor Blount decided to make White’s Fort, which was by that time called Knoxville in honor of General Henry Knox, the capital of the territory, and the town site was surveyed in part and laid off into lots by its owner, James White, in that year. [Illustration: WILLIAM BLOUNT, GOVERNOR OF SOUTHWEST TERRITORY.] The location is on the north bank of the Holston, four miles south of the junction of the French Broad and Holston rivers, giving to the last stream the name to which it is entitled, without regard to many temporary, ineffective and indefensible changes of river nomenclature in East Tennessee by legislation. Between two creeks, once clear and vigorous, but now defiled and depleted by many civilized uses, rises a plateau of about two hundred and fifty acres, of diversified but comparatively level surface. Where this elevation slopes to the river on the southeast, the town made its beginning, and climbed slowly up the hill until it reached the highest point overlooking the river, which was crowned with a blockhouse known as the barracks, where a scanty garrison of regulars was intended to protect the settlers and to overawe the Cherokees. The barracks boasted at least one great gun, which was fired morning and evening with punctuality and impressiveness.