Day Hike: Johnsonville State Historic Park

What does one do when having a suppressed immune system and a house filled with sick people? Quickly head outside, of course. For the second consecutive Saturday, the KTF blog headed to the shores of Kentucky Lake. This week I stayed on the east side of the river and explored the trails inside Johnsonville State Historic Park in the town of New Johnsonville.

 

Johnsonville was a major Union supply depot situated on the Tennessee River during the Civil War. A redoubt protected the depot from the east, but in November 1864 Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest attacked from the west bank and destroyed the base and the Union gunboat flotilla. A second redoubt was constructed to better protect against any future attacks, which would never come. After the war, Johnsonville survived for many years as a river-rail transfer point. However, severe flooding took its toll, and the Tennessee Valley Authority purchased the land prior to flooding the area through the creation of Kentucky Lake.

 

The Upper Redoubt, positioned beyond Crockett Cemetery

 

A shallow depression is all that is left of this 1864 rifle pit

 

The redoubts protected the depot, and rifle pits defended the redoubts. Rifle pits were anywhere from four to six feet deep and may have included a firing step, which was a ledge soldiers could step down from to more safely reload their weapon. None of this is visible today, of course, as one hundred fifty years worth of erosion has nearly reclaimed the pits at Johnsonville.

 

There are about six miles of hiking trails inside the park, which I believe to be lightly traveled. The leaves are piled high on the trail in several areas. So high, in fact, that the footing in these locations proved to be a little treacherous, as I never knew upon what my foot was about to land - roots, rocks, fallen limbs, tiny Munchkin villages. Trail markings are few and far between. At one point I discovered I had wandered off the trail, only minutes after studying the land and concluding I had not. Trail intersections are simply marked with arrows pointing in every direction the trail leads. There are no trail names; no distances listed to the park's various features; and no maps to be had. Still, this is great place to hike. I flushed out deer on multiple occasions, saw blue herons and ducks, and didn't encounter even one other hiker during my three-and-a-half hour visit. For outdoor solitude in the mid-state, it's hard to top Johnsonville. Following are a few more pictures from Saturday's hike:

 

View of Kentucky Lake

 

 

Across the river, Pilot Knob is the highest point in West TN

 

Moss-covered trail

 

Old railroad support pier in background, left of cannon

 

Leaf-covered trail