The plaque from the original monument was placed next to the NC Museum of Minerals where it can still be viewed.
In September of 1780, the Revolutionary War marched through what is now the Toe River Valley. Hundreds of Overmountain Men from the Watauga Settlement in Tennessee came through Gillespie Gap on their quest to quell a threat from British Major Patrick Ferguson. The Overmountain Men would decisively defeat the British at the Battle of Kings Mountain on October 7, 1780. Thomas Jefferson called it “The turn of the tide of success” for the patriots. On July 4, 1927, the North Carolina Historical Commission erected a monument memorializing these men at Gillespie Gap. Judge Heriot Clarkson, the founder of the resort community of Little Switzerland, spearheaded the drive to construct the monument. Every community in Mitchell County was represented at this momentous occasion, which featured then-North Carolina Governor Angus McLean, former Governor Cameron Morrison, former U.S. Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels, and other dignitaries. Even Anna Jackson Preston, great-granddaughter of Stonewall Jackson, assisted in the ceremony, as well as many of the descendants of the Overmountain Men including the Sevier Family.