From the Cumberland Gap and Appalachian mountains at the Tennessee border, the fork called the Chesapeake Branch led northeast, passing 3 miles west of what is now Bristol, then through the sites of present-day Abingdon, Glade Spring, Marion, Rural Retreat, Fort Chiswell (another possible westward gap route), Draper, Ingle's or Pepper's ferry, Salem, Roanoke and Amsterdam, then up the Shenandoah Valley through Buchanan, Lexington, Staunton, Harrisonburg, Winchester.