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■>(y-  ELLEN  OLIVIA  MITCHELL  HIA  TT 


PART  YET  STANDING    OF    HOME   OF    JOHN    MITCHELL, 
ABOUT  1820.   NEAR    INMAN 


Sequatcl^ie  'Valley 

A  HISTORICAL  SKETCH 


BV 

ELLEN  OLIV  lA  ^MITCHELL  HL^TT 


Photographs  bu 
MARGUERITE  HI  ATT 


Though    neath  JistanI  skies  we  -jcander. 
Sti/I  our  thoughts  u-ilh  ihee  must  dwell.  " 


Author 


Printed  for  the  Author.    Publishing  House  of  the  M.  E.  Chun-h 
South.  Nashville,  Teiin. 


K 


IX  LOVING  MEMORY  OF  MOTH- 
ER, FATHER.  SISTERS,  AND 
BROTHER,  TO  WHOSE  TENDER 
CARE      I      OWE     SO      MUCH 


It  was  my  good  fortune  to  be  born  and 
partly  brought  up  in  Sequatchie  V^alley. 
Here  the  happiest  days  of  my  Hfe  have 
been  spent.  A  year  or  two  ago  I  began  a 
search  for  written  history  of  the  Valley, 
but  found  none  in  any  connected  form. 
In  publishing  this  little  volume  it  is  with 
the  hope  that  those  who  read  it  will  find 
some  pleasure  and  benefit,  as  I  have  in  the 
writing.  The  Author. 

7 


SEQUATCHIE  VALLEY. 


SEQUATCHIE  VALLEY  lies  be- 
tween Walden's  Ridge  on  the  east 
for  most  of  its  length  and  the  Cum- 
berland' Mountains  on  the  west.  For  its 
entire  length  it  is  watered  by  the  river  of 
the  same  name,  which  empties  into  the 
Tennessee  a  few  miles  south  of  Jasper. 
According  to  an  early  historian,'  the  "riv- 
er rises  near  Crab  Orchard,'  runs  into 
Grassy  Cove,  and  is  soon  lost  for  eight  or 
ten  miles,  then  bursts  out  in  a  clear,  cold 
fountain.  This  is  the  head  of  the  Valley, 
which  is  three  miles  wide  for  eight  miles." 
This  \^alley  is  seventy  miles  long  and 
four  wide.     The  scenery  is  most  pictur- 

'Named  for  the  Duke  of  Cumberland.  Former- 
ly sometimes  called  Great  Laurel  Ridge. 

"Imla}'. 

^"Settlers  established  villages  near  these  or- 
chards because  of  the  fragrant  blossoms,"  says  Mr. 
Roosevelt  in  "Winning  of  the  West." 


* 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

esque  and  beautiful.  The  mountains  rise 
abruptly  on  either  side  to  a  height  of  a 
thousand  or  twelve  hundred  feet.  Some- 
times, particularly  in  winter,  when  the 
weather  is  clearing,  they  stand  out  in  ma- 
jestic relief  from  the  background  of  the 
sky,  at  other  times  blend  gentlv  with  the 
landscape,  and  vet  again  the  clouds  almost 
obscure  them. 

The  pleasing  name  '*Sec[uatchie"'  is  of 
Cherokee  origin.  It  is  derived  from  Si 
Gicctsi,  a  traditional  Cherokee  settlement 
on  the  French  Broad  River. 

The  first  inhabitants  of  Tennessee  of 
whom  there  is  any  trace  were  the  Natchez 
Indians,  now  extinct,  having  been  annihi- 
lated by  the  French  after  they  were  ex- 
pelled from  Tennessee  bv  the  Cherokees. 
The  Natchez  were  considered  descendants 
of  the  mound  builders.  Traces  of  what 
are  supposed  to  be  mounds  exist  to-day  in 

^The  unlovely  meaning  is  supposed  to  be  "hog" 


TO 


COURTHOUSE,    PIKEVILLE. 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

Sequatchie  Valley.  The  Cherokees  came 
to  Tennessee  in  1623. 

More  than  one  hundred  and  twenty 
years  ago  a  battle  was  fought  between 
whites  and  Indians  near  the  mouth  of 
Sequatchie  River.  The  Indian  villages  of 
Nickajack  and  Running  Water  were  to- 
tally destroyed,  the  inhabitants  taken 
prisoners,  and  their  power  forever  broken 
in  that  part  of  Tennessee.  Joseph  Brown 
guided  the  raiders.  Years  before,  when 
Joseph  was  a  child,  his  family,  some 
young  men,  and  a  few  servants  were 
floating  down  the  Tennessee  in  a  flatboat 
on  the  way  to  Cumberland  when  all  wxre 
captured  by  the  Indians.  One  historian 
says  that  the  men  were  slain  and  the 
women  and  children  and  held  as  captives. 
Another  account  states  that  only  the  small 
children  were  saved.  Joseph  was  one  of 
the  latter.  After  a  time  he  was  ex- 
changed and  grew  up  to  take  this  fearful 
revenge  on  his  captors. 

Sequatchie  Valley  was  probably  ex- 
12 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

plored  first  about  1795  by  Gilbert  Imlay 
and  Daniel  Smith.  An  old  map  dated 
that  year  and  made  by  the  latter  is  fairly 
accurate  as  to  location.  On  it  Sequatchie 
River  seems  to  be  called  Crow  Creek. 

In  1805  three  men,  who  were  to  be  the 
first  white  settlers,  came  here  on  a  pros- 
pecting trip.  These  men  were  Amos 
Griffith  and  Isaac  and  William  Standifer. 
The  following  year  they  returned  with 
their  families,  accompanied  by  other  fam- 
ilies, and  made  permanent  settlements. 
These  men  were  originally  from  Virginia. 
Amos  Griffith  located  near  where  the 
town  of  Whitwell  now  stands.  A  spring 
near  there  still  bears  the  name  of  Griffith. 

There  was  no  "going  back  home"  for 
these  brave  men  and  women.  They  had 
come  to  stay.  They  or  their  fathers  had 
fought  in  the  Revolution.  Some  of  them 
perhaps  had  helped  in  settling  the  new 
State  of  Frankland,'  ''Land  of  the  Free," 

^Afterwards  changed  to  Franklin. 
13 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

and  maybe  had  a  voice  in  framing  its  con- 
stitution, the  first  written  one  west  of  the 
Alleghanies.  This  lovely  Valley,  with 
its  never-failing  springs  and  streams,  rich 
farming  lands,  mountains  that  furnished 
game  for  the  ready  rifle  and  which  in 
years  to  come  were  to  bring  forth  such 
an  abundance  of  coal  and  iron,  seemed  to 
these  newcomers  a  place  to  rest  and  make 
homes  for  themselves  and  their  children. 

Most  of  these  settlers  were  of  Ameri- 
can birth.  They  are  supposed  to  have 
come  from  Mrginia  and  the  Carolinas. 
Many  probably  brought  their  slaves. 

The  first  white  children  born  here  were 
William  Standi fer  Grifiith,  in  1807,  and 
Louise  Anderson,  who  afterwards  be- 
came a  Mrs.  Kirkman. 

Other  settlers  soon  came,  and  by  No- 
vember 30,  1807,  the  population  was  suf- 
ficient to  erect  a  county,  which  was 
named  for  Col.  Anthony  Bledsoe.^ 

^One  writer  sa3\s  it  was  named  for  Jessie  Bled- 
soe. 

'4 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

The  first  village  established  in  this  new 
county  was  Pikeville,  so  named  in  honor 
of  Gen.  Zebulon  Pike,  an  American  sol- 
dier and  explorer.  It  became  the  county 
seat  in  1813.  "The  first  county  seat  was 
Old  Madison,  six  miles  from  where  Dun- 
lap  now  is.  The  first  court  met  at  the 
cabin  of  a  Mr.  Thomas.'"  Outsiders 
were  well  informed  of  this  locality.  John 
Owen's  Journal  of  his  removal  from  Vir- 
o-inia  to  Alabama  in  1818  states  that  his 

o 

brother  "took  the  Sequatchie  road  from 
near  Kingston." 

In  1820  the  \"alley  contained  four 
thousand  and  five  people.  Ten  years  later 
the  increase  was  a  little  more  than  six 
hundred. 

In  1833  Pikeville's  population  num- 
bered one  hundred  and  fifty.  Among 
this  number  were  one  lawyer,  James  A. 
Whiteside,  and  two  doctors.  The  princi- 
pal public  and  business  places  were:  Five 


'J.  G.  Cisco. 
1  ^ 


COURTHOUSE,    JASPER. 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

stores,  some  saddlers  (everybody  rode 
horseback  in  those  days),  two  taverns, 
two  cotton  gins,^  and  an  academy.  Thus 
early  did  these  pioneers  provide  for  the 
education  of  their  children. 

In  i860  the  population  was  two  hun- 
dred. There  were  a  library  association, 
an  academy  (called  Lafayette),  a  union 
church,  and  various  business  buildings, 
including  two  hotels — "taverns"  no  lon- 
ger. 

Pikeville  to-day  has  about  five  hundred 
people.  It  is  situated  on  the  west  bank  of 
the  river  and  is  surrounded  by  a  beautiful 
farming  and  stock-raising  country.  The 
Sequatchie  Valley  Branch  of  the  Nash- 
ville, Chattanooga,  and  St.  Louis  Railway 
terminates  here. 

Marion  County,  named  for  Gen.  Fran- 
cis Marion,  of  South  Carolina,  an  Ameri- 
ican  patriot,  was  formed  in  181 7.     Eight 

^Cotton-raising  was  not  followed  to  any  great 
extent. 

17 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

years  later  Jasper,  so  called  for  William 
Jasper,  also  of  South  Carolina,  was  incor- 
porated and  made  the  ''seat  of  justice." 
It  had  been  a  post  office  for  several  years. 
Like  all  other  towns  in  the  Valley,  Jasper 
is  west  of  the  river.  Perhaps  this  is  be- 
cause of  more  level  land  on  that  side. 

A  ''Gazetteer  of  Tennessee,"  by  Eastin 
Morris,  compiled  in  1834,  states  that  the 
year  previous  Jasper  contained  "thirty 
dwellings,  about  one  hundred  and  eighty 
inhabitants,  twenty  mechanics,  six  profes- 
sional men,  five  stores,  one  tavern,  and  a 
good  courthouse  and  jail."  The  first 
court  held  in  Marion  County  is  said  to 
have  been  at  a  log  house  called  the  old 
Cheek  house.  The  lawyers  were :  William 
Standi fer,  D.  W.  Campbell,  George  W. 
Wood,  and  James  H.  Wilkinson. 

In  i860  there  was  a  population  of  three 
hundred.  A  business  directory  of  that 
year  gives  Alexander  &  Griffith,  general 
merchants ;  David  Chandim,  postmaster  ; 
and  W.  S.  Griffith,  planter.  Jasper  w^as 
18 


SEQUATCHIE      \^  ALLEY 

on  the  main  road  from  Knoxville  to  Ath- 
ens, Ga.  The  stage  road  from  Knoxville 
to  Huntsville,  Ala.,  crossed  the  Georgia 
road  here. 

According  to  land  agents,  a  great  fu- 
ture was  before  Jasper.  Present-day  real 
estate  agents  have  nothing  ''on"  their 
predecessors  of  seventy  or  eightv  vears 
ago.  Here  is  an  advertisement  of  prop- 
erty for  sale  in  1842  by  the  East  Tennes- 
see Land  Proprietors,  London: 

One-third  mile  from  Jasper.  Upper  Kelley 
farm.  300  a.  Comfortable  log  house ;  stables  ;  also 
cabin.  Town  creek  runs  through  farm.  A  never- 
failing  spring  near  house.  Jasper  County  town, 
which  is  handsomely  laid  out.  Lower  Kelley  farm, 
2  miles  from  town  at  junction  of  Sequatchie  and 
Tennessee  Rivers.  40  a.  first  river  bottom  land, 
20  do.  deadened  (timber),  do.  250  woodland  first 
river  bottom.  100  a.  2d  bot.  Fine  timber.  Price. 
£11,632. 

Nothing  cheap  about  that — nearly  sixty 
thousand  dollars. 

This  company  was  also  offering  for 
sale     thirty-nine     lots     in     Chattanooga. 

19 


FAIR  GROUNDS,    SOUTH    PITTSBURG. 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

'Trice,  £6,336.  This  place  contains  be- 
tween 1,200  and  1,500  inhabitants.  The 
rapid  increase  of  trade  and  population  al- 
most without  parallel,  .  .  .  and  it  will  no 
doubt  .  .  .  become  a  large  city."  Which 
prediction  is  coming  true. 

Residents  of  Jasper  and  vicinity  were 
also  expecting  much  of  their  Valley.  The 
following  extract  is  from  a  letter  written 
in  1849:  "This  section  of  country  is  des- 
tined to  be  (and  that  in  a  short  time)  one 
of  the  most  desirable  portions  of  the 
State,  from  the  fact  of  its  possessing 
more  communicational  facilities  than  any 
other  part  of  the  Southwestern  States." 
The  writer  says  that  two  railroads  were 
being  built  to  Chattanooga  —  one  from 
Nashville,  the  other  from  Charleston. 
But  it  was  not  until  after  the  Civil  War 
that  a  branch  line  was  built  from  Bridge- 
port, Ala.,  to  Jasper.  In  the  middle  sev- 
enties this  was  extended  to  Victoria. 
''Nashville  and  Chattanooga  Railroad 
building  line  to  Victoria.  Everything 
21 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

done  in  the  very  best  style.'"  Some  years 
later  the  extension  was  made  to  Pikeville. 
Politics  abounded  then  as  now.  The 
letter  quoted  above  continues:  "I  got  beat 
for  the  legislature,  as  I  expected.  There 
were  three  Whigs  of  us  and  one  Demo- 
crat. The  Whigs  of  this  county  [Marion] 
held  a  convention  to  settle  the  matter. 
.  .  .  I  got  the  nomination.  The  other 
two  candidates  and  their  friends  turned 
against  me  and  went  for  the  Democrat, 
.  .  .  which  has  laid  them  on  the  shelf 
for  all  time.  I  w^as  a  son  of  temperance. 
There  is  no  chance  to  run  against  the  jug 
in  this  country."  Perhaps  politicians  had 
degenerated,  as  in  the  earlier  settling  of 
the  State  ''no  person  who  denies  the  ex- 
istence of  God  or  future  state  can  hold 
civil  office,"  but  ''ministers  are  not  eligible 
to  a  seat  in  the  legislature."  Salaries  of 
State  officials  were  sarcastically  said  by 
Daniel  Webster  to  have  been  paid  in  skins. 

'Killebrew,  1876. 
22 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

''To  the  Governor,  one  thousand  deer 
skins ;  to  the  Secretary,  five  hundred  rac- 
coon skins."  Perhaps  this  is  apocryphal; 
but  skins  passed  current  in  trade,  taxes 
being  paid  with  them. 

Sequatchie  County,  the  youngest  of  the 
three  comprising  the  \^alley,  was  formed 
in  1857.  Dunlap,  the  county  seat,  was  so 
called  in  honor  of  William  Dunlap,  of 
Knox  Count V.  This  village  is  near  the 
mountains.  Fires  from  the  coke  ovens 
may  be  seen  at  night.  These  are  worth  a 
visit.  Dunlap  can  claim  no  great  beauty; 
but  it  is  a  quiet,  peaceful-looking  village. 
A  pretty  little  creek  meanders  by,  over 
which  is  a  picturesque  footbridge. 

The  towns  of  Whit  well  and  South 
Pittsburg,  in  Marion  County,  have  sprung 
up  within  the  last  thirty  or  forty  years. 
Both  are  products,  so  to  speak,  of  the 
iron  and  coal  industries.  The  site  of 
Whitwell  was  once  called  Liberty.  The 
last  census  gives  a  population  of  twenty- 
five  hundred. 

23 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

South  Pittsburg  boasts  a  fine  fair 
ground,  with  a  good  half-mile  race  track. 
The  inhabitants  numbered  two  thousand 
in  19 10.  This  spot  used  to  be  called  Bat- 
tle Creek,  after  the  creek  of  that  name 
near  by. 

Forty  years  ago  there  was  only  one 
bridge,  and  that  a  poor  one,  over  the 
Lower  Sequatchie  River.  A  few  miles 
below  was  a  ferry  and  also  a  ford  for  low- 
water  use.  A  big  rock  midway  of  the 
river  was  the  danger  sign.  The  roads 
were  often  almost  impassable  in  winter. 
But  to-day  the  Federal  government,  the 
State,  and  the  automobile  are  changing  all 
that.  There  are  miles  of  turnpike.  Be- 
sides this,  the  Dixie  Highway  will  soon 
be  built  across  the  mountains,  bringing 
Chattanooga  much  nearer  than  by  rail. 

Although  no  mention  was  made  of 
churches  in  those  early  days,  there  must 
have  been  a  place  of  worship.  The  set- 
tlers w^ere  mostly  a  religious  folk.  Per- 
haps, like  the  wandering  Israelites,  they 

25 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

took  their  ark  with  them.  Maybe  the 
lonely  mountains  and  dark  forests  served 
awhile  as  a  great  solemn  church.  These 
were  "r  civil,  orderly  people,  moral  and 
religious,  kind,  generous,  hospitable,  giv- 
en to  establishing  churches,  institutions  of 
learning,  schools  of  divinity ;  .  .  .  and, 
to  crown  it  all,  there  are  Sabbath  schools 
all  over  the  land.'"  One  stanch  Method- 
ist layman  was  for  fifty  years  superin- 
tendent of  the  Sunday  school  at  Shiloh 
Church,  near  Inman. 

Methodism  was  early  brought  to  Ten- 
nessee. Jeremiah  Lambert  traveled  the 
Holston  Circuit  in  1783.  The  circuit  rid- 
er went  to  his  appointment  through  all 
kinds  of  weather,  regardless  of  himself. 
"Providence  permitting,"  he  was  there. 
''Without  aid  beyond  that  of  his  spiritual 
exultation,  he  stepped  into  a  mental  at- 
mosphere of  cold  and  solitary  elevation."" 

^Thomas  A.  Anderson,  "Southeast  Tennessee." 
London,  1842. 

"Phelan,  "History  of  Tennessee." 

26 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

There  was  recently  celebrated  in  Wash- 
ington City  the  centennial  of  the  death 
of  Bishop  Francis  Asbury/  one  of  the 
founders  of  Methodism.  It  is  proposed 
to  erect  in  that  city  an  equestrian  statue 
to  honor  his  memory  and  to  commemo- 
rate the  circuit  rider. 

Baptists  and  Presbyterians  were  also 
early  arrivals  in  the  wilderness.  Cum- 
berland Presbyterians  seem  to  have  had  a 
strong  membership.  School-teaching  was 
not  a  profitable  occupation  a  hundred 
years  ago,  salaries  being  sixty  dollars  an- 
nually. The  best  teachers,  Presbyterian 
ministers,  had  nearly  all  graduated  at 
Princeton.  Possibly  these  were  better 
paid.  The  schools  at  Pikeville  and  Jasper 
doubtless  compared  favorably  with  those 
of  other  Tennessee  towns.  Country 
schools  also  kept  for  some  months  each 
year  as  the  population  increased.  Then 
there  were  the  singing  schools.     Itinerant 

'Died  March  31;  1816. 
27 


VIEW    OF    MOUNTAINS    FROM    VALLEY. 


SEQUATCHIE      V  ALLEY 

teachers  went  from  place  to  place  and 
lield  a  two  or  three  weeks'  session.  Ev- 
erybody sang  then.  That  was  one  of  the 
pleasures  of  going  to  church.  Instead  of 
listening  to  the  singing,  everybody  joined 
in. 

Some  customs  of  seventy  or  eighty 
years  ago  would  seem  strange  now.  Eve- 
ning church  services  were  announced  to 
begin  at  ''early  candlelight."  Bridal  re- 
ceptions, called  "infairs,"  took  place  at 
the  home  of  the  groom's  family  on  the 
second  day  after  the  wedding.  The  bride 
wore  her  "second-dav"  gown.  The  fol- 
lowing is  part  of  an  advertisement  of 
men's  clothing  which  appeared  in  a  Jas- 
per paper  in  the  late  sixties: 

And  after  the  wedding  and  in  fair  were  over. 
He    found    that   his   daughter    had    married    John 
Dover. 

Homespun  was  worn  by  men,  women, 
and  children.     Dresses  made  of  linsey  and 
cotton  were  often  quite  pretty.     A  calico 
29 


MOUNTAIN    ABOVE    JASPER. 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

dress  was  thought  fine.  Sheeting,  pillow- 
case linen,  and  beautiful  bedspreads  were 
all  made  at  home.  If  the  lady  of  the 
house  did  not  herself  spin  and  weave,  she 
could  direct  her  servants.  Mattresses 
consisted  of  big  feather  beds  as  soft  as 
down.  The  substitute  for  summer  use 
was  ticks  filled  with  sweet-smelling  straw. 
It  was  almost  a  disgrace  for  a  bride  not 
to  own  a  feather  bed.  It  used  to  be  said 
that  where  geese  were  on  the  farm  it  in- 
dicated woman's  domination.  However 
that  may  have  been,  many  families  raised 
these  noisy  fowls.  Feathers  had  to  come 
from  somewhere. 

But,  w^hatever  changes  have  come, 
whateA^er  has  altered  and  improved  the 
landscape,  nothing  can  add  to  or  take 
from  the  indescribable  glories  of  the  sun- 
rises or  the  sunsets,  whose  reflected  rays 
make  golden  the  clouds  which  hang  above 
the  mountain  tops,  reminding  one  of  St. 
John's  description  of  the  streets  of  the 
New  Jerusalem.      No  hand  of  man  can 

31 


SEQUATCHIE      VALLEY 

lift  the  mists  as  they  slowly  rise,  dispelled 
by  the  warmth  of  the  morning  sun,  re- 
vealing the  varying  hues  of  the  silent 
mountains.     These  remain  unchanged. 

From  the  bluffs  above  Jasper  is  a  pic- 
ture of  wonderful  beauty.  At  one's  feet 
is  the  village,  with  its  shady  streets  and 
pretty  houses;  toward  north  and  east, 
valley  and  mountain ;  looking  south,  more 
fields  and  shallow  streams  and,  beyond 
that,  Tennessee  River,  a  silvery  gleam  in 
the  sunlight. 

When  the  Dixie  Highway  is  finished, 
the  tourists  who  come  will  want  to  come 
again.  The  fame  of  this  Valley  will  be 
spread  far  and  wide.  The  vision  of  our 
forefathers  may  be  realized  for  others  in 
a  way  that  they  never  even  dreamed  of. 
Who  knows  ? 

32 


H156  74   578 


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