East Tennessee

“ My Fellow-citizens—It gives me pleasure to visit this historical city—a city that has given to the country many men who have been eminent in its councils and brought to the Nation they served and to the people who called them into the public service great honor. I am glad to visit East Tennessee, the scene of that early immigration and of those early struggles of men who, for vigor of intellect, strength of heart, and devotion to republican principles, were among the most conspicuous of the early pioneers of the West and Southwest. ”

“ Women in North Carolina and some parts of East Tennessee suffered themselves to be whipped, and everything taken from them, and yet they would not tell where their husbands were. I have known them to cut up the last blanket in the house, to make clothes for their husbands, who were lying out, waiting for a chance to reach the Federal army. The night I left, my wife had cut up a blanket and made for me a shirt and a pair of drawers. All these things go to show what the Union men and women of East Tennessee did to help save this Government when it was in danger of destruction. ”

“ Middle Tennessee is the largest of the three natural divisions of the State. It is separated from the West division by the Tennessee River, and from East Tennessee by the Cumberland Mountains. It is a fine stock-raising country; and the valley of the Cumberland River affords an extensive tract of excellent cotton and tobacco lands. ”

“ When the State was admitted into the Union, in 1796, her population was homogeneous. The institution of slavery existed in all sections of the State.
In West and Middle Tennessee, where the soil and climate were suitable for raising cotton, slave labor was very profitable. In East Tennessee, the poor upland farms scarcely yielded a return to white labor. As the result of this difference in natural conditions, slavery flourished in West and Middle Tennessee, but in East Tennessee, by 1860, it had become almost extinct, except upon the rich plantations that bordered the Tennessee River. ”

“ There have been a number of books written since the Civil War, dealing with the loyalty, heroism and suffering of the Union people of East Tennessee during that period, but few men have given their individual experience from 1861 to 1864. ”

“ We have very direct intelligence from Tennessee. The western districts are all Secession. Middle Tennessee is about equally divided. East Tennessee, a mountain region, containing few slaves, is inhabited by a hardy, primitive, industrious race. They are thoroughly, enthusiastically loyal.11
[Pg 147]
A Clear-Headed Negro.
The felicitous decision of Major-General Butler, that slaves of the enemy are "contraband of war," disturbs the Rebels not a little, even in the West. A friend just from Louisiana, relates an amusing conversation between a planter and an old, trusted slave. ”

“ In his eighteenth year he migrated to Tennessee, and established himself in that rich upland region on the eastern border of the State, where by altitude the same agricultural conditions are developed that characterize the land which lies several degrees further North. Specially adapted to the cereals, the grasses, and the fruits of Southern Pennsylvania and Ohio, East Tennessee could not employ slave-labor with the profit which it brought in the rich cotton-fields of the neighboring lowlands, and the result was that the population contained a large majority of whites. ”

“ The noble and patriotic women in East Tennessee, whose untold sufferings would fill a volume, most of whom have now passed beyond that bourne from whence no traveler ever returns, should have their names and deeds so far as possible recorded so that generations yet to come may honor them and reverence their memory.
No night was too dark, no danger too imminent, no task too arduous for these self-sacrificing women to perform when the opportunity was presented to them to lend a helping hand to the hunted, starving Union men. ”

“ The boys were worn out, mostly all barefooted and nearly naked from crawling through bushes and briar thickets.
Some of them, when we reached the top of the mountain, looked back into the valley of East Tennessee and said, “Farewell to rebellion;” and they looked North and said, “I can see the Promised Land!” They were happy, but they had been so long hiding in the woods that they would only speak in whispers, and it was a long time before they could break themselves from the habit. You could trail them by the blood from their feet, but like brave men they marched along without a murmur. ”

“ The extensive mountain region they drain in North Carolina and East Tennessee is a most attractive district, noted as a health resort, and famous for the sturdy independence of its people, while along the Tennessee and upon the mountains near it were fought some of the greatest battles of the Civil War. ”

“ Tennessee,—second State in population below Mason and Dixon’s line, and first in such food as armies consume,—would have been held to furnish the vital recruits and supplies to the [Pg 65] Confederacy. East Tennessee would have waited in vain for the relieving Northern forces. ”

“ About 1750, East Tennessee was beginning to be settled by adventurous individuals, principally from western North Carolina, south-western Virginia, and occasionally from more northern colonies. The Indians were still regarded as the rightful owners and proper "lords of the soil." At the date of the council held at the Tennessee River in 1757, only that portion of the country north of that stream had become sparsely settled, but soon thereafter purchases of land were sometimes made directly from the Indian chiefs themselves, as in the above instance, and settlements of whites speedily followed. ”

“ West Tennessee, the seat of the Black Belt, was the home of the Whig aristocracy. When the Whigs became Democrats in the decade between 1850 and 1860, the free farmers and small slaveholders, Democrats of East Tennessee, became Unionists and later Republicans. This same formula worked out over the entire state. There are Republican islands in Democratic sections, and Democratic islands in Republican [64] sections. East Tennessee remained loyal to the Methodist Church, and West Tennessee went into the Methodist Church, South. ”

“ From Natural Bridge our photographer took train on the Norfolk and Western Railroad, and proceeded southwestwardly to the junction of that road with the Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railroad, by which he passed into Tennessee as far as Knoxville, and from that point made excursions into the famous East Tennessee region, where scenes and scenery are quite unlike anything which he had ever before transferred to photographs. Nowhere in all the world are there richer lands, prettier women, braver men, finer landscapes, and bigger prospects than Tennessee affords. ”

“ It was utterly impossible to keep up a line of supply for an army in East Tennessee by the wagon roads over the mountains. The railroad through Chattanooga was indispensable for this purpose. But Mr. Lincoln had not fully appreciated this, and was discontented that both Buell and Rosecrans had in turn paid little attention, as it seemed, to his desire to make the liberation of East Tennessee the primary and immediate aim of their campaigns. ”

“ Having had its birth in the western district of the State, where the elements of a rapid growth were found, it was quickly communicated to the central counties and the neighborhood of the capital, and finding its way thence over the Cumberland Mountains—before its presence was even suspected in that [Pg 91] loyal quarter—developed a shamrock growth on the soil of East Tennessee. ”

“ It has been the constant desire of the Government, from the beginning of the war, to rescue the loyal inhabitants of East Tennessee from the hands of the rebels, who fully appreciated the importance of continuing their hold upon that country. In addition to the large amount of agricultural products drawn from the upper valley of the Tennessee, they also obtained iron and other materials from the vicinity of Chattanooga. The possession of East Tennessee would cut off one of their most important railroad communications, and threaten their manufactories at Rome, Atlanta, etc. ”

“ Tennessee and Kentucky are the two great mule-breeding States. East Tennessee takes first rank among the grazing sections of the South and West. Wild grass abounds in the uncultivated districts. Interminable forests on the mountain sides are carpeted with it. The woods are kept open and free from undergrowth by fires; and this native grass springs up and covers the ground. The mountains are full of deer which feed upon it. Many a beautiful range of thousands of acres is also afforded the farmers’ stock, which is sent in vast numbers to occupy this wild, free, unfenced pasturage. ”

“ The Tennessee rises in the Alleghany Mountains, traverses East Tennessee, and almost the whole northern limit of Alabama, re-enters Tennessee, and crosses almost the whole width of it, into Kentucky, and passes into Ohio, fifty-seven miles above its junction with the Mississippi. ”

“ We met in Greene County, with about a hundred men. We crossed Walden Ridge and the Watauga, Cumberland, Holston and Powell’s Rivers, encountering great hardships. Our provisions gave out, and the only way we could get anything to eat was to find a colored family. They were always loyal, and we could depend on them. They never would “give us away.”
When we reached Camp Dick Robinson, Kentucky, we found a great many East Tennessee men who had made their way through the mountains. Some had organized into companies. ”

“ Our fellow-citizens of East Tennessee, though able to furnish in the greatest abundance, and of the best quality, flour and other articles of the first necessity, have heretofore been doomed to strive against the natural obstructions in the Tennessee River, shut out as they are from Mobile, the more natural, and perhaps the more profitable channel of commerce. ”

“ They voted overwhelmingly for the Whig candidate for Governor in 1847. [13]
Present Republican counties of East Tennessee went Democratic. Washington, 1225 to 881 in favor of Polk; Sullivan, 1533 to 350 in favor of Polk; Greene, 1701 to 1031 in favor of Polk. The same line-up expressed itself in 1847 and in the Presidential election of 1848. [14]
There are certain counties in West Tennessee today that are quite as overwhelmingly Republican as any in East Tennessee. These counties are in full sympathy with the point of view of the North in politics and toward life generally. ”

“ In East Tennessee most of the people were small farmers, while West Tennessee was a land of great slave plantations. Johnson began in politics to oppose the aristocratic element and became the spokesman and champion of the poorer and labouring classes. ”

“ Some time in 1862 the loyal men of Cocke County, East Tennessee, refused to go into the rebel army. They lived in what was called the Knobs. There were about four hundred of these men, some farmers, some mechanics and some blacksmiths, all loyal to the Government. ”

“ Tennessee was never a unit on the slavery question. There were scattered groups of abolitionists throughout the state as long as slavery existed, while East Tennessee was almost solidly anti-slavery. The contest over slavery in the convention of 1834, in the churches, and in politics created divisions among the people of the state that have had a permanent influence upon the life of the state. ”

“ Knoxville, in early times a capital of the State, was, in 1860, the metropolis of East Tennessee; Chattanooga, at the southern extremity of the valley, is separated from Bristol, on the Virginia line, by a distance of more than two hundred and forty miles; Cleveland and Greenville were towns of less importance. The absence of large cities makes it evident that manufacturing had not yet begun to attract serious attention. Like early settlers everywhere in America, the pioneers of Tennessee sought the most immediate returns from the products of the forests and fields around them. ”

“ Tennemann, W. Gottlieb, German historian of philosophy; was professor at Marburg; wrote both a history and a manual of philosophy (1761-1819) .
Tennessee (1,768, of which 434 are coloured) , one of the central States of the American Union, lies S. of Kentucky, and stretches from the Mississippi (W.) to North Carolina (E.) ; is one-third larger than Ireland; politically it is divided into three districts with characteristic natural features; East Tennessee, mountainous, with ridges of the Appalachians, possessing inexhaustible stores of coal, iron, and copper ”

“ In Tennessee the vote upon secession had indicated that more than two thirds of the dwellers in the mountainous eastern region were Unionists. Mr. Lincoln had it much at heart to sustain these men, and aside from the personal feeling of loyalty to them it was also a point of great military consequence to hold this district. Near the boundary separating the northeastern corner of the State from Kentucky, the famous Cumberland Gap gave passage through the Cumberland Mountains for the East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad, "the artery that supplied the rebellion." ”

“ If it has not accomplished all that its friends desire, what agency has?
West Tennessee was more interested in colonization than either East or Middle Tennessee. In fact, colonization was largely anti-free-negro rather than anti-slavery, especially so in West Tennessee, where it was regarded as a means of eliminating the free negro from among the slaves. West Tennessee was not nearly so anti-slavery in sentiment as East Tennessee. There was organized a separate colonization society at Memphis, June 12, 1848, largely through the efforts of the Presbyterian Church. ”