East Tennessee

Author Shane Simmons explores tales of bravery, lore and bizarre customs within the East Tennessee region. The mountains of East Tennessee are chock full of unique folklore passed down through generations. Locals spin age-old yarns of legends like Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone and Dragging Canoe. Stories of snake-handling churches and the myths behind the death crown superstitions dot the landscape. The mysteries surrounding the Sensabaugh Tunnel still haunt residents.

A solid social, political, and military history, this book sheds light on the rise of the pro-Union and pro-Confederacy factions. It explores the political developments and recounts in fine detail the military maneuvering and conflicts that occurred.

Two aging Civil War veterans mourned the death of their sons at a joint funeral in Knoxville National Cemetery. One, a cavalry general, had fought for the Union. The other had served as surgeon/major of a Confederate cavalry regiment. They met for the first time at the graves of their sons--two army lieutenants and University of Tennessee graduates killed together in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. Newspaper accounts presented the encounter as an example of reconciliation between North and South. This book recounts the meeting of two families from opposing sides of the war--both rooted in East Tennessee, a region harshly divided by the conflict--placing their story in the context of America's reconciliation narrative at the end of the 19th century.

"Groce offers a gracefully written, impressively researched narrative account of the experience of East Tennessee Confederates during the Civil War era. His analysis raises provocative questions about the socioeconomic foundations of Civil War sympathies in the Mountain South."--Robert Tracy McKenzie, University of Washington "Scholars of Appalachia's Civil War have long awaited Todd Groce's study of East Tennessee secessionists. I am pleased to report that this ground-breaking study of Southern Mountain Confederates was worth the wait."--Kenneth Noe, State University of West Georgia A bastion of Union support during the Civil War, East Tennessee was also home to Confederate sympathizers who took up the Southern cause until the bitter end. Yet historians have viewed these mountain rebels as scarcely different from other Confederates or as an aberration in the region's Unionism. Often they are simply ignored. W. Todd Groce corrects this distorted view of East Tennessee's antebellum development and wartime struggle. He paints a clearer picture of the region's Confederates than has previously been available, examining why they chose secession over union and revealing why they have become so invisible to us today. Drawing extensively on primary sources--newspapers, diaries, government reports--Groce allows the voices of these mountain rebels finally to be heard. Groce explains the economic forces and the family and political ties to the Deep South that motivated the East Tennessee Confederates reluctantly to join the fight for Southern independence. Caught in a war they neither sought nor started, they were trapped between an unfriendly administration in Richmond and a hostile Union majority in their midst. When the fighting was over and they returned home to face their vengeful Unionist neighbors, many were forced to flee, contributing to the postwar economic decline of the region. Placing the story in a broad context, Groce provides an overview of the region's economy and explains the social origins of secessionist sympathies. He also presents a collective profile of one hundred high-ranking Confederate officers from East Tennessee to show how they were representative of the rising commercial and financial leadership in the region. Mountain Rebels intertwines economic, political, military, and social history to present a poignant tale of defeat, suffering, and banishment. By piecing together this previously untold story, it fills a void in Southern history, Civil War history, and Appalachian studies. The Author: W. Todd Groce is executive director of the Georgia Historical Society.