Reprinted from Montgomery's Vindicator, Sevierville, TN, Wednesday, September 29, 1937

State Representative Relates History of Grandparents Life in the Smokies
(by Mrs Ruth W. O' Dell)


The following account is of the writer's grandparents -- their early life, courtship and marriage, information gathered from other relatives.

It was springtime in the Great Smokies in the year 1860.  Joseph Shrader and wife, Nancy Martin Shrader, were prosperous, happy, God fearing, homeloving people.  They had a rather large family of grown children.  They were William, Carroll, James, Dicie, Cassandra and Chrisley, then Mary Anne who was always called "Polly".  To be a member of this particular Shrader family in Sevier county, in Tennessee, was like being a "Van" in some other states.

Homes of peace and plenty in the East Tennessee mountains were the rule and not the exception as many people have thought.  The pioneer settlers of this particular region were called Scotch-Irish but in truth were more Scotch than Irish, having merely emigrated to Ireland to escape religious persecution and failing to find their freedom there, they journeyed on to the New World and settled in Pennsylvania and Maryland, gradually following the Appalachian mountains from their Pennsylvania homes to the foothill of Alabama, which of course brought them through Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee along its eastern border.

No section of the whole world is so marked by blood as the South and particularly the mountain section.  These people are not the "poor whites" of the southern lowlands, but Scotch-Irish and English, always protestant in their faith, wonderful colonizers, thrifty, honest and highly honorable and intelligent citizens.  If their customs and language seem grotesque it is purest English of the 17th century with a few Shakespearian expressions added.

The Shrader children in the home of Joseph and his wife were well born, well bred and well loved by the entire neighborhood around about Cedar Bluff, their home community, where many of their grandchildren and great grandchildren live today, If there was ever a "black sheep" among them no one ever heard about it.  The girls were all beautiful; Polly Anne was the most striking of them all.  She was tall and slender with a head of gorgeous, dark red hair, truly auburn with its scintillating gold and copper lights, a Titian blonde, rare as they are beautiful.

The morning that Polly Anne was 18 was a day in April, it was Sunday, which meant that all must go to church.  Polly arose early that morn and climbed to the top of Cedar Bluff near her home so that she could better watch the sun come up over the mountain top and so that she could be alone and dream her dreams undisturbed.  One of her chief attractions at times was a wistful, half pensive yearning that often brought a far away look into her extremely fair face.  She was not one of those maidens who had reluctant feet but she was eager and ready to meet life with a zest, and she somehow felt that lovely spring morning that she was close to some great change in her life.


Springtime is enchanting in any clime but in the Tennessee mountains it is like fairyland.  The birds were giving a morning concert, the bees were humming all about the place.  The apple trees were in full blossom and their dainty pink and white petals floated in the sweet morning air filling it with a fragrance that one never forgets.  These thrifty Shraders had not only an apple orchard, but a peach orchard too and plum trees everywhere were bursting in a glory of white bloom as though they were trying to vie with the cherry blossoms on the good old fashioned black heart cherry trees all about the place.

In every direction Polly beheld beauty of blooming trees, for the mountain sides to the south of her were white with dogwood blossom reminding her of a bride adorned for her husband, the dark background of the cedars of Cedar Bluff made the entire homestead look like an enchanted fairyland of mystic beauty and Polly looked like its queen, which she, in all probability was, because many of the people of this section are of royal blood.  The beauty of this spring morn had overcome the girl almost and she felt "deliciously" happy, just being alive.

She knew not why, she seemed to be in a reverie and was constantly looking toward the road that led to the east and the west, which was about one-fourth of a mile from where she sat and toward the north from her home.  It was the old Indian war path that had been made into a roadway and was a cloud of dust in summer and a bog of mud in winter, but she wondered where it would take her if she should follow it some time; she had always wanted to ride to the end of it.

As she mused thusly of the roadway wondering if "it ended in some distance dim, where a limpid river rippled beyond the rainbow's rim", she saw coming from the East a rider.  She shaded her eyes with her hand to see if she could recognize the horse from its color, or its gait, as she knew most of the horses quite well in her neighborhood.  She noticed that the man sat his horse like an Indian and that he was riding rather slowly as though he were enjoying the morning in all its dewy fragrance.  Possibly it could be a stranger coming to inquire the distance to some locality in that vicinity.

Joy, of Joys!  He lifted his hat and waved it toward her and then she recognized him even though he happened to be riding a horse she had never before seen.  She thought he might come in the afternoon, as he often did, on the Sabbath day, but she did not even dream he would come in the early morning; and she was thrilled and rushed down from the bluff and walked toward him.


As she came near he dismounted and approached her like a Chesterfield and together they walked across a meadow, up the hill through the apple orchard, sweet with bloom, to the Shrader home.  As they walked along he explained why he had come in the early morning instead of the afternoon as was his custom.  He had decided that the day was so lovely they would like to go to Pigeon Forge that morning to the "quarterly meeting" which was being held at that place, a distance of several miles.  Polly was delighted beyond words for she had a nice new saddle and a horse of her very own that she rode everywhere she wished to go at any time she chose.  While she dressed in her prettiest attire, her lover saddled her horse, and in a few minutes they were off for the "big meeting" as it was often called.

To see Polly Anne Shrader and George W. Webb ride away that Sunday morn in mid-springtime was to behold a picture, that those who did so have not forgotten to this day.  She wore a green bodice, with a kind of tam to match it, both were made by her own hands and of wool that she had spun and dyed and fashioned herself.  Her skirt was of the same material, but did not show while on the horse, for in those days when women rode side saddles they first donned a long black riding skirt that reached within about two feet of the ground.  Polly's horse was black while her saddle and bridle almost matched her reddish coppery colored hair.  She made a most striking picture.  George W. Webb was dressed in a suit of broadcloth, not homespun, as one might be led to believe.  He was an Englishman and knew it but he had jet black hair and eyes that he had inherited from his maternal grandmother, who was said to have been an Indian princess that fell in love with a man by the name of Gregory and married him, leaving one daughter, Elizabeth, who became the wife of James W. Webb, the father of George W., the lover of Polly Shrader.

For several miles this couple rode along rather slowly for George W. was a serious minded man, or youth, I should say, for he was about 19 years of age, more than six feet tall.  As they traveled along this ancient old trail over which the Cherokees for ages had traveled, they became engaged in the conversation that was quite general throughout that part of the country at that time, but Polly Anne did not like to think about wars and rumors of wars and she changed the subject to the delightful beauty of the morning with the wealth of spring blossoms everywhere along the way; all the homes had orchards, and the roadway was lined with redbud, and dogwood and for a time the war and its nearness was forgotten.


A kind of dizziness seemed to possess Polly Anne, and, without looking at her escort, she could feel those jet black eyes often looking into her very soul.  Each time she did happen to glance out of the tail of her eye at him she noted a kind of charming, boyish seriousness about his face that she remembered all the days of her life.  She knew that he loved her, she had known it a long while and although she was submerged in a kind of blissful rapture she could only look at him quite foolishly and wonder why when love did come to one, that it took away one's ability to enjoy it as she had hoped to be able to do.

Soon they passed Harrisburg and the Umbarger mill which was the gathering place for the swains of that neighborhood.  They hurried up their horses a bit and soon passed through the picturesque covered bridge that spanned the East Fork of the Little Pigeon river.

George W. wished that he might steal a kiss, but he dared not, lest he might offend that redhead and invoke a wrath shower, instead of a shower of kisses, so they rode on without pausing.  How timid some men are when they are in love, and other times for that, but not George W.  He was merely wise and abiding his time.  He knew that a man can accomplish any wish if he will only go slow enough, and he had long since made up his mind to wed the slender, graceful, redheaded mountain sprite that rode beside him, and he also knew that they would return the same way at sunset, when "The purple shadows of the twilight hour would be kissing the trailing robes of night" and that the covered bridge would still be there and serve as a protection to anyone who might intrude on a lover's first kiss.

This young man had an unusual sense of the fitness of things.  It is with such happy recollections that one always thinks of the covered bridges that once spanned our streams, the peculiarly human atmosphere they brought to the landscape and the fine feeling of security that one experienced while clattering through one's shadowy way.  It was so delightful to pause within its protecting walls from a raging storm, or to just rest there on a sultry day, for it was seldom ever hot in a covered bridge, even though their walls and roof covered them over completely.

Anderson M. Scruggs must have adored them, too, else he could not so charmingly have written of them.  "Some part of life becomes oblivion, something whose roots lie deep within the heart of simple folk, is lost, as, one by one, these pioneers of other days depart.  Only the country folk whose careless tread endears a dusty road, can ever know the peaceful chattering joy of rude planks spread above the drowsy creek that gleams below.  Here was a refuge from the sudden showers that swept like moving music, field and wood; and here, cool, tunneled, dark, when sultry hours danced with white feet beyond the bridge hood.  Yet there are senseless men whose hand and brain, tear down what time will never give again."

This Sabbath April day was one of the happiest that Polly Anne and George W. Webb ever experienced.  The congregation at Pigeon Forge was one of great brotherly love.  The preacher was devout and an honored man of God.  His name was James Cummings.  Dinner was served on the ground as was the custom at these quarterly meetings.  Great preparation was always made for these particular services, and the women had an abundance of good food to prepare for it is a fertile valley, producing all the good things native to this section.  After dinner had been served, the services were turned into a "singing" in which all the people joined and were seated according to the part they chose to sing.  The singing master conducted the program.  He used a tuning fork to get the correct tone or pitch.  These "sings" are still conducted throughout the entire mountain region, and they meet regularly from church to church, singing all day and taking great baskets of lunch.  It is known as "the Old Harp Singing".


It was sunset when our happy couple arrived at the covered bridge on their way home.  It was such a cool delightful place, and, as George W.  was familiar with the beautiful wedding ceremony of the Cherokees, he thought it would be a fine thing to ask Polly to become his wife as they crossed the running water, indicating that he wished their lives to flow together in one stream.

Before they reached the Shrader home they had set their wedding day, which was to be in June and on the third Sunday, at high noon.  June, the month of months, when all the world is so in tune and brides carol their sweetest songs from morn until the night, flitting in and out the leafy trees with here and there a bluebird for happiness and a cardinal flaming his way across the meadows.

For this wedding there was much preparation as was the custom among the citizens of that day and time.  All the sisters and some of the neighbor girls lent a hand and soon everything was in readiness.

Each Sunday from the April morn until the wedding Sunday, the prospective bridegroom found his way to the home of his bride and each day that she expected him she climbed to the top of Cedar Bluff to watch the road and as she did so, it began to dawn upon her how much the road meant to her, and how much it had meant in the ages past to those who had traveled over it, she still had the yearning to follow it to the west, it became her road of love and dreams, because it brought her love to her and as he went away she would dream of the day she would journey with him.  I think Frank Grubbs must have had such a road in mind when he wrote his poem on Roads:

"There are roads that lead to fortune, there are roads that lead to fame
There are roads that all men travel, there are roads that have no name.
But the road that stirs my fancy, with its shadows and its gleams,
The road that to me is the dearest, is my road of love and dreams.

Sometimes is winds the alley, sometimes it climbs the heights,
Sometimes it flames with beauty, sometimes it broods of nights.
But never a road is fairer, never a road that teems
With wayside charm that's sweeter than my Road of Love and Dreams.

There are broad and stately highways, there are roads both strange and new
There are little windblown byways that are lovely to the view.
But I tire of roads of travel where the endless traffic streams
And I turn for contentment to my Road of Love and Dreams."


How swiftly the moments can fly when fledged with the music of love, and how quickly the time passed, though it seemed long to the lovers from the April sunset when they passed through the covered bridge to the June dawn that ushered in their wedding day.  The roses were in full bloom everywhere, the fences were covered with sweet muck roses and with eglantine which made such an artistic display, for rail fences then enclosed all the fields and generally the Cherokee rose grew wild along its zig zag path and often the corners were filled with larkspur in blue and white and pink, making an exquisite border of beauty about each home and garden.  Rhododendron and evergreens from the mountain side converted the home into a bower of loveliness for that June wedding in 1860.

The entire countryside seemed to have gathered for the occasion which was always followed by an "infair" to which all were invited.  The ceremony was performed by one of the brothers of the bride, who was a Justice of the Peace.  The bride was attended by her sister, Dicie Shrader.  The groom had for his best man his brother, Andrew Jackson Webb.

The groom was handsome in his black dress suit that he had bought in a northern city and for this occasion.  He was a gentleman to the manor born, standing six feet and two inches, a distinguished looking man with a fine mind and a courage given to few as the next four years proved, for the war between the states was in the offing, and he was destined to play a very brave part in the Second Tennessee Cavalry of Company 1.

The new home of the bride and groom was not very far away from the homes of either.  It was a gift from the bride's father and is now known as the Valley View farm and belongs to the heirs of N. G. T. Fox of Sevier county.  To this new home the bride and the groom each took two good beds with plenty of bedding, all made by hand by the bride and the groom's stepmother.  Some of the quilts and coverlids are still in the homes of the grandchildren.  Each took a cow, a horse and saddle and bridle, each took hogs and sheep and chickens and turkeys and everything that is necessary for the establishment of a home of peace and plenty.


Sometime during the next year, the husband had to leave his lovely wife and new home and join the Union army to fight for the cause he thought was right.  It almost broke Polly's heart, but the men in George W.  Webb's family had been soldiers all the way back as far as he could trace his ancestry, and he had it in his blood.  He could not be honorable and refuse to answer his country's call.  They had one child, James Gregory, a delicate little boy, the idol of their hearts.  During the second year of their marriage a daughter was born, and these cares with the lonely hours of anxiety and the responsibility of this big farm to look after, Polly seems to have grown discouraged, from the following letter, which with many others is among my most cherished possessions.  The letter to her soldier husband and his course of action after receiving it is as follows:

Tennessee, Sevier County, April the 15 day 1865.

Dear Husband: I embrace the opportunity of dropping you a few lines to inform you that the children and I are well and father's family are in common health at present.  I received your kind letter this morning by Parson Sims, it gave me great satisfaction to hear from you and to know that you are well.  I received a letter by Christopher Fox and one by Esquire John Byrd.  I sent one down to Knoxville to have mailed on to you.  I am sending two by Christopher Fox.  George, I want you to resign and come home, I think you have served long enough in this war.  I am lonesome and out of heart.  I have been robbed and I don't know what to do.  I want you to come home and bring the baby a name with you.  I am sending you a lock of her hair and also of James Gregory's.  I received yours and Jackson's likenesses, both taken together and the stars and stripes.  Bring the children and me some shoes when you come home.  I close my letter by saying that I still remain,

Your Most Affectionate wife until death.
Mary Webb to G. W. Webb.

This appealing letter must have gone straight to the heart of the devoted husband who with all his soldiering that was said to be without fear at all times, had a most tender feeling for his beloved wife and children for in the war papers of his I so cherish I find the following letter dispatched to headquarters as soon as he received the letter from whom he most always called by her name, Mary.


Camp near Edgefield, Tennessee.  June 17, 1865.  Brig. Gen. Whipple.  A. A. Gen. Dept. of the Cumberland.

Sir:  I have the honor very respectfully to apply for Leave of Absence for twenty days for the purpose of visiting my home near Knoxville, East Tennessee.  I have never received leave of absence during the near three years service and my private affairs require my immediate attention if possible.

Hoping this may meet with your favorable consideration, I have the honor to be,

Very Respectfully,
Your obediant servant,
George W. Webb
First Lieut. Company "1", 2 Cavalry East Tennessee Volunteers.

Needless to say that Lt. George W. Webb went home for the 20 days, took the baby the name and the shoes for all and many other gifts for he was a most generous man.  He named the little girl, Mary Lytle, for Lt. Lytle.  She grew to womanhood and she too had the wonderful coloring of her beautiful mother with the red hair and also the far off wistful look that ever wanted to follow the road to the west.  Mary Lytle did so and was a pioneer of the Middle West and today one of her sons is one of the most successful citizens of the great Northwest, another lives in St. Louis and is the father of a little girl with grace and charm and gorgeous red hair who is taking first prize in all her school work and in various contests of St. Louis.  Proving to the world that blood will tell and that the people of the Great Smokies are rightly known as the sturdiest race on the face of the earth, proud of their heritage and ready to prove it to the world.