Touring the Western North Carolina Backroads by Carolyn Sakowski

Author:Carolyn Sakowski
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780895875600
Publisher: John F. Blair, Publisher
Published: 2011-01-10T05:00:00+00:00

Chimney Rock was in the newspapers long before Rome Freeman arrived in the area. On July 31, 1806, a widow named Patsey Reaves reported that she and her two children had seen a “very numerous crowd of beings” atop Chimney Rock. She went on to say that the beings were clad in brilliant white raiments and that they seemed to rise in unison. Though the Cherokees would have dismissed it as a gathering of the Little People, the sighting managed to create quite a stir in western North Carolina.

Other witnesses came forward to report similar hilltop gatherings, but things were relatively quiet until September 1811, when a husband and wife who lived below Chimney Rock spotted two opposing armies of men riding winged horses high in the air. It was obvious that they were readying for combat atop Chimney Rock. The couple reported that when the preparations were over, the two armies dashed into each other, cutting, thrusting, and hacking. The wife distinctly “heard the ring of their swords and saw the glitter of their blades flashing in the sun’s rays.” Newspaper accounts of the sighting created so much excitement that a public meeting was held and a delegation with a magistrate and a clerk was appointed to visit the couple and take their affidavits. The delegation also reviewed the testimony of three other locals who witnessed similar cavalry gatherings on subsequent evenings.

In 1878, Silas McDowell, a well-known farmer, scientific observer, and man of letters in the area, came forward with the explanation he found most plausible. “In autumn,” McDowell proclaimed, “when the atmosphere is clear, before a change in weather, the lower atmosphere in the ravine is surcharged with vapor, and to all objects in the upper atmosphere, seen through this medium, this vapor acts with telescopic effect and swells in size a bunch of gnats when at play in the sun’s rays to the appearance of a squadron of winged-horse.” Regardless of how much credence one gives McDowell’s theory of the gnats, it is fun to look up at Chimney Rock around twilight during the fall and imagine a ghostly cavalry fight.

Another legend concerns Round Top, the mountain opposite and just north of Chimney Rock that forms one wall of the valley. In the 1700s, some Englishmen who owned a mine farther north were on their way to the coast with a load of gold when they were attacked by Indians. The Englishmen retreated to a nearby cave and tried to fight. All but one of them died. The lone survivor managed to reach the coast and sail back to England. He intended to return to America for his gold, but a loss of eyesight forced him to dictate a map showing the location of the cave as he remembered it. A search party was dispatched to look for the treasure. Subsequent parties were organized over the years, but no gold was ever found. Rumors circulated that a copy of the Englishman’s map was on file in the Library of Congress.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.