That’s what my friend Dakota of The Old History Project called it last week when we went traipsing through the ivy-covered property next door to Hayslope.
Oddly enough, for a while, the house that stood on that property was called “Hayslope,” although it was initially called “Killiecrankie,” after a famous Scottish battle in the 17th century. Dakota and I found no physical signs of the house I knew as the Blair house, just daffodils and English ivy – and an awfully big patch of vinca.
We did, however, find signs of the three cottages that stood behind the big house.
Here’s the story: Robert Patterson, a nephew of Theo and Louisa Rogan (son of her sister Connie) married Maud Hooper of Selma, Alabama. Her mother, Maude, spent many a summer at Hayslope when it was a 500-or-so acre resort. After Theo and Louisa died and the property was divided between their five children, Robert and Maude bought parcels from Griffith and Hugh Rogan, including the piece directly to the south of the old homeplace. And there Robert built Killiecrankie and the cottages, one of which was for Maude. Now, Robert’s sister-in-law, Ruth, married a true Scotsman named Robert Blair, and the Blairs, Pattersons, and Hoopers lived in the new structures along with friends and relatives who came to visit.
Cassie Rogan, the eldest child of Theo and Louisa, was living next door in the old house. Newspaper articles called Patterson’s house Killiecrankie until around 1925, when the comings and goings in the society pages began calling that house Hayslope. Cassie lived in the old house until her death in 1932, and five years later, Briscoe and Escoe Thomason bought the house and its 28 acres from Cassie’s sister, Ellen Stephens, who lived in Florida.
Meanwhile, the Pattersons and Blairs kept coming to their house in the summers, spending winters in Selma. After the Roberts died, both in the 1940s, Ruth and Maud kept up the tradition. Maud died in the 1950s, leaving the property to Ruth, who spent her summers in Russellville until she, too, died, in the 1960s. After that, the city of Morristown got the property.
We suspect the city may have bulldozed the big house, although perhaps more digging around in the ivy will overturn some evidence that it was there (other than my memory!) But there are plenty of bricks, including a chimney, indicating where the cabins were.
That’s why we went back in there to begin with. Dakota wanted to show me the chimney, which appears to be built with hand-made brick, and we found more piles of bricks, some looking like maybe part of a step or walk, and an odd construction that was likely some kind of ventilation for a crawlspace beneath one of the cottages. That particular construction was clearly made with more “modern” brick, and by that we mean not 18th or early 19th century.
Further back, we found what appeared to be a continuation of the old Kentucky Road – that famous road is pretty clear right next to Hayslope. It’s cut pretty deep right there, and there are even steps from the Hayslope yard down to the road level. The road wandered back through what’s now the east end of Morristown’s industrial park and then crossed the old stage road – creating Cheek’s Crossroads – before winding on toward the river and then up the mountains to Kentucky.
The cistern
And then Dakota nearly fell into an old cistern. Somebody (and I can’t remember who it was) told me it was back there before. I looked once, but didn’t find it. Dakota did. We couldn’t get a very good look into it. There’s a rim of brick around it, what may be a collapsed lid directly below, and the cut-out goes we don’t know how far around it. A better look later, we hope. It’s also more or less in line with the spring across Warrensburg Road, so we wondered if it might be connected.
It makes me really nervous with the city of Morristown owning that little strip of property right next to Hayslope. Personally, I think they should give it to us as part of the historic property, or donate it to the National Historic Trust as a preservation easement. Either of those would completely erase any nervousness on my part.
I am searching for descendants of Ruth Blair – it doesn’t appear the Pattersons had children. The Blairs did, however. They’ve all since died as well, but grandchildren may have photos of the house.
And so, our journey continues. We’re getting very close to being able to begin the real work on the house. As soon as the tenants currently living there are out, we’ll be doing a little termite treatment and getting utilities set up. And next week when I’m there, I’m planning to take a crowbar to a small section of the siding and see what it looks like under there. Pictures WILL be made.
I’ve blocked it off for the time being, because there’s no reason to park just yet. That’s coming, though, once the Civil War Trails signs are installed. Big thanks to Jerry Howington, who did a great job, and even fixed the drainage problem on the lower part of the driveway.
No parking just yet!
That was day one of my trip to Hayslope last week, along with meeting up with Everett from East Tennessee Pest Control. They’ll be treating for the termites and then the prevention of a further infestation. That’s set up and ready to go too.
Day 2 was a trip to Knoxville and the McClung collection at the East Tennessee Historical Society, where I met the society’s director, Warren Dokter, who you all may know of from The Old History Project’s work with him. It looks to me like our little area of upper East Tennessee is truly beginning to get the attention it deserves. The upper upper part, including Jonesborough and Watauga and all, and the Knoxville area have long been a draw for us history nuts. In between, with few exceptions, has often gotten short shrift.
Now, with focus coming from TOHP and the ETHS, that’s starting to change. There’s plenty to see in Hawkins, Hamblen, Grainger, Greene, Jefferson, Cocke, and other counties outside those in the far northeast and down Knoxville way. I’m really looking forward to hooking up with these folks as well as the Longstreet Museum and other organizations and groups in our area – we’re more than just a place for I-81 to run! And I’m convinced that we can be entertaining, education, and economical for all.
But what about K-town?
Well, I’d collected a list of documents I wanted to get a look at from the McClung collection – chief among them a photo showing Cavan-a-Lee, the house we now know was built by Absalom Kyle, who married Hughe Graham’s oldest daughter Mary. The photo wasn’t an original, unfortunately, but it showed the Patterson family (the Pattersons bought the property after the Kyles died) having a watermelon party in front of the house, with watermelons grown on the land.
Watermelon party at Cavan-a-Lee
This was W.H. Patterson and his wife Cornelia – Connie, another Graham daughter – and the property is the eastern half of the James Roddye estate, with Graham’s daughter Louisa and her husband Theo Rogan owning the Hayslope side.
The back of the photo says the Kyles built the house and that Absalom “personally chose every piece of lumber” that went into it. The Kyles both died at the house, it says. And it provides this brand new piece of information: Hugh Patterson, the son of W.H. and Connie, tore Cavan-a-Lee down and built a new house, discarding the old lumber in the process. His father died in 1904 and his mother in 1916, so it’s not clear when he did this, but apparently, the house bought by the Easterlys in 1952, which burned down the following year, was not Cavan-a-Lee after all.
Where there’s a will, there’s a way
Now, I did learn some mighty interesting things from Hughe Graham’s will, a copy of which – handwritten by his son Thomas – was in the McClung collection. We’d already learned recently that Graham got the Roddye estate from Roddye’s son Thomas as payment of a debt, and we’d assumed, based on the stories told, that Hughe had given the property to those children as wedding gifts (although the timing for the Rogans was certainly suspect, since they went to Texas immediately after they were married).
Hughe’s will, however, says something quite different. I haven’t yet read the whole thing – it’s dozens of pages, plus three codicils – but the original document, written in January 1862 (he died in March 1863) actually signs the Roddye property over to his children as of January 1, 1863.
But here’s the thing. We know that Hughe and his wife Catherine Nenney Graham got the Roddye property (called the “Rhoddy farm” in Hughe’s will) as payment of Thomas Roddye’s debt to Catherine’s father, Patrick Nenney, before he died. It appears, from the will, that Catherine’s brother Charles P. Nenney got the Roddye place after that, as Hughe’s will says it was “bought off Charles P. Nenney.” This part of the will bequeaths half of a tract of land made up of the “Rhoddy farm” and another segment known as the “King place” to Mary and Absalom Kyle, with the other half to Louisa and Theo Rogan.
The will requires Theo and Absalom to pick a man each, and those two chosen men to choose a third, who are to divide the property “to be equal according quantity, quality, and value.”
Page of the copy of Hughe Graham’s will, mentioning the “Rhoddy farm” and the “King place”
Let me tell you, Hughe Graham’s will is VERY detailed and specific. He says this division is to take place in the fall of 1862, and once done, Louisa “being the youngest” gets to choose which half she wants. The daughters are to take possession of their chosen properties on January 1, 1863, or upon Hughe’s death, whichever comes first.
What this tell us is that it’s highly unlikely that either daughter was living on the old Roddye property before 1863, since the property wasn’t even divided into two tracts until fall 1862. To review, census records put the Kyles in Hawkins County, where Absalom’s family lived, in 1850, 1860, and 1870. They are in Russellville in the 1880 census, but both died in that decade, and the Pattersons bought it. Theo Rogan had been living in Texas, returned to Tennessee to marry Louisa in 1853, then returned to Texas with her. She came back to Tennessee in 1860 with daughters Cassie and Little Maggie (who died in 1863), as the Civil War heated up, and Theo came back two years later, perhaps because his father-in-law was approaching death.
It’s going to be some fun going through this will. It’s long. This part, though, concerning the “Rhoddy farm,” is obviously of interest to our story!
Louisa Rogan left no will
But there’s more!
Most of the documents I saw were given to the historical society by a Graham descendent named Antoinette Miller Taylor, and many of you in the Russellville area knew her. These documents included store account books from Grahams and Nenneys and Mrs Taylor’s own notes as she worked to trace the history of her family. And boy, were her notes interesting.
Louisa left no will when she died in 1910 (Theo had died six years earlier) and so, Mrs Taylor says, the children “very equitably divided the estate after it had been surveyed,” wrote the names of the five divisions they’d created on a slip of paper, and drew for them.
The youngest daughter, Ellen – who was living in Lakeland, Florida, where her husband operated a large orange grove – drew the old homeplace and “suggested that Cassie (the oldest, and unmarried) live in the home place – Hayslope – which she continued to do for the rest of her life.”
Wow.
The other divisions went like this:
Margaret drew “Bayne’s Hill,” which she sold to someone named Bayles;
Griffith drew the section directly south of Hayslope and eventually sold it to Maude St John Philpot Hooper of Selma, Alabama, who had spent her summers there. One of W.H. and Connie Patterson’s sons, Robert – who was married to Mrs Hooper’s daughter Maude – put in a significant amount of money for that purchase (and may have been the actual purchaser) and, according to Mrs Taylor, built the large home I remember sitting there, as well as the three cottages behind it – which means that the house was NOT the one built by Griffith in 1898. She makes no mention of Maude Hooper’s sister Ruth, married to a Scotsman named Robert Blair, although the Blairs are mentioned as often as the Pattersons as staying there. Eventually, with both Roberts dead, the Hooper sisters lived there. Robert Patterson, Mrs Taylor says, named the house Killiecrankie, after a famed Scottish battle, but I can’t help but think Robert Blair may have had more to do with that name. The house is mentioned in newspaper articles as Killiecrankie a few times between 1915 and 1925, but then it becomes known as Hayslope until the Hooper sisters died and the house was torn down by the city of Morristown;
Cassie drew the Sugar Hollow section, but lived at Hayslope;
Hugh drew the section nearest to the Taylor place – Greenwood – and sold it to Robert Patterson as well.
Antoinette Taylor never found what I found – Ellen Stephens selling her 28-acre portion, including the old home place, to Escoe and Briscoe Thomason in 1937, although she did know that it had happened, and that it passed to Briscoe and to my dad C.D.
The other part I’ve found is the deeds transferring those five partitions to each of the children, with their descriptions.
Scrapbooking
One more interesting note. I looked through two boxes of scrapbooks, attributed to Margaret Rogan Millar, Theo and Louisa’s daughter. The scrapbooks were largely newspaper and magazine articles about happenings around the world, but the most interesting thing about them is that these articles were pasted over the pages of Theo Rogan’s old law books, including one that was “made by her father” at Hayslope.
Another page pasted into an old book talks of Hugh Rogan’s marriage to Bertie Millar (Margaret’s sister-in-law) in 1901. That page also includes an ad for “Hayslop Farm” (must have been a typo – it’s always been spelled with the “E” prior to this, although sometimes as two words). “At Russellville, in mountains of East Tennessee, on main line of Southern Railroad,” it reads. “19 hours from New Orleans. Through sleeper. Telegraph, long-distance and local telephone; express service; 10 passenger trains daily; fine springs; macadamized roads for driving and cycling; first-class table and service. For particulars, address Mrs. M.L. Rogan, proprietor; Mrs. T.L. Bayne, manager.
And that’s the first I’ve heard of Mrs Bayne, but certainly not the last: Mr Bayne, it seems was poultry farmers from New Orleans, persuaded by Griff Rogan to move to Hayslope, where he built them a 6-room cottage the Baynes called “The Cedars,” perhaps on Bayne’s Hill? And Mr Bayne’s poultry of choice? White Wyandottes. Mr Bayne even edited The Industrious Hen for a while. And that makes me wonder if Margaret Rogan Millar, who drew the Bayne’s Hill property, perhaps sold it to the Baynes and not someone named Bayles …
And there’s so much more. I’ll be looking over this material for a long time – there are names of people who could have documents and pictures of the Rogans and Grahams, and I’m sure to go back to Knoxville to study some of the account books, perhaps to find out how Thomas Roddye got into so much debt!
