Every Day in Tennessee History
Excerpts for April (1999):
APRIL 1
1783, Cumberland settlements. According to the Minutes of the Committee of the Cumberland Association for this day, the local government had decided to promote the manufacture and sale of local liquor rather than "Liquors Brought from Foreign parts; And Sold...here...." The purchase of "foreign liquor" caused a drain of money from the Cumberland settlements. With that in mind the Committee of the Cumberland Association imposed a stiff fee for a license to sell all but domestic spirits. The price of the latter-day liquor license was prohibitive in the extreme, being set at "Two Hundred pounds Specie." There was no fee required for selling domestic spirits, the price of which was set at no more than a silver dollar "for one Quart of good sound Merchantable Liquor." Failure to obtain a license would result in confiscation of all stock. The founding fathers of Nashville were neither prohibitionists nor free trade advocates, only protectionists.
1862, Iuka, Mississippi. Confederate Major General William J. Hardee, corps commander, after inspecting troops in Mississippi, noted of Brigadier General William Henry Carroll, son of Tennessee Governor William Carroll (1821-'27; 1829-'35) that "I found sufficient evidence against [Carroll]...to require...[his] arrest. I accordingly arrested Brigadier-General Carroll last night for drunkedness [sic], incompetency [sic], and neglect of his command." Even though the Nashville native demanded a hearing, one was never held and he resigned on February 1, 1863. He thereafter joined his family in Montreal, Canada, for the duration of the war. He died there on May 8, 1868, was temporarily buried in that French Canadian city, and was reburied in Elmwood Cemetery in 1869. He never received a pardon from the United States, partly because he was suspected of conspiracy in the death of President Abraham Lincoln.
1895, at the Royal and Cambria Mines in Campbell County at Coal Creek. A three month walkout began in the Royal Mine today as a dispute over "the unpopular management of the superintendent placed in charge of the Royal Mine about the first of January" who required day laborers to work during the noon hour "paying for that hour their regular wages." Two weeks after the strike had begun "a small riot took place when two miners were killed while attacking supposed company men...." The owners of the mines, the Royal Coal & Coke Company, soon afterwards hired "[a]n entire new force [of scabs]...and work was resumed about July 1." The strike was unsuccessful and any union was most likely crushed as well. "Nothing was gained by either side, excepting the loss of time to the laborers and the loss of patronage to the company."
1936, North Carolina. After serving less than two years of his prison sentence for bank fraud, Tennessee financial and political Tsar Luke Lea was paroled from the North Carolina state prison.
APRIL 2
1851, Nashville. The last of two concerts by Jenny Lind was held. Immense preparations had been made for the event so that the maximum profit could be made by packing people into the Adelphi Theater. New galleries were built and the choicest seats were auctioned off to the highest bidder, the best ticket going for $200. The Adelphi had a standing room only crowd and all were wild with enthusiasm. Rock and roll!
1886, Memphis. Having been notified that Ms. Fannie Williams' new born child was missing mysteriously, the police authorities went to her house and found the child - imbedded tightly in a flour barrel and quite alive, even though it had been covered by the flour for 24 hours. Ms. Williams was arrested.
1899, Iloilo, Panay Island, the Philippines. Young Tom Osborne from Shelby County a volunteer soldier with the 1st Tennessee wrote home describing the attack upon the Filipino freedom fighters. His "regiment was ordered to this island to take the City [sic] of Iloilo, which we accomplished after a short engagement. The day we arrived on the boat St. Paul [sic] from Manilla [sic], two of [Admiral] Dewey's gunboats the Boston and the Pettrel bombarded the town for an hour and then our boat pulled in near the shore as posible [sic] and then we were transferred to row boats and went ashore. Many of the boys in their anxiety jumped out intothe bay and proceeded to wade on reaching shallow watter [sic] only waist deep. We soon were rushing through the town which...one sollid [sic] mass of flames. As we went rushing through the streets many times the heat was so intense we almost suffercated [sic] and had many narrow escapes from the falling walls....my company was sent into the wood to find [the Filipino enemy]...and soon...the woods seemed to burst wide open and a rain of bullets came down upon my little band." Osborne's squad managed to chase the enemy from the woods. He explained to his mother that the "[n]ext day was quiet...and such sights that I saw that day will never grow old to my memory. Every house in town was burned and I saw dead women, dead horses, dead dogs, dead cows and may burned people and some with both legs shot off, others sit one arm torn off their carcasses lying partly in the fire and partly out. Those (U.S. Navy) gunboats did most of this...they are me most cruel things in existence."
1902, Jellico. 1,000 miners demonstrated for the implementation of an eight-hour workday.
1936, Crossville. The Crossville Chronicle carried the following story: "At a meeting of the Socialist Party in Nashville, Mrs. Kate Bradford Stockton was chosen as the gubernatorial candidate for Tennessee. The home of Mrs. Stockton was in Allardt, Fentress County. She enjoys the distinction of being the first woman ever to be nominated for governor of the Volunteer State by any political party."
The choice of Kate Stockton as the Socialist gubernatorial candidate was determined not so much out a feeling for gender equality as the fact that there was no one else willing to run. No doubt any other socialist candidate would have done much better than her 1% showing in the polls.
APRIL 3
1828, Nashville. The "ATLAS" was the first steamboat to stop at Nashville. The age of steam power was thus introduced to the City of Rocks.
1919, Nashville. 34th governor of Tennessee, Albert Houston Roberts, signed into law a state police bill, which gave him a police force to send to an outbreak of violence. The governor couldn't constitutionally send the state militia without the consent of the General Assembly and so the state police bill was conceived sort of as the governor's police force. There was a "red scare" going on in the nation at the time, complete with a hysterical fear that communist, reds, Bolsheviks and anarchists were planning a revolution in America. Labor constituencies in the state saw the measure as a state union busting force. State Senator John C. Houk of Knoxville called the law "class legislation of the rankest sort." Thus in response to widespread paranoia over a nonexistent threat Tennessee's State Police - or Trooper - Force was initiated. Today the threat is real.
1974, a tornado destroyed a large portion of Dowelltown, in DeKalb County.
APRIL 4
1781, Nashville, John Cotton said after the Battle of the Bluffs that the men spent all morning digging graves on what was now the west side of the Davidson County Court House, near their cabins. Later in the afternoon the bodies of the Indians, from which "the stink was foul," were buried with the dead dogs.
1875, Knoxville. In a baseball game between the "Riversides" and the Cedar Bluff Baseball Club, the Riversides won 19 to 10. The Cedar Bluff team's uniform consisted of a white hat with a blue band, white shirts and red pants. The Riversides wore cadet uniforms. "[T]heir appearance and good playing," claimed the Knoxville Chronicle, "won the hearts of many of the young damsels."
1968, in Memphis Martin Luther King was assassinated while standing on the second floor balcony of the Lorraine Motel. He was there to lend his support to the sanitation workers' strike against the city of Memphis. Today the Civil Rights Museum stands at the site.
1991. HBO ran "Guilt of Innocence: The Trial of James Earl Ray," an English production which showcased a mock trial of James Earl Ray. The jury in the show found him not guilty of the murder of Martin Luther King.
APRIL 5
1881, Nashville. Governor Alvin Hawkins (1881-1883) signed into law an act that protected fish in Tennessee's rivers and streams, especially during spawning season. This first piece of wildlife conservation legislation in Tennessee history prohibited the use of various devices, such as seines, traps, gig, grab-hook, gunpowder, dynamite, or other explosives. Just three days earlier Governor Hawkins signed an act to hold county sheriff's accountable if a lynching occurred within their jurisdiction. According to the law the local judge could force the sheriff to forfeit his office, or be barred from holding elective office if found guilty of allowing a lynch mob to break in and remove a prisoner from the county jail. Since the local judge would most certainly not hold a sheriff accountable for a violation of this act it meant that no sheriff had to worry about losing his job because of a lynching. It is interesting note that the government protected fish, but not the commonly African-American victims of lynch mobs.
1925, Memphis. The Memphis Commercial Appeal reported that the American Car & Foundry Company would soon begin manufacturing fifty to two hundred compressed-air-hydraulic car lifts of the kind invented by Memphis mechanic P. J. "Pete" Lunati. The device, said to be the first of its kind in America, would help service station mechanics change oil and grease automobiles. Lunati claimed he invented the device because he was "plain lazy." The device is found in very nearly every service station in the Untied States.
APRIL 6
1793, Greeneville. Methodist circuit rider Francis Asbury wrote in his journal that after fording the Nolichucky he made his way to Greeneville. At the courthouse he saw a "corpse...in a covered carriage drawn by four horses. Solemn sight! A whiskey toper [drunkard] gave me a cheer of success [cheered him] as one of John Wesley's congregation....If reports be true, there is danger in journeying through the wilderness; but I do not fear - we go armed. If God suffer Satan to drive the Indians on us; if it be his will, he will teach our hands to war, and our fingers to fight and conquer."
1838. General Winfield Scott was ordered into the Cherokee Nation to carry out the final removal of all remaining Indians. He began a policy of concentrating the Native Americans in wooden corral-like compounds in order to facilitate their shipping to Arkansas.
APRIL 7
1854, Nashville. Architect William Strickland died before his design for the capitol was completed. He was 64. He was buried in a vault that was a space hewn out of solid stone on the northeast corner of the first floor. The funeral was held on the 8th.
1882, Covington. The first telegraph connection between Memphis and Covington was completed this day. Now Covington was better able to stay in touch with the outside world.
1926, Washington, DC. Plans for a National Military Park in Murfreesboro (Battle of Stones River) were given a shot in the arm. Representative Erwin L. Davis introduced a bill to that effect to the House Committee on Military Affairs.
APRIL 8
1860, Memphis. According to the Memphis Daily Appeal of Tuesday, April 10, "the congregations worshipping at the various churches were greatly annoyed by the cursing and shouting" of firemen and boy hangers-on rushing to a fire. This kind of disturbance was sadly more common than not among volunteer fire companies in all American cities at this time.
1935, New York. Adolph Ochs, publisher of the Chattanooga Daily Times and the New York Times died today. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and started as a newsboy and printer's apprentice in Knoxville. On July 1, 1878, with borrowed money he bought the Chattanooga Daily Times (begun on December 15, 1869) from Sumner Cunningham, later editor of the Confederate Veteran. His career took him next to the New York Times where by 1896 he was managing editor. It was widely acknowledged that the New York Times benefited from his editorship.
APRIL 9
1886, Memphis. Mrs. Maud Prather, the wife of a street car driver "and a very good looking woman" was assaulted by a boarder, Oliver L. Racine, a clerk at Ozanne & Co. Mrs. Prather decided to take a trip to Texas which infuriated Racine, who may have thought himself Mrs. Prather's paramour. Grabbing a pistol he fired but missed, whereupon "Mrs. Prather fell on her knees and plead for mercy. She [said]...that Racine advanced on her and saying 'I had as well kill you now' fired a second shot which burned her face severely. She screamed and ran into the street without her shoes. All this time Racine's wife was pleading with him to desist...while he was swearing like a maniac." Neighbors watched from their windows as the drama unfolded. The police arrived after receiving a telephone call and quieted things a bit. Mrs. Prather declined to press charges. Finally, Mrs. Racine took Mrs. Prather to an unknown location to spend the night. After leaving for Texas the next day the police arrested Racine, however, he was soon out on bail.
1983, Weslaco, Texas. Myrna, Tennessee native Jesse Neely died. A Vanderbilt University graduate (1922) he was the school's football team captain. He received his law degree in 1924 from Vanderbilt, and began coaching football, at first at Southwestern, then Alabama and Clemson Universities. Boston College was defeated by his Clemson team in the 1941 Rosebowl. He later coached football at Rice University and eventually became Vanderbilt's Athletic Director. As a coach he compiled an impressive 207-99-14 recorded and was one of only thirteen head coaches in America to have more that 200 victories. He is a member of the National Football Hall of Fame.
APRIL 10
1779. 900 men took the offensive against Indians along the South Chickamauga Creek in present day Hamilton County. Eleven villages were burned and the raiders took pelts, horses and deerskins. On their way home they stopped to sell all their booty at the foot of a creek, now called Sale Creek.
1856, Nashville. Municipal authorities sent the police to raid the red light district to crack down on "Bawdy Houses" in an effort to expel prostitutes from the city limits. The raid was meant to be a final solution, once and for all to rid the city of a red light district and to help former prostitutes lead a healthy normal and moral life. Most of the trollops left town for other cities, however, not wishing to do as the moral crusaders would have them do.
1864, occupied Nashville. Concern was expressed over the appearance of a juvenile gang, the "Forty Thieves." Boys aging from 8 to 14 belonged to this band and some were arrested for throwing rocks at the city school buildings. The Provost Marshal sentenced them to confinement at the work house.
1972, Hollywood, California. Isaac Hayes, born in Covington, Tennessee, won the Academy of Notion Pictures' award for the best original film theme in 1971. The name of the piece was "Shaft." Most recently his is the voice for "Chef" on the television series "South Park."
APRIL 11
1885, Memphis. The hated ordinance that outlawed the playing of baseball on Sunday was repealed. Angry workers demanded some diversion after working six days a week, and to them baseball was much better than reading a book.
1925, Nashville. Thirty-sixth governor of Tennessee, Austin Peay, vetoed a bill which would have exempted Memphis from the 1923 law prohibiting movie shows on Sundays. Peay stated his usual constitutional objections to special exemptions to any state law. In this case, however, he had more to day. "When the time comes that the Sunday in this country is no longer a day of rest and worship but has become instead a day of sport and amusements, our country is headed for decay and early dissolution."
APRIL 12
1824, Nashville. Singing School teacher Allen D. Carden made known the completion of his second tune-book with an advertisement in the Nashville Whig. He guaranteed that "The Book will be sold as low as any other ever published." Kenneth Rose of the music publishing firm of Rose and Acuff calls this the first music published in Nashville with a label imprint, that of The New Harmony was important in Nashville's musical history.
1833, near Nashville. John Overton, judge, friend, family man, master of Traveller's Rest, land speculator and slave trader and slave breeder, died.
APRIL 12
1864, Fort Pillow, in Lauderdale County. The infamous Fort Pillow Massacre occurred in which 551 United States Colored Troops and another 221 United States Army white troops killed by forces led by C.S.A. General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Most of those massacred were killed after surrendering to Forrest's troops. Then Sergeant Achilles V. Clark, a member of Forrest's cavalry and participant in the battle, wrote to his sisters two days after the engagement. This Henry County native and member of the Twentieth (Russell's) Tennessee Cavalry explained that: "The slaughter was awful. Words cannot describe the scene. The poor deluded negroes [sic] would run up to our men[,] fall upon their knees and with uplifted hands scream for mercy[,] but they were ordered to their feet and then shot down. The white men faired but little better. Their fort turned out to be a great slaughter pen. Blood, human blood stood about inn pools and brains could have been gathered up in any quantity. I with several other tried to stoop the butchery, and at one time had partially succeeded, but Gen. Forrest ordered them shot down like dogs, and the carnage continued. Finally our men became sick of blood and the firing ceased.
APRIL 13
1787, Jonesborough. George Middleton Clarkson, found guilty of murder by the superior court of Franklin, was hanged. This was most likely the first legal execution in Franklin or in what is now Tennessee.
1826, Washington, DC. Ohio Congressman William Stanbery was guilty of making unflattering remarks about Tennessee Congressman Sam Houston, who challenged Stanbery to a duel. The two met on Pennsylvania Avenue. Houston asked if the man were Stanbery, who replied in the affirmative and bowed. It was then that Houston hit the Buckeye on his head with a stout cane. Stanbery recovered quickly and drew a pistol which he held against Houston's chest. When the pistol misfired Houston hit Stanbery a few more times and then ended the row by kicking the Ohioan in the groin. Houston was mildly reprimanded by the House of Representatives.
1868, Murfreesboro. A report in the Nashville Union and Dispatch the population of Murfreesboro totaled 3,092. There were 757 white males, 663 black males, 774 white females, and 898 black females, or 1,531 whites and 1,561 blacks.
1902, Chattanooga. Police Officer W. S. Brown, in plain clothes was assigned to spot saloons violating the Sunday closing law. He found Robert Glohon's establishment, a very popular saloon on the city's south side, open for business. Brown went in and claimed an altercation occurred, one no witness claimed to have seen. Officer Brown drew his pistol and shot Clohon dead. The good old days of law and order!
APRIL 14
1835, Washington, D.C.. President Jackson wrote a letter to his adopted son Andrew Jackson, Jr. about the virtues of moderation insofar as liquor was concerned: "It was well known to all that I have adopted you as my own son and you are to represent me when I am called home. How careful then you ought to be to shun all bad company, or to engage in any dissipation whatever and particularly intoxication which reduces the human being below the brute."
1874, Memphis. In the adjourned meeting of the Common Council it was proposed to adopt a quota system to fill municipal jobs. The percentages proposed were the following: 10 per cent Italian; 20 per cent Irish; 20 per cent German; 50 per cent native American, including Negroes.
1880, Memphis. Ex-President U.S. Grant visited Memphis. A large crowd of dignitaries and municipal employees attended the welcoming ceremonies. However, there was little enthusiasm registered for Grant. "The people came out to see Grant as they would to see Barnum's Elephants," claimed a Memphis newspaper writer, "and they manifested as much enthusiasm...that I think the elephants would have had the advantage...." [The elephant was not yet the symbol of the Republican Party.]
1885, Union City environs. Two members of a gang of robbers which had lost three of its members to mob action earlier on the 11th of March, were lynched. They were Greemen Ward, black and Bud Ferris, white.
APRIL 15
1859, Memphis. Five members of Invincible No. 5 fire company on Shelby street, assaulted a German cobbler, one Mr. App. App was an honorary member of the fire company and was visiting the engine hall late that night. When an alarm was sounded about 11:00 P.M. App declined to turn out with the rest of the "b'hoys." He and his brother were then attacked and ran home, where pursuing firemen broke down the door. While one volunteer was knocked unconscious by a blow from an iron bar delivered by Mr. App. all male members of the family were severely beaten and Mrs. App "was so much alarmed that she was...confined to her bed."
1886, Memphis. A scandal was reported in the Nashville American under the title "Naughty Memphis." Mr. R. A. Young, who doubted his wife's fidelity, went to a house of assignation run by an old African-American woman, Esther Mosby, on Court Street, near the Memphis and Charleston Depot. To his shock he found there his wife in a room "with one of the most prominent men" in Memphis, Will J. Steele. "Neither the wife nor her lover offered any explanation. Mr. Young then left, remarking that he would take the matter to court. Mrs. Laura R. Young was the daughter of a wealthy wagon manufacturer in Memphis, James Roosa and had eight years earlier run away from her father's Memphis home to marry R.A. Young. Naughty rumor has often in the past connected her with scandalous reports...." Her paramour Steele was a popular and handsome man, known locally as an amateur singer. His friends claimed he was set up by the Youngs in a variant of the so-called badger game, inasmuch as she had telephoned him for a meeting at Mosby's house. Mr. Young had reportedly filed for a divorce.
1894, Chattanooga. Bessie Smith, blues singer extraordinaire, was born. Her early career consisted of touring with the Rabbit Foot Minstrels where she was the featured child singer. From 1913-1916 she came into contact with Gertrude Pridgett Rainey who many insist taught Bessie to sing the blues. Smith recorded extensively from 1923-1926 and used many of the leading jazzmen to accompany her songs, men such as Louis Armstrong and Clarence Williams. She regularly toured the vaudeville circuit with her own companies, the Midnight Stoppers and the Harlem Frolic company. She was featured in the film "St. Louis Blues" and her voice was used for several soundtracks. She died in Clarksville, Mississippi, after an automobile accident on September 26, 1937.
1902, Jellico. Drillers struck oil on this day and crowds of curious people witnessed a gusher spew petroleum over the immediate vicinity.
APRIL 16
1934, the first editorial cartoonist for the Memphis Commercial Appeal, James Pinckney Alley, died in his bed of Hodgson's disease. He was also the author of the nationally syndicated cartoon "Hambone's Meditations." His cartoons critical of the Ku Klux Klan were instrumental in the paper's winning a Pulitzer Prize in 1923. His son Calvin would later return to Memphis and carry on his father's work with the Commercial Appeal.
1965, Memphis. The then high school track star Dr. William Hurd, Negro, broke Jesse Owens's 100 yard dash record for Manassas High School.
APRIL 17
1861, Nashville. Democratic Governor Isham Harris, the state's 17th chief executive (1857-1862) sent telegrams to the U.S. Secretary of War, defiantly refusing to honor Lincoln's requisition for two regiments of militia as Tennessee's contribution to the 75,000 volunteers the President requested. According to Governor Harris: "Tennessee will not furnish a single man for the purpose of coercion, but 50,000, if necessary;, for the defense of our rights and those of our Southern brothers...." In ten months, however, Harris, with a great many frightened "Southern brothers," evacuated Nashville in the face of an advancing federal army.
1886, Memphis. The public committee charged with finding a good source of water for the city decided on a close vote to recommend the Wolf River.
APRIL 17
1899, Nashville.
The Nashville Banner printed a letter from a soldier in the 1st Tennessee in the Philippines. Among other things the letter complained of the course of the fighting in the Philippines and a deep sense of homesickness. "The boys are getting sick of fighting these heathen[s], and all say we volunteered to fight Spain, not heathen[s]. Their patience is wearing off....They will be fighting [the Filipinos] 400 years and then never whip these people, for there are not enough of us to follow them up....The people of the United States ought to raise a howl and have us sent home."(It should be noted that the vast majority of Filipinos were Catholic, not heathen.)
1905, Nashville. Tennessee's state flag was officially adopted by the Legislature. There was not state flag until that time. It was designed by LeRoy Reeves veteran of the Third Regiment of the C.S.A. Tennessee Infantry.
1943, Nashville. Rumors held that President Franklin D. Roosevelt has secretly been in the city after inspecting troops at Camp Forrest in Tullahoma. The rumors were true inasmuch as F.D.R. did pass through Nashville after a ten minute train delay in Music City.
APRIL 18
1883, Knoxville. Perhaps the city's first black baseball team was formed and named, "Bank's Choice." They were "prepared to meet any nine that shall see fit to challenge them."
1887, in Memphis, the Negro Mutual Protective Association adopted resolutions saying African Americans had a "duty to claim the full rights and privileges which pertain in common to the citizens of the a great republic."
1889, Knoxville. The Knoxville Daily Tribune ironically remarked of one performance of black entrepreneur Cal Johnson's minstrels, formed in 1886, that: "There was scarcely any necessity for the use of burnt cork as the `artists' were genuine negroes." Such were the quirks of a segregated and racist society.
APRIL 19
1847, a convention of ten East Tennessee counties was held in Knoxville in an attempt to establish a common public school system.
1901, Nashville. Six Vanderbilt University students guilty of attempting to waylay Dean Tillet and of throwing rocks into the library of Dean Tolman were identified, according to an address at the University chapel this morning.
APRIL 20
1835, Memphis. In Shelby County's first recorded marriage between two free African Americans, Joe and Fannie Harris occurred.
1867, Gallatin. The town's Radical Republicans met and passed a resolution condemning President Andrew Johnson and demanding his impeachment.
1886, Memphis. The city's street car drivers met to discuss their grievances and possible courses of action, including a strike.
1902, Knoxville. Over 280 Confederate Veterans boarded a special train which was to take them to Dallas, Texas, for a reunion. 80 of the veterans were from Knoxville. Other veterans join them at Sweetwater.
APRIL 21
1797, Philadelphia. While at a special session of Congress, Tennessee's Senator William Blount wrote a letter to a compatriot, James Carey in Knoxville. In it Senator Blount confided that a British scheme to form armies of Indians and white men to take Louisiana from the French and Florida from the Spanish would most likely take place. The three European powers were all at war then. Blount, a land speculator of no mean ability, hoped to profit handsomely from his involvement in the scheme. He specifically told Carey not to show the letter to anyone, to burn it after reading it three times. Carey did, however, show it to another federal employee who passed it on to President John Adams, who sent it to the U.S. Senate. In due time Blount would be expelled from that body while the House of Representatives prepared impeachment charges against Blount. In 1799 the Senate proceeded with the impeachment, even though the body had expelled him in 1797. The U.S. Senate decided it had no jurisdiction in the matter and so Blount was never impeached.
1936, The Nashville City Council for the first time in its history passed unanimously on first reading an ordinance making it illegal to sell or possess marijuana, unless prescribed by a doctor. As part of an educational effort the council agreed to hear Earl A. Powell, an anti-marijuana zealot and lecturer, at its next session
APRIL 22
1886, Memphis. Car drivers of the Memphis City Railway Company went out on strike demanding an hourly pay raise of 13.5 cents an hour. Shelby County Sheriff Cannon returned from Elmira, NY, where he took Thomas Adams in charge. Adams was charged with embezzling funds from Quinn's Hotel in Memphis.
1898, Nashville. In the evening cannon fired a salute from Capitol Hill in Nashville upon learning of the news that seventeen miles south of Key West, Florida the first shots of the Spanish-American war had been fired by the crew of the gunboat the U.S.S. NASHVILLE. The ship's log for 0400 to 0800 tells the story this way: "Went to general quarters at 7:10. Fired three shells across the Spanish steamer's bow and then she stopped and hauled down her colors. Sent Ensign T.P. Magruder on board with armed crew. Found vessel to be Spanish steamer Buena Ventura laden with lumber from Pascagoula, Miss., bound for Norfolk , Va., for bunker coal." The ship was towed to Key West. The action was little more a routine gun practice and the episode wherein a dozen U.S. war ships subdued an unarmed merchantman, whose captain and crew were unaware of the American declaration of war against Spain. It did not reflect great credit on the country, regardless of the enthusiasm with which the news was then received. America had entered the imperialist age.
1933, Nashville. The Iris was now officially the state flower. Governor Hill McCallister approved a joint House Senate resolution making it official.
APRIL 23
1825, Nashville. The newspaper the Nashville Whig printed instructions for the populace to follow upon the arrival of the Marquis de Lafayette on his upcoming visit. They were to wait until the courthouse bell rang and then to assemble in the public square. There they would form ranks and parade in procession for Lafayette, with no one allowed to break ranks. Those with houses were urged to light as many candles as possible for the night of his arrival, May 4.
1886, Clarksville. The city concluded its first contract to light the town with electricity. The generator was to be run by "the engines of the Anchor Mills, located on the rear of the city." Talk abounded that "a plant will be fixed at Dunbar's Cave with sufficient power to brilliantly illuminate this great cavern, three miles underground, presenting a curious scene of the wondrous beauty of nature, unsurpassed in the world."
APRIL 24
1886, Nashville. A report in the Nashville American told of "the old story" of a young wife falling in love with the handsome young man. Eight months previous Nannie married John Crisp, a tall, bearded workman at the Nashville plow factory who was many years her senior. She had "barely turned sixteen, though a fully and handsomely developed woman of medium height, well rounded proportions...she carried herself with the winsomeness of a girl and the ease of a woman....A pair of lustrous brown eyes...waving chestnut hair....two rosy red lips, a firm chin and the attractiveness of the young creature is fairly told." The Crisps moved to Bell Buckle, staying in a boarding house belonging to Crisp's relatives. In time a young marble cutter, John Coleman, arrived in the town and rented a room at the same boarding house. John and Nannie soon fell in love. They left Bell Buckle for Nashville and had been in the city for about a week when the young woman's husband, with a warrant and the assistance of Constable Joe Graves, had Coleman arrested on Broad Street near the new First Baptist Church. She declared her unyielding love for her lover as he was taken to jail. Nannie said of her husband: "'I never loved him but my family wanted me to marry him and I did. He was too old; they might have known I'd fall in love with a younger man....Like all old men who marry young girls he was awfully jealous'" and their "marital relations were not pleasant." She agreed to return to Bell Buckle if Crisp would release Coleman from jail, an act to which he would not consent. She refused to return and stayed in Nashville at the home of Coleman's mother with vague notions of freeing him and divorcing Crisp.
APRIL 25
1861, Nashville. A second special secret session of the state legislature was called by Governor Isham Harris after efforts in February failed to lead Tennessee out of the Union. Eventually the session would produce the "Declaration of Independence and Ordinance Dissolving the Federal Relations Between the State of Tennessee and the United States of America." The Declaration was not made public until May 6, with an added provision that a special referendum was to be held to ratify the document.
1898, Nashville. M.E. Church of the South Bishop Gallaway was quoted as saying about the Spanish-American War: "I believe the war is justified." Catholic Bishop Byrne issued a pastoral letter to clergy and laity directing prayers and masses for a victory of American arms over the Spanish in Cuba.
APRIL 26
1884, Chattanooga. The Almira S. Steele Home for Needy Children opened in Chattanooga. Ms. Steele, a widow and Boston native, was the guiding force behind the facility. She said that she "came south to found a school....I constantly saw destitute colored orphans compelled to beg or steal. I saw...the precious souls of these helpless blacks." Within three years of her death on June 6, 1925, the building ceased to function as an orphanage and was leased to the Chattanooga school board. It has long since been demolished.
1951, near Mugok, Korea. Sergeant First Class Ray E. Duke, Co. C., 21st Infantry upon learning several of his men were isolated and heavily engaged in an area yielded by his platoon when ordered to withdraw, led a small force in daring assault which recovered the position and the beleaguered men. During an enemy attack, even though Sergeant Duke was wounded by mortar fragments, calmly moved along his platoon line to coordinate firing and to urge his men to hold. Threatened with annihilation and with mounting causalities Sergeant Duke was ordered to withdraw when he was wounded a third time in both legs and was unable to walk. Realizing he was a burden to the two comrades carrying him away from the position, he urged them to leave him there and seek their own safety. He was last seen alive pouring devastating fire into the ranks of the enemy. Ray E. Duke, a native of Tracy City, Tennessee, was posthumously awarded the Medal of honor.
APRIL 27
1879, the first installment of Lucy Virginia Smith's "Darlingtonia: The Eaters and the Eaten. A Romance of Tennessee" was published in the Detroit Free Press. The last installment was published on August 17, 1879.
1888, Knoxville. A mass political meeting was held for all Knoxville voters, white and black, of all religions, to gain approval for the public expenditure of $75,000 by the Common Council to build sewers in the city. The only opposition was voiced by Dr. Kearney, who believed that it wasn't enough money to do a thorough job.
APRIL 28
1842, Nashville. Former President Martin Van Buren was welcomed in the capitol city. He was accompanied by James K. Spaulding, his former Secretary of the Navy. He rode in an open carriage with Andrew Jackson and stayed at the Hermitage. Van Buren also visited with Governor and Mrs. James K. Polk. The Whig newspaper the Columbia Observer criticized Van Buren for wearing "a round-about coat and striped breeches." Van Buren had a reputation as a dandy who perfumed his whiskers.
1898, Nashville. Enthusiasm for the war against Spain swept Vanderbilt University. Students were addressed by Chancellor Kirkland and then they paraded into town accompanied by a marching band and flags. A cheering crowd followed them to the Maxwell House. A rally was held later at Church and Cherry streets. There is nothing to indicate just how many � if any - Vanderbilt students enlisted.
APRIL 29
1874, Nashville. The State Convention of Colored Men convened. Delegates came from twenty counties. Edward Shaw was chosen chairman. The Convention protested anti-miscegenation laws and denounced Senator William g. Brownlow for opposing supplemental civil rights legislation and urged black women to become teachers while recommending that blacks in Tennessee support political candidates who support the right of blacks to serve on juries.
1876, Memphis. The newspaper the Memphis Appeal put itself squarely against woman suffrage in an editorial which read in part: "White women would make as intelligent voters as unlettered colored folks."
1892, Goodlettsville. Henry Grizzard, an African-American, was identified by his victims Mary and Connie Bruce the night before. He was taken away from Davidson County Sheriff Hill by a mob composed mostly of Sumner countians to a bridge over Mansker's Creek. There he was lynched on the Sumner County side of the creek, protesting his innocence to the end. According to the Nashville Daily American: "The deed was witnessed with evident satisfaction by the assemblage of vigilantes. Some one pinned an envelope on the hanging negro 's breast. On the envelope was written 'Death to the man that cuts this rope before 12 P.M..'" Another black, Mack Harper, was to be hanged as well but the mob could not agree as to his guilt and so he was surrendered to the Sheriff after several ministers and prominent citizens pleaded with the mob to let the law take its course. Harper was taken to Nashville along with Eph Grizzard, Henry's brother and two other suspects. According the Nashville Daily American, the black community in Goodlettsville was split, one group composed of "the better class of negroes" condemning the rapes and approving of the lynching, while "[t]wo negroes had early in the morning made threats of what the colored people would do if any of their race should be hanged. They were told to leave the State and that unless they left within twenty-four hours they would summarily be dealt with. They...left during the day." The coroner's jury rendered the following verdict: "That he came to his death by a party unknown to the jury." Henry Grizzard had served a term in the state penitentiary for attempted rape in and "house-breaking." He was survived by a wife and child.
APRIL 30
1892, Nashville. Eph Grizzard, a black man, who along with his brother Henry, was accused of raping the Bruce sisters of Goodlettsville, was lynched. A large and restive crowd had gathered in the town square with the intent of lynching Eph, his brother having been murdered in Goodlettsville the day before. Later the crowd attempted to rush the jail but two deputy sheriffs shot into the crowd and wounded an indeterminate number. A crowd estimated at 6,000 grew to 10,000 many of whom were armed. At noon Governor Buchanan's proclamation asking the crowd to disperse was met with jeers and heckles. Meanwhile the prison guards attempted to remove Eph from danger by dressing him as a woman but it was too late. With the cry "remember your wives, daughters and your mothers!" the mob rushed and took the jail. According to one newspaper account: "He was jerked down and dragged over the rough cobblestones, his eyes and tongue protruding." He was quickly taken to the Cumberland river bridge with a noose around his neck and dropped fifteen feet. Although he was dead the frenzied mob hauled him up and dropped him one more time while countless bullets struck his body. It was said that over 50,000 people had witnessed the lynching. Afterwards, his body was taken to Goodlettsville so the Bruce family could see the mobs handy work, after which his body was burned to ashes in a large bonfire. As the Sunday Chattanooga Daily Times explained: "While everybody condemns mob law, no man can ravish a Southern girl and live a day after it is proven on him."
1933, Wilder-Davidson, Fentress County. "Barney" Graham, president of U.M.W. Local No. 4467, who led the miners in a bitter and protracted strike, was murdered in the streets of Wilder-Davidson by Jack "Shorty" Green, a company goon hired to intimidate miners. Even though Green confessed to the killing, he was acquitted by a jury. It must be then that it was all right to kill a union leader.
1969, Oxford, Mississippi. Boyd Robert Jones was born. He was educated in Mississippi and the Webb School in Bell Buckle, Tennessee. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1990 and soon went to the Republic of China to begin his career. His skills in the Chinese language led him to a better understanding of oriental business customs, and he soon returned to the U.S. to graduate with an MBA from Washington University in St. Louis. From there he returned to Taiwan to begin building his career on the world wide net providing venture capital investment possibilities to hungry American capitalists. His future is secured.
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