Part 3

A few days later rumors reached the missionaries that the Cherokees held two other Osage children, a boy and a girl, and that Lydia was their sister. The boy had been sold first for $20 and resold so many times that the last price brought $150. Return J. Meigs, the Indian Agent, gave the missionaries authority to take possession of the boy and place him in the Brainerd school. John Ross, then a dashing young man, went to Brainerd and tendered his services in rescuing the boy. Ross rode horseback for 250 miles to the mouth of the Catawba River. He handled the situation with skill. Before going to the house of the Indian who held the boy, Ross hid his horse in the woods and stealthily approached on foot. When he glimpsed the lad, entirely nude, playing about the hut, as agile as a deer, Ross leaped the fence gracefully, and in another moment he had the boy securely in his arms. In great excitement the owner came rushing out. Ross turned a deaf ear to the pleading of the Indian, who tried all kinds of schemes to prevent Ross from taking the boy away. In a few moments Ross had the boy riding behind him on the horse, and they were hastening on their way to Brainerd Mission. After 13 days, riding through forests, swimming rivers, fording streams, Ross returned with his human prize. During this time he had traveled more than 600 miles. On his return the Osage boy was christened John Osage Ross in honor of the young man who had rescued him.

The story of these two children was so remarkable that Elias Cornelius wrote a book entitled _The Little Osage Captive_, which was published in Boston, also in York, England. The book had a wide sale.

Later when John Rogers, Cherokee, came from Arkansas to take Lydia Carter and John Osage Ross back to the Osages, there was great sadness at Brainerd when the missionaries had to part with the children. John Rogers was an antecedent of the late humorist Will Rogers and a relative of Tiana Rogers, Sam Houston’s Cherokee wife.

The Brainerd Mission was closed on August 19, 1838, at the time of the removal of the Cherokees to the West. Many of the missionaries chose to accompany them to the new lands and there resumed their labors as they had done so unselfishly at Brainerd. It should be remembered that Brainerd Mission gave the name to Missionary Ridge, and on August 19, 1938, at the identical hour marking the 100th anniversary of the closing of the Brainerd Mission, a meeting was held on the grounds attended by hundreds of Chattanoogans.

SAVING THE NAME _CHICKAMAUGA_

A few months before the Chickamauga Dam was completed in 1940, its historical name, with so much beauty and clear, sweet music in its pronunciation, was threatened with extinction.

Persons who were interested in preserving the original Cherokee names became anxious over the safety of the name _Chickamauga Dam_. Through the columns of _The Chattanooga News_ a protest was registered daily for about a week. The beginning interview came from the historian of the University of Chattanooga, who was strongly opposed to changing the name to the _McReynolds’ Dam_, in honor of Chattanooga’s Congressman. On succeeding days, similar protests were published from Chattanooga’s leading citizens, each of them giving logical reasons for the retention of the name _Chickamauga_. At the close of the series of interviews the public had been thoroughly awakened to the importance of holding on to this beautiful historical name which had been given to some of this region’s loveliest streams by its aborigines. Irvin Cobb once declared that the word _Chattanooga_ was the most beautiful of any word he knew in the English language. Could not the well known humorist writer also have made the same assertion about the word Chickamauga?

To climax the movement to hold on to the historical name, the Chickamauga Chapter of the DAR of Chattanooga, at the last moment when the bill was up for its final reading, the members voted unanimously for the retention of the name Chickamauga. When Congressman S. D. McReynolds received notice of its action, he withdrew his name, and the name _Chickamauga Dam_ was thereby saved for posterity.

CHICKAMAUGA LAKE

Where farmers’ cattle grazed on pasture lands, The fishes feed; the clumsy turtles swim Where once the corn crops grew; the frog expands His throat, proud of the pleasure given him; This lake now slips its fingertips between A hundred little pebbled hills, and all Are dressed in tender grass and leaves of green, With here and there an islet like a ball Half sunken in a pool, yet floating on To reach some distant shore. The swallows swing Their airplanes down and wet their beaks at dawn, And men awake to hear the thrushes sing.

When day grows old and sun is westward bound, They stretch the shadowed trees across the lake, And duck and loon and gull and teal have found A place which fishermen will not forsake; And when the moon receives its silvered crown, The waters, like magicians, reach into The sky and pull the stars and planets down Without their heat, void of the distant blue; Then leave them floating in their watered graves, And as the boat speeds on, the pilot sees Amidst the rippled and discordant waves, Reflections broken by realities.

This latent power decrees that through the years The form of woman shall remain unbowed By household toil which warped the pioneers Who slaved as sweaty beasts while farmers plowed And tilled the soil; that men shall play as well As work, and know what rest from labor means; That love of beauty in the heart shall tell That eyes are never blind to Nature’s scenes. If _Chickamauga_ means in Cherokee _A sluggish stream_, this dam revives the dead, Electrifies the soul of Tennessee, And gives to industry a potent head.

Transcriber’s Notes

pg 6 Changed: generating capacity of 81,000 kilowats to: generating capacity of 81,000 kilowatts

pg 13 Changed: about seven feet in diamater to: about seven feet in diameter

pg 15 Changed: 3—Batteau to: 3—Bateau

pg 16 Changed: there was made on of the most to: there was made one of the most

pg 19 Changed: Chickamauga Dam was no named to: Chickamauga Dam was so named

pg 19 Changed: near old Fort Loudon, was Milaquo to: near old Fort Loudon, was Mialoquo

pg 23 Changed: we mgiht see everything to: we might see everything

pg 23 Changed: Spring Frog, or Toonantuh to: Spring Frog, or Tooantuh

pg 23 Changed: Toonatuh was born about the year 1754 to: Tooantuh was born about the year 1754

pg 26 Changed: a litte Osage girl to: a little Osage girl

pg 29 Changed: Lydian Carter and John Osage Ross to: Lydia Carter and John Osage Ross

pg 29 Changed: sweet music in its pronounciation to: sweet music in its pronunciation