|
One of the First White Children
Born in Ross’s Landing
An event of this period was
destined to have a remarkable and interesting effect on Chattanooga’s history.
One of the first white children
born in Ross’s Landing was Elizabeth Lenoir, born January 18, 1838, to
Commissioner and Mrs. Albert S. Lenoir.
Mr. and Mrs. Lenoir could not
have realized that their little daughter, born in a log house, almost in an
Army Camp, surrounded by thousands of Cherokees mourning over the loss of their
homes, would become a factor of importance in the South, than the man whom she
would marry would be a famous young Army Officer, a Cabinet Member and a
distinguished United States Judge, and that her children and her children’s
children would be among the best known and most influential people of a great
city.
“Elizabeth Lenoir” was known to
Chattanoogans of recent generations as Mrs. David McKendee Key. Many who knew he well, who realized her
wonderful intellect, her courageous spirit in long continued physical suffering
and her remarkable memory, failed to understand that she was older than
Chattanooga, that she was born before Chattanooga evolved from Ross’s Landing.
|