The Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad runs around the curve of the river, under the mountain. As we sat looking down from the Point, a coal-train appeared, crawling along the track like a black snake.
Returning over the crest to the summit of the road, we paid a visit to Mr. Foster, known as the “Old Man of the Mountain.” He was living in a plain country-house on the eastern brow, with the immense panorama of hills and vales and forests daily before his eyes. He was one of the valiant, unflinching Union men of the South. In its wild nest on that crag his liberty-loving soul had lived, untamed as an eagle, through the perils and persecutions of the war. He was sixty-nine years old; which fact he expressed in characteristically quaint style: “Tennessee came, into the Union the sixth day of June, 1796; and on the twenty-second day of June I came into the world to see about it.”
His father was a Revolutionary soldier. “He was shot to pieces, in a manner. It took a heap of his blood to nourish Uncle Sam when he was a little feller. I recollect his saying to me, ‘There’s going to be wars; and when they come, I want you to remember what the Stars and Stripes cost your old father.’ I did not forget the lesson when this cursed secession war begun.”
He was by trade a carpenter. He came up on the mountain to live twenty years before, on account of his health, which was so poor in the valley that people said he was going to die, but which had been robust ever since. Twice during the war he was condemned by the Vigilance Committee to be hung for his Union sentiments and uncompromising freedom of speech. Twice the assassins came to his house to take him.
“The first time they came, it was Sunday. My wife had gone over the mountain to preaching, and I was alone. I loaded up my horse-pistol for ’em,—sixteen buck-shot: I put in a buck load, I tell ye. There was only two of ’em; and I thought I was good for three or four. They’d hardly got inside the gate when I went out to ’em, and asked what they wanted. One said, ‘We’ve come for Old Foster!’ I just took the rascal by the arm, and gave him a monstrous clamp,—I thought I felt the bone,—and shoved him head-over-heels out of that gate. I was going to shoot t’other feller, but they rode off so fast down the mountain I had no chance.”
The next attempt on his life resulted similarly. After that, the Committee did not persist in getting him executed. “I was so old, I suppose they thought I was of no account.” He told of several other Union men, however, whom they had caused to be hung. “After the Rebels got brushed out, Sherman and Hooker came to pay me a visit, and denominated me the ‘Old Man of the Mountain.’”
CHAPTER XXXV.
THE SOLDIERS’ CEMETERY.
A mile and a quarter southeast from the town is the National Cemetery of Chattanooga. An area of seventy-five acres has there been set apart by the military authorities for the burial of the soldiers who died in hospitals or fell on battle-fields in that region renowned for sanguinary conflicts. It occupies a hill which seems to have been shaped by Providence for this purpose: its general form is circular, and it rises with undulations, showing a beautiful variety of curves and slopes, to a superb summit, which swells like a green dome over all.
General Thomas, commanding the Division of the Tennessee, was nominally the director of the cemetery works. But he appears to have left all in the hands of Mr. Van Horne, chaplain of the post, who, in addition to his other duties, assumed the responsible task of laying out the grounds and supervising the interments. His plan has certainly the merit of originality, and will prove, in the end, I have no doubt, as beautiful as it is unique. Copying nothing from the designs of other cemeteries, he has taken Nature for his guide. The outline of each separate section is determined by its location. Here, for example, is a shield,—the rise of the ground and the natural lines of depression suggesting that form. In the centre of each section is a monument; immediately surrounding which are the graves of officers, in positions according to their numbers and rank; while around the latter are grouped the graves of private soldiers, in lines adapted to the general shape of the section. The paths and avenues follow the hollows and curves which sweep from the base in every direction towards the summit. This is surrounded by a single circular avenue; and is to be crowned, according to the chaplain’s plan, with a grand central monument, an historic temple overlooking the whole.
The place will abound in groups of trees, verdant lawns and slopes, magnificent vistas, and concealed views designed to surprise the visitor at every step. Outcropping ledges and bold, romantic rocks afford a delightful contrast to the green of the trees and grass, and to the smoothness of the slopes.