This story should interest those that descend from the Buncombe County clan. It even includes a murder mystery.
Mike
THE
OLD STROUP CABIN
History by Jessie
Stroupe and Ethel Stroupe Vochko, revised July 1989.
LORE
Eternal gratitude
is owed to ALBERT MC LEAN, whose sense of history and hard work preserved a
particularly beautiful old mountain cabin that once stood beside the French
Broad at Long Shoals in Avery's Creek Township, across from the Biltmore Estate.
In the 1920's,
George Vanderbilt turned this cabin over to an employee, the plan being to
demolish it. Historian ALBERT MC LAIN
asked for and got it, then painstakingly marked each stone and log, dismantled
it, and carried it to his home where he lovingly re-assembled it in the hollow
behind his house at 206 Aurora Drive, Asheville. He furnished the interior nicely using
authentic period pieces, many of which are heirlooms from his own family, such
as the round table, rocker and wall cabinets for medicines cabinets, the latter
from his physician grandfather.
LORE
When Mr. MC LEAN
tried to learn the cabin's history, all people could tell him it was "the
old STROUPE cabin that was associated with two early STROUPE brothers, and has
a dark and sinister history of violence and crime, a mysterious disappearance
and a bloody murder". These clues were extremely puzzling, and they needed
to be untangled to uncover the cabin's past.
THE
"TWO EARLY BROTHERS" TALE
STROUP historians
were completely stumped by the tale about "two early STROUP brothers
living together in a cabin." The
best we could come up with was the theory that JOSEPH (b. 1776 Lincoln Co.) and
his younger brother, DAVID (b. ca 1785) lived together for a short time when
they first moved to Buncombe County ca 1806, until they located suitable wheat
lands and build two large houses on Bull Creek, their known location by
1810. However, this theory was blown sky
high when it was learned that JOSEPH's first Buncombe County location had been
Warm Springs Cr., (now Madison County) where he had built a mill on land
belonging to his father-in-law, ADAM CREASMAN, who acquired the land in 1807,
and that, after a few years at Warm Springs, JOE STROUP had moved with the
CREASMANS to Bull Creek.
This just deepened
the puzzle about the identity of "two STROUP brothers who lived in the old
Stroup cabin."
LAST KNOWN OWNERS
At the Buncombe
County Courthouse, STROUP researcher RUTH (MORGAN) STROUP of Brevard located an
interesting 1909 deed. GEORGE
VANDERBILT, who had completely his estate, was now improving his view across
the river, and to that end purchased a small farm from ZEB STROUP. The deed is: 4-22-1903, Bk. 126, p 525, to
GEORGE VANDERBILT for $1,015.35, 67 acres on French Broad River from JAMES Z.
STROUP and wife. Therefore, the last
known local owner of the cabin was JAMES Z. STROUP. Who was this man and how had he acquired this
small farm and cabin?
ZEB STROUP
JAMES Z. STROUP,
better known as "ZEB", was no puzzle whatever to RUTH STROUP who
located the deed: he was her husband's grandfather, and she was interested in
the "old STROUP cabin" because ZEB grew up in it. His father had died in the Civil War, but his
mother remarried and continued to live in it.
So, we are now looking at the cabin's last known occupants.
RUFUS
LOT STROUP AND WIFE NANCY JOHNSTON
RUFUS LOT STROUP
was born on Aug. 19 1840, the eldest child of SILAS & SUSAN HARPER STROUP
of Cane Cr. For ten years, RUFE was the
only boy in his parents’ home, and had much responsibility for helping his
father around the farm.
RUFE'S NATURE
When RUFE was
fifteen, on Aug. 5, 1855, his mother gave birth to an infant they named
DRUCILLA DELANA "LANNY" STROUP, who died when a year and a half
old. Seventeen year old RUFE got a slab
of soapstone from his grandfather, LOT HARPER, who had a quarry, and carefully
carved little Lanny's tombstone saying she died at age one year, four months
and 13 days. The painstaking work on the
tombstone's long inscription tells something about the teenaged boy who
lovingly carved it for a dead infant.
MARRIAGE
On Nov. 15, 1860,
twenty year old RUFE married eighteen year old NANCY E. JOHNSTON. Both the STROUP and JOHNSTON homes were
prosperous but they were filled with children, and the young couple wanted to
live on their own.
THE
OLD CABIN HOUSES NEWLYWEDS
Although it was
believed that SILAS STROUP, a well off farmer, was the one provided his eldest
and well-loved son with a small farm when he married, just as he had helped
later children, no transfer deed nor purchase record could be located to
confirm this. Perhaps he merely provided
them money to purchase the place or livestock and household goods. Neither could a deed be found showing that a
67 acre farm was purchased by, nor transferred from, the bride's JOHNSTON
family who owned much land along the French Broad. However, the cabin's proximity to the
JOHNSTON land raises the distinct possibility that they were the original owners
this little farm and its old pioneer cabin.
The lack of a
deed being registered to show RUFE, SILAS or the JOHNSTONS as this farm's
1860's owner may be due to the onset of the Civil War, a time of turmoil when
courthouse records were poorly kept.
Whatever the legalities, RUFE and NANCY definitely lived on this 67 acre
tract, and NANCY continued lived there most of her adult life. Who was the woman that once tended the fire
and cooked on this hearth?
NANCY E. JOHNSTON STROUP
NANCY E. JOHNSTON
was born Sept 18, 1842, a sister to HALL JOHNSTON, of the HALE JOHNSTON family
who lived along the French Broad. In Nov. 1860 eighteen year old NANCY married
RUFUS STROUP, and the newlyweds moved into the little cabin on the French
Broad. The next two years were perhaps
the happiest the little cabin ever knew, the bliss of young people in love,
defying the gathering gloom of the Civil War.
RUFE GOES TO WAR
But Confederate
feelings ran very high in the area, and in May 1862 RUFE enlisted in the
Confederate Army, and, although NANCY was six months pregnant, he marched off
down the road with other local recruits, heading for a C.S.A. camp at Lowden,
east Tennessee.
Three months
later, on Aug. 6, 1862, his son JAMES ZEBULON was born, and word of this
undoubtedly reached the happy father.
However, that summer RUFE came down with dysentery and was probably bed
ridden in camp when he began carving his initials on his powder horn. He died Nov. 12th, having carved only "R
ST..". The lad, who so carefully
carved a tombstone for his little sister, was buried at Lowden in an unmarked
grave. His powder horn was sent back
home to SILAS, to be found a hundred years later in his closet when the old
home place was torn down. (24)
NANCY REMARRIES
Most likely NANCY
and her infant son lived with her parents during the war years, but after it
she married TOM HUNTER who had lost an arm in service, and returned in the
little cabin on French Broad where for some years they supported themselves on
this 67 acre tract of bottomland. Here
they raised ZEB STROUP and her two children by TOM HUNTER, a son JOE HUNTER and
a daughter. So, Mr. MC LEAN'S lore about
"two brothers" was quite correct, but they turned out to be ZEB
STROUP and JOE HUNTER, half-brothers.
1880 CENSUS:
The 1880 census
for Avery's Creek showed: TOM HUNTER, aged 44, NANCY E., 38 and JAMES STROUP,
18. (JAMES "ZEB" STROUP.)
'A HISTORY OF
CRIME, A MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE AND MURDER'
TOM HUNTER was a
prosperous man. One day about 1885, he
went out on the mountain to call in his stock for the winter, taking with him a
pocket full of gold coins and vanished without a trace! NANCY's two sons searched, and then called in
the Sheriff and neighbors, but they combed the woods in vain. HUNTER was not the type to abandon his
family, so theft and murder were suspected. And there were suspected
perpetrators: a nearby trashy family was inexplicably flushed with money. But,
without a corpse, no charge could be brought against them. (6).
Many years later,
when a woodman was felling a tree on the mountain, out of its hollow fell the
skeleton of a one-armed man! And so was
solved the dark mystery of TOM HUNTER's disappearance. As for who originally
built the "old STROUP cabin", today nobody remembers, nor have record
searches cleared up this part of the mystery.
THE CABIN'S BUILDER
The best guess at
present is that this lovely old cabin was built by a very early pioneer along
the French Broad. He may have been
BENJAMIN, EDWARD JAMES or ROBERT JOHNSTON, all of whom had deeds starting in
1795/99. Comparison the early JOHNSTON deeds, with particular attention to the
exact descriptions, might solve the last part this mystery. Or a JOHNSTON family historian may know which
pioneer was the original builder and owner.
Until this becomes known, for convenience we shall refer it by the name
of its last owner occupant, ZEB STROUP.
THE CABIN
The old STROUP
cabin is a prime example of a pioneer cabin of the type built in the Blue Ridge
from about 1790 to 1825, and in use for several generations after. On a fieldstone base is a structure of
chestnut logs, split and hewn, mortised at the corners. Chinks were originally caulked with mud, and
then coated with a mixture of buttermilk and lime. The pitched roof was of split oak
shingles. A large, stone chimney
dominates one side of the house. On the
porch, the young couple undoubtedly rocked and rested on summer evenings,
watching their three young'uns chase fireflies.
DAILY LIFE:
Across the porch
was a line on which they hung things to dry, from wet dish towels to strings of
"leather britches" (dried beans), and red pepper pods. In the nearby sunny clearing, flats of sliced
apples and peaches were set to dry for winter eating. Inside the simple door
today are the handmade household furnishings, as used by old time
families. There is a round dining table,
spinning wheel, and a coonskin cap on a wall peg. An ox yoke now stands in the
corner (which originally would have been in the barn.) The corner cupboard holds clay and pewter
dishes (11).
PIONEER LIFE:
The STROUP cabin on
French Broad consisted of a single, large room with sixteen paned windows on
either side of the fieldstone fireplace and hearth. Here a small, cast-iron
Dutch oven which was buried in red hot coals to bake crusty, yellow corn bread,
made with sour milk and soda (11), and eaten with the butter, along with fresh
fish fried in cornmeal batter, and garden-grown green onions. Winter treats were dried apple pies, pastry triangles
filled with apples and browned in a skillet.
At this hearth, we
can picture the young NANCY STROUP boiling a rabbit stew seasoned with wild
garlic and pepper, in her iron pots held over the fire by pot hooks, and frying
fresh corn and potato cakes on an iron spider set in hot coals. In a rear shed in "cold storage"
for winter eating: crocks of sauerkraut, sausages preserved in lard, and various
pickles: crab apples, beets, peaches, cucumbers, and pig’s feet. Bushel baskets woven from reeds and packed
with straw held apples, nuts, cabbages and root vegetables.
NANCY was again
widowed but, with the body missing, could not remarry. Son ZEB took over
running the place and, thereafter her two boys cared for her. They say the
STROUP and JOHNSTON families helped, and SILAS STROUP was especially fond of
ZEB. In 1894, shortly before he died,
SILAS STROUP deeded the 67 acre tract and cabin to grandson ZEB STROUP (25).
Years later, the
HUNTER mystery was accidentally solved, from a story in the ASHEVILLE
CITIZEN: Someone was logging trees on
the mountain and felled a large old hollow tree, when out fell the skeleton of
a one-armed man!
ZEB STROUP, CABIN OWNER
ZEB STROUP said he
grew up on the French Broad, and was proud of being able to swim across, turn
and swim back. One winter, he jumped
into the river in mid-winter and saved a man who was drowning after breaking
through the ice trying to cross.
But the old cabin
was too small and outdated for modern use, and so, on April 22, 1909, ZEB
STROUP and wife, CAROLINE "Corrie" MILLER STROUP, sold it and the 67
acre tract for $1,015.00 to George Vanderbilt (26). The Biltmore Estate was already built, but
Vanderbilt was adding nearby farm lands to his other large holdings, probably
to maintain his view and to prevent civilization's encroachments.
SOURCES:
(5) Hunter's SKETCHES OF WESTERN N.C.
(6) As told to Jessie Stroupe, b. 1897, of Asheville.
(10) F. A. Sondley, HISTORY OF BUNCOMBE CO.
(11) THE ASHEVILLE CITIZEN.
(12) N. C. GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY JOURNAL.
(22) Buncombe Deed Bk.
(23) Stroup Bible records.
(24) Found by Howard Stroup in Silas's house, given to Vernon
Stroupe, Sr., returned by Vernon Stroupe, Jr. to Zeb Stroupe's family at
Brevard.
(25) Buncombe Deed Bk. 100, p 44.
(26) Buncombe
Deed Bk 126, p 525.
