Tuckahoe

"Tuckahoe" is a Native American word for the large, truffle-like fungus that grew in the rich, moist soil along waterways, as well as for "tubers" like Indian Turnips. From those edible "bulbs," the Cherokees and others got starch to make their bread.

I am amazed that my Loveday ancestors from the 1700s lived along the Tuckahoe in Talbot County, Maryland, and then my Loveday grandparents coincidently lived along the Tuckahoe in Knox County, Tennessee!

Cousin Guy Merritt shares that all of our Tuckahoe and Thorn Grove area was once owned by the Derioux family. Peter Derioux was next in line to be the King of France, but when the French Revolution beheaded the king and his wife, Peter decided he should leave. He lived across the road from Thomas Jefferson, and Peter's grandson, also named Peter, came to East Tennessee, where he was a doctor in Dandridge. He owned many acres, and local families, including the Cokers, married into the Derioux holdings.

The Coker/Tuckahoe Mill stood just below the location of our grandparents' home place and was run by Guy's great grandfather William Lafayette Merritt. Mr. Merritt first ran a mill in Wear's Valley for Ahas Bryan and then moved to Newport to run the mill downtown there before eventually moving to Tuckahoe to run the one pictured here.

Visit with Aunt Dicie (Loveday) Kelly

After gathering the basic framework of our family tree, one of the first visits I made was with my sister to see our Great Aunt Dicey Kelly (b. April 2, 1888). She was my grandfather Jesse James Loveday's sister, and she lived near the old mill in Pigeon Forge, TN. Among the things we learned from her was that her mother Callie's father, John Spurgeon, was a farmer who had lived to be 100 years old and still had all his teeth but one!

Dicey helped us straighten out some names and relationships, and she was a lot of fun to visit. She was a wealth of information, and we hoped to visit again. However, she passed away on July 16, 1972, and many family stories were lost with her death.