Female ‘Espionage,’ Violent Strike, McCallie Military Highlighted In Chattanooga World War I Tour

  • Saturday, November 3, 2018
  • John Shearer

Can you name anything about Chattanooga’s history as it relates to World War I?

 

Perhaps you know that Memorial Auditorium was built as a memorial to the local soldiers and sailors whose lives were lost in that war, or that Fort Oglethorpe trained soldiers, but can’t recall much else.

 

In an effort to shed more light on this topic in connection with the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I this Nov.

11, local attorney and history tour guide Maury Nicely offered a lecture/tour on the topic.

 

“Chattanooga doesn’t have a whole lot of ties to World War I, but there are some really interesting facts,” Mr. Nicely told a small group Saturday morning during a tour that was part of UTC’s World War I Centennial Events activities.

 

Despite this fact, he still managed to shout out peripheral facts as regularly as the coxswains were yelling commands in the “Head of the Hooch” regatta below as he walked between the Walnut Street and Market Street bridges downtown.

 

For example, while he mentioned that Fort Oglethorpe was training numerous soldiers for the war effort, he said Chattanooga was also involved. He said the Terminal Station (now Chattanooga Choo-Choo) was built in 1909, and numerous letters during World War I from soldiers, many of whom were from rural areas, talk about being impressed at the station on their way to the service.

 

“It was the entranceway into the city,” he said of the local landmark.

 

He also said that the buildings now known as Warehouse Row were built as storage facilities for railway traffic for the terminal at that time.

 

He also pointed out that such other buildings as City Hall (Municipal Building), the Hotel Patten and the Volunteer State Life Building had been built not long before or during World War I and were a big part of the city at that time.

 

Mr. Nicely also mentioned that Chattanooga had only the Walnut Street Bridge (then known as the Hamilton County Bridge) and the Market Street Bridge, the latter of which was completed after America had entered World War I.

 

He said the Market Street Bridge (officially the Chief John Ross Bridge) was the world's largest bascule bridge and that it cost a lot of money to build. “They called it the million dollar bridge,” Mr. Nicely said.

 

The tunnel where Cherokee Boulevard is now had opened shortly before the war, opening parts of the Red Bank area to Chattanooga for the first time. Sections of North Chattanooga, Riverview and the Chattanooga Golf and Country club were developing, too, he added.

 

Among the unusual events that happened during World War I, he said a streetcar workers strike turned deadly violent after some stones were put on the track at Sixth and Market streets.

 

He said a somewhat humorous incident related to the war occurred when a woman of Prussian descent named Baroness Zollnar checked into the Hotel Patten. Fearing she might be a German spy, local authorities kept an eye on her, Mr. Nicely said.

 

They eventually raided her room, and found a soldier from Fort Oglethorpe with her. Thinking they had uncovered a scandal, they arrested her, jailed her and sent her to Knoxville to stand trial.

 

However, realizing she was apparently not a real spy, they eventually released her back to New York, Mr. Nicely said.

 

The tour guide said that Hamilton County residents had initially been against entering the war, but after the Lusitania was sunk and other news and persuasive propaganda began filling up the newspapers, the local outlook changed.

 

“Every (factory) whistle and bell in the city rang when it was announced the U.S. was entering the war,” Mr. Nicely said, pointing out that Chattanooga was eager and ready to join in the fight.

 

As evidence, he said that Chattanooga used to have a popular “Spring Festival” parade about every year during that time period, and they began using it to sell Liberty Bonds to help in the war effort.

 

Marching in the parade during World War I were the McCallie School cadets, who had developed a military curriculum at the outbreak of the war.

 

“McCallie made the decision to support the war effort by going to the military,” he said. “They liked it so much that they continued until 1970.”

 

Baylor School also started its longtime former military curriculum during World War I.

 

Mr. Nicely added that Chattanooga – a town mostly known for its Civil War history in terms of its connection to the military – has only a few reminders or memorials to World War I today.

 

They include Memorial Auditorium, which was built shortly after the war, a stone memorial marker at National Cemetery to the World War I veterans from the entire state of Tennessee, and a marker also at the National Cemetery remembering the 78 German POWs who died in area military prisons.

 

A marker to the World War I training at Fort Oglethorpe is also found near the Chickamauga Battlefield Visitors Center, he added.

 

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To learn more about the other UTC events related to remembering World War I and its centennial, read here:

https://www.utc.edu/history/pdfs/events/2018-9-ww1.pdf


(Note: The concert scheduled for Sunday night has been rescheduled for Tuesday due to the visit of President Donald Trump to McKenzie Arena on Sunday).

 

* * * * *


To listen to tour guide Maury Nicely tell a couple of anecdotes about Chattanooga and its connection to World War I, click here.

 

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jcshearer2@comcast.net

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