The Cabins was on Pine Street near Ninth
Primitive Crutchfield home could long be seen at the foot of Cameron Hill
The Crutchfield House was completed in 1847
Crutchfield House with a barren Cameron Hill in the background
An odd collection of log rooms was long a curiosity at the foot of Cameron Hill at 807 Pine St.
"The Cabins," that were a temporary home for Thomas Crutchfield Sr. as he built the Crutchfield House before the Civil War, lasted many years after his early death.
Crutchfield was one of the leading contractors in East Tennessee, having learned the art from his father-in-law, Samuel Clegg. They built fine brick homes and county courthouses along a path from Virginia down through East Tennessee.
Crutchfield built the brick homes of Col. James A. Whiteside and Dr. Milo Smith on Cameron Hill. Crutchfield had cleared the forest growth off Market Street soon after it was surveyed. For this service he received the timber that he cut down. With the timber, Crutchfield burned the first kiln of brick made in Chattanooga, using it for the Whiteside and Smith homes. Crutchfield also built a large brick store building at the southwest corner of Fourth and Market.
In Chattanooga, Crutchfield first established his family in the log home. It was built from timber cut at the Pine Street site. It had a hall in the middle, rooms on either side of the hall, and a kitchen and dining room at the back. Some of the Crutchfield workers slept in the loft. There were several outlying huts for slaves. The settlement came to be known as The Cabins.
It was nearby where Thomas Crutchfield began his most ambitious project yet - the construction of a sprawling, three-story hotel. The Crutchfield House was to be directly across from where the train station had been built at Ninth Street. Crutchfield positioned himself in a platform in a tree to oversee the work. The hotel was completed in 1847.
Thomas Crutchfield was on a trip to Nashville in late February 1850 when he took a cold. He died at The Cabins on March 8, 1850.
The operation of the Crutchfield House was taken over by his son, Thomas Crutchfield Jr. The hotel was flooded during the great deluge of 1867 so that boats floated in the front door. Then it burned to the ground a short time later. The Crutchfield House was replaced later by the Read House.
W.L. Dugger, a Ross's Landing pioneer and longtime Cameron Hill resident, at one time owned The Cabins as well as the Whiteside house that Thomas Crutchfield had built.
Fred Jones was living at The Cabins at the 807 Pine St. location in 1924 with Charles Simmons and Jasper Lewis in the rear. The old landmark finally disappeared from the scene the next year when the site was cleared for a Standard Oil Company filling station.