Editing Gatlinburg, Tennessee (section)

===Radford Gatlin and the Civil War===
{{see also|East Tennessee bridge-burning conspiracy}}
In 1856, a post office was established in the general store of Radford Gatlin (c. 1798–1880), giving the town the name Gatlinburg.<ref name="Abramson, 644">Abramson, pg. 644.</ref> Even though the town bore his name, Gatlin, who didn't arrive in the flats until around 1854, constantly bickered with his neighbors.<ref>J.A. Sharp, "Radford Gatlin: Gatlinburg's First Tourist" [http://www.sevierlibrary.org/genealogy/drsharphis/gatlin.htm] Accessed: May 19, 2007. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071026020720/http://www.sevierlibrary.org/genealogy/drsharphis/gatlin.htm|date=October 26, 2007}}</ref> By 1857, a full-blown feud had erupted between the Gatlins and the Ogles, probably over Gatlin's attempts to divert the town's main road. The eve of the [[U.S. Civil War]] found Gatlin, who became a [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] sympathizer, at odds with the residents of the flats, who were mostly pro-[[Union (American Civil War)|Union]], and he was forced out in 1859.<ref>Michael Frome, ''Strangers In High Places: The Story of the Great Smoky Mountains'' (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1994), pp. 123–124.</ref>

Despite its anti-slavery sentiments, Gatlinburg, like most Smoky communities, tried to remain neutral during the war. This changed when a company of Confederate Colonel [[William Holland Thomas]]' Legion occupied the town to protect the [[saltpeter]] mines at Alum Cave, near the Tennessee-North Carolina border. Federal forces marched south from [[Knoxville]] and Sevierville to drive out Thomas' men, who had built a small fort on Burg Hill.<ref>Wall, pp. 128–132.</ref> Lucinda Oakley Ogle, whose grandfather witnessed the ensuing skirmish, later recounted her grandfather's recollections:<blockquote>
... he told me about when he was a sixteen-year-old boy during the Civil War and would hide under a big cliff on Turkey Nest Ridge and watch the Blue Coats ride their horses around the graveyard hill, shooting their cannon toward Burg Hill where the Grey Coats had a fort and would ride their horses around the Burg Hill&nbsp;...<ref>Lucinda Oakley Ogle, Jerry Wear (editor), ''Sugarlands: A Lost Community In Sevier County, Tennessee'' (Sevierville, Tennessee: Sevierville Heritage Committee, 1986), pg. 57.</ref></blockquote>

As the Union forces converged on the town, the outnumbered Confederates were forced to retreat across the Smokies to North Carolina. Confederate forces did not return, although sporadic small raids continued until the end of the war.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}