Dr. Swancey Kennedy (1844-1923), and his 40+ diaries give us a peek into life in the late 1800s in the Fork, the lands between the French Broad and Holston rivers in Knox County, but sometimes the related research just takes me down a different rabbit hole.
While looking up news articles about something else mentioned in Dr. Kennedy’s diary, I came across a few 1875 headlines that caught my attention and led me to a fascination with William Henderlight, a reported “freebooter.” Unfamiliar with that word, I had to look it up and found that it meant someone who is like a pirate or adventurer roaming in search of plunder. And I had to also look up the word “brigand,” which was also used to describe him and refers to an armed robber who is part of a gang that hides out and preys upon passersby. I was intrigued.
From all accounts, William Henderlight was a fisherman who typically anchored his boathouse where Sinking Creek spills out from the Fork into the Holston River at the bluff next to the old McMillan marble quarry, about ten miles upriver from Knoxville. Living with him was a small boy, as well as a young woman named Hilda Parker. Henderlight fished on the water during the day and would send the boy by land to sell the fish. Hilda cooked for him.
1875 header about Henderlight
At night, he was said by some to move up and down the river, inflicting “nocturnal depredations” against area farmers. His large boat was reportedly lined with three-inch oak and armed with various weapons, which meant anyone approaching it while it was moored against the bluff was at a distinct disadvantage.
His reputation preceded him, for he had been charged with larceny in Hawkins County, but the sheriff and posse there supposedly had never been able to arrest him. In 1873, Henderlight had been charged in Knoxville Circuit Court with assault and battery, but the case was stricken from the docket under Judge Hall. However, in 1875, he was under indictment for lewdness in Criminal Court, probably because of his questionable relationship with Hilda, and Knox County Sheriff Swan was determined to get him.
According to the news of the time, on the morning of May 20th, the sheriff and a posse of six men boarded the train in Knoxville and got off in what is now Mascot at McMillan’s Station (at the river end of Ellistown Road) across the Holston from the bluff. Spotting Henderlight and the boy approaching the bank in a small skiff, the sheriff summoned more men to join the posse and took some of them to raid the gunboat while Henderlight was away. Only Hilda was aboard.
Meanwhile, the boy came on land and headed toward the station to sell the fish. A number of the posse addressed Henderlight from the bank and ordered him to surrender, but he stayed in the skiff and headed toward his houseboat. They fired at him but missed. When Henderlight approached his boat, he was met by the sheriff and the other men, who demanded his surrender. He reportedly pulled a small pistol and was fired upon again with shotguns and revolvers, disabling him by hitting him in the arm and hand. They were about to fire again, when he surrendered.
They arrested him and Hilda, were said to have confiscated three Enfield rifles and several revolvers, and took them all by train back to Knoxville, where they were jailed. Henderlight, who was a muscular five-foot-nine or six-foot tall, depending on whom you believed, was reported to have vowed to kill his captors, especially the McMillan Station depot agent-turned-posse-member named Bailey. However, like most stories, there are two sides to the account.
Next week, we will continue the saga of William Henderlight, a bit of dramatic history that has been forgotten in the Fork.
Jan Loveday Dickens is an educator, historian, and author of Forgotten in the Fork, a book about the Knox County lands between the French Broad and Holston Rivers, obtainable by emailing ForgottenInTheFork@gmail.com.
Enjoyed this article? Read more of Jan Loveday Dickens’s stories about the people, places, and history that make the Fork community unique.
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