The Tipton-Oliver Place – Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountain National Park USA

“The Tipton Place” has been featured by the group “Smoky Mountain Masterpieces” 7/08.

This grand old cabin belonged to Johnathan Wade Hampton Tipton. Colonel “Hamp” had a carpenter build this home after the Cival War. Hamp was a veteran of the revolutionary war. The land came from Tennessee Land Grants in 1821 aquired by his grandfather, William Tipton, better known as “Fighting Billy” for his heroism in the Revolutionary War. President Andrew Jackson was his friend and said that if he had a company of Tiptons, he could “lick the whole British Army”.

Although Hamp never lived in the house, his two daughters did. Miss Lucy and Miss Lizzie were schoolmarms in the cove in the late 1870’s. The homestead eventually included a smokehouse, a woodshed, corn crib, blacksmith shop, cantilever barn, and an apiary for bees.

William Tipton owned a great deal of the cove by 1836. He deeded much of the land to friends and family, including John Oliver and Peter Cable. The three of them established the Primitive Baptist Church.

The home went on to be owned by Jim McCauley in 1879, and then by John Oliver’s grandson William Howell Oliver in 1887. William served as an ordained minister of the Primitive Baptist Church from 1882 until the time of his death in 1940. His family lived in the home until the land was aquired for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Other works in the Cade’s Cove Collection:

Companion Piece