Antebellum Home Destroyed By Fire, 2011

Bridgeport-A lightning strike during the Feb. 28th rainstorm is thought to be the cause of a fire that destroyed Seclusion Bend,a two-story antebellum brick home near the French Broad River,in the Bridgeport Community.

According to the current owners,the home was uninhabited,and a neighbor notified them of the fire.

The home was featured,in the 1970's,in The Newport Plain Talk,as an installment of special series,"Traces of the Past".At the time,the late Miss Hester Susong,granddaughter of the home's builder,told a newspaper reporter,that construction of the home was commenced in 1848.

Miss Susong's grandparents,Jehu Stokely,and his wife,the former Jane Adaline Burnett,had the home built of bricks hand-forged on the site.Miss Susong said slaves gathered the clay from the farm,made the bricks,and burned them by the yard fence.

The home's interior featured a kitchen,downstairs bedroom,and two upstairs bedrooms.

Construction was completed in 1850.

Originally the home contained only one closet.

A separate large log kitchen.located on the north side of the home,was ruled over by a slave.Two slave cabins once stood on the property.

The wooden baseboards were approximately a foot wide,and the ceilings were eighteen feet high.Following the deaths of Stokley and his wife,ownership of the property descended to their daughter,Susan Eleanor Stokely,who married George Washington Susong,and later to their daughter,Miss Hester Caroline Susong.

The Susongs moved into the home following Mr. Stokely's death in 1889.

After Miss Susong's death,at age 93,in 1976,the property was sold.For several years it was the home of tenants,but had been empty for some time.

It is thought the home was built on the site of McKay's Fort,one of several structures which stretched across Cocke County in its earliest days as a refuge for settlers during times of Indian uprisings.Many of the McKays left Cocke County and moved west.