Sacred Ground: The Slaven graves
Deep in the Big South Fork backcountry, on a ridge that juts out above the river, is a cemetery that may hold the key to a mystery of early settlement in the Station Camp area: specifically, the location of Newt Blevins’ burial.
John Newton “Newt” Blevins was murdered near his home in 1928. Landmarks here still bear his name, unofficially, nearly 100 years later. But it isn’t clear where he was laid to rest.
However, on the same ridgetop he lived on are the graves of his parents, and there are at least two more people buried with them in unidentifiable graves. This is the Big South Fork’s Slaven Cemetery.
A remote location
There are dozens of cemeteries within the boundaries of the Big South Fork National River & Recreation Area, some big and some small. There aren’t many of them that are more remotely located than this one. It’s about 1.5 miles — as the crow flies — to the nearest public road. There are no trails anywhere in the vicinity; the graves are alone on a small knoll amid thousands of acres of uninterrupted forest, just a few hundred yards from the cliff’s edge above the Big South Fork River.
In recent weeks, work crews have cleared the old road down this ridge to reach a natural gas wellhead that is just a short distance from where the Slavens’ home once stood. But that road is gated, and requires crossing private property. The only other way in is to climb up from the river — through what is still known by locals as “The Newt Gap,” for Newt Blevins.
Two identifiable graves
The graves at Slaven Cemetery that can be identified are those of Richard D. “Wild Dick” Slaven (1841-1923) and his second wife, Telitha “Lithie” Blevins (1841-1927). They were married in 1903, shortly after the death of Richard’s first wife, Melda Mary Jane Spradlin.
Wild Dick was the grandson of Richard Harve Slaven, who is widely credited with being the first permanent settler of the Big South Fork region and is buried at the Nancy Smith Cemetery on No Business Creek. Lithie was the great-granddaughter of Jonathan Blevins, who is often credited with being an early settler of Station Camp Creek, although that account is disputed by some descendants. He is buried at the Blevins Cemetery on Station Camp Creek. Newt Blevins was a great-grandson of both of these Big South Fork legends.
You may be wondering about Newt Blevins’ name. The genealogical assumption is that Wild Dick fathered several children with Lithie out of wedlock before they were married. That cannot be conclusively proven.
Lithie Blevins was the daughter of Tarlton Blevins (1811-1880) and Mary Ann “Polly” Wood (1816-1915). When the 1880 census was taken, Lithie was listed as head of her household, with five children at home: 20-year-old Joseph, 17-year-old Abel, 15-year-old Catherine, 5-year-old John N., and 1-year-old Sarah.
While there’s no record of Lithie having been married prior to her marriage to Wild Dick in 1903, the 1880 census lists her as “widowed.”
Notably, the 1870 census lists Lithie as living with her parents. None of her children were listed in the home that year. In 1878, when Sarah was born, an old Kentucky birth record lists her father as “Not Told.”
Wild Dick, meanwhile, married Melda Spradlin in 1867. If genealogical assumptions are correct, he had already fathered children with Lithie at that time. He and his first wife had several children, as well. When the 1900 census was taken, living at home were 20-year-old Ewell Slaven, 16-year-old Mary Slaven, and two grandchildren, Starlin and Mary Hatfield, ages six and four.
It is assumed that Melda, or Mary Jane, as she was known, died between the 1900 census and Wild Dick’s marriage to Lithie in 1903. However, it isn’t known where she was buried. The family had moved to Scott County from Wayne County, Ky. by 1900.
By the time the 1910 census was taken, Wild Dick and Lithie lived alone. They were both 67. Ten years later, they still lived alone, their age recorded as 77.
Richard was the first to die, in 1923. Lithie died four years later, in 1927. Both were buried on the knoll above the river, on the ridge where they made their home. Lithie’s headstone has been moved slightly, but a footstone contains the initials “L.S.,” confirming the location of her grave. Richard’s stone has fallen over at some point and has been propped against a tree.
The death of Newt Blevins
In August 1924, Newt Blevins was convicted of killing Dick Hatfield during an argument over apples. The killing was featured in the Independent Herald’s “Murders in the Heartland” series.
Dick Hatfield was the son of William Riley Hatfield and Elizabeth Burke, who lived on Station Camp Creek. Ironically, his father had been shot and killed during an argument on the river in 1892. Dick Hatfield married Elvira “Vicy” Thompson, and moved his family to Oklahoma. Following Vicy’s death in 1913, he returned to Scott County, and may have remarried to Poppie Litton Blevins after her husband died in 1919.
According to old court records, Hatfield owned an apple orchard at his Station Camp home and was angry that some children — including at least one of Newt Blevins’ children — had taken some of his apples. He complained to Ike King, who was both the community’s teacher and constable. King approached Blevins, and Blevins had his children return the apples.
Some time later, in August 1924, Hatfield and Blevins ran into each other at High Point. Blevins invited Hatfield home for dinner. It was during that dinner that another argument ensued, and Hatfield was said to have lunged at Blevins with a knife. Blevins retaliated by shooting Hatfield.
Before he died, Hatfield told several people that Blevins had started the argument, bringing up the stolen apples again. But Blevins said it was Hatfield who started the fight, also by bringing up the apples.
Blevins was charged with involuntary manslaughter. A jury found him guilty, and he was ordered to serve a year at the Scott County Jail in Huntsville.
Two years after getting out of jail, Newt and his wife, Mandy Smith, were rounding up cattle near their home when Newt was ambushed and killed.
That’s how the Newt Gap, a passageway through the cliff line not far from the Slaven Cemetery, got its name. Newt Blevins had his house atop the cliff line, and his cattle grazed below the cliff line. He moved the livestock back and forth through the split in the sandstone cap rock.
No one was ever charged in connection with Blevins’ death. There were theories, but no arrests. A Chattanooga newspaper wrote that “It is reported that Blevins had turned some parties up to the officers on a charge of stilling in that section, but, so far as can be learned, no charge has been made against any one for the shooting.”
Who are the other graves?
There is at least one, and perhaps two, other graves by Richard and Lithie Slaven. One of them is clearly a grave, given the indention in the earth and the presence of an uninscribed field stone that serves as a head stone. There’s another indention on the opposite side of the Slaven graves that resembles a grave, along with another field stone that might have been placed as a head stone, though it wasn’t planted as deeply as a head stone would have likely been planted.
Who are these graves? One may very well be Newt Blevins. The official narrative of his death was that he was buried in a small cemetery near his home. There are two other cemeteries in the area, though it seems unlikely that he’s buried in either of them. It isn’t clear why his parents would have commercial stones and he would only have a field stone.
The other grave could perhaps be the grave of Wild Dick’s first wife, Mary Jane, though that’s only speculation. They were living in that location by the time of her death in 1902 or 1903, and she does not have an identifiable grave anywhere else.