| Sources |
- [S73] Rawlings Funeral Home, Book 2, 2 May 1985.
Marjorie Eleanor Flynn obituary
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 12 Sep 2012.
Upland Chronicles: 1960 drowning of teenager remembered
By CARROLL McMAHAN
Sevier County residents by the hundreds lined up at Atchley Funeral Home on Thursday evening, June 30, 1960, to view the remains of the young man whose body was discovered floating in the East Prong of the Little Pigeon River.
Earlier that afternoon, 16-year-old Dorothy Ann Brock noticed something suspicious as she crossed the swinging bridge located at the end of Court Avenue which crossed the river between Love Addition and downtown Sevierville. Thinking the object floating in mid-stream was probably a large turtle, Dorothy Ann threw a large plank at what turned out to be the remains of a teenage boy.
When the body did not move, she looked closer and realized it was a corpse clad in blue jeans and a sports shirt floating with his back partially out of the water. Despite her young age, Dorothy Ann had the presence of mind to rush back to her near-by home for her fishing gear.
To avoid plunging into the river, Dorothy Ann calmly positioned herself on the floor of the footbridge, straddling a steel cable that connected the floor of the bridge to another steel cable which was used as a handrail. She then snagged the body near the shoulder on her first cast. Holding the corpse at the end of her line, Dorothy Ann managed to signal a passer-by for assistance.
The Sevier County Rescue Squad made the recovery. Among those squad members assisting were Jim Atchley, Jim Kyker and Dwight Brock, brother of Dorothy Ann. According to Sevier County Coroner Harold Atchley the body had probably been in the river about two or three days. No sign of foul play was found.
By the time the body was recovered from the river and loaded into an awaiting ambulance, a sizable number of spectators had gathered near the river bank.
There was no means of identification found on the drowning victim, therefore the body was taken to Atchley Funeral Home and placed on a slab in the embalming room for viewing. Within a matter of a couple of hours word of the incident spread around the county and a large crowd gathered to “see if they knew him.”
In 1960 practically everyone in town recognized every individual they saw in Sevierville, which made the case of the unidentified young man sensationalistic. Although the morbid curiosity of the throngs who got a glimpse of the stranger was satisfied by the public showing, a positive identification was not made that evening. Several people said they had seen the boy but could not recall a name.
The first lead toward an identification of the victim came from Howard Sutton when he identified the body as that of the boy he had given a ride the previous Monday from Knoxville to Sevierville around 11 p.m. According to 20-year-old Sutton, the drowning victim had hitched a ride with him and mentioned something about trying to get to South Carolina.
The boy fell asleep and was not awakened until they arrived in Sevierville.
Scott Baxter, who was an oil company employee, identified the body as the person he had helped Sutton awaken when they arrived at the oil company in Sevierville.
A Sevierville policeman on duty that same night remembered seeing the boy and following him through town since the youth was a stranger. When it appeared that the boy was just passing through, the policeman left him alone.
The longer the victim remained unidentified the longer the line of curious viewers grew. By dark, the line extended out the door, onto the lawn and turned down the sidewalk for several hundred yards.
On Friday morning, a boy viewed the body of the drowning victim and recalled talking with him. He said that the dead boy mentioned that he worked at the Lake View Restaurant on Chapman Highway in South Knoxville.
An investigation by Sevier County Sheriff Fred Pierce at the restaurant revealed the teenager’s address, and his father who lived in Maryville was notified. The victim’s father drove to Sevierville and positively identified the victim as his son, 18-year-old John Marion Chadwick Jr.
Although there were no known witnesses to the drowning, some people speculated that the boy could have fallen in the river just above the mouth of Middle Creek where another swinging bridge crossed the river at the Ralph Murphy Farm. It was known as the Reno Bridge and came to the right bank at a cliff about 30 feet above the river. A popular swimming hole was just below the bridge.
According to J.M. Chadwick Sr., the boy was on his way to visit his mother in Rock Hill, S.C. Chadwick, Jr. had listed a Social Security number and driver’s license number when he applied for the job at the restaurant. Those objects would normally be carried in a billfold and would have provided immediate identification. Investigating officers suspected the billfold was probably lost out of the victim’s pocket during the time he was in the river.
According to the death certificate, the permanent address of the deceased was Rock Hill, S.C. and his date of birth was Sept. 19, 1941. He was listed as a single, white male and his occupation was listed as a restaurant employee. Drowning was recorded as the cause of death.
Chadwick was laid to rest in Mount Olive Cemetery in Knox County.
Life soon returned to a normal routine in Sevierville as excitement mounted daily about the upcoming county election and state primaries scheduled for Thursday Aug. 4.
After graduating from Sevier County High School, Dorothy Ann Brock became a dental hygienist. She moved to Atlanta, Georgia, where she lived the rest of her life. After Dorothy passed away, she was cremated and her ashes scattered in the East Prong of the Little Pigeon River near the spot where she discovered the body of John M. Chadwick Jr. on that fateful day in 1960.
The swinging bridge was demolished in the late 1960s when TVA widened the East Prong of the Little Pigeon River as part of a flood control project.
— Carroll McMahan is the special projects facilitator for the Sevierville Chamber of Commerce. The Upland Chronicles series celebrates the heritage and past of Sevier County. If you have suggestions for future topics, would like to submit a column or have comments, please contact Carroll McMahan at 453-6411 or email to cmcmahan@scoc.org; or Ron Rader at 604-9161 or email to ron@ronraderproperties.com.
- [S23] Atchley Funeral Home, (http://www.atchleyfuneralhome.com/), 2 Jul 2015.
Juanita H. Brock obituary
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Abt 1944 - 2015 (~ 59 years)
, d. 1 Nov 1989 (Age 89 years)