Underground Chattanooga: Difference between revisions

After years of suffering through flooding, in March of 1867, Chattanooga experienced a record amount of flooding due to four days of heavy rainfall. 1 The river had risen over 50 feet and houses were floating away. After the worst flood on record, the city’s occupants finally had enough and took the problem into their own hands and raised the northern side of the city twenty feet higher, indirectly creating Underground Chattanooga.

In 1867, it rained for four days straight in the first week of March. Chattanooga townspeople were accustomed to flooding, although inconvenient. However, the flood of 1867 was devastatingly different. The river had risen 57 feet (28 feet above flood stage) as the largest flood in city history, all of the streets being submerged in 10-15ft of water. 2

The flood nearly destroyed the old city of Chattanooga. Streets were turned into rivers, crops were destroyed, and houses were washed away with the owners inside.3 The once, strong standing Military Bridge, that connected Chattanooga to the other side of the river, fell to pieces and was washed away in the current. Even the rail yard was submerged. 4

People everywhere were struggling to stay afloat, while others drowned in the quick moving river. One account describes two men floating on the roof of a house until they fell into the river. While trying to pull themselves back up, the house capsized taking them with it. 5 The river claimed at least 15 men, women, and children according to a man who stood a top Lookout Mountain after the disaster. 6

The water started receding back into the river March 14, leaving the townspeople responsible for dealing with the destruction. 7 However, they didst just clean up Mother nature’s mess; They took action in preventing this from ever happening again.

The townspeople who were tired from terrible flooding started to slowly raise the street level of Chattanooga, anywhere from 10 to 20 feet. 8 First floors transformed into basements and second floors became ground floors. 9 In raising the city, the townspeople indirectly created an underground labyrinth that historians are just studying.

Archeologist and UTC professor Dr. Jeff Brown, started noticing small clues to the underground world while walking around downtown Chattanooga. 10 He discovered doorways leading to nowhere and underground tunnels and rooms. While following staircases that led to nowhere, he asked around the city and learned that underneath the city, Chattanooga had another level. 10

Although poorly documented, and almost forgotten, there are clues around downtown hinting to the town it once was, like oversize windows and 12 foot high rock foundations. An example of this the Sports Barn, where the concrete arches are close to four feet to the ground. 11

• The Bijou, now the Chattanooga Visitors Center, 215 Broad St.

• Big River Grille & Brewing Works/Blue water Grill, 222 and 224 Broad St.