The Legend of Sautee and Nacoochee is well documented. The first White settlers, coming up the Unicoi Trail, now known as Georgia Highway 17, heard the story as they stopped to rest in the shade of the giant white oak, still standing adjacent the Old Sautee Store. (Hwy 17 & 255) One among them, George Williams, a young lad at the time, retold this story in his memoirs. The Cherokees considered themselves to be a superior race, as indeed they were. Handsome, tall and intelligent, they even had an alphabet, the first in America. They were not nomads, they built log houses and tilled the soil. They had but one grievous fault. This superiority was allowed to show. Naturally, this did not endear them to the neighboring tribes. One of these, the Chickasaws, was constantly at war with the Cherokee. However, there were moments of relative calm. During one such truce, a band of Chickasaws was allowed to cross over Cherokee land, provided they stay on the Unicoi Trail and rested only at designated spots. One such spot was where two trails crossed at the junction of two lovely valleys, the same place where - a century later, a young George Williams stopped. As the Chickasaw band rested, in the shade of the giant oak, around them gathered curious Cherokees, trying to get a closer look at the dispised Chickasaws. Soon they were trading insults and obscenities. The Cherokees were hoping to bait the Chicasaws into making an overt act. But, the Chickasaws were too cagey to be trapped by such obvious maneuvers. One of the Chickasaws stand aloof from this bickering. It is Sautee: young, handsome and a chief's son. He dreams of the day when he will be chief. And has the authority to negotiate permanent peace with the Cherokees. Some of this greatness must have shown, for Nacoochee, the Cherokee chief's 16-year-old daughter, is so taken by this handsome stranger that she stares unashamedly. The their eye meet. The magic alchemy of love does the rest. Not one spoke spoken word- and yet a tryst was made. That night Nacoochee steals away from her father's log house to meet with Sautee, under the giant white oak, now known as the Sautee Oak. By this time, they are helplessly and hopelessly in love.
The rest of Sautee's party, counsels against this madness. No good could come of this flagrant violation of their truce. If Wahoo, the girls's father, learned of this meeting, all would be doomed. But, then, as now, teenagers feel they must defy the establishment. "Run, if you must," Sautee tells his followers, "but, I remain here with Nacoochee. Together we will make Wahoo understand. This must be the first step to a lasting peace between our two nations." The young lovers then flee to nearby Yonah Mountain. There, in a secret cave known only to Nacoochee, they spend a few idyllic days. They have their love. They have each other. But, destiny calls to a larger purpose, peace between two great tribes. To this end, out they come to face Wahoo. With such a just and lofty purpose, how could they not succeed? Wahoo is a great chief and has great wisdom to handle all problems. But this time, when compassion and understanding are most needed, he is blinded by hate and chagrin that his beloved Nacoochee would choose Sautee - a Chickasaw- to a Cherokee brave.
He ordered Sautee thrown from the high cliffs of Yonah Mountain, while Nacoochee was forced to look on. Life without her Sautee holds no promise. Nacoochee tears away from the restaining hands of her father and she, too, leaps from the high cliff. There, at the foot of the cliff, the young lovers are joined again. Their bodies broken and dying, they do not surrender to death - - - not just yet. They find fierce strength in their love. They drag their broken bodies together. Then, locked in final embrace, they die. This is how Wahoo finds them. Too late, a flash of understanding comes over him. Too late, he is aware of the greatness of love. Too late, the lost opportunnity for a lasting peace with the Chickasaws. Wahoo is now overcome with remorse. He has the two bodies, still locked in death, laid to rest on the banks of the Chattahoochee River, there to remain for eternity, at a burial mound that still stands at the junction of Georgia Highway 17 and Geotgia Highway 75. So that the lesson to be learned from this tragedy may never be forgotten, he renames the two valleys where first the young lovers met, one for Sautee and the other for Nacoochee.
