Jesse Stephens was a farmer living at the base of the mountain, and although Federal records usually misspelled his name as Stevens, the gap and road were named for him. The 1860 Federal Census listed him as a 54-year-old Georgia native living with his 52-year-old wife Amy of South Carolina, a 22-year-old daughter, and four sons ages 20, 18, 16, and 14; he also owned two enslaved Africans, a 60-year-old woman and a four-year-old boy. The road descending the mountain at his farm became one of the major routes used by the Federal Army in crossing Lookout Mountain. General James Negley, leading the advance division in Thomas' 14th Army Corps, was the first up the mountain and reported that Confederate pickets had been driven from Stephens' Gap after skirmishing, that about 100 rebels were in sight there, and that obstructions had been removed though the road needed repairs. Negley then brought his division down through Stephens' Gap, a movement observed by Confederate cavalry, who informed General Braxton Bragg that the Federals were off the mountain and moving toward Davis' Crossroads and were vulnerable to a surprise attack. Although the Confederates failed to coordinate attacks that might have destroyed Negley's division, fighting on September 10-11 forced it back to the base of the mountain. After the skirmishing at Davis' Crossroads on September 11, 1863, Surgeons S. Marks and R. G. Bogue established a field hospital first at the Widow Davis house, then moved it to Bailey's Crossroads, and then to the Stephens House at Stephens Gap, where 27 wounded were treated and two eventually died. On September 16, 22 of the remaining wounded, along with some sick, were sent to Chattanooga, while those too badly injured to travel were left at the Stephens House with medical staff. Surgeon Marks said all of Baird's Division's wounded but one were sent to Chattanooga, and that one badly injured man remained there with a surgeon and two nurses from Negley's Division. Surgeon Bogue reported that the sick had been cared for nearby in the division ambulance park in a grove of trees, that two wounded men died at the Stephens House, and that two of his division's wounded and one from Baird's Division, along with nurses, Assistant Surgeon H. S. Griswold of the 11th Michigan, and several days' supplies, were left there and were later captured when the Federals abandoned Stephens Gap on September 20.

Photo: Duane and Tracy Marsteller