TENNESSEE - LEGEND OF THE VOLUNTEER

What’s a Volunteer? 

Not your run of the mill school nickname, the proud legacy of the Volunteer calls Tennessee student-athletes to compete at an elevated standard when the stakes are highest. A Volunteer is the bravest breed of human from the boldest nation on Earth, fiercely proud to call Tennessee home whether the battle lies within its borders or in a land far away.

THE FIRST VOLUNTEERS 

In the aftermath of the Declaration of Independence, Americans were determined to create a nation that was free of the evils that had required them to resort to revolution. Among these was the fear of a large standing army. Such a force could be used to impose the will of an evil monarch and was therefore a threat to individual liberties. Instead, they would rely upon a volunteer army, citizen soldiers who would be called into service at times of crisis to serve their country. 

When the people who would later be known as Tennesseans were first asked to volunteer for such an army, they had been living along the upper tributaries of the Tennessee River, near modern day Elizabethton. The call went out for volunteers to gather at Sycamore Shoals in September 1780 and march across the Smoky Mountains to meet this British threat. When finally assembled, the volunteers totaled almost 1,000 men, virtually the entire fighting force of the settlements. These “Overmountain Men” defeated the British at King’s Mountain to turn the tide of the war in favor of the fledgling nation. 

The tradition of the Tennessee Volunteer was thus already initiated when, in the War of 1812, the nation once again went to war. As they had done over 30 years before, Tennesseans responded enthusiastically. Instead of the 3,500 troops requested, 25,000 Tennesseans joined, participating in battles from the Canadian border to the Gulf of Mexico.

OLD HICKORY 

Earlier in the War of 1812 the British torched Washington. The Tennessee Volunteers made sure New Orleans would suffer no such fate. Under future President Andrew “Old Hickory” Jackson at the Battle of New Orleans, Tennessee Volunteers took part in the greatest victory of the war when they helped to defeat an army of crack British regulars. Facing more than twice their number, the Tennessee Volunteers joined a New Orleans militia, a group of former Haitian slaves fighting as free men and a band of outlaws headed by the notorious pirate Jean Lafitte. Thanks in no small part to the deadly Volunteer riflemen of Tennessee, the U.S. took a lopsided victory where more than 2,000 British were killed or wounded compared to eight killed and 13 wounded on the American side. 

Jacob Hartsell, a captain in the 2nd East Tennessee militia, was among the Tennesseans who took part in the battle. He was so inspired by his fellow Tennesseans that he wrote a heroic poem in their honor. Entitled “The Brave Volunteer,” this poetic journal entry is the earliest known written reference to Tennesseans as Volunteers.

VOLUNTEERS AT THE ALAMO 

Two decades later, Tennesseans advanced their reputation as volunteers when, unsolicited, several hundred made the journey south to assist the Texans in their war for independence from Mexico. The best known of these was David Crockett. His already legendary status was only enhanced by his dramatic death at the Alamo in 1836. 

But before the Alamo fell, 33 Tennesseans, the largest number of defenders provided by any state — nearly four times as many as from Texas — kept Mexican General Santa Anna’s overwhelming army at bay for 13 days against unbelievable odds. On March 6, 1836, the brave Tennessee Volunteers and the other Alamo defenders were overrun and breathed their last. 

However, the crucial days the Volunteers slowed down the Mexican army gave another Tennessean, Sam Houston, enough time to gallop through Texas raising an army to defend what would become the Lone Star State. This army defeated Santa Anna in no small part because of the contributions of Tennessee’s Volunteers. There can be no doubt Texas owes a great debt of gratitude for its statehood to the fierce men from Tennessee.

TENNESSEE... THE VOLUNTEER STATE 

But Tennessee’s status as the “Volunteer State” was solidified 10 years later when the United States War Department called for volunteers in the War with Mexico. Moving quickly to meet their allotted quota of 2,800 recruits, state officials were overwhelmed by 30,000 volunteers. 

It was during the Spanish-American War that the students of the University of Tennessee began to lay official claim to the Volunteer nick- name for themselves. In 1897, the student yearbook was christened, The Volunteer. 

In 1902, the Atlanta Constitution used the term “Volunteers” to describe the football team when recounting a game between UT and Georgia Tech. However, the university sports teams continued to operate without an official nickname until 1905. In March of that year an article in the Knoxville Journal announced a nickname had been chosen. 

“One of the admirers of the old school has suggested ‘the Volunteers’,” the newspaper reported. In classic understatement the report concludes, “The name sounds good, and it is likely that it will stick.”

THE VOLUNTEER SPIRIT 

There have been other men who symbolized the indomitable Tennessee Volunteer spirit on and off the field of battle. One of the most famous proved to be Alvin York in World War I. York was drafted and nearly single-handedly captured 132 Germans, took out about 35 machine guns which had been decimating his battalion and killed no fewer than 25 of the enemy, according to officers’ reports. Indeed, Marshall Ferdinand Foch said of York’s heroism, “What you did was the greatest thing accomplished by any private soldier of all the armies of Europe.” 

Humbly, the reluctant hero returned home to Tennessee as the toast of the nation. Yet York wasn’t interested in celebrity or cashing in on his fame, saying, “This uniform ain’t for sale.” 

Tennessee Volunteers took part in every theater of World War II, whether helping secure the deadly beaches of Normandy to working in their own backyard in Oak Ridge on The Manhattan Project and the atomic bomb that brought an end to war in the Pacific. 

Not every Volunteer story was forged in wartime. Part of the Volunteer legend deals with self-sacrifice for the good of others. Take Tennessee train engineer Casey Jones, for instance. Steaming full-bore in the early morning in Vaughan, Miss., in 1900, Jones saw boxcars in the distance on the tracks in front of him. When it became apparent the passenger train he was driving was destined for a catastrophic collision, Jones was faced with a desperate choice — he could jump out of the engine and save his life before the crash or he could stay in the engine and try to slow the train enough to save more passengers’ lives. After ordering his fireman to jump from the racing locomotive and save him- self, Jones died that day saving dozens of lives in an amazing display of self-sacrifice. But his story and heroism live in the ballad devoted to the Tennessean who saved so many lives that day in his casket of splintered wood and twisted steel. 

The legend of the Tennessee Volunteer also applies to great minds who create items of great cultural value in interesting ways. The first constitution ever written by white men in America was drafted in 1772 by the Watauga Association near present day Elizabethton. Take the example of the Cherokee silversmith Sequoyah, the only known man in the history of the world to single-handedly create an alphabet, the first written language for a Native American people. 

Similarly, Tennessean Alex Haley became one of America’s most famous authors after recounting the experience of African-Americans in his highly-acclaimed “Roots.” Haley chose to make his home in Norris, just a short drive from the University of Tennessee. 

Every time since the nation’s birth to this very day, when the U.S. needs an extraordinary effort to brush back the dark curtain of hopelessness, the Tennessee Volunteers are called. The bravery, heroism, wisdom and ferocity of the Volunteers place them on a pedestal of great American legends. 

— by Nathan Kirkham Rockwood, Tenn.