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Standing atop Huckleberry Knob. At 5,560 ft it’s the highest point in the Unicoi Mountains. The name “Unicoi” comes from the Cherokee word ᎤᏁᎦ (Unega), which means “white.” The first Europeans to see the lonely White Mountains of the Southern Appalachia were 16th-century Spanish explorers in 1540, the Hernando de Soto expedition passed just west of the mountains en route from the Chiaha villages in East Tennessee to the Coosa Chiefdom in northern Georgia.
If you visit the mountain today you’ll see a white cross and grave near the peak. In the winter of 1899 two surveyors bodies were found 3/4 of a mile from the summit next to a small creek amidst the snow and fog. Several jugs of whiskey were found near the bodies, it was assumed the men froze to death while lost and drunk.
