Cherokee Name In, Confederate General Out for Tennessee’s Highest Mountain

The highest peak in the sprawling Great Smoky Mountains National Park is dropping the name of a Confederate general in favor of its Cherokee name “Kuwohi.”

The U.S. Board of Geographic Names this week approved a formal request by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. The effort was started in 2022 by band members Mary Crowe and Lavita Hill, who called the 6,643-foot peak “spiritual and sacred.”

“Kuwohi is significant to our people,” Hill told the USA TODAY Network. “This is where our medicine man came, this is where our healers and spirtual leaders came to pray and to get guidance from the creator.”

The Cherokee first settled the mountain thousands of years ago, and the name they gave it translates to “the mulberry place.” In 1859, geographer Arnold Guyotthe surveyed the mountain and named it Clingmans Dome after Thomas Clingman, a senator from North Carolina who would soon serve as a general in the Confederacy during the Civil War.

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“The trails you are walking are trails created by my people,” Crowe told WBIR-TV. “We were blessed to get the support from the Clingman family.”

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Park officials close Kuwohi to the public every year for three half-days so Cherokee schools can visit the mountain. The kids learn the history of Kuwohi and the Cherokee people from elders, Cherokee language speakers, culture bearers and community members.

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The previous name honored Thomas Clingman, a U.S. congressman and senator from North Carolina who advocated for slavery and was expelled from the Senate because of his support for the Confederacy. He served as a brigadier general in the Confederate Army during the Civil War.

Clingman was an avid explorer who measured several of the peaks that eventually would become part of the national park. He died Nov. 3, 1897 and is buried in Asheville, North Carolina.

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Efforts are underway or have already succeeded in changing the names of landmarks and historical sites out of respect for Native Americans. Two years ago the Board on Geographic Names voted on the final replacement names for nearly 650 geographic features featuring the word “squaw,” saying it has historically been used as an offensive ethnic, racial and sexist slur, particularly for Indigenous women.

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