Skunk Ape in Alabama: The Russell County Wild Man

"He has been seen a number of times."

by Dale Cox

Beautiful old Uchee Chapel United Methodist Church has
stood in the Uchee Community of Russell County, Alabama
since before the wild man sightings. It was built in 1859 and
is on the National Register of Historic Places.

The skunk ape, a smaller version of what many people call Bigfoot or Sasquatch, is usually associated with Florida. Many who believe in them, however, say they also live in areas of Alabama and Georgia.

Skunk apes are said to be bipedal creatures or apes. They stand 5-6 feet tall, are covered with hair, and live in the swamps and wetlands where humans rarely go. One of the most famous of these was the Ocheesee Pond Wild Man, a creature captured in 1884 at Ocheesee Pond in Jackson County, Florida. You can learn more about him by watching the short video at the bottom of this page.

Seven years earlier, a similar (or the same?) creature was spotted in the swamps along Uchee Creek in Russell County, Alabama:

Today's Uchee Road follows the approximate trace of the
Old Federal Road through the area of the wild man sightings
in Russell County, Alabama.

The people in the Hichtie [Hitchiti] country on the Uchee tell us of a wild man up there. He is about five feet high, covered all over with gray hairs, and is stark naked. He keeps concealed generally in the Uchee swamp, though he has been seen a number of times passing about and near the swamp. - Russell Register, July 1877.

The area along Uchee Creek was one of those where the Muscogee (Creek) Indians made their last stands in Alabama during the Creek Wars of 1813-1814 and 1836. These lands were coveted by white speculators and settlers because they were prime for growing cotton. The Old Federal Road wound along the ridge overlooking the Uchee swamp and its trace is followed - more or less - by Sandfort and Uchee Roads today.

Uchee Good Hope Cemetery, along the ridge overlooking
Uchee swamp, was already 40 years old when the wild man
made his appearance in the summer of 1877.

The 1877 report continued:

...About two weeks ago Johnnie, a little son of Mr. F.A. Boykin, saw him standing in a horse lot on the creek used for feeding stock when working that part of the plantation. As soon as he saw Johnnie he ran to the fence, jumped it, (ten rails) and made his escape to the swamp. His track upon being examined looked like that of a ten year old boy. - Russell Register, July 1877.

Several other eyewitnesses reported seeing the creature, but he grew with each telling until at least one said that it was over ten feet tall! Efforts were made to capture it throughout the summer of 1877, but each one failed. Whether the creature actually lived in the area or was just passing through was never determined.

Editor's Note: Learn more about the actual capture of another "wild man" in this fun story from Two Egg TV:

Hurricane of 1877 at Chattahoochee, Florida

Recreated path of Hurricane #4 in 1877.
Map and data from NOAA.

A hurricane devastated a wide area of Northwest Florida in October 1877. The Chattahoochee area was particularly hard hit by the storm, which researchers have dubbed "Hurricane #4."

The National Hurricane Center believes that the storm made landfall somewhere between Apalachicola and present-day Panama City Beach on October 3, 1877. It is believed to have been a Category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 115 miles per hour.

After making landfall, the storm tracked to the northeast across today's Bay, Washington, Calhoun and Jackson Counties until the eye passed over or near Chattahoochee. Damage reports were stunning, as is explained by a letter written from Chattahoochee on October 6, 1877:

The Apalachicola River at Chattahoochee, Florida.
The river was still crossed by ferry in 1877.

...The freshet and gale has done much damage in this section. The gale began on Monday and continued till Wednesday. It was very heavy during Tuesday and Tuesday night. Twelve mills and water gins within a few miles of here have been swept away. There is only one mill, that of Mr. McMillen, standing in twenty miles of here. -  Report from Chattahoochee dated October 6, 1877, Marianna Courier, October 1877. 

The railroad did not yet cross the Apalachicola River into Jackson County, but had reached Chattahoochee by 1877. The storm did so much damage to the tracks and trestles that no trains could reach the city:

...All the bridges are gone, and the railroad is so washed up that we have had no train since Tuesday, and it is not thought that the road and bridges can be repaired under eight or ten days. So we are cut off from all communication with the outside world. - Report from Chattahoochee dated October 6, 1877, Marianna Courier, October 1877.

The Tallahassee newspapers reported that the storm did extensive damage all along the Gulf Coast. A storm tide of 12-feet above normal was reported at St. Marks, a large schooner was driven completely ashore on St. James Island and parts of the wharves and several boats were wrecked at Cedar Key.

The old Apalachicola Arsenal at Chattahoochee as it appeared
when the 1877 hurricane struck the city. The structure at left,
with verandas, remains in use as the Administration building.

The damage around Chattahoochee was even worse. Newspapers reported that roofs were torn from homes and businesses, trees were uprooted and that even the crops of the region were devastated. Cotton plants were literally blown out of the ground in the fields. Farm workers tried to salvage what the could by digging the cotton bolls out of the mud, trying to save enough to make their loan payments:

...The damage to the cotton crop is heavy, having been blown out and beat under the ground by the heavy rain, but with dry weather much of it can be saved. It will be impossible for planters to meet their notes for guano and other supplies, which mostly come due about the 15^th. The railroad was quickly repaired. - Report from Chattahoochee dated October 6, 1877, Marianna Courier, October 1877.

The death toll from the storm was not broken down locally so it is difficult to know how many people lost their lives along its path through Florida. Along its total path from the Caribbean up through the Atlantic Coast states of the United States, however, the storm claimed at least 84 lives.

It crossed over Georgia and the Carolinas, its feeder bands reaching into the Atlanta Ocean, and then moved up the coast to the north, causing floods and doing heavy damage all along its path.