Monsters of the Coosa River Still Got Cotton in My Blood

In 1816, a hunting party from St. Clair County, Alabama, was just below Ten Mile Island on the Coosa River. They stumbled upon a dead animal that was half in and half out of the water. One of the hunters later wrote a letter to his sister in Charleston about the beast. It would be over 50 years before the letter surfaced.

It said when they cut the critter open, they found an Indian, his canoe, a bow and arrows, a deer and a rifle. The writer said they figured the rifle was what made it sick and killed it. His description has stood through the years. He described it as a type of sea serpent, with scales, a long tail about 25 feet in length, and big around the middle.

Stories of River Monsters in the Coosa and her tributaries have been reported ever since. Many of our steamboat captains filed reports of strange creatures in the waters. One famous steamboat captain was J.M. Elliott. He captained the Magnolia, Sidney P. Smith and Hill City at one time, and reported seeing the monster on several occasions. Once near Rome, and twice below Centre, Alabama.

He was such a credible witness that nobody dared question his integrity, especially when on one occasion Cherokee County Judge Lemuel Standifer was with him.

A Mrs. Martin of Gadsden, Alabama, reported the creature in the 1860’s, and on June 8, 1877 the Gadsden Newspaper ran a piece where Marcus Foster of the Ball Play community was out running trot lines just after daylight. He thought he saw another fisherman standing up in his boat across the river.

Marcus figured he was setting limb hooks and paddled his way to see if it was a friend. When he got within about 30 feet it turned and looked at him. Marcus said it had a head like a horse, with bugged out eyes, and a red tongue. He made the fastest trip he had ever made back to his side of the river.

Reports such as these are scattered out in the news print of all the cities along the Coosa. Also, some of the mysteries have been solved. The Alabama state record alligator — Gar — was 151 pounds the last time I checked. Sturgeon were a heavily populated species at that time in history. Alligators have been reported off and on in the river and impoundments for years.

One story that has also been around for years was the one dam builders passed along when building the various lakes for Alabama Power on the Coosa. The stories of “Catzilla,” have lasted till the present day. That is the report of catfish the size of Volkswagen Beetles near the foot of the dams. To be sure, catfish over a hundred pounds have been caught in the Coosa.

What I had was a lot of reports from my research, and no concrete documentation. So, I made a call to an old buddy, Elmer P. Suggins Jr., who is the third cousin twice removed from James Duke, up Armuchee way. Now Elmer has a fishing shack along the Oostanaula on state land. Usually you can find a group of his friends hanging around on any given day. They live off the river, and make a little white whiskey, plus grow their own smoke.

I called Elmer and asked him if he had ever seen anything like a river monster in all his years on the river. This is what he told me, and I’ve never known him to lie.

“Mike, one night a possum got into our mash, we didn’t see him, and the poor fellow fell in the river and tried to swim to the other side. He was almost half way when something about twenty foot long just rose up and swallowed him.

“It sure did like that drunk possum. We started feeding a lot of mash to the possums around where we are, and feeding them to that thing. C.J. made a harness, and we caught the critter, and began letting it pull us on skis.

“We had one of your fine officers set up with his radar gun at the head of the Coosa. When I left the Oostanaula, I thought I was going to hit a tree at the country club. They clocked me at 82 miles an hour. There’s a lot more, but you’ll have to come up and visit, and hear what everybody has to say.”

So, I guess they’re still there. MIKE RAGLAND