Whitehead and Gregory cabins in the Cades Cove region of Great Smoky Mountains National Park

See the Cades Cove Region web page for an interactive location map.

The Henry Whitehead Place is located on Forge Creek Road, the first right after passing the Cable Mill Historic Area in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The dirt road eventually becomes one-way once it turns into Parsons Branch Road, but it is a two-way road to the Whitehead homestead, so you can turn around and rejoin the Cades Cove Loop Road after a visit to the site.

The Whitehead homestead consists of two cabins side by side. This makes for a great way to compare two different styles of log construction. The oldest cabin looks like a typical log cabin. It was built by the brothers of Matilda Shields Gregory after her husband left her and her children. She later married widower Henry Whitehead, and he built the second cabin in 1898. While it appears to be a frame house built with machine-sawed lumber, it is actually built with hand-sawed logs just like the older cabin, only here the craftsmanship is so advanced that the cabin looks like a frame house. There were only three houses in Cades Cove like this, but this is the only one to survive. Also notice the stone chimney on the old cabin and the brick chimney on the new one. Brick was not that common because you had to make your own bricks. Stones were everywhere in the Smokies.

The newer Whitehead cabin (left) and the older Gregory cabin (right) in the Cades Cove region of Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Interior of the Whitehead Cabin in Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountains National Park