Three Freeman families are listed in the 1850 Union County census: The Mr. Congdon mentioned in the 1854 article at Ducktown, TN was superintendent of the Hiawassee Mining Company, later the Tennessee Mining Company. From New York, Samuel and his brothers Charles and Walter were shareholders and had positions of leadership in the mining industry of the copper (and other ores) at Ducktown, Isabella, etc. in "The Copper Basin." So probably who ever found the meteorite (believing it to be native iron) had taken the ore to Mr. Congdon for analysis. 
The Burra Mine
Train bringing copper ore out of the Ducktown mines, 1939.
Smelter fumes have destroyed all vegetation and eroded the land.
Samuel Freeman, , age 23
J. W. Freeman (Baptist clergyman) age 47 Lewis Freeman, age 69
Nothing known of B.R. Dickey at this time.
More to be added -
Ducktown was the center of a major copper-mining district from 1847 into the 1970s. The district also produced iron, sulfur and zinc as byproducts. The copper was discovered in 1843 by a prospector, presumably panning for gold, who found nuggets of native copper. The first shipment of copper ore was taken out on muleback in made in 1847.
1850 saw the opening of the first mine. This was the Hiawassee Mine located at Hiawassee (later Ducktown, Tennessee). More than 30 mining companies were incorporated between 1852 and 1855 to mine copper at Ducktown. Development was speeded by a road built in 1853 connecting the area with Cleveland, Tennessee. The first smelter was built in the Ducktown district in 1854.
Mining ceased when Union troops destroyed the copper refinery and mill at Cleveland, Tennessee in 1863. Mining resumed in 1866, and continued until 1878, when the mines had exhausted the shallow high-grade copper ores. Please see other sources for additional history.