He probably took poetic license with the name just as Steven Foster did with " I dream of Jeannie." The lady he was courting was named Inez, but, it just didnt flow, so, he used the name of her sister, Jeannie when Inez snubbed him. More trivia? he also wrote "way down upon the PEE DEE River, not Suwannee. He never saw the Suwannee.