USA > North Carolina > Western North Carolina; a history, 1730-1913 > Part 26
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Blockading is usually applied to the illegal selling of moon- shine whiskey or brandy.
THE STRENGTH OF UNION. The following account of the cooperation common among the early settlers is taken from " A Brief History of Macon County" by Dr. C. D. Smith, published in 1905, at Franklin:
"It was the custom in those early days not to rely for help upon hired labor. In harvesting small grain crops the sickle was mostly used. When a crop was ripe, the neighbors were notified and gathered in to reap and shock up the crops. The manner was for a dozen or more men to cut through the field, then hang their sickles over their shoulders and bind back. The boys gathered the sheaves together and the old men shocked them up. The corn crops were usually gathered in and thrown in great heaps alongside the cribs. The neighbors were invited and whole days and into the nights were often spent in husking out a single crop. I have seen as many as eighty or ninety men at a time around my father's corn heap. If a house or barn was to be raised the neighbors were on hand and the building was soon under roof. Likewise, if a man had a heavy clear- ing, it was no trouble to have an ample force to handle and put in heaps the heaviest logs. It was no unusual thing for a man to need one or two thousand rails for fencing. All he had to do was to proclaim that he would have a 'rail mauling' on a given day, and bright and early the W. N. C .- 18
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neighbors were on the ground and the rails were made before sun-down. This custom of mutual aid, cultivated a feeling of mutual dependence and brotherhood, and resulted in the most friendly and neighborly intercourse. Indeed, each man seemed to be on the lookout for his neighbor's comfort and welfare as well as his own. It made a community of broad, liberal- minded people, who despite the tongue of gossip and an occasional fist- icuff in hot blood, lived in peace and good will one toward another. There was then less selfishness and cold formality than now. I am free to admit that there has been improvement along some lines, such, for instance, as that of education, the building of church-houses, style of dress, etc., but I am sure that there has been none in the sterner traits of character, generosity, manliness, patriotism, integrity, and public spirit."
GIANTS IN THOSE DAYS. It also appears from the same very admirable sketch of Macon county, that when a new road was desired a jury was appointed to lay it off and divide it into sections as nearly equal as possible, the work on each section being assigned by lot to the respective captains of militia companies, and that the work was done without com- pensation. Dr. Smith cites an instance when he saw "men taking rock from the river with the water breast deep to aid in build- ing wharves. They remained until the work was finished."
FIST AND SKULL.
"There was another custom in those bygone days which to the pres- ent generation seems extremely primitive and rude, but which, when an- alyzed, shows a strong sense of honor and manliness of character. To settle minor disputes and differences, whether for imaginary or real per- sonal wrongs, there were occasional fisticuffs. Then, it sometimes oc- curred in affairs of this kind, that whole neighborhoods and communities took an interest. I have known county arrayed against county, and state against state, for the belt in championship, for manhood and skill in a hand-to-hand tussel between local bullies. When these contests took place the custom was for the parties to go into the ring. The crowd of spectators demanded fairness and honor. If anyone was disposed to show foul play he was withheld or in the attempt promptly chastised by some bystander. Then, again, if either party in the fight resorted to any weapons whatever, other than his physical appendages, he was at once branded and denounced as a coward, and was avoided by his former associates. While this custom was brutal in its practice, there was a bold outcropping of character in it, for such affairs were conducted upon the most punctilious points of honor. This custom illustrates the times and I have introduced it more for the sake of contrast than a desire to parade it before the public."
HORN AND BONE. Buttons were made from bones and cow's horns, while the antlers of the red deer were almost indispen-
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sable as racks for the long barreled flint-lock rifle, hats, cloth- ing or other articles usually suspended from pegs and hooks. Dinner and powder horns were from cow's horns, from which the "picker" and "charger" hung. Ink bottles were made from the small ends of cow's horns, powder was carried in these water-proof vessels, while hounds were called in from the chase or "hands" were summoned from the fields by toots upon these far-sounding if not musical instruments. During the Civil War, William Silvers of Mitchell county made combs from cow's horns, filing out each separate tooth after boiling and "spreading" the horns into flat surfaces. He sold these for good prices, and once made a trip to Ashe- ville with a wagon for a full load of horns as the neighbor- hood did not supply the demand.
GUNPOWDER BOUNTY. 19 " In 1796 Governor Ashe issued a proclamation announcing that in pursuance of an Act to provide for the public safety by granting encouragement to certain manufactures, Jacob Byler, of the county of Bun- combe, had exhibited to him a sample of gunpowder manu- factured by him in the year 1799 and also a certificate prov- ing that he had made six hundred and sixty-three pounds of good, merchantable, rifle gunpowder; and therefore, he was entitled to the bounty under the Act (2 Wheeler's History of North Carolina, 52). This Jacob Byler, or rather Boyler, was afterward a member of Buncombe County court, and in the inventory of his property returned by his administrator after his death in October, 1804, is mentioned "Powder mill irons."
ELIZABETHTON'S BATTLE MONUMENT. On a massive monu- ment erected in 1910 at Elizabethton, Tenn., to the soldiers of all the wars in which Tennessee has participated is a marble slab to the memory of Mary Patton who made the powder with which the battle of Kings Mountain was fought. This was made on Powder Mill branch, Carter county, Tennessee. On what is still known as Powder Mill creek in old Mitchell, so long ago that the date cannot now be fixed with certainty, Dorry and Loddy Oaks made powder near where the creek empties into Toe River. Zeb Buchanan now owns the land.
WANDERLUST. Alexander Thomas, A. J. McBride, and Marion Wilson, all of Cove creek, Watauga county, went to California in 1849, crossing the plains in ox carts, and mined
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for gold. Captain Young Farthing helped to carry the Chero- kees to the West in 1838, as did also William Miller, Col. James Horton and others of Watauga. They were paid in land warrants to be located in Kansas, but the warrants were usually sold for what they would bring, which was little. Jacob Townsend of near Shull's Mills was a pensioner of the War of 1812. Colonel J. B. Todd, Peter Hoffman and Jason Martin of Watauga were in the Mexican war. A number of others volunteered from these mountains, but were never called out.
FORGE BOUNTY LAND GRANTS. One of the first needs of these pioneers was iron, and in 1788 (Ch. 293, Laws of N. C. as revised by Potter J. L. Taylor and Bart Yancey, Esqs., 1821) the legislature passed an act by which 3,000 acres of vacant lands "not fit for cultivation most convenient to the different seats is hereby granted for every set of iron works, as a bounty from this State to any person or persons who will build and carry on the same." One or more tracts for each set of works was to be entered and a copy of the entry trans- mitted to the next court that should be held in the county, when a jury of twelve persons of good character should view the land and certify that it was not fit for cultivation. Iron works were then to be erected within three years, and when it should be made to appear to the court that 5,000 weight of iron had been made the grant was to be issued. "Three forges where it was made grew up in Buncombe county, one on Hominy creek, upon the old Solomon Luther place, which belonged to Charles Lane; another on Reems creek at the Coleman mill place, which belonged to the same man, but was sold by him in 1803, to Andrew Baird; the third was on Mills river, now in Henderson county on what has ever since been called the Forge mountain, on which are also the Boils- ton gold mines. The iron ore for this purpose was procured at different places in Buncombe county." 20 The State granted to Thomas Calloway, November 21, 1807, 3,000 acres
of land in Ashe county (Deed Book D, p. 88) and to William Daniel, David Worth, Moses L. Michael and R. Murchison 2,000 acres in Ashe county, in 1854. (Deed Book U, p. 62.) Grants were also issued to the late Messer Fain in Cherokee, and some of the pigs are still in existence there.
DATES OF WORKING OLD IRON MINES. From " The Iron
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Manufacturer's Guide" (1859, by J. P. Lesley) we find that Harbard's Bloomery Forge near the mouth of Helton creek was built in 1807 and washed away in 1817; that the Cran- berry Bloomery Forge on Cranberry was built in 1820, and rebuilt in 1856; that North Fork Bloomery Forge eight miles northwest of Jefferson on New river, was built in 1825; aban- doned in 1829; washed away in 1840; Ballou's Bloomery Forge, at Falls of North Fork of New river, 12 miles north- east of Jefferson, was built in 1817; washed away in 1832 by an ice freshet; Helton Bloomery Forge, on Helton creek, 12 miles north-northwest of Jefferson, was built in 1829; washed away in 1858; another forge was built one and one-fourth miles further down in 1802, but did not stand long; Laurel Bloomery Forge, on Laurel creek, 15 miles west of Jefferson, built in 1847; abandoned in 1853; Toe river Bloomery Forge, five miles south of Cranberry Forge, built in 1843; Johnson's Bloomery Forge, six miles south of Cranberry Forge, built in 1841; Lovingood Bloomery Forge, on Hanging Dog, Cherokee county, two miles above Fain's Forge, built from 1845 to 1853; Lower Hanging Dog Bloomery Forge, five miles north- west of Murphy, built in 1840; Killian Bloomery Forge one- half miles below Lower Hanging Dog Forge, built in 1843, abandoned 1849; Fain Bloomery Forge, on Owl creek, two miles below Lovingood Forge, built in 1854; Persimmon creek Bloomery Forge, on Persimmon creek 12 miles southwest of Murphy, built in 1848; Shoal creek Bloomery Forge, on Shoal creek, five miles west of Persimmon creek Forge, built about 1854; Palsey Forge, built by John Ballou at mouth of Helton in 1859 and rebuilt by W. J. Pasley in 1871 (it is now aban- doned); New River Forge on South Fork of New river, one- half mile above its junction with North Fork; built 1871, washed away in 1878. Uriah Ballou of Crumpler, N. C., has gold medals for the best magnetic iron ore from the Louis- iana Purchase Exposition and from the World's Fair at Paris immediately afterwards, which was taken from these mines. The lands are now the property of the Virginia Iron & Coke Company.
PIONEER THORS AND FORGES. Iron was manufactured at these old time forges about as follows : When the ore was in lumps or mixed with rock and dirt it was crushed by "stomp- ers," consisting of hardwood beams 6x6 inches, which were raised
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and dropped by a cogged horizontal revolving shaft. When the ore was fine enough it was washed in troughs to separate it from as much foreign matter as possible. It was then ready for the furnace, which consisted of a rock base 6x6 feet and two and one-half feet high. On three sides of this base walls of rock were erected two and one-half feet high, leaving one side open. A nest was left in the bottom of this base or hearth, through the middle of which a two inch blast pipe ran, and projecting above it. Air was furnished to this pipe by a stream of water passing through wooden tubes 12x12 inches. A small fire of chips was started in this nest above the mouth of the blast pipe. Over this fire three or four bushels of char- coal was placed and blown into a white heat. Upon this charcoal a layer of ore was spread, and as it was heated, an other layer of charcoal was placed above, and on it still another layer of ore. This was gradually melted, the molten ore set- tling into the nest and the silica remaining on top. Into the mass of melted iron an iron bar would be thrust. This bar was used simply to form a handle for the turning of the ore that adhered to it after it had been withdrawn and placed on the anvil to be hammered. The melted ore thus drawn out was called a "loop."
The hammer and the anvil were about the same weight, 750 pounds each, with an eye through, 6x12 inches. They were in- terchangeable. The anvil was placed on white oak beams, about the size of a railroad cross-tie, which spanned a pit dug in the ground in order to give spring to the blow made by the hammer. Through the eye of the hammer a beam of strong wood was fastened, the other end working on a pivot or hinge. Near this hinged end was a revolving shaft shod with four large iron cogs, each about six inches long and five inches square, and each having a rounded corner. These cogs lifted the ham- mer handle rapidly, while above the handle a wooden "bray" overcame the upward thrust, and gravity drove the hammer downward upon the heated mass awaiting it on the anvil. The blows thus dealt were rapid and heavy and could be heard under favorable conditions ten or more miles.
SILENT FINGER SIGNALS. It was the duty of the "tender," the chief assistant of the hammerman, to withdraw the loop from the furnace and place it on the anvil, when the hammer- man took the end of the handle and signaled with his fingers
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laid on the handle to the tender to begin hammering, which was done by the latter allowing the water to strike the wheel which worked the hammer shaft. Two fingers indicated more rapid hammering, three still more rapid hammering, and the withdrawal of all fingers meant that the hammering should cease. When the foreign matter had been hammered out of the loop, it was divided into two or more loops of 25 to 30 pounds each; a short iron bar, to serve as handles, was welded to each piece, and they were again placed in the furnace and re-heated and then hammered into bars from 9 to 12 feet in length, or divided into smaller pieces for wagon-tires, hoe- bars, axe-bars, plough-shares, plough-molds, harrow-teeth bars, horse-shoe irons, and gun "skelps." There was an extra charge for "handage" in the case of wagon-tires, because they were hammered out thinner. In finishing up each bar or smaller piece of iron the tender would pour cold water on its surface to give it a hard and smooth finish.
GIANT "HAMMERMEN." The hammerman soon became a veritable giant in his arms, and it is related of one of the older Duggers that he could insert an arm into the eye of the hammer and another into that of the anvil and strike the two together. For miles below the water powers which drove these forges the streams were muddy with the washings from the ore. For years iron thus made was the principal commodity of trade. The ends of the iron bars were bent like the runners of a sled, and as many of these bars were bound together by iron bands as could be dragged over the rough trails by a single ox. In this crude fashion many tons of iron found a market on farms remote from wagon roads.
EXPENSIVE HAULING. It took from three weeks to a month to go from Asheville to Charleston or Augusta by wagon before the Civil War. The roads were bad, and those in charge of the wagons camped on the roadside, cooking their own meals. No wonder freight rates were high, and that peo- ple did without much that seems indispensible now. It is said that Waugh, Murchison & Poe, early merchants of Jef- ferson, hauled their goods from Wilmington, N. C. The late Albert T. Summey says that : "goods were hauled from Au- gusta and Charleston and cost from $1.75 to $2.00 per hun- dred. Salt cost in Augusta $1.25 for a sack of 200 lbs. Add $4.00 for hauling, and it is easy to understand why people
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thought it cheap when they could buy it for $5.00." As late as the spring of 1850 it took Deacon William Skiles of Valle Cruces three weeks to ride horseback from Plymouth, N. C. to Watauga. 2 1
RIFLE GUNS. 22 The word "rifle" is too generic a term for the average mountaineer; but he knows what a "rifle-gun" is. Some of the older men have seen them made-lock, stock and barrel. The process was simple : a bar of iron the length of the barrel desired was hammered to the thickness of about three-sixteenths of an inch and then rolled around a small iron rod of a diameter a little less than the caliber desired. After this, the rolled iron was welded together gradually- only three or four inches being welded at a time because it was not practicable to do more at a single "heating" without also welding the rod which was inside. This rod was with- drawn from the barrel while it was being heated in the fur- nace and allowed to cool, and when the glowing barrel was withdrawn from the fire the rod was inserted and the weld- ing would begin and be kept up till the bar inside began to get too hot, after which it was withdrawn and cooled while the barrel was being heated again, and then the same process was repeated till the work was done. The caliber of the barrel was now smaller than desired, but it was enlarged by drilling the hole with a steel bit operated by water-power. The spiral grooves inside the barrel were made by small pieces of steel, two inches long, with saw-teeth on the edges, which served the purpose of filing the necessary spiral channels. The cali- ber was determined by the number of bullets which could be molded from a pound of lead, and usually ran from 80 to 140. The caliber of rifles is now measured by the decimels of an inch, regardless of the number of bullets to the pound of lead. No hand-made rifle was ever known to burst. The locks, hammers, triggers, guards, ramrods, etc., were all made on the common anvil. 2 8
PRIMITIVE TOOLS AND METHODS. Dutch scythes for cut- ting grass have been in the mountains time out of mind, but English scythes for the same purpose did not come into use in some of the counties till about 1856-7. Cradles for cutting small grain were employed about 1846; before which time reaping hooks had been used entirely. Before thrashing ma- chines arrived small grain was separated from the stems by
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means of flails, as in the old Bible days of the threshing floors- only in western North Carolina a smooth place was made in the hillside, if there was no level ground elsewhere, cloth was spread down over it, and the grain beaten out by flails. After this had been done, what was known as a "riddle" was used to free the grain of straw and chaff, sheets or coverlids of beds being used to fan the chaff away as the grain fell. Then came the sieve to separate the grain from all heavy foreign matter, after which it was ground in grist mills, and bolted by sifting it through thin, loosely woven cloth wound over a cylindrical wooden frame revolved by hand, a labor often im- posed by the indolent miller on the boy who had brought the grist to mill. The miller never made any deduction from his toll because of this labor, however.
GROUND HOG THRESHERS. When the threshing machine came, about 1850, it was a seven days wonder. It was what was known as the "ground-hog" thresher, and required eight horses to pull it from place to place. It was operated by horse power also, which power was communicated to the ma- chine by means of a tarred cotton rope in place of a band or sprocket chain, both of which came later. The grain and straw came from the machine together and were caught in a big sheet surrounded by curtains. The straw was raked from the top of the grain by wooden forks made from saplings or the limbs of trees. Steel pitchforks .did not come into gen- eral use in these mountains till about 1850. A ground hog thresher could thresh out about 100 bushels a day with the help of about 16 hands, while the modern machine can easily thresh out over 400 bushels with the assistance of 10 hands; but as the extra hands of the olden time charged nothing for their labor, and felt honored by being allowed to take part in such glorious work, no complaint was ever heard on that score. Mowing machines did not come into general use in this sec- tion till 1869 or 1870. Even the North refused them till England took them up. 24
THE HANDY BLACKSMITH. Tools of all kinds were made by the ordinary blacksmiths of the country at ordinary forges. They made axes, hatchets, drawing-knives, chisels, augurs, horse-shoes, horse-shoe nails, bolts, nuts and even pocket knives!
FISH AND FISH TRAPS. Fish abounded in all mountain
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streams, and "a good site for a fish trap" was the greatest recommendation which a piece of land could have. These places were always the first entered and granted. In them fish by the barrelful would sometimes be caught in a single night where the trap was well situated and strongly built. Fishing at night in canoes by torchlight with a gig was a fa- vorite sport as well as profitable practice and it was much in- dulged in." 25 Above vertical falls trout could not pass. Elk river, above the Great Falls, had no trout till 1857 (D. L. Low in Watauga Democrat, June 26, 1913), when men placed them there.
GRIST MILLS. "The first consideration, however, with these primitive inhabitants, was the matter of grist mills. Hence at the first session of the [Buncombe] county court we find it 'Ordered that William Davidson have liberty to build a grist mill on Swannanoa, near his saw mill, Provided he builds said mill on his own land.' This was in April, 1792. In January, 1793, it was 'Ordered that John Burton have liberty to build a Grist mill on his own land, on a branch of French Broad River, near Nathan Smith's, below the mouth of Swannanoa,' Apparently Davidson's mill was not built, "but John Burton's was on Glenn's creek a short distance above its mouth."
WHEN THE CLOCK STOPPED. There were a few old seven- day clocks brought by the first settlers, but as a rule watches and clocks were few. Men and women learned to guess the time with some accuracy by looking at the sun on clear days, and guessing at it on cloudy. Following is a description of the usual time-piece : "The clock consisted of a knife mark, ex- tending north from one of the door-facings across the punch- eon next to it. When the mark divided the sunshine that fell in at the door from the shadow of the facing, it was noon. All other hours were guessed at : on cloudy days the clock stopped. " 2 6
CULTURE AND MANUFACTURE OF FLAX. The flax seed were sown thick, and when the plant was mature it was pulled up by the roots and spread on the ground to dry. Then it was bound in bundles and placed in a dry place till the envelope surrounding the fiber was decomposed. Sometimes it was scattered over the snow to bleach the lint. It was then re- bound in small bundles and when the farmer was ready it
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was opened and placed on the "brake," which consisted of four or five wooden slats parallel to each other through which wooden knives passed, driving the flax stems between. After the flax was thus broken a handful of it was placed on the end of an upright board which had been driven into the ground, and struck smartly by a wooden swingling knife in order to knock off the small pieces of straw from the fiber. Then the fiber was drawn through the hackle, which consisted of a board from whose surface projected five or six inches a row of iron spikes, which served to separate the tow from the flax. The flax was then spun on the low wheels, now sometimes seen in drawing rooms, gilded and beribboned, but never used. Then it was wound on spools from which it was reeled into hanks. In the elder day the women had to count the revo- lutions of the reels, but before the Civil War a device was invented by which, after 100 revolutions, the reel would crack, and the housewife thus knew a hank had been reeled off. The flax thread was then ready to be spooled and placed on the warping bars from which it was wound on the beam of the loom. From this beam it was put through gears and slays of split reeds, thus making the warp. After this, other flax thread was reeled off on quills from the hanks and placed in shuttles which were shot through the warp as the tread opened it, and the thread thus placed between the warp was driven back against the first thread by means of the battern, thus making loose cloth. Wool was shorn, washed, dried, picked, carded, spun, reeled on to brooches with shuck cores from the spinning wheel, when it was ready to be woven or knitted.
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