USA > West Virginia > Hampshire County > History of Hampshire County, West Virginia : from its earliest settlement to the present > Part 38
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immense time great results are accomplished. River ter- races, far above the present channels of the streams, are found in many parts of the world, and are studied with interest and profit. They give us hints of former land- scapes. The gravel and bowlders, now buried under soil, tell us what manner of rocks were brought down by the ancient floods, and whether they were different then from those now carried down by the same streams.
There was a time when the valley which now lies be- tween Romney and the mountain on the other side of the river had not been scooped out. A plain level with Indian Mound cemetery then extended to the mountain west of the South branch-the bottom of that valley being about one hundred and seventy-five feet above the level of the present valley. It was no doubt a wide and beautiful plain but the evidence which remains is not sufficient to fix its exact boundaries or dimensions; nor to justify a conclusion as to its vegetable or animal life, except within certain wide limits. The ancient floor of that whole valley has been worn down and washed away, except one little frag- ment. This fragment is the terrace now occupied by Romney. The river has cut far below the ancient level; but the fragment of the old bottom.remains to show where the river once flowed.
What is the evidence of this? The position, slope and general appearance of the terrace suggest its origin; but the direct and positive proof that the river once flowed there, is found in the beds of rounded bowlders cov- ering the whole terrace. These bowlders are exactly like those found in the present bed of the river. Their rounded and polished surfaces show that they were rolled a long distance. They are typical water-worn bowlders, and cannot have any other origin. They rest upon the solid bedrock, and they are covered with several feet of soil. The solid rock was first cut out by the river. Next the bowlders accummulated. Then the river cut a deeper
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channel and left the beds of bowlders to be covered by soil. Any person who will follow the edge of the terrace, beginning at the ravine south of the cemetery, and passing northward for a mile, will find beds and layers of river bowlders exposed in many places, usually where the soil has been removed or cut through by smill ravines and gullies. Near the top of the grade where the North- western pike ascends the hill at the cemetery, the layer of bowlders is exposed, resting upon the shale.
On the south side of the ravine at the same point, and all the way to its head, where it has cut back in the ter- race, the bowlders are exposed to view. The covering of soil at that place is thin. A person would not need dig deep, anywhere in that vicinity, to find river bowlders and gravel. In many parts of Romney wells and cisterns have been dug through beds of bowlders. In one place a well passed nearly fifty feet through soil, gravel and bowlders before the betrock wis reached. From the cemetery northward, along the bluff for a mile, bowlders are found in layers between the soil and bed rock. In many places they have rolled down and have covered the face of the bluff from top to bottom. There are a few places, how- ever, where bowlders are not found in large quantities; and some of the wells and cisterns in Romney reached bed- rock without encountering many. This exception to the rule is not difficult of explanation. At the present day the river deposits gravel and bowlders more bountifully in some portions of the bottom-lands than in others. It did likewise in ancient time.
. The Romney terrace is not horizontal. It slopes from its highest part, near the cemetery, northward about one mile, reaching a much lower level. It seems to have orig- inally been a series of terraces, one above the other, de- scending like steps in the direction of the flow of the river. But the erosion which has taken place, and the cross-cut- ting by ravines and gullies, have obliterated the dividing
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lines between the different planes, if such ever existed, and at present the whole terrace, from north to south, has. a general and uniform slope, much cut by gullies and ravines, but still appearing from a distance as if it were one unbroken, oblique plane. The probable explanation of the obliqueness of the terrace-its slope toward the north-is that the higher portion, where Romney stands, is oldest. The river having cut out that part-a platform in the side of the mountain-sank to a lower level, leaving the platform dry, and cutting another a little further down stream and a little lower; thus continuing one after another until the whole series was done. Since then the South branch has continued to lower its bed, cutting deeper and deeper into the bedrock, until it is found today almost two hundred feet below where it flowed when it cut the highest part of the Romney terrace.
An examination of the bowlders which cover the terrace shows that the were, in most cases, brought from a great distance. They were all carried to their present resting place by the South branch; and a comparison with the for- mations up the river warrants the conclusion that many of the bowlders came from the present limits of Pendleton county. The swift current of the river transported them, rolling them along the bottom until they found lodgment where they are today.
How long ago? The question cannot be answered. The time has been sufficient for the river to cut down through bedrock from the level of the cemetery to the present river- bed, and to widen the valley from hill to hill. The stream is probably still cutting deeper, and is certainly widening the valley. The evidence of this is open to every one who will inspect the almost perpendicular bluff north of the cemetery, where the river is undermining the terrace, and where the cliff of shale is constantly crumbling down. The. stream is eating its way across the terrace. It is cutting away the base, and the top falls down. By that process
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the valley is being widened. If the South branch continues to encroach upon the crumbling cliff, the time will come when the whole terrace on which Romney stands will be undermined and washed away. The work is rapid. The shale which forms the bluff is soft, and offers comparatively little resistance. That is, it perhaps is carried away twenty times as rapidly as would be possible with the sandstone and chert-lentel of the Hanging Rocks, four miles below. As the cliff crumbles down, now and then a bowlder is loosened from the gravelly subsoil on the brow of the precipice and falls to the bed of the river, nearly two hundred feet below. One cycle of that bowlder's history closes. It was originally torn from its native ledge, per- haps in Pendleton. It was then an angular rock. In the course of a few centuries it was rolled by the river, had its corners rounded, and found lodgment in the old channel of Romney terrace. There it was covered with soil; forests grew above it; ages passed; the river cut a deeper channel, undermined it, and it fell, to be rolled again, onward to- ward the Atlantic.
There are many fragments of river terraces along the South branch in more or less advanced stages of ruin. Some have almost disappeared; others are being under- mined and will ultimately be washed away. Without doubt many that formerly existed have been entirely destroyed by the ever-encroaching and never-resting river. It is a work of stupendous destruction. Miles of level uplands have been carried away. It has not been done by violent convulsions of nature, but quietly, ceaselessly, resistlessly, just as the present Romney terrace is being destroyed and obliterated by the river, which seems eternal when com- pared with the crumbling rocks and mountains which it has carried away.
To the east of the road leading from the bridge to Rom- ney lies a smaller river terrace, about one-half as high as the cemetery. This is more clearly defined and is more
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nearly level than the larger one. It is not so old as the up- per terrace, having been formed at a later period in the river's history.
The Levels .- In the northeastern part of Hampshire county is a region of fifteen or more square miles known as the Levels. It is a plateau, bounded on the north by the Potomac, on the east by Little Capon, on the west by the South branch, and on the south by the gradually rising ridges which skirt Jersey mountain. The average eleva- tion of the Levels is about one thousand feet above the sea, a little more in places, and in others a little less. Viewed from the standpoint of geology and geography, the district appears to be an old base-level of erosion. That is, it was once worn down until it was little higher than the beds of the three rivers which then, as now, washed its three sides. It was then the bottom lands, with some slight irregulari- ties, lying in the quadrilateral formed by the three rivers and the higher region of Jersey mountain. Long-continued rest at one altitude and never-ceasing erosion had worn down all the irregularities and made the district level. Without doubt the chief cause for the uniform surface over the area was the soft rock formation which underlies it. The rock is red shale, and it has comparatively little power to resist the action of the elements, rain, frost and wind; and consequently all wore down at a uniform rate and reached the same plane; while the harder rocks of the mountains beyond its borders resisted more successfully the wear and tear, and remained at greater altitudes, with more irregular outlines.
After the Levels had worn down nearly or quite to the plane of the rivers, there was an elevation of the land. The whole region rose together and became much higher than it was. The beds of the rivers of course rose with the land. But they continued to cut deeper, and have now reached a depth nearly or quite five hundred feet below the plateau. The bluff from the border of this upland
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plain, down to the present channels of the three rivers is, in many places, very steep, and in a few places quite precip- itous. Since the elevation took place, the erosive forces have been busy with the plateau. It has been cut with ravines all round the borders where the rainfall on the plateau flows over the brink of the bordering bluff to reach the rivers below. These ravines are deeper and steeper where they descend the bluff; gradually becoming sballower and wider as they are followed toward their sources near the center of the upland plain. The re- sult is, the Levels have the general appearance of a rolling prairie, the water courses being wide, shallow troughs, and the intervening ridges low, with graceful outlines and reg- ular curves. One may here observe the first stages in the process by which plateaus are gradually cut to pieces and destroyed by flowing water. The work has but lately be- gun, when compared with the much more ancient results of erosion in the county. Future ages will see the Levels very different from what they are now. The ravines which have already cut deep into the bordering bluffs, will, as the ages glide away, cut deeper and work their way fur- ther back toward the center of the plateau, until the whole region will become a network of deep canons and steep hills, and ultimately, but very gradually, the face of the country will change and will wear away, becoming a hilly district instead of a nearly level upland.
The result will be brought about by the irresistible but inconceivable slow process which, in the unmeasured past, have chiseled continents, worn away mountains, widened valleys, and changed again and again the face of the whole world. No man knows how long will be the time required to cut away that five-hundred foot plateau and bring it down to the level of the present bed of the Potomac. The best geologist will not risk an estimate in years. But that the ages to come will be sufficiently long to accomplish that result admits of no doubt. The past eras have been long
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enough to accomplish greater results in the same place; for the unerring and indubitable records of geology, written in the rocks, soils and sands about us, show that from the top of that same plateau, the Levels, there have already been stripped no less than seven thousand feet of rock, which once were piled stratum on stratum, and if now replaced would reach to the clouds. That stupendous work of destruction has been accomplished since the close of the Carboniferous age, one of the recent eras of geology.
Why Hampshire Has No Coal .- All theories and the deductions from all experience teach that Hamp- shire county has no coal in commercial quantities. For a century, from time to time, explorations have been made, and in some instances money has been spent in digging, and always with the result that prospects fail to material- ize. To the observer who is guided solely by local appear- ances, there are places which promise to yield coal; but a knowledge of the conditions under which coal is always found, and outside of which conditions it is never found, makes it plain that this valuable product of the earth is not to be expected in Hampshire county. A brief explanation of what these conditions are will be given, after stating that coal is to be looked for only in rocks of the Carbonif- erous age. It is not found in paying quantities in older formations; and good coal is seldom or never found in newer formations. .
Geologists segregate the rocks on the earth into great groups, called ages, the rocks of each age having some- thing in common-usually fossils-to distinguish them. The oldest rocks lie deepest, the next oldest on top of them, thus ascending, layer on layer, until the highest and newest are reached. The clastic rocks-those in layers and which can be taken to pieces without breaking them- begin with the Algonkian age, the oldest. On these lie the rocks of the Cambrian age, next to the oldest. Third comes the Silurian age; then the Devonian age; and next is
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the Carboniferous age. There are later ages, but none of them ever had any representative rocks in this part of West Virginia, and it is not necessary to consider them. the oldest two ages-the Algonkian and Cambrian-are buried so deeply in this part of West Virginia that they have never been seen. Therefore, the only ages now rep- resented in Hampshire are the Silurian and the Devonian. The Carboniferous rocks once were represented here. The rocks of each of these ages have a great thickness. It cannot be stated exactly how thick they are in Hamp- shire. They vary in thickness in different parts of the country. But partial measurements and estimates based on measurements elsewhere, indicate that the rocks of the Silurian age are thirty-five hundred feet thick, underlying Hampshire. More complete measurements show that the rocks of the Devonian age, resting upon the Silurian, are no less than sixty-six hundred feet thick.
If this is not plain already, it may be further explained that the rocks were formed on the sea bottom, layer upon layer, spread out flat. When these layers were piled up until their aggregate was thirty-five hundred feet thick, that completed the Silurian age. Then other rocks, layer on layer, were deposited on top of the Silurian rocks, and these newer strata reached a thickness of sixty-six hun- dred feet. That closed the Devonian age. But in all the rocks thus far formed there was no coal. Then came the Carboniferous age. Layers of rocks, aggregating thous- ands of feet in thickness, were deposited on top of the De- vonian. At intervals, and in certain localities, beds of coal were formed among the layers of the Carboniferous rocks. The material of which the coal was formed was always de- posited on top, and then was covered by a new stratum of rock. It is believed that the positions and the sequence of formation of the rocks are now sufficiently plain to render easily understood the reason why Hampshire has no coal. It is simply because there are no rocks of the Carbonifer-
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ous age in the county. The formations all belong to the Silurian and Devonian ages, and they have no coal. They never had any and never will have any. In the first part of this book is a chapter dealing with West Virginia's geol- ogy, and the reader who cares to do so, may refer to that for additional facts and conclusions.
Did Hampshire ever have coal? There is no positive evidence that it ever had any, but the probability is that it once had as much coal as the counties lying west. The reason why it now has none is because the rocks of the Carboniferous age, which once rested upon the Devonian, and if now restored would extend across the county far above the tops of the present mountains, have all been stripped off and washed away. They once formed the surface of the ground here; but the vast number of years since then has been sufficient to wear away the last pebble of the once enormous strata. The veins of coal which probably were sandwiched in among the rocks, have all been ground to pieces, broken up and washed into the At- lantic ocean. The South branch, Capon, North river, and all the tributary streams were the agents by which this pulverized rock was carried away. These rivers have been at work for millions of years carrying back to the sea the sand and pebbles worn and broken from the mountains of Hampshire. They are at work now the same as then. They are the mills of the gods; they grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine.
The work of denudation which has been done, even in the small space of Hampshire county, appalls the imagina- tion. It seems impossible. Yet our reason compels us to believe it. Climb to the summit of some lofty eminence, as the writer of this has done-that conspicuous dome six miles southeast of Romney, rising with grandeur twenty- four hundred feet, fertile and cultivated to the very top. From that lofty watch-tower, an a clear day, read the open book of geology and it will teach a useful lesson. The
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whole county lies below, and the eye can reach the rolling hills and sequestered valleys of four states. Far off to- ward the west stretch the Alleghanies, which seem eternal; farther away in the east the regular and unbroken summit of the Blue Ridge meets the sky which bends above the valley of Virginia. Toward the north the mountains of Maryland and Pennsylvania are crowded together in beau- tiful confusion. In the south, mountains are piled on moun- tains as far as the eye can reach. But it is not the study of distant objects which now claims attention, but of the landscape near at hand, all cut and scarred, furrowed and trenched, until the original form of the land can scarcely be restored, even in fancy. Yet there was a time when not one of those valleys had an existence; not one of those rocks, hills or cliffs had ever seen the light of day. Every object on which the eye now rests was buried thousands of feet beneath the vast beds of the Carboniferous rocks which then rested upon them. The only feature of that ancient land which would now seem familiar, if we could see it, were the rivers. They were flowing then. They were cutting channels and valleys in the Carboniferous formations. They were carrying the spoil to the sea. The sand was being worn from the surface of the ground, and age after age the surface of the country changed. The streams cut deeper; the valleys widened; the hills became rounded in form. The merciless hand of erosion was laid heavily upon the land. The larger rivers finally cut en- tirely through the Carboniferous rocks and reached the upper layers of the Devonian. Then all the streams cut through the Carboniferous formations and the intervening hills were worn down and washed out to sea as sand, and at length the last vestige of Carboniferous rock had been stripped off and was gone. Hampshire's coal went too. The Carboniferous rocks were worn further and further back toward the Alleghanies, until today the edges of those vast strata may be seen sticking out of the side of that
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range, reminding one of a remnant of ice adhering to the bank after that which once crossed the entire stream has been broken up and washed away.
The work of erosion and denudation is going on now as rapidly as ever. The Carboniferous formations are gone; the Devonian rocks are going. The vastness of the work of destruction may be viewed from the summit of the mountain. On every side, in every direction, lie valleys, ravines and gorges. Each of them is the trench cut by some stream. The South branch, which lies in full view from one end of the county to the other, has cut entirely through the sixty-six hundred feet of Devonian strata, and is now attacking the upper layer of the subjacent Silurian. Beyond Mill creek mountain the wide, irregular valleys of Mill creek and Patterson creek show the work of erosion there. The rounding hills and intervening vales between the Mill creek mountain and Knobby, ten miles further west, are witnesses to the work of destruction, the grind- ing down of all the sharp angles of the hills, the scooping out of the valleys, the havoc of frost and rain, of flood and wind, throughout the unnumbered centuries of the past. It is the same in every direction. Trout run, a mere brook, with its source near the Hardy county line, lies in full view from head to mouth. It flows as straight as an arrow from its source, northward several miles, between two mountains, one of which is the highest in Hampshire county, thirty-one hundred feet. Then it turns to the west and reaches the South branch. That small stream has scooped out a ravine more than one thousand feet deep, several miles long, and two miles wide across the top, from summit to summit of the mountains between which it flows. This ravine lies entirely in Devonian rocks; but before the brook began the work which is now visible, it first cut through and carried away the thousands of feet of Carbon- iferous rocks which lay above the Devonian. The same may be said of the other ravines and valleys to the east and 36
DAVID H. HEFLEBOWER.
31
ANDREW WODROW KERCHEVAL.
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR LENOX AND ELDEN FOUNDATION
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south, and of Grassy Lick and Tearcoat in particular. Fully one-half, perhaps much more than one-half, of the Devonian rocks which once covered Hampshire has already been stripped off. The time will come when these rocks will all disappear, as has been the case with the Carbonif- erous rocks which once rested upon them. Then the forces of erosion will commence upon the Silurian formations, and when the Silurian has been stripped off, the same forces will attack the still lower Cambrian; then the underlying Algonkian; and finally, when that shall have shared the same fate, the attack will be made upon the lowest of all, the Archæan rocks, which have no bottom that has ever been reached, but are supposed to extend so deeply that their lower portions rest upon the fused or plastic interior of the earth.
The belief is common among some people, in Hampshire as elsewhere, that coal may be found "by going deep enough." This is a false doctrine. In some parts of the world coal is reached by deep shafts, but that is because the Carboniferous rocks lie beneath the surface. In Hamp- shire the Carboniferous rocks and their coal veins, if they still existed, would be found overhead, somewhere near the present clouds. It is, therefore, plain that the deeper into the earth one goes in Hampshire the further he is from coal. He is digging away from it rather than toward it.
The statement has been made, and no doubt truthfully, that coal has actually been found in Hampshire county. In the first part of this article it will be remembered that the writer always qualified his assertion that no coal ex- ists in rocks older than the Carboniferous, by saying that it does not exist in "commercial quantities," or "paying quantities." Why this qualifying term was used will now be explained. Small and worthless seams and streaks of coal are frequently found in rocks older than the Carbon- iferous; and it is not uncommon to find beds of what is called "carbonaceous shale," which occasionally will burn
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in an imperfect manner. But all efforts to develop such deposits and make them valuable, result in failure, because they are either too limited in extent or too poor in quality. Coal, as is well known, is formed of vegetation. Vast quan- tities were required to make thick and good veins. The climate and other conditions of the earth were not suited to luxuriant vegetation until the Carboniferous age. When that age came, coal was formed, usually in vast swamps. near the sea level, where the accumulation of trees, leaves and plants of many kinds formed beds of great thickness. But before that time there had been comparatively little vegetation, and there could be only thin seams of coal. Carbonaceous shale was made of a mixture of mud and ac- cumulated vegetation. If there was only a small amount of vegetable matter present, the shale is probably black in color, but with little other resemblance to coal. If vegeta- ble matter was more abundant, the shale may now contain enough of it to burn imperfectly. But, in any case, these deposits are nearly or quite valueless. They excite but never satisfy the hopes of the prospector.
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