USA > West Virginia > Monongalia County > History of Monongalia County, West Virginia, from its first settlements to the present time; with numerous biographical and family sketches > Part 8
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HISTORY OF MONONGALIA COUNTY.
of water in the Monongahela River was a serious drawback to water-carriage. Hence, efforts were early made to better the condition of the existing roads and to secure new ones. At the same time attention was directed towards the increas- ing of the navigableness of the Monongahela.
The General Assembly of the State, on the 27th of Jan- uary, 1812, passed an act for the opening of a road from the Monongalia Glades (now in Preston County) to the mouth of Buffalo, and thence to the site of New Martinsville on the Ohio River, there to meet a road opening from Zanes- ville, Ohio. The act appropriated a part of the county revenues of 1812 for the purpose. This road . being deemed the nearest and best way from the northern part of the State to the State of Ohio and the adjoining country, in the same month of the next year-the 29th of January, 1813-an additional appropriation was made for its con- struction. It was projected with a view to open up northern Virginia, connect the interests of the eastern and western parts of the Commonwealth, and to secure commercial intercourse between the inhabitants of Ohio and adjoining territories and those of Eastern Virginia. Over this road salt and like commodities could be brought into Monongalia County by a land carriage of fifty miles from New Martins- ville, while before from this point they had to come around by Pittsburgh to Morgantown, a distance of 260 miles, or else go to Winchester. John S. Barnes and William Willey were commissioners on this road, which, however, never fulfilled the expectations of its projectors. The Northwest- ern Turnpike, which passed by Smithtown, afterward became the great avenue of trade and travel. An academy was in- corporated in 1814, and the town of Granville (two miles from Morgantown on the river) was established. Public
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attention was still engaged upon the object of securing an outlet to the world, to quicken the industries of the county by safe and cheap transportation ; and an effort in this line was made January 2, 1817, by the incorporation of the Monongahela Navigation Company.
The census of 1820 exhibited a falling off of 2,000 in the population of the county ; but adding the 3,000 inhabitants of Preston taken off two years before, and a gain of 1,000 is shown, of which the Monongalia of 1820 was entitled to fully one-half. Besides, immigration naturally decreased as the county filled up, and her industries, for want of market, could not reach that state of development necessary to attract any considerable number of the laboring and com- mercial classes from abroad.
Some changes having been secured in the charter of the Monongahela Navigation Company in 1821, a meeting was held, October 27, 1823, at the court-house, and T. S. Hay- mond, C. S. Morgan, A. P. Wilson, Thomas P. Ray and J. T. Dougherty were appointed to attend a meeting to be held at Washington on November 6th, for the purpose of considering the question of securing the connection of the eastern and western waters of Virginia by a canal.
It was estimated that, during the year 1826, ten thousand dollars' worth of cattle and hogs was sold by the people of the county.
On Sunday, April 29, of this year, the first steamboat came up to Morgantown. It was the Reindeer, commanded by Captain Bennett, and came to just below the town.
In November, Thomas P. Ray and A. P. Wilson attended another canal convention. All efforts to secure slack water navigation had failed.
The census of 1830 showed an increase of 3,000 white
.
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population since 1820. On the 3d of February, 1830, Blacks- ville was established as a town. A meeting was held at the court-house on the 28th of May, and a committee was ap- pointed to secure the establishment of a mail-route, over which mail would be carried semi-weekly in stages, from Uniontown, via Morgantown and Clarksburg, to Parkersburg.
On the 23d of March, 1831, the trustees of the Monon- galia Academy, by act of Assembly, were authorized to sell a lot and establish a female academy, which they did the next year. In it and in the Monongalia Academy, incorpo- rated January 28, 1829, for years afterward, were educated not only many of the sons and daughters of Monongalia, but many also from abroad.
During 1832, the Maryland and Ohio Turnpike, which was to pass through the county, received considerable at- tention. The trustees of the road were authorized by act of the Assembly passed January 21st, to raise $100,000 by lottery to construct it. An act of the Assembly, passed the 25th of February, provided for the opening and improving of the navigation of the Monongahela River in Monongalia County, and a committee was appointed to raise $20,000 for this purpose. Col. Johnson, on the 9th of March, started a line of four-horse stages to run between Uniontown and Morgantown. January 14, 1883, was passed an act by the Assembly, authorizing the holding of a lottery to raise the sum of $50,000 to construct wharves at Morgantown. This, however, was never done. In 1834, mails were carried tri- weekly in two-horse stages, from Uniontown, via Morgan- town, to Clarksburg.
During the next year the subject of turnpike-roads occu- pied considerable attention; and, in 1836, through the exertions of Thomas P. Ray and others, the State directed
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an engineer to survey the Brandonville and Fishing Creek Turnpike, which was a portion of the Maryland and Ohio Turnpike; and efforts were made during the next two years to push forward the construction of this turnpike. The Assembly incorporated the Dunkard Creek Turnpike Com- pany and the Morgantown and Clarksburg Turnpike Company in 1839. The latter company was formed to build a road by way of Morgantown and Ice's Ferry to the Pennsylvania State line. Also, in this year the county court was empowered to borrow $10,000, to build bridges and aid in making internal improvements. During 1840 the locating and constructing of turnpikes engaged public attention. Among the most active workers was Thomas P. Ray, clerk of the circuit court. Ellicott's rolling-mill at Ice's, Ferry, on Cheat River, commenced work this year, employing many hands, and giving a new impetus to business in the county. The white population was now nearly 17,000, an increase of over 3,000 since 1830. A . meeting was held at the court-house, November 23d, to secure signers to a petition praying the legislature to pass an act to provide slack-water navigation. An act of Assem- bly was passed March 10th, 1847, incorporating the " Mo- nongahela Navigation Company," and on the 19th another act, empowering this company to increase its capital and improve Cheat River, was passed. On the 13th the Dunk- ard Creek Turnpike project of 1839 was revived.
An unwise opposition in Monongalia contributed to some extent to losing the location of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad through the county and compelling its construction through Marion County .* This failure was a bar to her
* Monongalla is not to be too strongly censured for her early opposition to railroads. In that day their advantages were little understood, and the most erroneous ideas
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HISTORY OF MONONGALIA COUNTY.
future progress. The construction of the road through the county would have given life and success to many of the since-attempted enterprises, and ushered into birth many never yet contemplated. The development of its material resources and the establishment of numerous branches of industry would have stayed the emigration from the county to the prairie lands of the Great West. Remaining in her isolation, Monongalia has seen herself outstripped in the race for population and wealth by her daughters lying upon the line of the great railway.
The loss of the location of the Baltimore and Ohio Rail- railroad through Monongalia did not discourage her enterprising citizens who had been projecting and securing
prevailed concerning these new roads-ideas ludicrous enough indeed in the light of this age. As an example of these, we quote the following from the reminiscences of the Rev. Mr. Hanna, published in the Waynesburg (Penna.) Independent : "The Balti- more and Ohio Railroad had been completed to Cumberland, Md., and her representa- tives came knocking at the door of the Pennsylvania Legislature asking the right of way through this immediate neighborhood. But oh! the wisdom of the citizens of Fayette and Greene counties, through which the road was expected to pass. Instead of hailing the proposition with delight and receiving the representatives with open arms, they rise up in fierce opposition. R. T. Galoway, of Uniontown, and Dr. J. C .. Cummings, of Connellsville, were the representatives of Fayette County in the State Legislature at the time. These men were possessed of sufficient intelligence to know that the railroad could not be permanently halted at Cumberland. Not so the people. I listened to the sophistical arguments of some of the demagogues of that day, in which they asserted that the iron horse could not eat oats or corn. ' Let us just com- pel them to stop at Cumberland, and then all the goods will be wagoned through our country, all the hogs will be fed with our corn and the horses with our oats. Go away with your railroad ! We don't want our wives and children frightened to death by the screaming of the locomotive. We don't want our hogs and cows run over and killed by the cars of a soulless corporation.' Meetings were held and instructions formulated and forwarded to the representatives in the Legislature warning them of the fearful precipice on which they were standing, and notified them of the all-important fact that the people had a heavy rod in soak for them, if they dared to violate the will of their constituents. These men did in part violate the instructions and reaped the bitter consequences. But how were the applicants treated ? They received a negative an- swer. The Baltimore and Ohio Company built their road over the almost impassable mountains of Virginia, almost touching Pennsylvania at the south-west corner of Greene County, leaving the regions that had said 'no,' to reap the consequences of their folly, while that proud, imperious company 'sits and laughs at their calamity.'"
Mr. Hanna does not overdraw the picture. The excitement was intense and all-ab- sorbing. Large meetings of the citizens gathered at the country school-houses, whereat the subject was warmly discussed. Resolutions of opposition were passed at almost if not quite all these meetings with great unanimity. Thus Monongalia was not alone in an act which time has demonstrated to have been one of very great folly.
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the construction of turnpikes, and who had hoped to see the railroad built through the county. They conceived the idea of constructing a railway from the Pennsylvania line, by the way of Morgantown, to intersect the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at or near the town of Independence, in Preston County; and the General Assembly, November 30, 1852, through the exertions of Maj. William B. Zinn, of Preston County, and others, passed an act incorporting " The Morgantown and Independence Railroad Company." Its capital stock was to be $200,000, divided into shares of $25 each. It was provided that books of subscription should be opened at Morgantown by John Hanway, Will- iam Lazier, Nicholas Pickenpaugh and James Evans, and at Kingwood by William G. Brown, John P. Byrne, Elisha M. Hagans and John A. Dille; that when the sum of $50,000 was subscribed, the company was to be organized, and that the work of constructing the road was to begin by the year 1857. The necessary amount of subscriptions could not be obtained, and work was never begun.
The next railway project was that of a road from the Pennsylvania line where the Monongahela crosses it, by way of Morgantown, to Ravenswood, Jackson County. An act incorporating "The Monongahela and Ravenswood Railroad Company" was passed February 27, 1857. The act fixed the capital stock of the company at $4,000,000, in shares of $100. At a meeting held at Morgantown on April 24th, one hundred and forty delegates were appointed to attend a convention at Fairmont, June 15th, in the inter- est of this project. This road, however, never got beyond the paper stage.
In 1865, on the 6th of March, the "Monongahela and Lewisburg Railway Company" was incorporated. The
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HISTORY OF MONONGALIA COUNTY.
object was the building of a railroad from a point on the Pennsylvania State line, by Morgantown, to or near the town of Lewisburg, in Greenbrier County. Capital stock, $5,000,000 ; shares, $50 each. A period of four years was allowed to receive subscriptions and begin the work of building the road. A large meeting was held at Fairmont, November 4th ; but the enterprise, like all its predecessors, amounted to a "paper railway" only. Among the stock- holders were James Evans, William Lazier, Henry Dering, D. H. Chadwick, B. F. Smith, George M. Hagans, William Wagner, William A. Hanway, Samuel Sears, Alfred and S. S. Yeager, Amos Courtney, E. C. Bunker, W. T. Willey and James McClaskey, of Monongalia County.
An act authorizing the Monongahela Valley Railroad Company, of Pennsylvania, to construct a railway from the State line on the Monongahela River, by Morgantown, to a point on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at or near Fair- mont, was passed March 3, 1868. The work was to com- mence in three years and the road to be completed in ten years. This road, too, was exclusively a paper one.
The year 1869 opened with another attempt to get a railway through the county. The Legislature, February 18th, passed an act empowering the townships east of the Monongahela, severally or jointly, to subscribe stock, by vote of the people, not exceeding $200,000, to " The Union- town and West Virginia Railroad," a corporation chartered in Pennsylvania. An election, accordingly, was held in Union and Morgan townships, May 17th, the result of which was adverse to the subscription. The enterprise, however, was not abandoned ; and a meeting in the interest of the project was held at Morgantown, December 26th, which adjourned to a future day. It re-assembled on the
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8th of January, 1870, and proposed that the townships of Union, Morgan, and Clinton vote $110,000 to the road, and that individual subscriptions to the amount of $10,000 be raised. The route of this road crossed Cheat near Ice's Ferry, passed through Morgantown, and thence south- ward. The town of Morgantown granted this road the right of way through its corporate limits.
On the 15th of February, 1870, the Legislature renewed and amended the charter of the " West Virginia Central Railway Company." This road was to begin on the Penn- sylvania line in Preston County, and extend thence to Charleston, Kanawha County. This act gave it the right to construct its road by the best route, from the State line in Preston or Monongalia.
The Legislature, in the same year, on the 25th of Feb- ruary, passed an act which granted to the Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railroad Company the privilege of extending its road across West Virginia. All the rights granted to the Monongahela Valley and the Greenbrier and Tygart's Valley railroads were revived and re-enacted, and the benefits thereof transferred to the Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railroad. The work of constructing the road was to be commenced within three years, and be finished within ten years. At a meeting held in aid of this road, at Fairmont in April, A. G. Davis, of Monongalia, was appointed to confer with the parties in Pennsylvania interested in the project.
All hope of the extension of the Uniontown and West Virginia Railway through Monongalia having been aban- doned, the Legislature was asked to pass an act incorpo- rating "The Pennsylvania and West Virginia Railway Company," which it did on the second of March, 1870.
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HISTORY OF MONONGALIA COUNTY.
This company's railway was to begin at a point at or near where Ruble's Run crosses the Pennsylvania and West Virginia State line, and thence pass by Morgantown to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad at or east of Grafton. The capital stock was to be $1,500,000, in shares of $50 each. . The county or the townships were authorized to subscribe stock. When five hundred shares had been taken, the cor- porators* were to organize. The road was to be commenced by 1876, and be completed by 1879.
During 1870 another railroad was projected from the Pennsylvania line via Morgantown, Fairmont, Clarksburg and Charleston, to some point in Wayne County on the Kentucky and West Virginia line. This road was incorpo- rated February 26th, as the Northern and Southern West Virginia Railroad. Among the corporators were George C. Sturgiss, William A. Hanway, John J. Brown, D. H. Chadwick and William Price. The capital stock author- ized was $5,000,000, in shares of $100 each. The next year the charter was amended on the 28th of February, increasing the capital stock from $5,000,000 to $10,000,000, and providing that the road was to be commenced within two, and finished within ten, years. Meetings in the inter- est of this project were held at the court-house, April 15th and August 21st. George C. Sturgiss was appointed to solicit subscriptions to the amount of $100,000. This company organized at Clarksburg, October 31, 1871, at which time $300,000 of the stock had been sub- scribed for; $40,000 by persons in this State and the balance
* W. T. Willey, D. H. Chadwick, Wm. Wagner, Samuel Sears, Geo. M. Hagans, James Fisk, Jr., H. B. Lazier, Wm. R. Griffith, John J. Brown, J. M. Hagans, John H. Hoff- man, E. H. Coombs, A. L. Wade, George W. Brown, John W. Mason, R. W. Blue, A. D. Casteel and Reuben Davisson.
WILLIAM SANFORD COBUN. See Page 354.
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by capitalists of New York City. The subscriptions raised in Monongalia were not put in as stock. Officers of the company were elected December 2, 1871. The Pennsyl- vania Central Railroad had surveyed the route of this road from the Pennsylvania line to Morgantown, and the com- pany had surveyed it as far north as Weston, Lewis County. On the 20th of February, 1872, the company was authorized to increase its capital stock to $12,000,000. At a meeting of the projectors held at Charleston in March, Col. Thomas Scott of the Pennsylvania Central proposed that his com- pany would construct the road if West Virginia would raise $1,000,000. A division of this sum among the several counties directly interested in the construction of the road was made, and $175,000 was apportioned to Monongalia.
On the 28th of February, 1871, an act was passed authorizing George Hardman and D. Randolph Martin to extend the Iron Valley Railroad from Irondale, Preston County, by Morgantown, to the Pennsylvania State line.
There was considerable agitation in 1875, of the project of building a railway from Waynesburg, Penn., through western Monongalia to Mannington, Marion County. A meeting in the interest of the scheme was held at Man- nington.
All the many laudable efforts to secure a railway through the county having failed owing to the impossibility of securing the necessary capital, in 1877 attention was di- rected to the narrow-gauge railway. These roads are usually of three-foot gauge, while the standard-gauge is nearly two feet wider. The narrow-gauge admits of the close fitting of the road-bed to the contour of the ground; and thereby is made a great saving in the cost of the road- bed. Considerable, too, is saved in the smaller cross-ties 8
114 HISTORY OF MONONGALIA COUNTY.
and lighter rails. Steeper grades than can be used on the standard-gauge are practicable; and this, with the closer fitting of the narrow-gauge to the contour of the ground, saves distance. As the difference between the cost of the narrow-gauge and the standard-gauge increases in favor of the former in proportion to the roughness of the country, it would seem that the narrow-gauge is a railway peculiarly adapted to the mountain regions of West Virginia. At this time the people of Kingwood and neighborhood (Preston County) were agitating the project of connecting Kingwood with Morgantown by a narrow-gauge road, and thence with Pittsburgh by the Monongahela. A meeting at Kingwood appointed a committee to confer with the people of Mor- gantown. Accordingly, a meeting was called to assemble at the court-house in Morgantown, August 30th. There were present at this meeting from Kingwood, Robert W. Monroe, Wm. M. O. Dawson, J. Ami Martin, John Barton Payne and Charles E. Brown. The Hon. W. T. Willey was elected chairman and Henry M. Morgan secretary. Ad- dresses were made by Messrs. Willey, Dawson, Payne, George C. Sturgiss, Monroe, Charles E. Brown and John J. Brown. A committee consisting of the Hon. W. T. Willey, George Hall, Joseph Moreland, John J. Brown, Ashbel Fairchild, George C. Sturgiss and Henry M. Morgan was appointed to confer with the Preston County committee.
The attention of the people of Monongalia was next turned to the Pittsburgh, Castle Shannon and Washington Narrow-Gauge Railroad. The object was to get an exten- sion of this railway, by way of Mt. Morris (Greene County, Penn.) and Morgantown, to some point on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. A meeting. was held at the court-house, November 3, 1877. The company owning
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the above-named railway proposed to the meeting that they would extend and operate their road to Morgantown, and thence to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, if the people along the route would subscribe, in money or labor, an amount sufficient to grade the way, build the bridges and furnish the cross-ties.
The meeting appointed a committee to solicit subscrip- tions. Three thousand dollars were subscribed by those present at the meeting. The name of the road was changed, in 1878, to the Pittsburgh, West Virginia and Southern Narrow-Gauge Railroad ; and on the 31st of January, at a meeting held at Grafton, George C. Sturgiss was appointed general manager of the enterprise in West Virginia. The road was to run from some point in Cass District, by way of Morgantown, to Grafton. The people along the route were asked to subscribe $3,000 for each mile of the road. Meetings were held at Maidsville and Cassville, and one at the court-house on March 16th, where $11,000 were sub- scribed. On June 14th, Morgan District, by a vote of four hundred and sixty-seven to six, subscribed $20,000 to aid in the construction of the road through her territory. Novem- ber 9, 1878, Cass District voted on a proposition to sub- scribe $15,000, and by a vote of one hundred and seven for and one hundred and twenty-three against, refused to con- tribute her portion; and thereby defeated the project in the end, as all efforts afterward failed to raise the amount by private subscription in the district. In the next year a corps of engineers, under N. McConaughty, surveyed the route of the road from Morgantown to the State line, and Dr. George P. Hayes, president of the company, addressed meetings in its interest at Morgantown and Cassville. In August, 1881, President Hopkins, of the Pittsburgh South-
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ern Railroad, was at Morgantown in the interest of the extension of that road, via Carmichael and Mt. Morris, to the State line and to Morgantown; thence south by the proposed Iron Valley and Morgantown Railroad.
The Southwest Pennsylvania Railroad-April, 1880- made an estimate of the probable cost of extending their road from Fairchance Furnace, Penn., to Morgantown. The estimated cost from the State line to Morgantown was $260,000. A bridge eighty-five feet high and 720 feet long, across Cheat, it was found, would have to be constructed. The company, owing to the cost, declined to make the extension.
Early in 1881, another railway was projected-The Iron Valley and Morgantown Railroad .* Its route was partly in the direction of that of the first railroad projected in the county, run in 1852 ; and of a later projected road in 1871. It was hoped that, by the early construction of this road, Morgantown would become the junction of the road up the Monongahela and down Elk River with the great road pro-
* The "Iron Valley and Morgantown Railroad Company " was incorporated by Col. Felix Nemegyie and Charles E. Kimball, of New York; J. N. Camden, of Parkersburg, John T. McGraw, of Grafton, and William C. McGrew and George C. Sturgiss, of Mor- gantown. The company was organized for the purpose of constructing a railroad from Hardman's Switch, a point on the B. & O. R. R., Preston County, "along the meanders of Three Fork Creek, to the Irondale Furnace, in the said county, and from said Irondale Furnace, along said creek, to the water shed between the said Three Fork Creek, and Decker's Creek, and from thence along and over the most practical route of the said last named creek to the town of Morgantown,"and "from Morgantown along the eastern shore of the Monongahela River to the Pennsylvania State line ;" or from Hardman's Switch to Morgantown through Preston, Taylor and Monongalia counties by any other route " found upon a survey to be practical and convenient." The articles of incorporation were filed with the Secretary of State March 1, 1881. The certificate of incorpration was admitted to record in Preston County March 21, and in Monongalia the next day. The corporation commenced its existence from the 15th of March, 1881. Capital stock, $600,000, with privilege to increase to $2,000,000, in shares of $50 each. The corporators organized September 19, 1881, at Sturgiss and Berkshire's law office. The directors were Daniel R. Davidson, James B. Young and Robert Pitcairn, of Pittsburgh ; William C. McGrew and George C. Sturgiss, of Mor- gantown ; Col. Felix Nemegyle, of New York ; and John W. Guseman, of Preston County. The officers elected were Daniel R. Davidson, president; William C. McGrew, 'vice president ; and George C. Sturgiss, secretary.
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