USA > West Virginia > Wood County > Sketches of Wood County : its early history : as embraced in and connected with other counties of West Virginia : also brief accounts of first settlers and their descendants : including accounts of its soils, timber, minerals, water, and material wealth > Part 2
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An Act of incorporation for this improvement was granted by the Legislature of West Virginia on the 28th day of January, 1866; and an Act amendatory thereto, on the 4th day of March, 1868. The work of improvement of the river under the provisions of these Acts, from the city of Parkersburg to Burning Springs in Wirt county, a distance of upwards of forty miles, was commenced in 1870 and 1871. The late General J. J. Jackson and the Hon. J. N. Camden have been the fast and firm friends in prosecuting this great work, and it is now open and in active operation from Parkersburg to Bu. ning Springs.
In 1851 the county of l'leasants was formed from Wood, Tyler and Ritchie. In its formation all the territory of Wood between Bull creek and Middle Island was taken. St. Mary's, situated on the Ohio below the mouth of Middle Island, was made the county seat. This county presents a fine body of land for agricultural enterprise. It has a coast on the Ohio river of about twenty- five miles, embracing rich and wide- spreading bottoms of the best of lands. Middle Island creek, with its fertile bottoms and uplands, divides this county into nearly two equal parts.
St. Mary's, the county seat, is pleasantly located on the Ohio river ; has a population of about 600. A Masonic, Odd Fellow and Encamp- ment Lodges are by Charters in active operation in the town ; also sev- eral churches and church edifices. In the Fall of 1877 a weekly news- paper was established, known as the Watch Word, edited by the Rev. F. M. Yates. This county is assuming a healthy and prosperous position among the Ohio river counties of the State.
In the formation of the four counties named above, since the year 1832, the county of Wood has lost nearly three-fourths of its original territory. Yet such has been its marvelous advancement in wealth and population, that it now has within its circumscribed boundaries an assess- able property of about $8,000,000, and a population of upwards of 20,- 000. And further, it may be said, that the new counties formed from her original territory have increased in like proportion.
Few portions of our common country laboring under so many disad- vantages, can boast of a more healthy advancement in all the material elements of wealth and prosperity than Wood county. Her original large territory has been taken away in the formation of these new coun- ties, until she now has only about 350 square miles.
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CHAPTER III.
COLONIAL SETTLEMENTS.
In the preceding Chapter we traced the divisions and subdivisions of Western and Northwestern Virginia into counties, as its increasing population demanded, and the spirit of enterprise pushed its settle- inents westward and northwestward from the Valley of Virginia. The Honse of Burgesses were active in their efforts to meet the necessities of these settlements, as they arose from time to time in its colonial history.
These divisions and subdivisions of counties in Western and North - western Virginia we traced from 1738, when the District of West Augusta was formed, down to the present boundaries of Wood county, showing in what name the territory of Wood county was included during those years.
We now turn back, and in a brief and general way, view and trace the history of the settlements from the first decades of the eighteenth century onward, under the influences and surrounding dangers of those times. . . .. ... \ -. ">!
In the carly part of the eighteenth century settlements were being made in the Shanandoah Valley and up the Eastern slopes of the Al- leghany mountains, and also up the valleys of the James and Roan -. oke rivers west of the Blue Ridge; also about the same period of time settlements were being made up that portion of Virginia generally known as the "Northern Neck."
The bold and enterprising pioneers who entered these primeval forests were subjected to various and adverse fortunes, hardships and sufferings from the frequent raids and incursions of the Indians; es- pecially from those inhabiting the Northwestern territory, whose war-paths extended up the two Kanawhas and Sandy rivers and through the forests of Kentucky. Owing to these untoward circum- stances the efforts then made to pass the barriers of the Alleghany mountains were failures, and were abandoned until about the year 1769, at which time there was a treaty, or a partial treaty of peace with these Indian tribes.
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FRENCH WAR.
Also, during the early part of the eighteenth century the French Government, under her rights of discovery, was putting forth strong and vigorous efforts to claim and hold her possessions in the valley of the great Mississippi and its tributary waters. Under the fostering care of that Government, stations or posts of trade were established among the numerous tribes of Indians then inhabiting the great Northwestern territory. These trading posts extended from the Canadas and the Northern lakes to the Ohio river, and from thence onward to the terri- tory of Louisiana. They also established and sustained a few settle- ments at different places within the territory thus claimed.
The House of Burgesses of Virginia, under her Collonial Charter' from the English Government, rejected this rival claim put forth by the French Government to any and all the territory of the Upper Missis- sippi. From time to time schemes were projected by the House of Bur- gesses for taking, holding and colonizing the same under the provisons of the grant specified in che Colonial Charter. But owing to the sparse population and her colonial weakness, she failed in her attempts to sustain these enteprises. . .
About the year 1750, the French Government established forts on the Upper Ohio river, and one at the junction of the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers, which she named Fort DuQuesne, which occupied the present site of the city of Pittsburg. . At that time about sixty miles of the western part of the territory now embraced in the State of Pennsyl- vania was claimed and supposed to belong to the Colony of Virginia.
Under the authority of the English Government, acting with the House of Burgesses of Virginia in 1754, General Braddock, at the head of an army, marched from Winchester, Va., to within .a few miles of Fort DuQuesne, where, after crossing the Monongahela river, he was ambushed and defeated by the Indians and lost his life. The retreat of the army was conducted by Col. George Washington. The object for capturing Fort DuQuesne from the French by the Virginia House of Burgesses was to settle and establish her claim in the Northwestern ter- ritory, and secure her settlements on the Ohio river and its tributaries against the devastations of the Indians and the claims of France.
During the war with the French Government in.1758, General Forbes, of Pennsylvania, made a successful movement and captured the Fort from the French and Indians, and held it until the close of that war, . and gave to it the name of Fort Pitt. After the close of that war in. 1765, by a treaty of peace, the French Government relinquished all her claims to the lands in the Northwestern territory .. But the war spirit of the Indians, who had been their confederates and allies during that war, still survived and manifested itself in frequent raids upon the Virginia Colony until 1769, when a treaty of peace was concluded with them.
From thence during a comparative peace with these Indian tribes of two or three years, the hardy and enterprising yeomanry of Virginia and other Southern Colonies again pushed forward their settlements
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INDIAN WAR
Northward and Westward. In 1769, 1770 and 1771, settlements were extended further up the James and Roanoke rivers, and also over on the Greenbrier and New rivers, and also on the Monongahela river and its tributaries, and down the Ohio river as far as Wheeling and Grave creek.
The contest growing out of the dissatisfaction of the American Col- onies with Great Britain, the mother country, was then rapidly approach- ing. The deep ground swell of discontent and rebellion was agitating the colonial legislatures in all parts of the country ; a full knowledge of which was communicated to the Indian tribes of the Northwestern ter- ritory by British fur traders and agents who had taken the place of the French traders, causing these tribes to become restless and warlike, thereby making it necessary for the Colony of Virginia to raise troops and send northwest for the safety and protection of her settlements. .
In the summer of 1774, steps were taken by the House of Burgess- es of Virginia to raise two divisions-one under the command of Lord DuL. . re, Governor of Va., to march to Fort Pitt, the other un- der the command of Gen'l. Andrew Lewis, to march to the mouth of the Big Kanawha. It was arranged that he would there be joined by a detachment from Fort Pitt, with ammunition and supplies, early in October. But Gov. Dunmore, at Fort Pitt, remained strangely in- active, and, for some eause not fully accounted for, seut no supplies or ammunition to Gen'l. Lewis. (He however marched down the Ohio river as far as Big Hoeking. There he stopped and erected a Fort. . From there, he marched to near Chilicothe, and met the great Chief- tain, Cornstock, and, coneluded a partial peace with him, and returned to Virginia, on the winter following.) On the morning of the 11th of October; 1774, Gen'l. Lewis found himself and his little army sur- rounded by the Shawnee Indian tribes, headed and led on by that . fearless Indian monarch and warrior, the celebrated Cornstalk. The battle which followed was long, fieree and bloody, lasting the entire day. The great Chief was in the thickest of the fight, cheering his men by word and deed. As night came on Cornstalk called off his forees, gave up the battle, and retreated across the Ohio. Gen'l. Lewis being left in possession of the ground, soon after erected a Fort, which was afterwards held and garrisoned for the purpose of intersecting the Indian war-path up the Valley of the Big Kanawha, and thereby giving protection to the inland settlements of Virginia, and securing its border territory.
The strange course and policy pursued by Gov. Dunmore towards Gen'l. Lewis, in relation to this battle, and the circumstances conneet- ed with his meeting with Cornstalk and his Chiefs in their territory without suitable protection, and the hasty treaty of peace then made with the Shawnee nation furnish strong evidence for the belief that Gov. Dunmore was in possession of the policy then being pursned by : the British Government in the formation of alliances with these Iu- dian tribes, preparatory to the war then approaching. The course
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1774. BATTLE AT POINT PLEASANT.
he then pursued, taken in connection with his subsequent aets as Gover- nor, leads to this eonelusion. Viewing the approaching contest of the Revolutionary War from this standpoint, makes the battle of General Lewis, at Point Pleasant, on the 11th day of October, 1774, the first bat- tle fought for American independence. It removes the commencement of that great struggle for liberty and independence from Lexington and Concord, in the State of Massachusetts, to the valley of the Ohio river, in the District of West Augusta. It was at Point Pleasant, on the 11th day of October, 1774, where the Virginia forees inet and conquered these savage allies of the British Government, and thus gained the first vietory for American independence. Let a monument to the memory of those brave men be there erected to commemorate that first battle for liberty.
Again, in referring to the formation of the first settlements made in the District of West Augusta, between the years 1769 and 1774, it will be seen that those settlements swept in a circular belt, at station points as centers, around a large wilderness of heavy forest lands. Commen- eing at Wheeling and Grave creek, on the Ohio river, in the North, pass- ing over the dividing mountains to the waters of the Monongahela river, thence to Clarksburg on the West Fork river, thence over to Tygart Valley and Buckhannon rivers in the East, from thence southward to the Greenbrier and New rivers, and from thenee westward down New and Big Kanawha rivers to the Ohio river at Point Pleasant. This semi- cirele embraces a space of about 170 miles on the Ohio river, extending back southeastward from 50 to 125 miles.
Owing to the exposed condition and near approaches to the Indian towns and settlements in the northwestern territory, from which squads of Indians were passing and repassing, and the fears arising from their cruel and relentless mode of warfare, this vast territory of heavy forest lands was left unsettled at that time, and during the next two decades it was slow in receiving emigrants, or the States in making the neces- sary provisions for the protection of those who had braved the dangers and privations of the wilderness.
The Little Kanawha river, a stream of considerable importance and magnitude, navigable in high stages of water by small boats, (and now by slackwater improvements for 40 miles), heads back in the Alleghany Mountains, and running in a northwesterly direction, passes through this territory and empties into the Ohio river at Parkersburg, about midway between Wheeling and Point Pleasant. The borders of this river with its numerous tributaries, are lined with lands well adapted to the husbandman and farmer for developing improvements and prosper- ity. Beneath its valleys and mountain forests of very heavy timber are hidden rich beds of untold wealth, while the surface is divided by numer -. ous streams of water and water-power, for mills and machinery, murmur- ing their musicin shady solitudes. Yet with all these primeval advantages, so richly and lavishly bestowed by nature, owing to their savage sur- roundings and threatening dangers, it secured but few, a very few, set-
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SETTLEMENTS-1785 TO 175.
tlers until about the year 1785. In 1780 and 1795 the bold and daring enterprise of pioneers became more frequent, tempting them to penetrate these unbroken solitudes for the purpose of opening up and making their future homes. They have long since passed away, and but a few only have left any record of themselves and of their times behind them.
Before closing this chapter we will turn back to the battle of Point Pleasant. Soon after that battle, as we have stated, a treaty of peace was concluded between the great Indian warrior and statesman, Corn- stalk, and Governor Dunmore, of Virginia, in October 1774.
This treaty of peace was strictly and faithfully observed by this mon- arch of the Shawnee Nation. Ilis sagacious mind saw no prosperity and happiness for his nation only on their living on terms of amity and peace with the white' inhabitants of these colonies. In his defeat and sorrow he had found that the Indian could not cope with the white man on the battle field. And though Great Britain had her agents and em- issaries among his tribes, endeavoring to enlist them and form alliances up to the spring of 1777, yet by his great influence and power he had kept his tribes in peace.
In the spring of 1777 this great chief and monarch of that Nation, with two others of his tribe, came to the fort at Point Pleasant for the purpose of making the authorities of Virginia acquainted with the ef- forts then being made among his tribes to enlist them against the colo - nies. This condition of mind in him undoubtedly grew out of the fact in some way connected with the treaty made with Governor Dunmore in 1774. . He and those with him were detained at the fort as hostages until the information brought by them could be conveyed to the Govern- ment of Va. In consequence of the long absence from his tribe, his son Ellinipsico, a chief of one of his tribes, came to Point Pleasant to ascer- tain the cause of his long stay. On the following day after his arrival, two of the soldiers of the garrison crossed over the Big Kanawha on a hunting expedition, and while thus engaged one of these men was shot and murdered by some wandering Indian. Of the presence or who these wandering Indians were, Ellinipsico declared he had no knowledge and was in no way connected with them. In that hour of tumult, of fren- zied passions, the soldiers of the garrison determined that they would at once avenge the death of their companion by shooting the great chief and son and those with them.
In that sad hour of revengful hatred, of danger and of death, the un- daunted courage, coolness and greatness of this warrior chieftain did not forsake him. In hu 1. . ence he faced the sentence of death boldly and endeavored to sust hind cheer his son by words of kindness and sympathy. Facing the mob whose leaden missiles were pointed at him, without a word he fell pierced with many balls. Thus ended the career of this, one of the noblest of the Indian chieftains ; one whose oratory had made classic the eloquence of nature, one whose boldness and he- roic bearing on the battle-field was the pride and glory of the Shawnee
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CORNSTALK'S DEATH.
Nation, and whose tragic death was the signal of gloom and horror to the settlements in Virginia and elsewhere.
This overt act of treachery, arising from a sudden and momentary pas- sion, prompted and immediately executed under a spirit of inconsiderate revenge upon these innocent . persons, then held in custody as hostages for the safety of others, was an unpardonable indiscretion-an act of bad faith, which even civilized nations would not overlook or fail to pun- ish. As it might have been justly expected it served to ineite all the In- dian tribes of the northwestern territory in deadly hostility and war against the white settlements of the colonies, which lasted not only du- ring the Revolutionary War, but long after that sanguinary struggle was ended with the British Government. The thinly and exposed position of the whole country in Virginia, west of the Alleghany Mountains, made its slopes and valleys the theatre of savage vengeance and deeds of untold sufferings.' In consequence of this heart-sickening and cruel war, and the exposed condition of these frontier settlements, this whole vast territory of Western and Northwestern Virginia was slow in be- coming settled. Many were the thrilling tales of adventure and heroic daring here enneted by these carly pioneers, who sought to make homes for themselves and their families. Not until near the year 1800 did the thinly inhabited settlements of the Ohio river and its tributaries feel that they were free and safe from savage revenge. Yet there were those. whose limited means and love of adventure caused them to seek homes and settle in these forest wilds.
As a general rule these courageous and hardy men were persons of the most generous impulses. Though many of them were uneducated, and possessed a rough exterior, yet they possessed hearts of generosity. and enjoyed happiness in sympathizing and making those happy around them. The hoarding of the "almighty dollar" was not the object of their ambition and love. In their daily intercourse they were social, kind and generous, imparting or bestowing their hospitalities with cheer- fulness. They were kind, generous and considerate to those around them and thereby enjoyed happiness in the happiness of others. They were kind for kindness sake.
The huntsmans camp, and the rude log cabins of the pioneers, with their few articles of rough furniture, were the abodes of genuine good feel- ings, and honest open handed hospitality. . A common sympathy was felt and shared by neighbors, in the social amities of life. Toils, priva- tions, and common dangers endured, became a strong bond of attach- ment, mutual kindness : : ood will. It was thus, in the opening and carly settlements of the tain fastnesses of West Virginia. A new era-a new world is opened out before the present generation, begotten by the rapid advancements in the arts and sciences, and the manner in which they were communicated. Owing to these courses, the present generation can form but an imperfect idea of the hardships and dangers, endured and overcome by the first inhabitants of Western Virginia.
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CHAPTER IV.
POLICY OF THE COLONY AS TO HER PUBLIC LANDS.
In preparing these Chapters on Western, and North Western Vir- ginia, for the purpose of enabling the reader, to form clear and cor- reet ideas of its early history, we devote each chapter, to certain facts in that history, as those faets were connected with, and had an in- fluence in shaping the forination of these settlements. All of these separate and distinet facts, we desire to photograph upon the mind of the reader, for the purpose of enabling him to see, and have cor- reet conceptions of the numerous obstacles, which had a tendency to cripple and retard its rapid settlements, during the latter part of the eighteenth, and the first part of the present century.
In former chapters, we presented a general outline of its territory . with its divisions and subdivisions into counties, as its settlements from time to time, made it necessary. Pursuing the same course, in this chapter, we shall notice the policy of the colony in surveying out its public lands.
It must be remembered, that the colony of Virginia, was under the laws, and dependant on the English government. Large grants of land had been made to many of her nobility, for the purpose of col- onizing her poorer classes, and furnishing them with homes in this New World, under the same policy, which had obtained under her home regulations. Hence the actual tillers of the eoil, were poor, and the policy pursued by the House of Burgesses, was shaped by the English goverment in the grants and surveys of her public lands.
Thus it will be seen, that the landed policy of the colony, was forced upon her by the Mother country, and owing to the dangers growing out of the hostile character of the Indians, and the limited
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SURVEY'S OF LANDS.
resources of her territory, the same general policy was continued; es- pecially was this the condition of the colony at the close of the Revo- lutionary war.
A person who will reflect upon the condition of this country, at, and prior to that war-the hostile attitude of the Indians, who had been in alliance, first, with the French, and then with the English goverimient, will at once see the nature and character of these diffi- eulties, and the enforced reasons which caused Virginia, as a State, to pursue the landed policy which had been entailed upon her, by Great Britain.
Therefore, in this Chapter, we shall treat of the surveys of lands, made in Western and North Western Virginia, as the same arise un- der that policy, and the effects thereof upon the future settlements of this portion of the State. Yet in doing so, we do not intend to cast any reflections upon the men of those colonial years, who labored to perform their duties under the embarrassing circunstances of those times.
It is a well known fact throughout the entire country, that the ti- tles to lands in Western, and North Western Virginia are uncertain and unsatisfactory. Courts of justice within its territory have had their dockets crowded with suits in which these titles have been the subject of litigation for the purpose of settling these conflicting claims. The doubts and inseenrity of these titles has had a very damaging in- finence upon the settlements as well as upon the business enterprise of the country. And yet these difficulties are not all settled. Snits for settling the title to lands in the State, are yet upon the dockets of onr conrts. Soon, however, these claims will be finally settled.
The first survey made of land in the Ohio valley, of which we have any record, was those made for Gen. Gorge Washington, in the summer of 1771, for services rendered the colony. of Virginia, as col- onel during the French and Indian war. These surveys for him were made in that summer under his personal supervision, by Col. William Crawford (who was afterwards captured by the Indians and burnt at a stake in 1793.) The first of these entries and surveys was a tract of 2314 acres of land situated five miles below the mouth of the Little Kanawha river in this county, and made in June, 1771. This county was then a part of the District of West Augusta. Several oth- er surveys were made by him on the Ohio and the Big Kanawha rivers, during that summer, and were claimed to be the first made in this valley, under the authority of the colony of Virginia,
In the spring of 1771, Col. Geo. Washington with his surveying party embarked in small boats at Fort Pitt, and slowly descended the Ohio river, making notes of their journey and of the country as they .passed down the river to the mouth of the Big Kanawha, and also in their ascending that river to the falls. A full account of this voyage wns published some years since in Eastern newspapers, and was made
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GEN. WASHINGTON'S SURVEYS.
very interesting, as showing the condition of the country at that time.
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