History of The Middle New River Settlements - Chapter VIII



Chapter VIII
1866-1905

The Confederate soldier, with the close of the war, returned to his
country, where he had once had a place he called home, but now--at least
in many instances--he found nothing but blackened ruins and utter waste
places. As he had been brave and magnanimous in war, and had in good faith
laid down his arms, he returned to engage not in war, but in peaceful
pursuits, build up and start anew and become a useful citizen of the young
Commonwealth. He had no money or property, some perhaps a small piece of
land, if he had been fortunate enough to own such before the war. In many
instances, an arm or leg had been lost in battle, or his health greatly
shattered. He was not the man he was when he entered the army and many of
his nearest--dearest friends, relatives--had perished in the strife. His
only trust was in God and his own good right arm, if he was fortunate to
have that limb left. On all sides were gloom and despair, to a less braver
heart and manlier spirit. He sought no quarrel with anyone, only asked to
be free, not disturbed, and he would try and work his way through the
remainder of his days as best he might. He neither wanted nor sought
revenge for wrongs, real or imaginary. That for which for four years he
had struggled and suffered had not been accomplished, and the effort to
establish it had failed. Nothing was left him but to live for the future,
in the consciousness of having faithfully discharged his duty in the past,
and with a fixed determination to do this in the future. The Governor of
his state, (Note: Boreman to Staunton Series II. Vol. VIII. Reb. Record p.
533) in a letter to the Federal Secretary of War, opposed his return to
his country, and a few in his midst desired to rob him of his rights as a
citizen of a new Commonwealth. In time of profound peace, unarmed, perhaps
with but one leg or one arm, broken in health and in purse he was as much
feared as when he carried his musket with forty rounds of cartridges,
marching beneath the "Stars and Bars." If he was found with an old, poor,
crippled mule or horse, that General Grant had given him at Appomattox,
trying to plow and make bread for his starving wife and children, he was
robbed of this upon the plea that it was Government property, either
Federal or Rebel. It was dig or die and his enemies preferred him to take
the latter course.

It is true that at that time he was a citizen of the state with all is
rights as such guaranteed to him by the constitution of the new
Commonwealth, with no law in force that in any way deprived him of the
privilege of full citizenship; but the devil is always ready to aid the
ingenuity of bad men to accomplish bad things, and hence the only way, in
a measure, at least, to get rid of the ex-Confederate soldier, was to
decitizenize him, and thereby either drive him from the state, or place
him in a condition of political vassalage or serfdom. The political
machinery was put to work to accomplish the purpose in view by
decitizenizing all ex-Confederates, as well also as all who had aided or
sympathized with them. This could not be done under the then existing
organic law of the state, and a change in this law was necessary to the
accomplishment of the object in view; but be it said to the credit of the
better class of the then dominant part, they took no part in this crime
against liberty, and did not seek to fix manacles on the poor Confederate--
it was the other set, generally of the vile and vindictive; when
"Prometheus was chained to the rock it was not the proud Eagle, but the
miserable Vulture that came down and tore out his vitals." In all great
revolutions, like in all the great floods of waters, it is the filth and
foul things that rise to the surface and float, while the gold lies at the
bottom.

It was late in the fall of 1865 before there was anything like the full
restoration of Civil Government in Mercer County. All things in Government
were new or novel to the people. They had always known, and their
ancestors before them had known for more than a century, nothing but the
old Virginia County Court system, with one or more magistrates in each
magisterial district in the county, clothed with jurisdiction to try
warrants for small claims, and to sit as a Court and administer county
affairs.  The Circuit Court trying all criminal and civil cases, as well
as chancery causes. Now they found magisterial districts no longer in
existence; townships created in their stead, with a justice of the peace
in each township, and he regarded the biggest man therein, although in
some instances he could not write his name and perhaps did not know the
way to the mill. with jurisdiction to try cases involving an hundred
dollars, with the right to empanel a jury of six men. In lieu of the old
County Court, a Board of Supervisors to administer county affairs, and
this board, in part, at least, was composed of men who not only could not
write their names, but whose honesty was not above par; however, this was
only true for a short while, when better men were selected for this
position, such as L. D. Martin, Silas T. Reynolds, William C. Honaker, and
others.

Judge Nathaniel Harrison, of Monroe County, having been made Circuit Judge
very soon after the close of hostilities, appointed Benjamine White,
Sheriff, and George Evans, Clerk and Recorder of Mercer County. White had
been a violent Secessionist at the commencement of the war, but had
changed his views somewhat about the close thereof; while Mr. Evans, being
a Northern man by birth, was doubtless a Union man from the beginning.
Judge Harrison (Note: Articles of impeachment were exhibited against him
in the Legislature and he was forced to resign the Judgeship.) had been a
Confederate, and as late as 1862 had applied for appointment on the staff
of Brigadier General Chapman. Thus it will be seen that men who started
out on the Southern side, found out their mistake, as they claimed, in the
latter part of the war or just about the close, were honored. They started
out in the boat and as long as there was fair breeze and it floated well,
they were willing to stay, but when adverse winds blew and it was
threatened with wreck and disaster, they jumped out, pulled for the shore
and left their friends to perish if they must. This was true of more than
one man in Mercer County, even extending to those who had volunteered in
the army and taken an oath to support the Confederate Government; Yet,
disregarding their oaths, deserted and went over to the enemy, and this is
not all, came back among their neighbors and friends and engaged in
pillage in its worst form. These deserters were without honor among their
own people and distrusted and despised by those to whom they deserted.

In the fall of 1865 Judge Harrison rode into the town of Princeton; that
is, where it once stood, sat on his horse, no one inviting him to stop or
alight; he rode seven and one-half miles east to Concord Church on the Red
Sulphur turnpike road where he opened and held his court. The ex-
Confederates who had been elected at the election that fall were
arbitrarily refused permission to qualify, and others who claimed to have
adhered to the Union wee installed in their stead.

The Legislature met at Wheeling in January, 1866, and in a contest Colonel
William H. French, who had been elected to that body was unseated by
Colonel Thomas Little, who had not been elected. By a joint resolution of
the two Houses, an amendment to the Constitution was proposed, by which,
if adopted, all ex-Confederates and their sympathizers would be
decitienized. At the session which provided for the submission of the
amendment to the Constitution, which had been proposed in the session of
1865, an Act was passed declaring that no one should be allowed to vote at
the next succeeding election, except those who would take a prescribed
oath known as the "Test Oath." The amendment referred to is in the
following words and figures: "No person who since the 1st day of June,
1861, has given or shall give voluntary aid or assistance to the rebellion
against the United States, shall be a citizen of this state, or be allowed
to vote at any election held therein, unless he has volunteered in the
military or naval service of the United States and has been or shall be
honorably discharged therefrom." This was the first instance in the
history of a free government, where the Legislature plainly and
intentionally subverted the Constitution of a free state, and openly and
deliberately violated their oaths and the plain provision of the
Constitution, which provided that "The white male citizens of state shall
be entitled to vote at all elections held within the election districts in
which they respectively reside." The election at which this amendment to
the Constitution was to be voted upon by the people, was held on the 24th
day of May, 1866, and was ratified by a vote of 22,224 for, to 15,302
against the same. Only 75 votes were cast in the County of Mercer, of
which 61 were for ratification and 14 for rejection, yet the voting
population at that time in Mercer County under the Constitution as it then
existed, was not less than 1,000. Among those voting against this iniquity
in Mercer will be found the names of Colonel Thomas Little, David Lilley,
Sylvester Upton, and Russell G. French, the latter classed an ex-Federal
soldier.

Truly loyal officers were now elected to the various offices, and finding
so few regarded as qualified to discharge the duties of the same, it was
found necessary to give two or three offices to one man; in fact in one or
more instances it was stated that one or more men held at least five
offices each at the same time.

The Legislature of West Virginia not only disfranchised men and kept them
from voting, but passed numerous laws preventing attorneys from practicing
their profession, people from teaching school, men from sitting on juries,
or from prosecuting suits, unless they would take the Test Oath." These
laws against attorneys who had been engaged as soldiers in the Confederate
Army, or had sympathized with those engaged in armed hostility against the
Government of the United States, brought to the Courts of the State,
especially in the Southern border counties, swarms of ill pests, Northern
carpet-bag lawyers, who without practice where they came from, and perhaps
having left their country for their country's good, came to feast and to
fatten on the miseries and sufferings of the poor, downtrodden,
disfranchised, tax ridden Confederate people. The voice of the lawyer of
the community, to whom the people looked for aid and were willing to trust
their lives, property and honor in his hands, was, with few exceptions,
refused a hearing in the court room. There were a few attorneys residents,
or who became residents, who were Union men, fair-minded and just, among
them Henry L. Gillispie, James H. McGinnis, Frank Hereford, J. Speed
Thompson, Edwin Sehon, and Colonel James W. Davis; the latter gentlemen
had been a Colonel in the Confederate Army, but had succeeded in
persuading the Legislature that he was a truly repentant rebel, sorry for
his sins, and succeeded in getting that body, by special Act, to forgive
his waywardness and restore to him the privilege of practicing his
profession without taking the attorneys' "Test Oath."

Shortly after Colonel Davis had been permitted to enter again upon the
practice of the law, he was employed in a case in the Circuit Court of
Mercer County, involving the title to a horse, which had been taken or
stolen from Colonel John S. Carr during the war. On the other side of the
case was the witty Irish lawyer, J. H. McGinnis, of Raleigh. In course of
the argument of Colonel Davis before the jury he took occasion to say how
good and magnanimous the Legislature had been to him, by again conferring
on him the privilege to earn a living for his family by the practice of
his profession; he followed this by a bit of his war experience in the
battle of Chapmansville, describing the wounds he received by which he
lost a finger, and received a shot in the shoulder and back. The
resourceful McGinnis, while listening to the Colonel's speech, had
composed some verses which in his reply, and in his inimitable way, he
repeated, much to the discomfiture of the Colonel, but to the joy of the
bystanders; only one of which verses in recollected, and ran as follows:

"On the battlefield I long did linger
Where guns and cannons they did crack,
Until by a cruel shot, I lost this finger,
And got this hole in my back."

In order to effectuate the purpose of the framers of the Constitutional
amendment and disfranchisement law already adverted to, the Legislature
enacted what was known as a Registration law, providing for a registration
of the voters and creating a Board of Registration composed of three
members to be appointed by the Governor, and to hold their office at his
will and pleasure. This proved a powerful weapon in the hands of the party
then in power, who evidently intended thereby to perpetuate themselves
therein. It was almost the equal of the proposed "Force Bill" introduced
into Congress a few years ago, if it had been wielded by wise and
conservative heads, and would have kept the then dominant political party
long in power in the state; but like all other engines of oppression,
originated and constructed in Republics for the destruction on the liberty
of the Anglo-Saxon, they became a boomerang in the hands of those who
wielded them, finally effecting their own destruction. It is said, "Whom
the gods would destroy they first make mad." This was certainly true of
the dominate party in West Virginia at that time, and especially in Mercer
County. Their apparent inordinate desire to punish those who differed with
them about the great civil conflict, and the quest of individuals for
place and power, led them to extremes in the Legislature, and the
enforcement of proscriptive laws. They very soon began to quarrel among
themselves, and the scramble for the public pap, and the crumbs which fell
from the master's table engendered, as it always does, bad blood. Very
soon the better and more conservative part of the dominant party became
disgusted and disposed to fall in with their neighbors--ex-Confederates--
insisting upon according to them some rights, besides the payment of taxes
and right to die.

As already stated in this work, the County site had in the year of 1837
been fixed at a place called Princeton, but so soon as the Judge of the
Circuit Court opened and held a term of court at Concord Church, some to
the people in that and other sections of the county began the agitation of
a removal of the County site from Princeton to Concord Church. Steps were
very soon taken to have the Board of Supervisors order an election
removing the seat of Justice from Princeton to Concord Church; and an
election was held, but Concord Church failing to receive the requisite
three-fifths vote, the removalists failed in their scheme. Very soon
another election was held which also failed, but the Board was induced to
declare the result in favor of removal.

Colonel Thomas Little, the Delegate from the County to the Legislature at
its session of 1867, procured the passage of an Act locating permanently
the County site at Princeton, but at the session in 1868 George Evans, the
Representative from Mercer County, procured the repeal of the Act of 1867;
and so the fight continued both before the people and in the Courts.
Injunctions were obtained first by one and then by the other party until
the question was finally settled as will be hereinafter stated. The
litigation over the County Court House question ended with the disposition
of the Bill, prepared by one Martin H. Holt, an attorney of Raleigh
County, which was known as the celebrated "Bill of Peace," in which
appeared the names of the Board of Supervisors of the County, a
corporation, plaintiff against a large part of the people of the county,
who favored Princeton as the seat of Justice, as defendants. In this Bill
was set forth the various steps, acts, doings and proceedings from which
it was contended that the County site had been removed from Princeton and
located at Concord Church, and also setting forth the Acts of the
Legislature touching the same as hereinbefore referred to; and alleging
and charging in effect that all the people of the county who were opposed
to Concord Church as the lawful and proper location for the seat of
Justice, were a lawless band and disturbers of the quietude of the people
and of the public peace, and praying an injunction inhibiting and
restraining them from further action looking to the opening of the
question. An injunction was granted, but about as quickly dissolved, and
as before stated, this was the end of all litigation concerning this
troublesome matter.

In January, 1870, a few of the citizens of the little village of Princeton
assembled and constituted themselves a Committee of safety, for the
purpose of devising a plan by which the much vexed County site question
might be finally settled. After a careful review and consideration of the
situation in all its aspects, local, political, and otherwise, it was
concluded that the first and best step to take was to have the Legislature
of the State, then in session at Wheeling, pass a special Act submitting
to the people the question of the location of the seat of justice, to be
settled by a majority vote. In order to get such a law passed, it was
deemed necessary to send to the seat of government a man who who was
recognized as belonging to and a leader of the dominant party then in
control of the Legislature. The man was found in the person of Mr.
Benjamine White, who had been and was still the Sheriff of the county.
White was a man of influence and weight in the county with his party, and
was fairly well known in the southern part of the state, and a man of fair
address, and when aroused was bold and plausible talker, and could make
himself felt in any enterprise or cause he chose to espouse. He was going
on public business, but in the interest of Princeton; which neither he nor
those in the secret let the public know. Once in Wheeling and the matter
being put under way, on account of the irregularity and uncertainty of
mails and the long time that it took letters and papers to reach our
section in mid-winter, it was felt that no intelligence of what was going
on at the capitol was likely to reach Mercer County until the mission of
the messenger had been accomplished and the Legislature adjourned; which
would then be too late for any organized opposition to Mr. White's bill,
should anyone wish to oppose so fair a mode of settlement of our local
trouble. As before stated, Mr. White was going on public business, and it
was not to be expected that he would be compelled to pay his personal
expenses, therefore a few persons raised and placed in his hands $100.00
to meet these expenses. There were no railroads in this immediate section
in that day and no public conveyances of any kind, so Mr. White, in the
dead of winter, mounted his horse and pushed out over the mountains to the
Kanawha, where he took passage on a steamboat to Wheeling by way of the
Kanawha and Ohio Rivers. On his arrival at the capitol and meeting several
of his acquaintances and political friends, and laying the matter in hand
before them, he soon had his bill introduced, passed and was on his way
home before the people of Mercer County knew what had transpired. The
committee of Safety was composed of Captain John A Douglass, Mr. H. W.,
Straley, Major C. D. Straley, Mr. Joseph H. Alvis, Mr. William Oliver and
this writer. To insure success perfect secrecy was necessary, and the
Committee of Safety made and took a solemn pledge that nothing which was
said or done touching this matter should be divulged by them to anyone;
and none were admitted to their counsels, except those who gave the pledge
to each other to keep within their own breasts whatever happened or was
resolved upon. It soon became known where we held our meetings, at one of
which, a slight disagreement or misunderstanding with our friend Mr. White
took place, and he withdrew and we were afterwards termed by him the "Town
Clique." We were not offended at this, however, as it is well known that
all towns are said to have their "Cliques." At our first meeting after Mr.
White's return from Wheeling, held at our place of general rendezvous,
there was a very serious difference of opinion between members of the
Committee. Mr. White was for calling the Board of Supervisors of the
county together at once and having it order a special election on the
question of the location of the seat of justice; the other members of the
Committee opposed it, and the vote of the majority was the law which
governed its actions. Now it might be well to give some of the open
reasons which were expressed for not being willing to hold the election
under the new law and before the general election, which was to take place
in the following October. First, the special law did not authorize a
special registration of voters; secondly, we had a board registration and
by law it could only revise the registration lists at certain stated
periods before each regular election; third, if we held the special
election under this special law with a new registration, and succeeded,
the question might again get into court, where it had already been for
nearly five years, and in the end might be defeated; fourth, there was no
reason for haste, as the election could be held before another Legislature
would assemble and have opportunity to repeal the Act. These, as have been
stated, were the open reasons; but beyond these was one which we dare not
disclose to any but the truest--the trusted and the tried.

Fully seventy-five per cent of our people were proscribed and
disfranchised by the provisions of our Constitution, and obnoxious laws
upon our statute books; and civil and political liberty to our people were
worth more than Court Houses, especially as Court Houses were not free to
the proscribed; for to that class there were but four things free, viz:
Air, water, payment of taxes and death; therefore the passage of the
special Act, ostensibly to settle the Court House controversy, meant to
those in the secret much more than appeared on the surface; it meant the
breaking of the bonds of political slavery and decitizenship, under which
our people, probably twenty-five thousand or more in the state, had
suffered and groaned for nearly years. It also meant the again clothing of
that part of our people who had been disfranchised, with the right of
citizenship and of freemen, and restoring to them that liberty which had
been torn and wrenched from them by a set of political pirates, most of
whom were moved only by the spirit of revenge, but others by more sordid
motives. By this proscriptive legislation honest men and women could not
by law collect their honest debts, if the debtor had been truly loyal to
the Union during the late unhappy strife. Professional men could not
practice their profession for a livelihood; and no man who had engaged in
the war on the Confederate side, or had sympathized and given aid and
comfort to the Confederates, could sit upon a jury or hold office; nor
could the poor young woman, the daughter of a Confederate soldier, teach
school without subscribing to the "Test Oath." While these laws were
pretty rigidly enforced for a period of nearly five years, the time was
rapidly approaching when they would become a thing of the past. As has
already been stated, the law provided for the appointment by the Governor
of a Board of Registration, consisting of three members, removable at his
pleasure. This board possessed powers somewhat akin to that exercised by
the Spanish Inquisition; they had power to send for persons and papers--a
right to say who should vote and who should not--by a mere stroke of the
pen (that is, such of them as could write) either to place a man's name on
the list or strike it off at their pleasure, and in this they were
protected by law, being exempt from civil suits or criminal prosecution
for any dereliction or violation of law connected with the registration of
voters, or any other outrages they chose to perpetrate touching the
qualification of electors or the right to vote.

The men composing the County Board of Registration of Mercer County for a
good part of the period referred to, were in most part honest men and
desired to do right as far as the law allowed them. It was not so much the
fault of the men who composed the Board in the latter days of the life of
the law, as it was the law and the District registrars, who were not
always the cleanest birds that could be found, for it was an open secret
that any man who would promise to vote the Republican ticket, or for any
particular candidate, perhaps for the registrar himself, could have his
name enrolled as a voter without taking the oath prescribed by law for all
voters, or to procure the registration of a voter by deceiving the
registrar that the party registered would vote for him, when it was
understood he was to vote for another.

In this connection it may be mentioned that the court records of the
county had been kept at Concord Church until the fall of 1869, when at a
meeting of the Board of Supervisors, Mr. Benjamine white, who was then
sheriff and lived at Princeton, made a motion before the Board to remove
the records to Princeton for safe keeping, alleging that a threat had been
made to destroy them, an in support of his charges produced the affidavits
of one or more persons tending to show the truth of his charges. Mr.
White's strong and boisterous speech and serious charges alarmed two of
the members of the Board of Supervisors, and they actually gathered their
hats and left the place, leaving three members only of the Board present,
who voted for the motion and the records were immediately removed by
wagons procured by Mr. White. The feverish excitement aroused over this
removal of the records engendered bad blood, and nearly approached open
collision. The fact, though not apparent to the public, was that the
people in the interest of Princeton had made a bargain with Mr. George
Evans, who, for a certain consideration, would aid in removing the records
and abandon his fight for Concord Church as the County site, and espouse
the cause of the people in the interest of Princeton; how well this
bargain was carried out and the manner of its carrying out, will be fully
hereinafter stated.

As hereinbefore stated, the County Board of Registration exercised the
right of revision of the list of voters, and the right to strike off the
name of any person they chose, and thus deprive him of the right to vote
at the succeeding election; and woe to the man that was suspected of
disloyalty, not to his country, but to the Republican Party, for when the
County Board met and it suspected, or some one reported, that a given man
was not loyal in the sense above stated, a summons was issued requiring
the suspect to appear and prove his loyalty; no charges preferred, none
proved, but the party summoned must come prepared to prove his innocence--
that is, that he was truly loyal to the Republican Party and had always
voted and still intended to vote with that party--but if he did not show
up right on this he was adjudged not a legal or qualified voter. Very few
instances of this kind occurred in Mercer County, but one such at least
occurred in an adjoining county, in which a gentleman of the legal
profession, being under suspicion of disloyalty, was summoned before the
Board of Registration to show and prove that he was true to the Grand Old
Party; appearing before the Board, inquiring what it wanted, and being
told he must prove his loyalty, he thereupon became very indignant, using
some very rash, opprobrious epithets toward the Board and some of its
members for their baseness, meanness and ignorance. When he had finished
his speech, one of the members of the Board raised his spectacles upon his
brow and lifting his eyes said: "Well, sir, I am like the apostle of old,
I thank God I am what I am," to which the legal gentleman retorted: "Yes,
and you are thankful for d---d small favors."

This registration scheme was wholly political and one against liberty; a
plot to disfranchise honest, law-abiding people and to perpetuate the
dominant party in power in the state, and well it succeeded for five
years, but they pressed their advantage too far and the conservative
element in their party finally revolted, and the plan that had been
devised to ostracize their neighbors became a useful weapon in the hands
of liberty-loving freemen for the political overthrow and destruction of
the inventors, and resulted in hurling from power the party which had, as
it supposed, firmly entrenched itself behind its registration
disfranchising scheme, which it had theretofore regarded as impregnable.
This registration law, together with the manner of its execution, became
so offensive to the good people of the state and smelled so badly, that it
was said that "The man in the moon was compelled to hold his nose when he
passed over"; and by the close of the fourth and fifth years of its life,
no one scarcely dared to do it reverence, or to publicly attempt to
justify it. It was doomed and must go, and it was only a question of a
short time when it would go; the law itself was bad enough, but its abuses
were ten fold worse.

Quite a digression has been made from the consideration of the special law
passed to settle the County site question, to let in the explanation of
the operation and effect of this registration law; for this very law
played an important part, not only in the settlement of the local
question, but influenced greatly the political results in the county and
state at the general election held in October, 1870.

The Committee of Safety on the part of the Princeton people could no
longer have Mr. White in its counsels, and was compelled to go its way
alone without the aid of this gentleman and his friendly advice. It was
finally determined not to have a special election under the special
statute until the new registration could take place in the September
following, but the plan was to get control of the Registration Board, not
only to have such board friendly, but also favorable to a fair non-
partisan registration, and this was a question of grave consideration, for
the appointing power of this board was the Governor and he was an extreme,
staunch Republican, who could be depended upon to appoint men that he at
least believed would do what his party wanted done. This Committee could
have no influence with the Governor, and therefore began to cast about as
to how they might get control of this registration board, without raising
a suspicion that it was engaged in some political intrigue against the
Republican Party. Mr. George Evans was a Republican of the Republicans,
and no man could question his fealty to his party or his zeal for its
success; he was a warm personal friend and admirer of the then Governor
Stevenson, who was a candidate that spring for re-nomination and for re-
election that fall, and as the Republican Convention was to be held in the
city of Parkersburg, it was not thought likely that any delegate except
Mr. Evans would go to the convention and that he would not probably go
without it was urged upon him and his expenses paid.

The Circuit Court for the county was to be held at Concord Church in May,
which was a short time prior to the meeting of the Republican Convention
at Parkersburg. The Safety Committee, supposing that the Republicans of
the county would hold their convention at the Circuit Court in May and
appoint their delegates to their State Convention, a plan was hit upon to
make known to Mr. Evans that it would be a good thing for the interest of
Princeton, he having in the meantime changed his base from the support of
Concord Church to that of Princeton, for him to keep in favor with the
governor, and to do this it would be well for him to go as the only
delegate from the County of Mercer, and that if he would undertake to
manage to hold his county convention during the court an have himself
appointed a delegate, and to be sure to appoint men other than himself,
none of whom would go, that the committee would undertake to furnish the
money to pay his expenses. The bargain was struck, the court came on, the
Republicans held their meeting and Mr. Evans, among others, was appointed
a delegate to the convention. The committee started out to raise the
money, and among the men they came across and asked to contribute five
dollars was Honorable Frank Hereford, Democratic nominee for Congress; who
inquired what was wanted with the money, and the answer came, "Never mind
about that; you will be informed this fall, after the election." Mr. Evans
went to the convention; Governor Stevenson was re-nominated, but his
election was another question.

For a number of years the people living in the lower district of Mercer
County, on and along the New River, and the people of Greenbrier and
Monroe Counties occupying the territory adjacent to the New River, near
the mouth of Greenbrier, favored the formation of a new county, and the
Committee of Safety conceived the idea that this was the favored time to
encourage the people to ask the Legislature to create the new county and
to vote for a candidate who would be in favor of the project and would
push it through the Legislature; and while this committee advised the
people to secure the right man, it wanted to see and know that the man was
right, not only on the new county question, and therefore on the County
site question, bit that he would pledge himself to use his best endeavors
to secure the repeal of all proscriptive and obnoxious laws.  Arrangements
for a secret meeting were made between the representatives of Princeton
and those in favor of the new county, and it was agreed that Sylvester
Upton, a staunch Union man, a conservative Republican, but in every sense
an honorable and upright gentleman, should be supported by the combination
for the House of Delegates, and he was accordingly named as the candidate.
Against Mr. Upton, the Concord Church people nominated or placed in the
field Mr. Keaton. In this same combine Mr. George Evans was to be
supported for Clerk and recorder, David Lilley was to be supported for
Clerk and Recorder, David Lilley for sheriff, L. M. Stinson for county
Surveyor, and J. Speed Thompson for Persecuting Attorney.

The support for Mr. George Evans for Clerk and Recorder was the
consummation of the arrangement entered into at the time he abandoned the
interest of Concord Church and agreed to stand for Princeton; and this was
to be in full settlement and discharge of any obligation to him by reason
of the previous arrangement for his abandonment of the interest of those
favoring Concord Church. Before all the plans could be fully carried out
some arrangement had to be made to control the Board of Registration; and
in some way, if possible, non-partisan men, or at least the majority of
such must be secured on this board, or there would not be the ghost of a
chance for success. The board at this time consisted of L. M. Thomas,
Silas T. Reynolds and Mr. Cox. Mr. Reynolds was a high-toned gentleman and
liberal in his views, and while he would faithfully execute the law, he
would not pervert it; the two others were narrow-minded partisans, and
whose chief aim was party success.

The war had now been over for five years and many young men had attained
their majority, and they were almost universally against the party in
power. It was hoped that by the aid of these voters and that of the
liberal, conservative element of the Republican Party, and with a non-
partisan board of registration, to be able to overthrow and defeat the
radical wing of that party; not only carry the county ticket, composed in
part of liberal Republicans, but to also carry the Court House question
for Princeton, and the measure in favor of the new county. But this
dreaded Registration Board, like "Banquo's Ghost," would not down; it was
concluded, however, that down it must go, at all hazards. The committee
knowing that its friends, Mr. Evans and L. M. Thomas, president of the
Board, were close friends politically and otherwise, it was therefore
thought possible for the sake of the local question and the committee was
again perplexed. While brooding over this apparent ill-luck, with nothing
but what seemed a dark and dismal future, a little incident happened which
opened the way of escape from the apparent difficulties.

Mr. Thomas came to Princeton, and as he was quite fond of his drink and
Mr. Joe Alvis had a little good liquor to give a man for his first drink,
after which he always said he would then give him the bad and he could not
tell the difference--furnished Thomas what he required along that line,
after which he became exceedingly liberal, and took a tilt at what he
denominated the "Cussed Registration Law," saying there was no reason to
have such laws, and that the time had come for every body to register and
vote. It is very doubtful whether Thomas meant what he said, for it was
believed that he meant just the reverse, and that his talk was only a ruse
to deceive the people as to his real intentions, and to cover up some dark
thing that he had in view to aid the Republican Party. Thomas had by this
declaration in favor of liberalism furnished all the cause necessary for
his removal as a member of the Board, for it was only necessary for a
whisper of this declaration to reach ears of the Governor's best friend to
accomplish his removal. No sooner had he uttered the declaration, than the
Committee of Safety had a man getting up affidavits embracing Thomas'
statements; these were furnished to Mr. Evans, to whom it was made known
that if Thomas carried out his declaration it would destroy the Republican
Party in Mercer County; and as no one wished to see Mr. Thomas disgraced
by being removed from office, it was deemed wise that Mr. Evans should pay
a visit to Mr. Thomas, and show him the affidavits and ask him to place
his resignation in his hands to be sent to the Governor. Mr. Evans made
the visit and returned with the resignation of Mr. Thomas.

This was in the last days of July, or in the first days of August and time
was becoming most precious, as the committee had determined to ask the
Board of Supervisors to order a special election under the special act,
upon the question of the location of the County site and had planned to
have this election take place within a period of less than ten days next
preceding the day on which the state election would be held; the object of
this being to prevent the Board of Registration from striking off the
names of voters, who had been registered to vote on the local question,
and thus allow them to vote at the state election; the law forbidding the
striking off of the names from the registration books within ten days of
any general election. The Committee being satisfied that there was a
better showing for a fairer and fuller registration than could be had on
state election, and it requiring thirty days' notice under the special act
before the people could vote on the local question, it was determined that
this thirty days should expire within less than ten days of the state
election, and thereby the people would have the benefit of the full
registration in the state election.

As soon as Thomas' resignation was made known to the committee, the
question as to who should be his successor arose. Various names were
suggested, and finally that of Mr. Andrew J. Davis, and he was found
agreeable to Mr. Evans, because he had always been classed as a
Republican, had held office as such, and no one belonging to that party
doubted his being a Republican, although in fact he was a staunch
Democrat. To carry out this plan and have Mr. Davis appointed was also a
matter of delicacy and required secrecy; for the mails could not be
trusted, none of the committee dare afford to go before the Governor on
such a matter, it was therefore finally concluded that Mr. Evans was the
only man that could or should be trusted with such an important mission. A
sufficient fund was quietly raised, and Mr. Evans set off for the capitol,
and succeeded in having Mr. Davis appointed as President of the Board of
Registration. The secret of the appointment of Mr. Davis was so well kept
by the committee, Mr. Evans, and the people at the Governor's office, that
every one was surprised when Mr. Davis at the next meeting of the Board
took his seat as a member thereof. Mr. Davis and Mr. Reynolds, a majority
of this board, were known as friends of the Princeton interest in the
local fight. The board appointed its District Registrars composed of
liberal men; and the Board of Supervisors met and ordered the election on
the Court House question, and the fight opened with spirit and energy all
along the line.

So far, the plans of the committee had worked well and were successful,
but in their zeal to succeed they came near committing a serious blunder,
which if they had, would have defeated the settlement of the vexed
question. The District Registrars seemed to forget that they had any other
duty than to get out, hunt up, and register all the male citizens of the
county over the age of twenty-one years. This proceeding at once became
known, and so loud was it noised abroad that it was heard in the
gubernatorial office at Charleston, and gave alarm and great concern to
the Governor and his friends. About the time the District Registrars had
completed their list of voters, the September term of the Circuit Court of
Mercer County began its session at Concord Church; the Honorable Joseph M.
McWhorter, of the Greenbrier Circuit, presiding. There was a great throng
of people at the court to hear Honorable Frank Hereford, Democratic
nominee for Congress, make a speech. There happened to be also present on
the occasion Major Cyrus Newlin, a Republican lawyer from Union, who also
addressed the people on the political issues of the day. Newlin was a
carpet-bagger of the lower sort and extremely partisan, and his abuse of
the Democratic Party, particularly of the Southern people, aroused such
intense feeling and indignation towards him that it became necessary for
his friends to take care of him, in order to prevent personal violence.
The fact is, a crowd gathered that night with a rope, prepared to hand
him, and but for the wise counsel of Colonel William H. French and others,
who interposed, it would have been accomplished. On the Court day on which
this public speaking took place, it was discovered by the people in the
interest of Concord Church, as well as the Republicans, that the
registration had been indiscriminate, and that in returning the books to
the County Board, the one containing the names of persons registered in
Plymouth District, the district in which Concord Church is situate, had
been misplaced, and it was suspected by the Concord people that there was
some trickery about it; and they became aroused to such a pitch of feeling
and excitement as to forget everything else except the local question,
which not only absorbed their whole attention and interest, but some of
them were willing to sacrifice their political interests and put in
jeopardy the chances of shaking off their civil and political shackles;
and therefore, in order to wreak vengeance on those opposing them on the
local question, they imparted to Major Newlin what they supposed to be the
plan for registering every person, with the view to the overthrow of the
Republican Party.

No sooner had Major Newlin caught on to the supposed scheme than he wrote
a letter to the Governor, containing the startling news, that eleven
hundred rebels had been registered in Mercer County, all of whom would
vote the Democratic ticket; and strange, yet true, it seems that this
letter received the approval and endorsement of Judge McWhorter. When this
letter reached Charleston it, of course, very naturally, aroused the fears
of the Governor and his Republican friends for the safety of the party;
and in order to ascertain more fully the situation the Governor dispatched
one A. F. Gibbons, armed with blank commissions to be filled if he,
Gibbons, thought proper to do so, with the names of a new Board of
Registration. This letter had gone and was in the hands of the Governor
before the committee discovered that the same had been written, and by
this time it was too late to counteract the effect thereof at the capitol;
in fact, Mr. Gibbons had arrived in the County before anyone was aware
that he had been sent, or what steps the Governor proposed to take. The
committee was confronted by a new, formidable and serious danger; hitherto
it had been equal to every emergency as it had arisen, but the question
now was, would it be equal to this? Up to this time every movement of the
committee's adversaries had been met and thwarted; being always on the
alert, and through information derived from its spies it was kept well
advised, and before the blow was struck a counter one was given, and the
arm of the adversary fell palsied at his side.

The reader must not suppose that these things were idle dreams--they were
stern realities--actual occurrences; and no question more certainly and
effectually divided our people than did this local question. The war
between the states had not more thoroughly estranged the people of the
North and South, than this question had the people of the two sections of
our county. Military lines were never better connected and more securely
guarded and watched with greater vigilance, than were the lines between
these contending factions; and both money and brains were at work on both
sides, and the struggle throughout resembled that of two great armies on
the battlefield maneuvering for positions and preparing to join in deadly
struggle.

Mr. Gibbons had scarcely more than reached Concord Church, than the
information thereof was brought to the Committee of Safety. A meeting was
called and the situation discussed and the conclusion reached to watch
Gibbon's actions and await developments, which would doubtless show up in
a few hours; and the committee was not mistaken in its conclusion, for Mr.
Gibbons by some word or action had given offense to the Concord people,
and he left there in high dudgeon and came to Princeton. Now was the time
for action, and the committee determined that Mr. Gibbons must be met with
open arms and be fully assured that Governor Stevenson's interests should
not suffer in the hands of the people who were espousing the cause of
Princeton on the local question. To this end large numbers of the people
visited Mr. Gibbons, and assured him of their strong friendship for
Governor Stevenson, and of their intention to vote for the Governor if the
registration books were not blotched by erasure, and that the Governor had
all to gain and nothing to lose by allowing the names then on the books to
remain untouched. Mr. Gibbons heard these assurances with seeming delight
and satisfaction, and his faith in the truth of these statements was
strengthened from day to day by the action of and conversations had with
our people; at length the adversaries of Princeton, seeing that its people
had probably won Gibbons over to its side, and that he was a little too
credulous, whispered in his ear that he was being deceived, that the names
of too many prominent ex-Confederates were on the registration list for
the strong professions of these people to be true; so Mr. Gibbons became a
little wary and somewhat alarmed, stating that he thought the names of the
more prominent ex-Confederates should be erased from the lists. The
committee was reluctantly forced to yield and compromise by the
elimination of about two hundred names from the list of voters; yet enough
remained to accomplish their purposes, for they knew that while the people
had pledged themselves to stand by and vote for Governor Stevenson they
had made no further pledges and Mr. Gibbons had not asked or demanded more.

The opponents of Princeton were not without resources, and while these
events were transpiring at Princeton they were not idle; for they
formulated a plan which they supposed would prevent the people from
holding the special election on the local question; and that plan was to
get an injunction, prohibiting and enjoining the election officers from
opening the polls, holding the election and declaring the result; and with
this view, a bill was prepared by Attorney Newlin and entrusted to
Attorney J. M. Killey to be taken to Charleston by him and to be presented
to a Circuit Judge for an injunction, and if refused, then to be presented
to Judge James H. Brown of the Court of Appeals. Mr. Killey had scarcely
gotten away from Concord Church before the news of his leaving and that of
his mission reached the Committee; whereupon it determined that this last
effort of the removalists must be headed off and defeated. It was now only
ten days until the election was to b held on the local question. Mr.
Killey started on Wednesday, and a messenger was selected and directed to
follow Killey, and he started on Thursday morning; however, before
starting, Mr. Gibbons requested a little time to write some letters to be
sent to the Governor and other friends in Charleston by the Princeton
messenger, who took the letters and put off to Charleston, reaching there
in less than two days, being only twenty-three and one- half hours in the
saddle, and reaching there two hours ahead of Killey, although the latter
had twenty-four hours the start and had traveled twelve miles of the
distance by steamer. Hurrying to the Governor's office, the Princeton
messenger found no one there but Mr. Blackburn B. Dovener, now the
Honorable Blackburn B. Dovener, member of Congress from the Wheeling
district, private secretary to the Governor, to whom the letters of which
he was the bearer were delivered, the Governor being absent in the
northern part of the state, leaving Mr. Dovener in charge of his office.

The messenger made known to Mr. Dovener that it was necessary that he
should see Judge Brown, and requested him to accompany and introduce him
to the Judge, which he did. After stating to the Judge his mission and the
character of the bill which would likely be presented to him for action,
the Judge promised the messenger that if such bill was presented that he
should have opportunity to be heard. Mr. Killey presented his bill to
Circuit Judge Hoge, at Winfield, who refused the injunction, and on Mr.
Killey's return to Charleston, and on presentation of his bill to Judge
Brown the injunction was also refused by him. The Princeton messenger at
once started for home, reaching there on the Thursday evening preceding
the Saturday on which the election was to be held; and which passed off
quietly, a full vote was polled, and County Court House question was
settled in favor of Princeton by a majority of over four hundred. The
state election followed on the Tuesday week thereafter, and resulted in
the election of the whole Democratic county ticket by an average majority
of about three hundred, and a majority of nearly five hundred for Mr.
Hereford for Congress; electing Mr. Upton to the House of Delegates; and
George Evans Clerk and Recorder over Mr. Green Meador--this was in
fulfillment of the agreement of the Princeton interest with Mr. Evans. The
county authorities immediately went to work and had erected on the old
Court House foundation at Princeton a new building which was completed in
1875. This building was destroyed by fire, but another building was
erected immediately thereafter.

Mr. Upton, the Representative from Mercer County, on the assembling of the
Legislature in January, 1871, immediately introduced his bill for the
creation of a new county out of the territory hereinafter described; and
on the 27th day of February, 1871, the bill was passed creating the county
of Summers out of parts of the Counties of Mercer, Monroe, Greenbrier and
Fayette, within the following described boundary, to wit:

"Beginning at the mouth of Round Bottom Branch, on New River, in Monroe
County, thence crossing said river and running N. 47 1/2 W. 5430 poles
through the County of Mercer to a point known as Brammer's Gate, on the
line dividing the Counties of Mercer and Raleigh; thence with said county
line in an easterly direction to New River; thence with a line between the
Counties of Raleigh and Greenbrier, down New River to the line of Fayette
County; thence with a line dividing Raleigh and Fayette Counties, down
said river to a station opposite Goddard's House; thence leaving the line
of Raleigh County, crossing New River and passing through said Goddard's
house, N. 67 1/2 E. 3280 poles through said County of Fayette, to a
station on Wallow Hole Mountain, in Greenbrier County; thence S. 55 E.
3140 poles to a station east of Keeney's Knob in Monroe County; thence S.
9 E. 1320 poles to a station near Greenbrier River, and running thence S.
32 W. 7740 poles to the beginning."

The period between the close of the civil war and the settlement of the
question of the location of the seat of justice of Mercer County, and the
complete removal of all civil and political disabilities, under which our
people had been laboring for a period of nearly seven years, was one of
turmoil, trouble and unrest. Business in Mercer County during this time
was largely at a standstill, no one knew what to do, many suits had been
brought against the ex-Confederates for alleged wrongs and injuries done
or committed during the civil war, and they, the ex-Confederates, had
little show in the courts, which had been organized, as a rule, in the
interest of the dominant party and for oppression. The men who sat upon
the juries of the county were the political enemies of the ex-Confederates
and of the people who had espoused the Southern cause. No man who had
served in the Confederate Army or sympathized with the South, regarded his
life, liberty, property or cause, whatever it might be, as safe in the
hands of the Courts and Juries as they were then organized and existed.
Hundreds of people who had owned valuable property before the beginning of
the war and lived in opulence, were by its results reduced almost to
beggary, and they had a long, hard struggle to earn even a livelihood. The
expenses of government--the taxes--had grown to such enormous proportions
that the people had great difficulty in paying the same. The levies of
taxes for local purposes were often outrageous, on account of the
character and amounts of the claims and demands for which they were
levied; and after the levies had been placed in the hands of the
collection officers they were often squandered and never accounted for. In
the great struggle over the Court House question, a large amount of the
public funds were squandered, stolen or wasted. A jail had been erected at
Concord Church and the walls for a Court House had been about half way
built, and the expenditures in this regard amounted to thousands of
dollars, which was an entire loss to the taxpayers of the county. But,
notwithstanding all these drawbacks, the people labored, toiled and
struggled on in the hope of a better day coming, and it came at last when
we had better government and lower taxes, and the end largely of all the
difficulties growing out of the civil war and the questions therein
involved.

The board of Supervisors had power to lay and disburse the county levies,
and to make all contracts touching county affairs. After the removal of
the records and books from Concord Church to Princeton, the Board of
Supervisors consisted of L. D. Martin, William C. Honaker, Silas T.
Reynolds, Thomas Reed, and, for part of the time, Washington Lilley.

Mention has already been made of Mr. George Evans, who was of Welsh
extraction or descent, and who came from Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania. He was
a man of fair education, good sense, and, although often roundly abused,
was yet a very clever man, but in the days in which he ruled was a power
among the Republicans, and ruled them generally with a rod of iron. He
held as many as four or five offices at one and the same time, and did
pretty generally as he pleased touching the control and management of
county affairs, civil and political.

After the Board of Supervisors had adjourned its meetings from Concord
Church to Princeton, a proposition was made to it by Mr. Evans to sell to
the county a small farm which he owned in the valley of East River
Mountain as a place on which to keep the paupers of the county. Mr. Evans
was, in his political manipulation, always shrewd enough to control one
man on each of the Board of Supervisors and Registration; this man was
always a friend of Mr. Evans'--his middle man or fifth wheel--and by and
through whom he was generally able to carry out any measure he desired, or
that he knew was to his interest or that of his party. The Board of
Supervisors was generally divided politically, two Democrats and three
Republicans, but Mr. Evans could not always rely upon his political
friends to save his pet measures, but when necessary, he was sometimes
compelled to call on the other side, and with the aid of his man carry his
point. Mr. Evans' proposition to sell his farm to the county met with
disfavor, not only from the two members who were in the Princeton
interest, but especially from the two men who were friends of the Concord
interest, the two latter being exceedingly hostile to Mr. Evans on account
of his desertion of their interests in the Court House controversy and his
espousal of the interest of Princeton; therefore, when his proposition was
submitted to the Board, not only the two men from the Concord section
voted against it, but also the two men from the Princeton section, leaving
only Mr. Thomas Reed, the friend of Mr. Evans, to vote for his
proposition. No sooner was the measure defeated than Mr. Reed made a
motion that the Board adjourn to meet at Concord Church on the next day,
and his motion was promptly carried by his own and the votes of the two
Concord men, who were highly elated at the prospects of the Board again
holding its sessions at Concord Church, which would probably result in
taking the records to that place, and that the Courts would again be held
there. Mr. Reed, with the two men that had voted with him, mounted their
horses and took the road toward Concord Church, stopping however, over
night with Colonel William H. French, by whom they were very highly
entertained and cared for, and who was greatly delighted with their action
in adjourning the meeting of the Board to the place above named. The Board
met the next morning at Concord Church with the two members from the
Princeton section absent. Mr. Evans' proposition was again submitted and
unanimously carried, but before the Board adjourned the two members from
the Princeton section arrived, and thereupon Mr. Reed moved that the Board
adjourn to meet at Princeton; the two members from Concord voting in the
negative, but Mr. Reed voting with Princeton men, the motion was carried.
This incident is related here to show that this Court House controversy
entered into every public and private transaction of whatever character.

The Legislature at its session of 1870 repealed the "Suitors Test Oath,"
and amended the oath of teachers and attorneys, and at the same session
proposed an amendment to the Constitution commonly known and designated as
the "Flick Amendment," which provided that: "The male citizens of the
state shall be entitled to vote at all elections held within the election
district in which they respectively reside; but no person who is a minor,
or of unsound mind, or a pauper, or who has been convicted of treason,
felony, or bribery in any election, or who has not been a resident of the
state for one year, and of the county in which he offers to vote for
thirty days next preceding his offer, shall be permitted to vote while
such disability continued." It will be seen that this amendment was
intended, and in fact did, recitizenize and reenfranchise those who had
been decitizenized and disfranchised by the amendment to the Constitution
of May 24, 1866. The session of 1871 adopted the amendment, and provided
by law for its submission to the people, and it was adopted by a large
majority, on the fourth Thursday in April, 1871. This however, did not
satisfy the people of West Virginia, for they had determined to remodel
the Constitution, or rather, have a new one; and on the 23rd day of
February, 1871, an act was passed to take the sense of the people upon the
call of a convention and for organizing the same, and providing for an
election on that question to be held throughout the state on the fourth
Thursday of August, 1871, and which election resulted in a majority of
votes being cast for the call. The same act provided that in the event of
a majority of the vote being cast in favor of the convention, that the
Governor should make proclamation accordingly, and on the fourth Thursday
of October, 1871, that delegates to the said convention should be elected.
There were to be elected two delegates from each senatorial district and
one from each county and delegate district. From the Mercer County
senatorial district, Honorable Evermont Ward, of Cabell County, and Doctor
Isaiah Bee, of Mercer County, were chosen over Honorable Mitchell Cook, of
Wyoming County, and Mr.Harvey Scott, of Cabell County; and from the County
of Mercer, Elder James Calfee, a minister of the Church of the Disciples,
was chosen over Colonel William H. French. The members elected to this
convention assembled at Charleston on the third Tuesday of January, 1872,
and elected Honorable Samuel Price, of Greenbrier County, President. The
convention sat from the 16th day of January to the 9th day of the
following April, and having finished its work, adopted a schedule
submitting the Constitution framed by it to the people to be voted on, on
the fourth Thursday of August, 1872, and the same was ratified by the
people by a majority of over 4,000.

At the August election, 1872, Captain William L. Bridges, a Democrat, was
elected to the House of Delegates from Mercer County, over Jno. H. Peck;
and a full set of Democratic county officers were also elected, but Mr.
George Evans, a candidate for re-election for Clerk of the Courts received
but thirty votes; and this was his last appearance in the arena of
politics in Mercer County. Honorable Evermont Ward was elected Circuit
Judge, over C. W. Smith, Ira J. McGinnis, Henry L. Gillespie, and I. S.
Samuel; David E. Johnston was elected prosecuting attorney, over R. C.
McClaugherty, J. Speed Thompson, and Alonzo Gooch; R. B. Foley was elected
Clerk of the Circuit Court, over E. H. Peck and J. C. Straley; Benjamine
G. McNutt was elected Clerk of the County Court, over John H. Robinson.

The people who had espoused the cause of Princeton in the Court House
controversy were anxious to remove, as far as possible, the chagrin and
disappointment of the people who had striven to have the County site
located at Concord Church; they induced Captain Bridges to introduce and
have passed a bill establishing a branch of the State Normal School at
Concord Church (Now Athens), and which is today a most flourishing
institution of learning, and of which Captain James H. French was the
principal for nearly twenty years.

The political shackles that had been forged by the extreme Republicans--
radicals--and placed upon the ex-Confederates and tightly held for more
than five years, and had been snapped asunder and cast away, and the
Confederate people with the Union Democrats took charge of the ship of
state and guided her course safely for more than a quarter of a century,
and only lost control when the state became flooded with criminal Negroes.
For a full twenty-five years or more the conservative Democratic people
governed the state, during which time there was made more rapid material
development than in any other period of her existence, before or since.
(Note: George W. Anderson began, about 1876, the publication of the
Princeton Journal, the first newspaper published in Mercer County.) The
whole policy of the state, and her wise laws and administration thereof
during the years referred to, were dictated and controlled largely by the
old Confederate soldiers. It was through this influence that the
Constitution of 1872 was framed and adopted, and into which was
incorporated the provision that no person on either side of the war should
be held, civilly or criminally, liable for acts done according to the
usages of civilized warfare.

In the year of 1750, Doctor Thomas Walker and his party, on his return
from his second visit to the Cumberland Gap and Kentucky section of
country, passed by the site of what is now the city of Pocahontas,
Virginia, discovering the outcrop of the great coal beds of the Flat Top
region; consisting of some thirteen measures of coal, one of which is
known as the Pocahontas or N. 3, and which is over ten feet thick. The
next we hear about this coal field is in the report of Prof. Rogers, State
Geologist of Virginia, who visited this section between the years of 1836
and 1840, and made an extensive examination and a report of this coal
formation; however, this report seems to have excited no particular
attention. General Gabriel C. Wharton of Montgomery County, Virginia, who
commanded during the late civil war a body of Confederate troops and
marched at their head across the Flat Top Mountain, observed this coal
formation, and was impressed with its commercial value. He having been
elected, in 1871, to the Legislature of Virginia from the County of
Montgomery, obtained on the 7th of March, 1872, a charter for the
incorporation of "The New River Railroad, Mining and Manufacturing Company,
" with John B. Radford, John T. Cowan, James Cloyd, James A. Walker,
William T. Yancey, William Mahone, Charles W. Stratham, Joseph H. Chumley,
A. H. Flanagan, Philip W. Strother, John C. Snidow, Joseph H. Hoge,
William Eggleston, G. C. Wharton, William Adair, James A. Harvey, A. A.
Chapman, Robert W. Hughes, A. N. Johnston, Elbert Fowler, David E.
Johnston, John A. Douglass, William H. French, R. B. McNutt, James M.
Bailey and A. Gooch, as incorporaters. This charter was a very liberal one
and gave to the company upon its organization the right and power to
construct, maintain and operate a railroad from New River Depot in Pulaski
County, Virginia, on the line of the Atlantic, Mississippi, and Ohio
Railroad, to such a point as might be agreed upon at or near the head of
Camp Creek in the County of Mercer and State of West Virginia, with ample
provision for the building of branch roads in Mercer and other counties;
the capital stock not to exceed $2,000,000.00. The first meeting of the
incorporaters was held at Pearisburg, and Dr. John B. Radford was elected
President and Elbert Fowler Secretary. Various committees were appointed,
among them Captain Richard B. Roane, who was authorized and directed to
visit the coal fields and to secure grants and subscriptions in lands or
money. In part at least, through Captain Roane, Colonel Thomas Graham, of
Philadelphia, became interested in the scheme, and finally with some of
his friends succeeded in getting control of a majority of the stock of
said company, and immediately went to work to secure all the coal land in
what is now known as the Pocahontas region, and to push the building of
the railroad into that field.

In 1875 experimental lines were run from New River Depot down the New
River to Hinton on the Chesapeake & Ohio road. Shortly thereafter Colonel
Graham succeeded in securing the Virginia State convicts and placed them
on the line and commenced the construction of a narrow gauge railroad. In
the year of 1881, Mr. F. J. Kimball, President of Norfolk & Western
Railroad Company, met with Major Jed Hotchkiss, of Staunton, Virginia, and
in a conversation insisted that his road must have coal. Major Hotchkiss
pointed out to Mr. Kimball the Flat Top Field and its accessibility to his
road and the wonderful value of the coal, which led Mr. Kimball to join
Hotchkiss in a visit to the section. The coal and mineral leases and
contracts taken by Captain Roane, together with those subsequently taken
by John Graham, Jr., and Dr. James O'Keiffee were in the names of J. D.
Sergeant and others, or rather for their benefit.

Some time prior to February, 1881, the mortgage on the Atlantic,
Mississippi & Ohio Railroad had been foreclosed, and the road purchased by
a Philadelphia syndicate, who changed the name to Norfolk & Western
Railroad Company, which very shortly thereafter became the owner of the
New River Railroad, Mining and Manufacturing Company's charter, and on the
3rd day of August, 1881, the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company commenced
the construction of its New River Branch. In the meantime a charter had
been obtained from the state of West Virginia incorporating the New River
Railroad in west Virginia, and also a charter for the East River Railroad,
in West Virginia.

On the 9th day of May, 1882, the New River Railroad Company of Virginia,
the New River Railroad Company of West Virginia, and the East River
Railroad Company were merged and consolidated. The work on this line of
road was rapidly pushed, so that on the 21st day of May, 1883, the same
was completed to Pocahontas, Virginia, the terminal point, and the first
shipments of coal were made in the June following. The Messrs. Graham,
Sergeant and others, in the meantime, had secured by option and purchase
and had gotten together some 50,000 acres of valuable coal properties in
the Pocahontas field.

For ten years or more prior to 1882, Messrs. H. W. Straley, C. D. Straley,
John A. Douglass, James D. Johnston, and this writer, had been securing
coal properties along the north side of the Bluestone River in the Flat
Top region, and from the Virginia and West Virginia state line eastward,
had gotten control of some 20,000 acres. In the year of 1881, these lands
of Straley and others were, through Echols, Bell and Catlett, of Staunton,
Virginia, and Honorable Frank Hereford, of Union, optioned to Samuel Coit
of Hartford, Connecticut; which options were finally taken by George M.
Bartholomew and Samuel Coit, the land was surveyed, paid for and conveyed
to said Bartholomew and David E. Johnston, trustees, and subsequently sold
to E. W. Clark, of Philadelphia, and his associates, for $105,000.00.The
name given to the company by the parties who held these lands prior to the
sale to Mr. Clark, was first, Bluestone-Flat Top Coal Company, and
afterwards Flat top Coal Company, but subsequently Mr. Clark and his
associates organized several joint stock companies, dividing up these
lands and conveying portions thereof to each of said companies. among the
companies organized, were Bluestone Coal Company, Crane Creek Coal
Company, Indian Ridge Coal Company, Widemouth Coal Company, Flat top Coal
Company, and Rich Creek Coal Company. While these companies were being
organized, Mr. Clark and his associates, together with some other persons,
organized the Trans-Flat Top Land Association, for the purpose of
acquiring coal lands north and west of the Flat Top Mountain, which
association acquired a large territory of lands in the Counties of
McDowell, Wyoming, Raleigh, Boone and Logan, including the Maitland
survey, called 500,000 acres, the Dillon survey of 50,000 acres, and a
large number of small tracts within these surveys held under junior
grants. The holdings of the several joint stock companies above named,
together with those of the Trans-Flat Top Association, aggregated 232,483
acres. On the first day of April, 1887, the Flat Top Coal Land Trust,
which afterwards changed its name to Flat top Coal Land Association, was
organized by Edward W. Clark, Sidney F. Tyler, Everett Gray, Robert B.
Minturn, Henderson M. Bell, Edward Denniston and Mahlon Sands, the objects
and purposes of which were the purchase and acquisition of mineral and
other lands and interests in real estate in the states of Virginia, West
Virginia, and North Carolina, and for the development, improvement and
sale of the same, and the leasing thereof for the purpose of cutting and
the carrying away of the timber, of coal mining for coal and coking
purpose of mining iron ore, and the manufacturing of iron, or for any
other purposes. The capital of the association was to consist of $40,
000.00, with the right to increase the same to $10,000,000.00 and the
stock to be divided into two classes, preferred and common shares, of
equal amounts. These articles of association constituted E. W. Clark, S.
F. Tyler, and H. M. Bell trustees, to whom was conveyed all to the
aforesaid lands.

Mr. Samuel A. Crozer of Upland, Pennsylvania, entered early into this coal
field on the Elkhorn Creek, and purchased a body of several thousand
acres, which he immediately proceeded to open up and develop. The major
part of his holdings lie largely on and along the Ohio extension of the
Norfolk & Western Railroad. These lands held by Clark, Tyler and Bell have
been recently sold and conveyed to The Pocahontas Coal & Coke Company.

It has already been stated that the first coal shipped from this field was
in June, 1883, and, as shown by the statistics, the whole output of coal
for the first year, 1883, was 55,522 tons, and of coke 23,762 tons. A
large number of collieries have been opened and are in operation in Mercer
County, and there are a number of others opening up in the Widemouth
Valley. The following are among the collieries in the County of Mercer,
viz:

Mill Creek Coal & Coke Co.
Booth-Bowen Coal & Coke Co.
Goodwill Coal & Coke Co.
Coaldale Coal & Coke Co.
Caswell Creek Coal & Coke Co.
Buckeye Coal & Coke Co.
Louisville Coal & Coke Co.
Klondike Coal & Coke Co.

The total output from these coal mines for the year of 1904 was 1,274,070
tons of coal, and of coke 190,132 tons.

These coal operations are carried on in the northeast portion of Tazewell
County, Virginia, the northwest portion of Mercer, and largely over the
southern portion of McDowell County.

When the railroad entered this region in May, 1883, there were no cities,
towns or villages. There are now in this field and in the immediate
vicinity, the city of Bluefield, in Mercer County, with a population of
nearly 11,000; the city of Pocahontas, in Tazewell County, with a
population of about 5,000, and the town of Graham, Coopers, Bramwell, Ada
and Oakvale. From the wildest, most rugged and romantic country to be
found in the mountains of Virginia, or West Virginia, this has become the
most rushing and thriving business center, with a population of perhaps 50,
000, whereas, before the coming of the railroad and the developments
referred to, the population was comparatively small. Many little thriving
villages and towns have sprung up in different portions of the county,
mostly, however, along the lines of railroad, and in the mining district.
Athens, formerly Concord Church, a few years ago but a very small village,
is now quite a thriving town; and Princeton, the county town, is now
putting on city airs on account of the prospective building of the
Deepwater Railroad.

The people of the county are generally prosperous farmers, and have within
the past few years greatly improved their farms, erected a better class of
dwelling houses, and there has been a general advance and improvement
along the whole line. The city of Bluefield has had a marvelous growth. In
1888 it was a mere flag station on the farm of John B. Higginbotham;
incorporated as a town in December, 1889, with Judge Joseph M. Sanders as
its first Mayor. The city has four banks, viz: First National, Flat Top
National, Commercial, and State Bank, with an aggregate capital of over
$250,000.00, with a line of deposits of over $1,000,000.00; four hotels;
four wholesale grocery houses, water works, electric light plant, electric
railway line. It has two Methodist churches (white), two Methodist
churches (colored), two Baptist churches (white) and two colored Baptist
churches, one Church of the Disciples, one Lutheran, one Presbyterian and
one Catholic. It also has a large high school building, costing about $20,
000.00, accommodating nearly 800 school children; a large Institute for
the colored people, which was built on state account, and is supported by
state appropriations; and also a large opera house.

The city is built on the watershed between the head branch of East River
and the waters of the Bluestone, in the extreme southwestern portion of
Mercer County, and is about 2557 feet above tide, in a high and healthful
location, and bids fair in a few years to have a population of more than
double what it has at present. Mercer County has, including the railroad
yard at Bluefield, about 195.03 miles of trackage in the county, of which
74.3 miles are within the city of Bluefield.

The taxable values in the county for the year of 1880 were $676,009.00 and
in the year of 1905, $4,103,563.00