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The first know exploration of this immediate area
was the time Governor Berkeley was Governor of the Colony of Virginia.
He was curious about the land across the mountains. He commissioned
Major Abraham Wood whom the Colonial Assembly authorized to explore and
to profit by trade for fourteen years after 1653. His commission must
have expired and have been renewed. Wood raised an exploration party
with Thomas Batts in charge, and Robert Fallam, Thomas Wood, Jack
Neasam, an indentured servant, and Perecute as guide. - "A great man of
the Appomattox Indians." Fallam kept a record. On September 1, 1671,
the five men started west from about where Petersburg, Virginia, is now
located. A few days later Wood got sick and had to stop. This party
crossed the mountains. They had no names for any place and their exact
route has been reconstructed. Evidently they crossed Peters Mountain
and continued west through or near where Pickaway is now. They
described the various mountains and streams and followed one to a river
which they crossed and then climbed a mountain. All present knowledge
of the country and of the Indian trails would determine that they came
down Wolf Creek, crossed the Greenbrier near Griffith's Creek, and
climbed by way of an Indian trail up Keeney's Knob. On September 13
and 14, 1671, they were in or very near the present location of the
Alderson community. From the top of Keeney's they gazed east and west
at the row upon row of mountain ranges. They then went down New River
as far as the Falls of Kanawha. There they had a little ceremony and
claimed the whole region for King Charles II. From the record, these
were the first white men to see what is now Alderson.
The English having settled on the Virginia
shores were slow to explore west of the mountains after Batts'
journey. They were even slower to settle. They wanted the fur trade
and quickly resented the success of the French. Stories of good land
on the "Western Waters" excited the greed of Eastern Virginians and
led to the earliest settlement of this wilderness. In 1749 the
Greenbrier Land Company was organized and granted 100,000 acres of the
best land in the present counties of Pocahontas, Greenbrier, and
Monroe. This land was not in a single tract but consisted of the
finest lands, widely scattered, which the company could claim. This
was the rankest kind of political deal given to "prominent men." The
president of the Greenbrier Land Company was John Robinson, Treasurer
of Virginia and Speaker of the House of Burgess, with eleven other
political favorites and Tidewater planter as owners. Most were out to
make a quick fortune and do little in return. John Lewis, one of the
members, and his sons Thomas and Andrew, both surveyors, were the
active working participants. This grant was based on previous
exploration. By 1755 they had surveyed about one-half of the great
give-away and had sold some.
The other land syndicates,
the Loyal Land Company with an 800,000 acres grant from the Greenbrier
to North Carolina, and the Ohio Land Company, began surveys and
explorations. In 1755 Dr. Thomas Walker, manager of the Loyal Land
Company, was exploring. Dr. Walker and his party definitely went
through the present location of Alderson. Dr. Walker left Staunton,
Virginia, March 16, 1750, and returned July 13, 1750. By measuring
the distances traveled daily as give in his journal, he passed for the
mouth of the Greenbrier up the river through the site of Alderson,
July 2, 1750, on his way home. He wrote in his diary July 6, 1750,
"---There are some inhabitants on the branches of the Greenbrier but
we missed their plantations." As an indication of the enormous
numbers of wild game, Dr. Walker recorded that his party killed 13
buffalo, 8 elk, 53 bear, 20 deer, 4 geese, 150 turkeys and other wild
game. He said, "We might have killed three times as much meat if we
had wanted it."
______
History of Monroe County,
Morton, and numerous other references
Lewis, Virgil A., First Biennial Report of the Dept. of Archives and
History, 1906, Tribune Printing Co., Charleston.
Walker, Dr. Thomas, Journal of an Exploration in the Spring of the
Year, 1750, Boston, Little Brown & Co. 1888, page 66.
Next, the apparent first settlement,
Baughman's Fort.
The contents contained in this series is copyrighted
and the sole property of
The Greenbrier
Historical Society - Lewisburg, WV
Used by permission - November 18, 2008 |
