Legends of the Skyline Drive and the Great Valley of Virginia

He learned how to track animals, to know the various birds' songs and cries. He watched the hunters build their camp fires and learned how to cook his own game.

Front Royal

As most of us know, Charles II lived in such extravagant style and had such a luxurious court he had difficulty in keeping his bills paid. He was accustomed to resorting to one scheme after another in order to raise revenue. At one time he dreamt of great wealth from the Virginia colony through its tobacco crop—and it did supply him generously with taxes.

Realizing a lucrative business might be established by trading in furs with the Indians, Charles ordered Governor Berkeley to send explorers beyond the mountains. The governor chose a man of whom history records very little. John Lederer was at one time a Franciscan monk. He obviously had leanings towards an adventuresome life. In 1761 he set out for the West, under the compulsion of Governor Berkeley. The party was composed of five Indian guides and a Colonel Catlett. They went through Manassas Gap in the neighborhood of Front Royal.

The expedition proved a failure because of the unfriendly attitude of the Indians and the roughness of the country. Charles was destined for another disappointment.

White settlers came to Front Royal as early as 1734 and built their little houses in sheltered coves near the Shenandoah. Soon, news of the desirable home sites in the Valley attracted other settlers. Lehewtown was the early name given the settlement.

Rough characters began to find their way here and shootings, brawls and hard drinking were the order of the day—so much so that the place later became known as "Helltown." However, it acquired more dignity and order with the years and about 1788 it was incorporated under the name of Front Royal. And why did the town get its double name? There are several existing legends as to the derivation of the town's present name.

The trails from Page and Shenandoah valleys crossed at this point. One account states that the settlers going from one place to another met at a tavern at the crossroads where the Royalist troops were stationed. Hence ground around the town was a military post. When the sentry on guard called out "Front" and the settlers were not able to give the password "Royal." The name Camp Front Royal was given the post and later it was known by the last two words.

A particularly tragic battle occurred at Front Royal in May, 1862, when the First Maryland Regiment of the Union forces met the First Maryland Regiment of the Confederate Army. It happened when Stonewall Jackson came out suddenly from the Page valley and attacked General Banks' left wing stationed at this town. The Federals were defeated and were driven on through Rivertown where they tried hard to burn the bridges and cut off the Confederate advance. The cavalry of the latter under Ewell saved the bridges which spanned the two branches of the Shenandoah River. About two weeks later the Confederates themselves burned the bridges, but this was after Jackson had flanked Banks away from the position at Strasburg, followed him to Winchester and won a victory there.

Flint Hill

In 1861 young Albert Willis was a theological student. Like many others, he left his studies to enter the services of the Confederate Army. While he was not a chaplain in Mosby's Rangers in which he had enlisted, he did carry on his pastoral work with the men by giving them Bibles, holding some services, and writing home for those who could not write; no day passed during which he did not find an opportunity to be of service to the men.

One day in October, 1864 he was granted a furlough and was riding southward to Culpeper, hoping to reach his home in that county. Not far away from Flint Hill his horse lost a shoe, so he stopped at Gaines Mill. There was a rickety old blacksmith shop at the crossroads. It had been raining and he was very wet. While the horse was being shod, he stood near the fire to dry his boots. The beat of the hammer on the iron drowned out the sounds of approaching horses on which rode Federal soldiers.

Willis was taken captive and joined another prisoner outside. The two Confederates were told that one of them must die in reprisal for the death of a Federal soldier who had been killed the day before.

The prisoners were carried before General William H. Powell, Union Cavalry leader. Someone told General Powell that Mr. Willis was a chaplain.

"If you are a chaplain," General Powell told him, "your life will be spared."

"I am not a chaplain," the young Confederate replied, "I am a soldier, fighting in the ranks."

General Powell then told the Confederates that one of them would be hanged within an hour. They would be given straws to draw lots. In this way would one be spared.

Willis replied that he was a Christian and was not afraid to die. He insisted that the other Confederate who was a married man, be set free. The doomed man was led out to a spot on the road near Flint Hill. A rope was placed around his neck while the other end was tied to a young sapling which had been bent down by the weight of several Federal soldiers.

While the preparations were being made, young Willis knelt down and prayed. A witness said he never heard such a beautiful prayer, lacking all bitterness. When he was through, the men released the tree and it sprang into its natural position, swinging Willis high into the air, where the body was left.

When the Federals had gone, Mr. John Ricketts came by with a companion and they cut down the rope, took the body of the brave Confederate and buried it in the cemetery at Flint Hill. Today there is a stone which marks his resting place and every Spring women go and place flowers on his grave. Nearby is a small chapel named in honor of him—"Willis Chapel."

General Powell knew that young Willis was not accused as a spy, but he was carrying out an order, issued in August 1864 by General U. S. Grant, which read: "When any of Mosby's men are caught hang them without trial."

The Skyline Drive

This world famous drive is not very old in point of years, but its lure has and is attracting thousands of visitors every week to see the beauties along its borders. Beginning at the northern entrance at Front Royal, one winds around curving grades of finely built roads which pass through great forests of oak, walnut, maple and wonderful specimens of evergreens.

West of the Drive one sees the eastern section of the Shenandoah Valley and Massanutten Mountain which divides the Shenandoah River into two forks for fifty miles or more. The river winds in and out and at one place the guide will point out eleven bits of blue river spots as it makes as many turns through the Valley. One thinks of old patchwork quilts as he looks into the Valley below, for there are patches of green fields, oblong bits of blue water, red roofs of barns and homes, besides the various shades of greenwood lots.

And no matter when or how often one goes, the views are never the same. Sometimes the blue haze from the Blue Ridge Mountains makes the sunlight turn to a golden mist. Clouds often cast huge moving shadows over the fields and forests below—and sometimes they shut out the patchwork entirely, leaving the visitor in a gray world, with only himself and the clouds below and above. But this is unusual.

Tall stark gray chestnut trees make a striking contrast against the greens and flowers, especially in the Fall when the leaves are so brilliantly colored. These once-producing nut trees were killed by blight years ago.

Occasionally one's attention is caught by a moving object high above on some peak. This will prove, upon investigation, to be a hiker, or maybe two or more. Every year more and more of these nature lovers are using the Appalachian Trail, which, as you know, is the foot-trail from Maine to Georgia. It was through the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club that this link in the trail was included in the Skyline Drive and they maintain locked shelters for hikers along the way within the park.

Other trails invite one to lofty peaks through wild canyons and into groves of giant hemlocks. Another takes one through White Oak Canyon where a stream of pure water tumbles over huge rocks and makes a snow-white misty spray. Here one sees rare wild flowers, ferns, moss and herbs. There are trout lilies, Solomon's-seal, Hepaticæ and many other varieties of flowers.

There is a trail to Big and Little Devil's Staircases where two hundred foot cliffs protect narrow canyons filled with maidenhair fern, spleenwort, cinnamon, wild parsley, ginseng and ginger. Tall maple and tulip trees are lovingly intertwined by such clinging vines as trumpet vines and honeysuckle while at their feet grow rare ferns and carpets of moss. One hears the songs of the birds and sees the flashing of their brilliant colored wings.

Not far from Mary's Rock is Skyland. Here the tourist finds accommodations for overnight or longer. Big roaring fires at evening make visitors linger to listen to the stories of the Valley.

Horseback riding is great sport for the Skyline guests who explore the various trails nearby.

The visitor may leave the drive at Panorama and go west down the mountain to Luray. Or he may go east from Panorama down a lovely road to Sperryville. Then on Route 211 he may motor north to Washington or, if he would like to go by way of Culpeper, Madison, Orange and Fredericksburg, he would find a rolling country and inviting roads to the west, south and east.

If the visitor would continue the drive to Swift Run Gap, he could go over the Spotswood Trail to Elkton and to the Valley beyond. If he would go east, he would also use the Spotswood Trail to Stanardsville and Gordonsville, then to Orange or to Charlottesville.

Who dreamed the dream or had the first vision of the Skyline Drive? What farsighted men started the movement which resulted in our national government's making a great scenic park in Virginia?

A bulletin from the Commonwealth gives the following summary:

"The movement which has made this area a national park was begun in 1924 when the director of the National Park Service and the Secretary of the Interior conferred on the establishment of a park in the southern Appalachian Mountains. The Secretary appointed a committee to choose the most attractive and suitable area; in December, 1924, his committee voted unanimously for the area of the Blue Ridge mountains between Front Royal and Waynesboro to be the first large national park in the East....

"Acquisition of the area was a very difficult task. In 1926 the newly created Virginia State Commission on Conservation and Development started field work, and the Shenandoah National Park Association began a campaign to raise funds for the purchase of the land. The required area was made up of 3,870 separate tracts. Most of the owners did not wish to sell; land titles were not clear nor boundaries well defined; sufficient money to make the purchase was not available. Congress reduced the minimum area required for administration, protection, and development of the park by the National Park Service. Certain individuals made large donations. The Virginia legislature appropriated $1,000,000 for acquisition and passed a special law providing for wholesale condemnation of the land. Finally, in 1935, at a total cost of approximately $2,000,000, 275 square miles were acquired, and the deed to the park area was presented to the United States government by the State of Virginia.

"The completion of this tremendous task of acquiring and establishing the Shenandoah National Park has made available to the people of the United States, for recreational and educational purposes, an unusually attractive region of mountains, hollows, dashing streams, forests and flowers.

"The mountains rise to a maximum height of slightly more than 4,000 feet above sea level, or approximately 3,200 feet above the surrounding country."

Strasburg

We can hardly mention a Valley town which has retained its original name throughout the years. What is now known as Strasburg was in the beginning called Staufferstadt, which indicates its German background. Peter Stover was the founder from whom the settlement took its name but when he had the town incorporated in 1761 he changed it to Strasburg in honor of his home city in Germany.

There are evidences of the pioneer life of the Valley to be seen near here. A house built about 1755 and occupied by the Hupps was so constructed as to serve efficiently as a fort during the Indian raids; this may still be seen. The home of George Bowman, a son-in-law of Joist Hite, is also close by Strasburg.

Joist Hite had four famous grandsons born at this Bowman home. John was a governor of Kentucky. Abraham was a Colonel in the Revolutionary War and Isaac also served in that war. Joseph served under General George Rogers Clark in the expedition to the Northwest Territory.

The story is told that a party of eight Indians with a white man named Abraham Mitchell killed George Miller and his wife and two children just two miles from Strasburg. They also killed John Dellinger and took his wife and baby prisoners.

A group of white men set out to find them and overtook the Indians in the South Branch Mountains. They fired upon the Indians and killed one of them, allowing the others to make their escape. Mrs. Dellinger was forgotten in their flight so she came home with her neighbors. She told them the Indians had killed her baby by dashing out its brains on a tree—a favorite means of execution with them.

Samuel Kercheval, who so frequently is quoted by us and of whom we have written elsewhere is buried near Strasburg at "Harmony Hall."

The town saw Union and Confederate troops march by during the length of the war and several battles took place not far distant. A few trench lines may still be seen around the countryside. "Banks' Folly" was erected by General Banks when he expected Jackson to invade the territory from the south and later found to his dismay that the Confederates had entered the Valley from the opposite direction. Signal Knob on top of Massanutten Mountain was used by the latter general as a means of communication with the main division of the army on the Rappahannock River.

Orkney Springs

Orkney Springs, earlier known as the Yellow Springs, was named for the Earl of Orkney and was surveyed by George Washington, according to some accounts. The Springs may be reached by travelling west of Mount Jackson.

"The Orkney Springs are composed of several lively springs and are strongly chalybeate. Everything the water touches or passes through, or over, is beautifully lined with a bright yellow fringe or moss. The use of this water is found beneficial for the cure of several complaints. A free use of this water acts as a most powerful cathartic, as does also a small quantity of the fringe or moss, mixed with common water."

So stated the historian Howe concerning the Springs. Around the waters there grew up a tiny village which accommodates the visitors to the section. An excellent hotel caters to the guests who seek either quiet and rest or zestful games.

Near Orkney Springs there is a beautiful outdoor shrine where the Episcopal Church holds regular and impressive services during the Summer months—Shrinemont.

Stephens City

An act of the General Assembly in 1758 made Stephens City, or Stephensburg as it was then known, the second town in the Valley. The first was Winchester. Lewis Stephens the founder of this town came to Virginia with Joist Hite in 1732.

Later on this was a thriving town manufacturing the Newtown-Stephensburg wagon that was the pride of teamsters who travelled all roads leading south and west. They took merchandise into the wilderness and returned with furs, skins and other products sent back by those settlers who had pushed on farther into the wilds of Virginia. Many a covered wagon which saw the plains of the Middle West had its birth in Stephensburg.

When the Forty-Niners created companies which sent supplies to the gold fields of California they found that few wagons lasted more than six months. At last they began to order those being made in Stephensburg. These were found to be sturdier in build and could stand the strain of the rough roads and paths longer than other wagons on the market.

The stores in the town were good ones, and often covered wagons came in drawn by splendid horses. The drivers of these teams put up overnight at the old taverns and many of the citizens gathered after supper to hear the news of what was going on in Alexandria or in Tennessee. The drivers would be called personal shoppers today, for they brought lists of articles to be carried back into the far-off country for the convenience of the homesteaders there. The lists probably included sugar, tea and coffee, cloth by the bolt and household articles. You can imagine the joy with which the covered wagons would be sighted days later!

During Jackson's Valley Campaign the village was known as Newtown and mention is made in this book of fighting in the neighborhood.

Today the main industry centers around lime which is found in large quantities close by.

Middletown

As an early village this was known as Senseny Town, in honor of the doctor by that name who owned the land. In 1795 it was called Middletown. Long ago it was a manufacturing town and was noted for the fine clocks and watches which were splendid time-keepers for the punctual and thrifty Valley folk. In fact, the demands for them came from far and near. The old wooden wheels were first used, then brass was introduced and the watch-makers learned to make the eight-day clocks—the last word in time-keepers until the advent of the modern electric clocks. The manufacturers of the watches and clocks soon made instruments for surveyors as well as the much needed compasses.

The first successful effort to produce a machine to take the place of the flail and threshing floor for threshing wheat from the straw had its start in this same town. The machines were a marvel in their day and the villagers talked for months at the time when the machine beat out one hundred bushels of grain in one day!

The Story Teller of the Valley—Samuel Kercheval

PIONEER LIFE

Samuel Kercheval as a boy saw many of the pioneer men and women who had cut their homes out of the wilderness. He never tired hearing of how they had left Germany, and later had come down from Pennsylvania into the Valley. He himself could remember many of the "Newcomers" who were themselves pioneers. He loved the stories of the forts, the Indian raids and the customs of the Germans and Scotch-Irish. He later began to write down many of these stories and after he was older he rode up and down the Valley gathering more and more stories and reading wills and old records. Nothing was of too little value for him to record, even accounts of the freaks of nature, like a six-legged calf, snakes and other animals.

When Kercheval's friends insisted that he write a book about the Valley, he objected until they told him how much the children of the country would enjoy stories of their grandparents. His own children (there had been fourteen of them in all), like all children, loved stories. Now he began to get his notes in shape and about one hundred years after the first settlers came into the Valley, Samuel Kercheval's History of the Valley of Virginia was ready for the publishers.

This was so popular that all the first edition was soon exhausted. How pleased he was with the demands for more of them! However, he died before the second edition came out. He lived at the time of his death in 1845 at "Harmony Hall" near Strasburg. This had at one time been a fort. During an Indian raid, we are told, sixteen families sought shelter within its old stone walls. They lived together so peaceably that they gave it the name of "Harmony Hall."

It is from Kercheval that we get the first pictures of the Valley. He writes that it was long beautiful prairie, with tall rich grasses, five and six feet tall, with fringes of sturdy timbers following its swiftly running streams. He describes the kinds of soils and tells which is rich and which is poor. For instance he says where one finds slate he may rest assured the soil will not produce very good crops. On the other hand, where one finds limestone the soil will produce fine products, grains and fruits.

Metal was found in some of the hillsides and mountains. An Englishman named Powell found silver ore on the mountain which bears his name. He smeltered the silver and from it made coins. This was breaking the laws, of course, and soon officers were attempting to arrest him. Powell fled to his mountain where he had a small fort hidden, and for years eluded them. After many years men found his little shop where he smeltered the ore and Kercheval himself saw the crude crucible in which the ore was refined and the iron utensils also.

Kercheval tells that many of the farmers found it difficult to plough their lands and to make crops because of the innumerable small and large stones which they found everywhere. At last they decided to get rid of them and built many of the stone walls which one sees up and down the mountain sides, along winding roads and enclosing picturesque homes. He says the soil is so rich that seeds do not need to be planted very deep, as they will germinate if there is only enough soil to cover them.

There were great sugar-maple trees too and he tells of those "sugar hills" in which there are four or five hundred acres of trees. They even look like sugar loaves from a distance and today on Paddy's Mountain you may still see some of them. You may already have guessed that the name Paddy was in honor of the owner Patrick Blake, an Irishman who built in the gap which is named for him.

Kercheval lists carefully all the various healing springs and gives the properties of each. He even gives the names of many persons who were benefitted by drinking from or bathing in them.

Let us pause here and read about these pioneers, how they built their houses, how they dressed, and something of their superstitions, manners and customs.

The first settlers built plain sturdy houses made mostly from rough hewn logs. Some of these were covered with split clapboards, having weight poles to keep them in place. Many of them had no floors except the earth itself. If made of wood, they used rough logs, split in two and roughly smoothed with a broad ax. However, as they improved the lands and their families grew, some larger houses were built of stone, which the men and boys brought in from the fields.

The married men generally shaved their heads and they wore wigs or linen caps. When the Revolutionary War broke out this custom was stopped for they could no longer buy wigs from Europe and none were made in this country. There was little linen, so they could not get enough for other needs and they could do without caps.

The men's coats were mostly made with broad backs and straight short skirts. These had huge pockets with flaps. The waistcoats had skirts nearly down to the knees and pockets also. Their breeches were so short they hardly reached to their knees, and they were fastened with a tight band. Their stockings were drawn up under the knee-hand and tied with a red or blue garter below the knee so it could be seen. Their shoes were made of coarse leather, with straps and they were fastened with buckles of brass for every day—maybe with silver for Sundays and holidays. The men's hats were either of wool or fur with a round crown three or four inches in height and with a very broad brim. The shirt collar was only a narrow band and over it was worn a white linen stock drawn together at the ends and fastened with a broad metal buckle.

The women wore a short gown and petticoat of plain materials and a calico cap. Their hair was combed back from the forehead and made into a plain knot at the nape of the neck.

The women and girls worked in the fields and wore no shoes except in the winter. They worked from dawn 'til dark, for they milked, churned, made cheese, washed and ironed for the family, cooked, spun and wove, knitted stockings and quilted in their leisure moments. Kercheval tells us how they made apple butter and sourkrout. Of the latter he wrote:

"Sourkrout is made of the best of cabbage. A box about three feet in length and six or seven inches wide, with a sharp blade fixed across the bottom, something on the principle of the jack plane, is used for cutting the cabbage. The head being separated from the stalk and stripped of its outer leaves is placed in this box and run back and forth. The cabbage thus cut up is placed in a barrel, a little salt is sprinkled on from time to time, then pressed down very closely and covered at the open head. In the course of three or four weeks it acquires a sourish taste and to persons accustomed to the use of it is a very agreeable food. It is said the use of it within the last few years on boards of ship has proved it to be the best preventive known for scurvy. The use of it is becoming pretty general among all classes in the Valley."