31 Saturday May 2014
28 Wednesday May 2014
Posted in Cemeteries, Fourteen
Tags
Andrew Elkins, Andrew Elkins Family Cemetery, Appalachia, Brandon Kirk, cemeteries, Elizabeth Elkins, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, Harry Kirk, history, Lincoln County, Phyllis Kirk, West Virginia
To reach the Elkins family cemetery, you must cut brush, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
Mom and I at the Elizabeth Elkins grave, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
Mom at the Elizabeth Elkins grave, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
Elizabeth Elkins was the wife of Andrew Elkins, a Confederate veteran and postmaster, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
Dad at the Elizabeth Elkins grave, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
Elizabeth Elkins grave, Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2002
18 Sunday May 2014
Posted in Cemeteries, Civil War, Fourteen, Wewanta
Tags
Brandon Kirk, Caleb Headley, cemeteries, Fourteen, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, history, Lincoln County, photos, Sulphur Spring Fork, West Virginia
Caleb Headley grave, Sulphur Spring Fork of Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV, 2014
18 Sunday May 2014
Posted in Big Creek, Ferrellsburg, Fourteen, Leet, Sand Creek, Toney
Tags
Anna Laura Lucas, Big Creek, Blackburn Lucas, Catherine Toney, Clerk Lucas, Ed Reynolds, Elizabeth Lucas, farming, Ferrellsburg, Fourteen, genealogy, Georgia Stowers, Hazel Toney, history, Huntington, Isaac Marion Nelson, Jessie Lucas, John Sias, Leet, Lincoln County, Lincoln Republican, Low Gap United Baptist Church, Marie Lucas, Rachel Fry, Republican, Sand Creek, Sarah Workman, Susan Brumfield, Toney, Tucker Fry, W.W. Lucas, Walt Stowers, Ward Lucas, West Virginia, Wilburn Adkins
“Bess,” a local correspondent from Toney in Lincoln County, West Virginia, offered the following items, which the Lincoln Republican printed on Thursday, May 23, 1912:
The farmers are all glad to see this fine weather. They are all busy planting corn and hoeing potatoes.
Clerk Lucas attended the Republican Convention at Huntington last Wednesday and Thursday. He reports an interesting time.
D.C. Fry spent Saturday and Sunday with his family here.
Some of our people attended church at Low Gap Sunday and heard an interesting sermon delivered by Rev. Nelson.
Mr. and Mrs. B.B. Lucas had as guests Sunday J.W. Stowers and wife, of Ferrellsburg, W.W. Lucas and wife, E.W. Lucas and wife, of Big Creek, and John Sias of Fourteen.
Mrs. Sarah Workman was shopping in Ferrellsburg Saturday.
Mrs. B.D. Toney and granddaughter, Hazel, were visiting on Green Shoal Sunday.
Ed. Reynolds, a hustling republican of Leet, was in our midst Sunday.
Mrs. Rachel Fry is visiting her mother near Leet.
Wilburn Adkins, of this town, was visiting relatives near Sand Creek last week.
Little Marie Lucas is on the sick list this week.
26 Saturday Apr 2014
Posted in Big Harts Creek, Ferrellsburg, Fourteen, Rector, Sand Creek
Tags
Albert Adkins, Allen Nelson, Brooke Adkins, Buffalo Creek, Christmas, David Farley, Doren Lucas, education, Everett Dingess, Ferrellsburg, Fisher B. Adkins, Floyd Enos Adkins, genealogy, Harts Creek, Hazel Adkins, history, Jessie Lucas, Lincoln County, Lincoln Republican, Logan County, Lottie Lucas, Maggie Fry, Maggie Lucas, Matthew Farley, Maud Toney, Methodist Church, Minerva Brumfield, Rector, Sand Creek, Ward Lucas, West Virginia
“Old Hickory,” a local correspondent from Ferrellsburg in Lincoln County, West Virginia, offered the following items, which the Lincoln Republican printed on Thursday, December 21, 1911:
Mrs. Brook Adkins is teaching one of the best schools in Harts Creek district. She is a faithful teacher.
Misses Maud Toney and Maggie Fry of Rector, were visiting Mrs. Ward Lucas last Sunday.
A.G. Adkins and wife, and M.C. Farley were calling on Misses Maggie and Lottie Lucas Sunday.
Miss Minerva Dingess was visiting Mrs. A.G. Adkins Sunday.
Everett Dingess has just returned from a flying visit to Big Hart. He reports a fine time.
Born to Mr. and Mrs. Ward Lucas on last Monday morning, a boy. The mother and child are doing well, and Ward says the boy will be a republican.
F.B. Adkins on returning from the Toney lodge on last Saturday night lost his hat.
M.C. Farley has returned from Big Buffalo, Logan county, where he has a good job of work.
Mrs. Martha Farley, mother of M.C. Farley, died at the home of her youngest son, David Farley, on Dec. 5th. She had been a member of the Methodist church since early life and was ever faithful to the teachings of that church. She was past 74 years of age. The remains were interred at the place selected by her on the home farm.
A small child of Allen Nelson, of Sand Creek, caught its clothes on fire the other day and was burned to death.
Hazel, the six year old daughter of F.E. Adkins, caught on fire the other day and was badly burned.
M.C. Farley went to Hamlin last Monday.
The boys of this vicinity are preparing for a lively time. Xmas and the children are looking for Santa Claus.
15 Tuesday Apr 2014
Tags
Appalachia, Fourteen Mile Creek, Frances Bush, George Bush, history, life, Lincoln County, photos, U.S. South, West Virginia, Wewanta
George Bush and Frances Lucas Bush-Workman (c.1855-1920), residents of Wewanta, Lincoln County, WV
09 Wednesday Apr 2014
Posted in Atenville, Ferrellsburg, Fourteen
Tags
culture, Ferrellsburg, genealogy, history, life, Lincoln County, Matthew Farley, photos, West Virginia
Matthew Farley, resident of Ferrellsburg, Lincoln County, WV
06 Sunday Apr 2014
Tags
Appalachia, Dry Branch, Fourteen Mile Creek, Frye Ridge, Lincoln County, mountains, nature, photos, West Virginia
Posted by Brandon Ray Kirk | Filed under Fourteen
06 Sunday Apr 2014
Posted in Fourteen, Green Shoal, Women's History
Tags
Appalachia, Emily Lucas, Fourteen Mile Creek, Green Shoal, history, life, Lincoln County, photos, West Virginia
Emily (Fry) Lucas, early resident of Green Shoal and Fourteen Mile Creek, Lincoln County, WV
06 Sunday Apr 2014
Posted in Big Creek, Fourteen, Green Shoal, Women's History
Tags
Andrew Elkins, Big Creek, Catherine Fry, Emily Lucas, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, Green Shoal, Grover Gartin, history, Jeff Lucas, John Fry, John Gartin, John Lucas, Lincoln County, Logan County, West Virginia, William Lucas, writing
Emily (Fry) Lucas was born on January 2, 1832 to John and Catherine (Snodgrass) Fry at the mouth of Green Shoal Creek in what is now Lincoln County, West Virginia but was then Logan County, Virginia. She married her first cousin, William R. Lucas, a son of John Lucas, who lived at nearby Big Creek. William and Emily made their home on Fourteen Mile Creek in Lincoln County. She died on June 7, 1910. I located her obituary many years ago in microfilm stored at the Hamlin-Lincoln County Public Library. Elder John Gartin penned her obituary, printed by the Lincoln Republican on June 20, 1910.
Our beloved sister, Emily Lucas, wife of W.R. Lucas, Sr., and mother of Jefferson Lucas, who is well known in this county, departed this life June 7th., at the age of almost 80 years. Mrs. Lucas united with the Church July 4th, 1883, and lived faithfully her duty for almost 27 years. Funeral services were conducted by Eld. John Gartin, assisted by Eld. Andrew Elkins and Elder Grover Gartin. She leaves 5 children and many friends to mourn their loss and we extend our heart-felt sympathy to the bereaved ones.
Emily was my great-great-great-grandmother.
29 Friday Nov 2013
Tags
Appalachia, banjo, culture, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, history, Holly Sias, life, Lincoln County, music, photos, West Virginia
Holly “Hod” Sias, Lincoln County, West Virginia, 1925-1940.
01 Friday Nov 2013
Posted in Fourteen, Wewanta, Women's History
Tags
Appalachia, Caleb Headley, Elizabeth Jane Farley, Fourteen, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, history, Lincoln County, midwife, photos, Sarah Headley, Sulphur Spring Fork, U.S. South, West Virginia, William Floyd Farley
Sarah Ann (Farley) Headley, daughter of William F. and Jane (Clark) Farley and wife of Caleb Headley. Sarah (1849-1945) is my great-great-great-grandmother. She lived at Sulphur Spring Fork of Fourteen Mile Creek in Lincoln County, WV.
19 Saturday Oct 2013
Posted in Fourteen
Tags
Appalachia, Caleb Headley, Fourteen, genealogy, Gladys Kirk, history, Johnny Headley, Moses Headley, Sarah Headley, Ward Adkins, West Virginia, Will Headley, writing
On July 18, 1903, Billy and Sarah Sias, with Sarah and Moses C. Headley, sold 30 of the remaining 34 acres of Caleb Headley’s estate to Cosby (Headley) Fry. It was located just across the creek from Caleb’s old home place.
“Beginning on a beech and white oak corner to John H. Fry & the company on a point below the Hinkles branch thence,” the deed for this 30-acre tract reads, “with John H. Fry line to Albert Neace corner thence with said Neace line to S.A. Sias corner thence down the creek with the meander of said creek to the mouth of the branch opposite Sarah Headley house she now lives in thence up said branch to the mouth of the first drain on the lower side of said branch thence up said drain to the back line between the company & Caleb Headley deceased thence with said line to the beginning it being part of Caleb Headley’s deceased.”
The remaining four acres of Caleb Headley’s estate remained in tax books from 1903 until 1910, when it was dropped with the following notation: “improper by sheriff.” Oddly enough, its value had risen from $2.50 per acre to $4.00 per acre in 1905.
In 1903, the same year Sarah and Moses Headley sold the remainder of the family estate to the Frys, they bought 45 acres of land (containing the original home place) from Sarah Sias. They kept it until 1909, when they sold it to Zack Neace. In 1918, Neace sold it to Van Alford, a son-in-law to Johnny Headley.
By the early twenties, Sarah Headley still made her home with her single sons, Ballard and Moses. In 1922, Moses married Lizzie Nelson (at his residence according to records) and soon left Sulphur for good. First, he settled in Chapmanville, then South Charleston, where he died and was buried.
“Uncle Mose married Lizzie Nelson and moved to Chapmanville,” said Ward Adkins, late resident of Sulphur Springs, in a 2003 interview. “He lived in a log cabin he had built and moved in there before they even finished a floor.”
In 1924, Ballard Headley married Claire D. Clark. About that same time, Will Headley opened a store near his home at the mouth of Sulphur.
“They had a small grocery store, him and Maw, from about 1924 until about 1927 just over from where the church house is now,” said Adkins.
In July of 1929, Johnny Headley’s wife, Emaline, died of dysentery flux and he remarried early the following year to widow named Emarine Elkins.
Throughout that time, Sarah Headley just came and went, staying with first one relative and then another.
“Ever since I can remember she would drop in and maybe stay a week with us, then she’d go somewhere else and stay,” said Adkins. “She’d go up on Harts Creek a lot of times and stay. She’d stay with Bal maybe a week and Uncle Johnny over on Steer Fork.”
“She used to come to Grandpa Johnny Headley’s and stay a few nights,” said the late Gladys Kirk, a granddaughter of Johnny Headley and a resident of West Fork. “Then she would go on back to Will’s. I was small at that time, maybe eight or nine years old. She wouldn’t do anything. She’d sit around. She was too feeble to cook or anything. She held on to a big red handkerchief she packed with her everywhere she went. It was folded. We never got to look in it but it looked like she had something in it. She told someone it was her burying clothes, whatever that meant. And when Grandmaw Headley would get meals ready Grandma Sarah would make the kids line up and she’d say, ‘They’s nobody going to the table to eat until they washed their hands.'”
Around 1935-36, Sarah Headley moved in with Will permanently.
“I guess she finally got too old to go from place to place,” said Adkins. “Anyhow, she come to our house and stayed there till she died. She’d got rid of her furniture by then but she had a whole set of these old big woven baskets she kept her clothes in. She was a kind person. I liked to hear her tell tales, you know. And I don’t know how many skirts she would have on at once. Six or seven — maybe more. She’d pull up that apron, run her hand down in there, get her pipe and her tobacco out. She died in 1945 when I was away fighting in World War II.”
15 Tuesday Oct 2013
Posted in Fourteen
Tags
Appalachia, Ballard Headley, crime, Dave Headley, Dave Merrill, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, Harry Tracy, history, Sarah Headley, Will Headley, writing, Zachary Neace
During the 1890s, Sarah Headley remained on Sulphur Spring Fork, although tax records and oral tradition do not indicate the exact location of her dwelling house. In that span of time, according to tax records, her property valuations increased significantly. In 1891, a 50-acre tract climbed from $100 to $125, a 45-acre tract went from $69 to $90 and a 26-acre tract jumped from $39 to $156.
In 1892, Margaret Headley, Sarah’s youngest daughter, married Zachary T. Neace, a well-to-do timberman on the creek. In subsequent years, they lived in Virginia, the place of Neace’s origin, or on Fourteen Mile Creek.
In 1893, Sarah Headley — perhaps taking advantage of a rising evaluation on her property — sold a 45-acre tract of land worth $90 to an unknown party, leaving her with only 76 acres of the 455 acres she had owned just after her husband’s death in 1882.
A few years later, Dave Headley, Sarah’s 23-year-old son, was accidentally shot and killed.
“Dave was aiming to sell this guy a gun and this guy was looking at it and it went off and shot Dave in the head,” said Ward Adkins, a step-great-grandson to Sarah Headley, in a 2003 interview. “When Will and Uncle Johnny first heard about it they aimed to kill that guy, then they found out it was an accident.”
In the late 1890s, Will Headley, who had left Sulphur around the time of the disastrous house fire and spent time with his uncle Burl Farley on Harts Creek, moved back to Fourteen after marrying Caroline Lucas, a daughter of William R. and Emily (Fry) Lucas. He and his wife settled near the mouth of Sulphur where he continued to assist his mother and family.
During that time, Sarah Headley was still somewhere on Sulphur. In 1897, she sold 42 acres — including 16 acres of the old homeplace — to Sarah A. (Nelson) Sias, whose husband Billy had bought 174 acres from Headley in 1884. Three years later, she was listed there in the Lincoln County Census as “Sarah A. Hedley,” age 51, with sons Ballard, age 20, and Moses, age 15.
Just after the turn of the century, Ballard Headley joined the army and left Sulphur Spring for a few years.
“Uncle Bal joined the army and they sent him West,” said Adkins. “I think he was in one or two Indian skirmishes and he deserted and joined a gang with Harry Tracy and Dave Merrill, two famous outlaws. I was reading a book about Harry Tracy. I asked him, ‘Did you ever hear of Harry Tracy when you was out West?’ He said, ‘Son, I rode with him.’ He said, ‘We was horse thieves. We’d steal horses from one state and take them into another state and sell them and then steal some there and take them somewhere else and sell them.’ He wasn’t afraid of nothing. He told me himself he held up a passenger train one time, too.”
Harry Tracy, the outlaw supposedly befriended by Headley, was born in Wisconsin in 1874. At a young age, he drifted west to Wyoming where he hooked up with a gang of cattle rustlers who worked with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. In 1897 he was arrested in Salt Lake City but escaped and went to Colorado where he joined the Hole-In-The-Wall gang. He was arrested there and sent to jail in Aspen, Colorado, but escaped a short time later after nearly killing a guard with a lead pipe. He next went to Oregon, where he met gambler Dave Merrill in a saloon. The pair committed their first crime together in January of 1899. They were soon arrested and Tracy and sent to Oregon State Penitentiary. In December of 1899, he and Merrill were transported to Olympia, Washington to face charges, where they again escaped. They were both free for New Year’s in 1900, but were captured again in Portland a short time later. On the morning of June 9, 1902, Tracy and Merrill broke out of prison, leaving behind dead and wounded guards. On June 28, Tracy killed Merrill in a duel near Napavine, Washington. Thereafter, he hijacked a boat, which dropped him off near Seattle. He slipped through the city and crossed the Snoqualmie Pass, before he killed himself after a shoot out with a small posse in Creston, Washington.
“Uncle Bal was mean,” Adkins said. “He wasn’t out West long but when he came back here he told my grandpa Neace, who ran the post office, ‘If any mail comes here for George Golden, it will be for me. You hold it for me.’ Sure enough, there was. And by the time the government tracked him down for desertion he was blind as a bat. Some people said he put his eyes out to keep from going back in the army but he didn’t. He said he’d caught this disease and it got in his eyebrows and he put red persipity in there to kill it and got out and got to working and went to sweating and it got in his eyes and put his eyes out.”
“Now Bal was awful intelligent,” Adkins continued. “He’d come up and he’d have me to read the Bible to him. He belonged to the church. And he knew the Bible all ready, I don’t know why he’d want me to read it. But I’d try to skip on him. Maybe I’d just down here eight or ten verses. He’d say, ‘Hold on, back up there.’ Then he’d start quoting it off to me.”
14 Monday Oct 2013
Posted in Fourteen
Tags
Appalachia, Burl Farley, Caleb Headley, Cole and Crane Company, genealogy, history, John Henan Fry, Johnny Headley, Moses Headley, Sarah Headley, Ward Adkins, Will Headley, writing
In 1881, Dr. Caleb Headley died of a lingering Civil War wound, leaving his young widow, Sarah, in a tough predicament. As the 32-year-old mother of six children — ranging in age from fifteen to two — she assumed charge of the family estate (a $100 house and 455 total acres), all of which was situated on a creek where she had no in-laws or immediate family to assist her. She chose not to remarry but did commence some sort of an affair with a Porter, which resulted in the birth of a son named Moses C. Headley on December 20, 1884.
The initial task of keeping the family afloat financially fell on Caleb’s oldest son, Johnny Headley. “After Caleb died, Uncle Johnny had to keep Grandma Sarah, and his brothers and sisters,” said Ward Adkins, an 81-year-old step-great-grandson to Doctor Headley, in a 2003 interview. “He ran rafts and made whisky and he farmed to make money. Everybody made whisky. It wasn’t a big thing.” In the mid-1880s, Johnny Headley married Emaline Susan Sias, a daughter of Henry C. and Sarah (Plumley) Sias, and settled on nearby Steer Fork.
Sarah, meanwhile, deeded off large parts of her property to provide for her remaining children. In 1884, she sold 174 acres of the family property to William A. “Billy” Sias, a neighbor and son of the local postmaster. Two years later, she sold 160 acres adjoining the homeplace to John Neace.
Around that time, her oldest daughter, Ida Cosby Headley, married John Henan Fry, a son of Christian T. and Elizabeth (Hunter) Fry of Green Shoal. They settled near Sarah on Sulphur. “Old man John Henan Fry was a quiet, docile kind of fellow and easy-going,” said Adkins. “Aunt Cos was awful good to kids, but now some of her boys were pretty rough and kind of sneaky. They’d pilfer a few things along the way from neighbors. They said they had a big cave up in that hollow and it was plumb full of chicken feathers and bones and geese feathers where they’d steal them chickens and things and take them up there and eat them. They just done as they pleased.” John Henan and Cosby Fry remained nearby until 1923, when they moved to Daisy in Logan County. (In 1925, Everett and Annie Sias bought their property.)
In the late 1880s, based on tax records, Sarah Headley’s financial woes continued. The valuation of her home, estimated at $100 from 1882 until 1887, dropped to $50 by 1890, before finally leaving the record books altogether by 1891. In that same time frame, the Headley home was destroyed by fire.
“Will said when he was eleven or twelve years old, the house burned and the family almost starved to death,” said Adkins. “He said the corn crib was close enough to the house when it burned that the fire parched all the corn. Well, they ground that corn up in an old coffee grounder, I guess. Then they’d ‘thrash’ birds at night using pine knots for light. One would kick the brush pile and scare the birds out and the other one would take the brush and knock them down. And Will said they’d clean them birds and cook them in with that parched corn they ground up and make a gruel. They ate that all winter. They had it tough. Grandma Sarah dug may apples and sold them for three cents per hundred pound.”
In this time of extreme hardness, Will Headley, Sarah’s third oldest son, went to live with her brother, Burl Farley, a wealthy timber man on Big Harts Creek in Logan County.
“When Will was about twelve year old, he went up on Harts Creek somewhere to stay with his uncle Burl Farley,” said Adkins. “Uncle Burl was pretty well to do. He worked for Cole and Crane Timber Company up on Pigeon Creek — the Brown’s Fork of Pigeon, I believe Will said. Will worked up there with him. Uncle Burl ran the timber part of it and Granddad took care of the stables and ran errands.”
“Will used to pushboat for a company on the Guyan River,” Adkins continued. “They took stuff out like ginseng. He told me it was so cold one winter — you might have heard them talk about that cold Friday or cold Saturday — his ears froze and busted. He said they bought chickens where they tied up for the night and they would dip them down in the water and pull them back out and all them feathers would just pull right out. He called it ‘scalding them’ but it wasn’t. It was just so cold it shrunk their skin up and the feathers come out easy.”
09 Wednesday Oct 2013
Posted in Fourteen
Tags
Appalachia, Caleb Headley, Fourteen Mile Creek, Henry Farley, history, Lincoln County, medicine, Sarah Headley, Ward Adkins, West Virginia, Will Headley, writing
The new “Mrs. Headley” — Sarah Farley — was born on May 26, 1849 to William Floyd and Elizabeth Jane (Clark) Jones-Farley in Logan County, (West) Virginia. She was a full 21 years younger than Caleb’s oldest child and barely older than his youngest child by his first wife. Her grandfather was Captain Henry Farley, who led an Indian raid down the Guyandotte River through present-day Logan County in the early 1790s and was one of the county’s earliest settlers.
Caleb and Sarah Headley had the following children: Lat. Headley, born May 1, 1866, died before 1870; John Timothy Headley, born April 20, 1867, married Emaline Susan Sias then Emarine Elkins in 1930, died March 29, 1956; Ida Cosby Headley, born March 23, 1869, married John Christian Henon Frye, died September 22, 1948; Caleb David Headley, born February 22, 1872, died about 1895; William Franklin “Will” Headley, born August 25, 1875, married Caroline Lucas, died January 1960; Margaret Headley, born March 28, 1878, married Zachary T. Neace, died 1911; and Ballard P. Headley, born April 14, 1880, married Claire D. Clark in 1924, died circa 1958.
Headley, a doctor, and Sarah, a midwife, combined to serve the medical needs of the community.
“Doctor Headley treated whatever ailed people,” said Ward Adkins, in a 2003 interview. “And Grandma Sarah was a midwife from the time she was young. She delivered way over a hundred babies, practically all of us. People paid them with whatever they had: chickens, garden stuff.”
In the 1870 Lincoln County Census (Harts Creek District, Household #16), Headley was listed as 62 years old, while Sarah was 27, John was 3 and Cosby was 1. Caleb had $160 worth of real estate and $350 of personal property.
Two years later, in 1872, Headley bought 145 acres of land valued at one dollar per acre from George Hager.
“Beginning at a chestnut oak, corner to Harman Stroud on the ridge between the Big Branch and the Sulphur Spring Branch,” according to the deed, “thence N. 20 W. 100 poles to a white oak and ash on the middle point of Big Branch, thence S. 87 E. 85 poles to a stake a corner to Daniel Messer, thence with his line, S. 70 E. 196 poles to a white oak and beech, a corner to Brumfield’s heirs lands, thence S. 5 W. 160 poles to a double beech, thence N. 55 W. 84 poles to a maple corner to Corbin Estep, thence with his line, S. 71 W. 43 poles to a locust, thence N. 45 W. 155 poles more or less and with Stroud’s calls to the beginning.”
In 1879, Headley purchased 62 acres worth one dollar per acre from a land company.
“Beginning at a poplar on the John Fry Branch,” reads the deed, “thence south 52 poles to a white oak S. 30 E. 40 poles to a ‘sour gum’ E. 70 W. 156 poles to a stake, N. 45 E. 153 poles to a poplar and beech in the old Hager Line, then with it S. 16 E. 77 poles to the beginning.”
In 1880, Caleb was listed in the Harts Creek District of Lincoln County as a 72-year-old physician. Interestingly, this was the first instance in which Headley, who claimed to have been a practicing physician for nearly fifty years in an interview conducted during the early 1880s, declared his occupation as anything other than farming.
“I know Will said he could cure cancer,” said Adkins. “He said he was born with a cancer on his stomach and he had to sleep on a pillow until he was four years old. He had to wait until that sore was large enough for his daddy to take it off. Will had a scar as big as a fifty-cent piece on his stomach. He showed it to me several times. He said, ‘That’s where Paw took the cancer off of me.’ Grandpaw Neace told me that, too. He took one off of some of their family. He died with his secret, though. He never did tell nobody what he knew.”
In 1881, Headley bought 150 acres of land worth two dollars per acre from G.W. Hager, giving him a total property acreage of 357.
The following year, he either purchased more land or surveyed his existing properties. Tax books record him with the following tracts: 210 acres worth two dollars per acre containing a $100 building; 200 acres worth $1.50 per acre; and 45 acres worth $1.50 per acre. In total, according to tax records, he owned 455 acres worth $888.
Around that time, Henry H. Hardesty published a biographical sketch on Headley and several of his neighbors in a Lincoln County history.
“Caleb Headley is now a prosperous farmer, owning 600 acres of good land on Fourteen-mile creek, a portion of which is heavily timbered with oak, poplar and pine; coal and iron ore in abundance. There is a fine sulphur spring upon the land, on the creek three miles from Guyan river, which has been visited by people from many parts of the United States, and it is pronounced of excellent medicinal quality by all.”
This sulfur spring, which provided the entire creek with a name and generated some interest as a spot for healing is still remembered by older residents of the area today.
“It was just up here around the curve from my house,” said Adkins. “It’s not there now. It’s been destroyed. It had a round rock and that rock was about two feet high and it was dressed all the way around. And someone had hollowed it out about two inches from the edge and it sat right down in that spring. People used to gather there when I was growing up to play marbles and pitch horseshoes. Dad used to send us up there to get him a bucket of water after we come out of the field. Sulfur is a blood purifier, they said.”
Not long after providing his biography to Hardesty, Caleb Headley passed away.
“Doctor Headley died in, I believe it was 1881,” said Adkins. “Will said his dad died when he was about six years old and he was born in August of 1875. I think he finally died of a Civil War wound.”
Tax records do not list Headley’s property as being in his estate until 1886.
09 Wednesday Oct 2013
Tags
Appalachia, civil war, Fourteen, Fourteen Mile Creek, Fourteen Post Office, genealogy, history, James Wilson Sias, Lincoln County, photos, Union Army, West Virginia
James Wilson Sias, Union veteran and postmaster of Fourteen in Lincoln County, WV
08 Tuesday Oct 2013
Tags
154th Regiment, Appalachia, Caleb Headley, civil war, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, Hardesty's History of Wetzel County, history, Lincoln County, Mexican War, Monongalia County, Nancy Ann Headley, New Jersey, Revolutionary War, Sarah Headley, Thomas Headley, Tyler County, U.S. South, Ward Adkins, West Virginia, Wetzel County, Will Headley
In the years following the Civil War, Caleb Headley migrated from Wetzel County, West Virginia to the Sulphur Spring Fork of Fourteen Mile Creek in Lincoln County, bringing with him a young wife and some degree of knowledge about medicine. Behind him were Pennsylvania roots, a soldier’s experience in the Mexican and Civil wars, as well as a failed marriage. About fifteen years later, he passed away and was buried on a hill near his home.
Today, Ward Adkins, an 81-year-old walking encyclopedia of Sulphur Spring history, is the best source on Dr. Headley’s life. He was partly raised by Headley’s son, Will, his step-grandfather, who told Adkins what little he knew about his father and eventually gave him a very important family heirloom: a geography book containing genealogical information in his father’s handwriting.
Caleb Headley was born on April 11, 1808, the first son and second child of Dr. Thomas and Sarah (Asher) Headlee, in Pennsylvania. Thomas was born around 1775 in New Jersey and was the son of a Revolutionary War veteran. Sarah was born around 1785 in Virginia.
Caleb had seven known or suspected brothers and sisters: Elizabeth Headley, born about 1807, Mary Headley (c.1811-1881), Anthony Headley (August 11, 1812 – January 1, 1894), Jerusha Headley (March 16, 1815 – May 16, 1884), Sarah Headley (August 22, 1817 – June 18, 1900), Elisha Headley (August 24, 1820 – August 2, 1895), and Nancy Headley, born about 1822.
In 1822, according to Hardesty’s History of Wetzel County, Thomas Headley settled in Tyler County, (West) Virginia with his family where he taught young Caleb what he knew about doctoring prior to his death, which reportedly occurred around 1830 in Monongalia County, (West) Virginia.
On November 2, 1826, Caleb married Nancy Ann Wright in Pennsylvania. Nancy was born on October 15, 1808 in Virginia. Her parents were born in Maryland.
Caleb and Nancy had ten children: Charity Headley, born March 1, 1828; Elizabeth Jane Headley, born June 2, 1829; Thomas J. Headley, born November 23, 1831; Joshua Headley, born April 7, 1832; Sarah A. Headley, born December 8, 1833; Caleb Samuel Headley, born March 30, 1836 or 1837; George Washington Headley, born May 21, 1839; Benjamin Franklin Headley (May 31, 1841 – April 11, 1918), Anthony Headley, born June 3, 1844, and Elijah Headley, born August 1, 1850.
During the 1830s and ’40s, Caleb lived in Tyler County where he was, by his own admission, a practicing physician, member of the Methodist Church and for sixteen years a justice of the peace.
“I don’t think Caleb had any schooling to be a doctor,” Adkins said, in a 2003 interview. “As far as I know, the only thing he had as far as a medical education was studying under his daddy. His daddy was a doctor.”
In 1846, the portion of Tyler County occupied by Headley became Wetzel County.
Some time between 1846 and 1848, Headley reputedly served as a lieutenant in the Mexican War. While no military records have been located at the present time to verify his service, one of his sons made the claim that he had been an officer in the war.
“His son Will told me that he was an officer in a war with Mexico,” said Adkins.
In the 1850 Wetzel County Census, Caleb appeared in the Green District as a 40-year-old farmer (not physician) with $200 worth of real estate. His wife was 32 years old, while the children were listed as follows: Thomas (age 17, farmer, in school), Sarah (age 16, in school), Samuel (age 13, in school), Washington (age 10, in school), Franklin (age 9, in school), and Anthony (age 6).
In 1860, the Headleys maintained their residence in Green District.
When the Civil War began in 1861, Headley joined with most of his neighbors and sided with the North.
“Wetzel County, Virginia, was one of the counties which supported the Union during the War Between the States,” Mary Curtis, a genealogist, wrote in 1959. “The large majority of the settlers were from Pennsylvania and the Piedmont areas of Virginia where slaves were not common, so that their interests lay with the North.”
According to Hardesty’s History of Lincoln County, Headley was captain of a company in the Union army. According to military records, he was captain of Company C, 154th Regiment.
“He was captain of a company in the Civil War,” said Adkins. “That’s in Hardesty’s. And Will said he was an officer. He didn’t know what rank, you know. I was told that he was shot in the back. His backbone was just barely hanging together. I think he was discharged in Ohio.”
Several of Headley’s sons fought for the North. Caleb Samuel, later a resident of Porters Falls in Wetzel County, “served a short time in the Union army as lieutenant,” according to Hardesty’s History of Wetzel County. Anthony, later a resident of Pine Grove in Wetzel County, “was a soldier with the Federal army, serving in Company I, 15th West Virginia Infantry, and he participated in all the fortunes of that regiment, engaging in its battles and witnessing the surrender of Lee at Appomattox.” His term of service was from August 24, 1862 until June 30, 1865.
In 1866, 50-something-year-old Headley settled in present-day Lincoln County and joined the Christian church. By that time, he had separated from his wife Nancy and was involved in an intimate relationship with 16-year-old Sarah Farley of Logan County. The two had their first child on May 1 then married on May 25 in Catlettsburg, Kentucky.
Headley’s separation from his first wife has been a hot topic of conversation among his local descendants.
“They had a rumor going that Dr. Caleb run off and left his first wife, but Will said it wasn’t so,” said Adkins. “I heard his wife died when their son Elijah was fifteen years old, which would have been around 1865.”
However, according to Wetzel County census records, Nancy was very much alive after the separation. In 1870 and 1880, she referred to herself in both census schedules as a widow.
20 Friday Sep 2013
Posted in Fourteen
Tags
Appalachia, culture, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, history, John Henan Fry, life, Lincoln County, photos, U.S. South, West Virginia
John Henan Fry
28 Friday Jun 2013
Posted in Culture of Honor, Fourteen, Wewanta
Tags
Appalachia, culture, Fourteen, Fourteen Mile Creek, genealogy, Great Depression, history, life, Lincoln County, moonshine, photos, U.S. South, West Virginia, Wewanta
14 Mile Creek men pose with a rifle and jar of moonshine, 1930s
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