The Life and Adventures of Wilburn Waters, the famous hunter and trapper of White Top Mountain, etc

Preface

. This book, except that portion of it illustra ting the life and adventures of Wilburn Waters, the great hermit hunter and trapper, comprises a series of articles written for a weekly news paper, partly for pastime, and partly to preserve for the use of the future historian a few facts connected with the early settlement of South western Virginia, and which otherwise might have been lost. These facts, together with at tempted descriptions of various localities, and all that the book contains, have the merit at least of being true. Being thus hastily thrown together, without revision or systematic arrangement, the author's only apology is, that it re appears in this form at the urgent solicitation of a great number of persons who read the articles as they appeared in the "Abingdon Vir ginian," and who thought them worthy of pres ervation.

PREFACE.

. With no further apology or explanation, this little volume of " multifarious small things " is thrown into the tide of current literature, not without hope that it may afford a few hours' pleasant pastime at the fireside of the mountaineer, and some of its facts form the nucleus of a much more comprehensive work by an abler pen, embodying the history of our own beautiful Southwestern Virginia. CONTENTS.

Chapter I. Description Of White Top Mountain, Near Which, Forty- Five Years

AGO, WILBURN WATERS SELECTED THE SPOT FOR HIS CABIN, AND WHERE, EXCEPT AT SHORT INTERVALS, HE HAS EVER SINCE RESIDED. Before entering upon a narrative of the life and adven tures of the remarkable man who is to be the subject of the following pages, it is proper that the writer should give his readers some idea of White Top Mountain, near which, when about twenty years of age, Wilburn Waters selected the spot for his future home. This is a peak in the Appalachian range, here more familiarly known by the local name of Iron Mountain, and near the point where the three States of Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee all unite at a common corner. It is about twenty miles from Abingdon the way the crow flies, though perhaps thirty by the intricate bridle paths, through intervening mountains, by which it is approached.

Until within a few years, comparatively, owing to its inaccessibility, it was almost in its primitive state, and visited only by hunters and trappers, and here and there a "squatter," who may have fled to its fastnesses to evade those penal enactments which a certain class of men in most communities deem oppressive. It is some 5,000 feet high from base to summit, and upwards of 6,000 feet above the level of the sea. Its summit is a vast field, com prising from 300 to 500 acres, without a tree or shrub, and covered with a luxuriant growth of wild grass, resembling that of our Northwestern prairies, which is highly nutri tious, and cropped with insatiable avidity by vast herds of stock, driven there from the neighboring settlements to graze and fatten. During the months of May and June, this field, as well as a large portion of the wooded part of the mountain, is gorgeously carpeted with wild flowers of every imaginable hue, and so fragrant that their perfume is often wafted a considerable distance on the wings of the wind, which sometimes sweeps across the broad field like the dying throes of a hurricane, with fitful shrieks of wild and melancholy music.

Bordering this natural field are great numbers of native gooseberry and currant bushes, which yield their acrid fruits in never-failing abundance, and the wild leopard lily, springing from its rocky bed, sways to and fro, and scatters its rich perfume as the blast sweeps by. Upon the very summit, various springs of ice-cold water gush from the rocks and leap down the declivities, babbling their wild music as they disappear amoDg magnificent rhodo dendrons and the dazzling crimson of the Indian pink. These waters are so pure and light that they never oppress, no matter how freely the thirsty visitor may quaff them. The field above referred to is bordered by a very singu lar as well as very beautiful growth of timber, known in that region by the name of Lashorn. Some of these trees grow to an immense height, but generally are not more than from thirty to fifty feet high, and, what is very re markable, where not crowded they are perfectly flat on top, spreading out to a diameter of from fifteen to thirty feet.

It is a species of and very much resembles Norway Spruce, an ornamental tree often found in the yards of our more elegant city residences. The lashorn of White Top is peculiar to that locality, and of the thousands that have been transplanted, not one has ever been known to grow, though some have lived several years. The limbs at the top where they spread out are so tenacious and inflexible, and so closely interlaced, that the writer has seen as many as twenty persons standing and stepping about upon the top of the same tree at the same time. It is very easy to ascend and descend, as the limbs usually begin at the ground, and being cut off about a foot from the trunk, a very convenient "Indian ladder" is formed, and then a hole being cut through the foliage in the centre of the top, it is not difficult for even a lady to ascend and step out upon the vernal platform.

AVhere the forest of this sin gular and beautiful growth is dense, there is no under growth, the trees limbless to the height of forty or fifty feet, the tops intermingling and forming a canopy the sun can scarcely penetrate, and the earth covered with a carpet ing of lichen moss, which feels to the tread as soft and elastic as a sponge. During the summer months, these trees are literally alive with snow birds, the little creatures congregating here in millions to build their habitations and rear their young. Notwithstanding the romantic beauty of this grand elevation, and the exhilarating effects of the highly rarified atmosphere upon the system, hundreds and thousands of people have lived and died within sight of it without ever having paid it a visit. The reason for this has been the difficulty of access, want of accommodations in the vicinity, and the mere cattle-paths by which it is approached through deep and intricate gorges, over steep foot-hills, and through almost impenetrable laurel jungles, sometimes infested by bears, wolves, wild-cats and rattlesnakes.

There are but few of these "varmints" there now, except the latter, Wilburn having nearly exterminated them. Rattlesnakes, however, are still abundant, though settlers are rarely bitten. The view from the summit of White Top is grand be yond description or even conception. Looking toward the south, you have within the scope of vision, stretching away from east to west, the Blue Eidge range, which, in the dim distance, looks like an azure band bordering the horizon, with here and there a tall peak hiding its head in the clouds. To the east, mountain piled upon mountain meets the view, their gentler slopes in places dotted with "clearings," and a column of snloke, here ascending and there laying in long folds along the mountain side, denoting the rude habitation of the ruder "squatter." Looking toward the north, you have the grand old Cumberland range, the barrier that divides the "Dark and Bloody Ground" from the Old Dominion, as if swelling up from an ocean of green, and struggling to lift itself above the vapor that hangs lazily upon its sides.

To the west, the view, though less imposing, is not less beautiful. You have before you the broad Valley of Holston, which, although diversified with hill and dale, bold pironiontories and pine-clad ridges, still, from the altitude from which you look out upon it, it has the appearance of a vast sea dotted with picturesque islands. In the distance, the spires and tin roofs of the town of Abingdon glisten in the sunlight, large planta tions look like blankets spread out in the forest, and at intervals, as it dashes out from behind a bluff, or winds its way through a green pasture, may the White Top Fork of Laurel be seen, like a serpentine thread of silver, its spark ling waters shimmering like diamonds among the foliage and wild-flowers upon its banks. The writer of this has enjoyed the luxury of many a magnificent scene in his wanderings, but never has seen that from the summit of White Top excelled, or evert equaled.

He was there on one occasion when a storm came riding on the blast more than a thousand feet below where a company of gentlemen were standing. The whole valley was shrouded as with a pall. The deep-toned thunder bellowed below, preceded by brilliant flashes of lightning, illuminating the dark bosom of the cloud. The scene was awfully grand, and so far transcends the power of mortal description, that he would not dare attempt it. It was near the base of this mountain, upwards of forty four years ago, in an obscure "cove," where the rays of the sun are partially shut out by the dense foliage of a grove of giant sugar-maples, that Wilburn Waters, then about twenty years of age, pitched his lonely tent and lighted his first camp-fire. He chose this spot for several reasons — first, because the foot of man rarely polluted the virgin soil; second, because it was the covert of wild ani mals in cold and stormy weather; and third, because a bright and bubbling spring of pure cold water leaps from the rocks and dashes off singing its wild lullaby among gorgeous flowers and the songs of birds of strange and brilliant plumage.

Wilburn is one-fourth Indian — what is called a quar teroou. For some reason he has never given, except his fondness for solitude and hunting, he sought and settled the obscure spot in which he has resided so many years, and still thinks he would be crowded to suffocation were a family to settle within sight or hearing of him. The writer of this, soon after hearing of the hermit-hunter, now more than twenty-five years ago, found his way into the mountains and sought him out. When he found him, he was eating his morning meal upon a log, — which consisted of corn cake, bear-meat and wild honey, and water from the spring — his two savage bear-dogs meanwhile standing sentinel, awaiting his word for action. We broke bread together, and from that day to this, if the writer has a friend upon whom he could rely in any emergency, that friend is Wilburn Waters, the great hermit-hunter of White Top Mountain.

Although sixty-odd years of age, he is still active and athletic, still devoted to hunting, still unerring in his aim, and was, when I commenced writing these pages in March, 1874, on a wolf hunt in the Alleghanies, which he expected to be the most extensive of his long career in that line, an account of which will probably be included in this little book. Whenever he finds the "sign" of a bear, wolf, or any other animal, he never loses the trail, although he may have to follow it from mountain to mountain for days to gether and to great distances, and is almost as sure of his game as if he had it. He is very pioiis, and will have no intercourse with a swearer or Sabbath-breaker. His motto is, "Isa man has neither fear of nor respect for his Maker, he is a dangerous companion for his fellow-man, and should be shunned by all who love the Lord and honor His in stitutions."

Chapter II. Birth, Parentage, Nativity And Early Orphanage Of Wilburn Waters

AVilburn Waters was born on what is called Ready's river, a branch of the Yadkin, in Wilkes county, North Carolina, on the 20th day of November, 1812. From the best information that can now be had, his father, John P. Waters, was a French Huguenot, who emigrated to Amer ica in early life, about the beginning of the present century, and settled in South Carolina. He was a man of some education and liberal acquirements, of strong prejudices and passions, restless, reckless and fond of adventure. Being remarkably stout, fearless and passionate, he was considered dangerous when excited or laboring under a sense of injury, and was supposed by those with whom he communicated most freely, to have been a refugee from South Carolina, if not from France, from some cause he never revealed to others. He settled down, without any apparent calling, among the simple and obscure people on Ready's river, where, after a time, he married his wife, the mother of Wilburn, who was a half-breed Catawba Indian.

From what little history we have of the Catawbas, they were a small portion of the tribe that inhabited Roanoke Island when Lord Raleigh took possession of it about the middle of the sixteenth century, and being dissatisfied with the encroachments and exactions of their new and powerful neighbors, they sought a new home among the mountains on the western boundary of the colony, where game was abundant, and the clear, bold streams afforded a plen tiful supply of trout and other excellent varieties of fish. It is not known whether or not there were other Indians there at the time, but they had occupied their quiet retreat but a few years before the whites began to settle near and even among them, and at the time John P. Waters found a home among them they were mostly half-breeds and quarteroons, with very few full-bloods, and the latter the aged members of the community.

It is said they origi nally bore the name of Chowans, but after finding their way into the mountains they took the name of Catawba, the name by which one of the principal streams in that region was known. Wilburn's mother was one of these people, and was, as before stated, a half-breed. He is, therefore, what is termed a quarteroon. She was said to have been very handsome, tall and straight, with nearly all the characteristics of a full Indian, except that she was unusually amiable in her disposition, and fond of quiet, domestic life. She had some education, was pious and affectionate, and was very anxious that her children should have pious instruction and the best education their limited means and opportu nities would allow. She was the mother of five children — four sons and one daughter — of whom Wilburn was the youngest.

She died when he was between two and three years old, and the only recollection he has of her is, that she had long, glossy black hair, which she wore loose, and reached nearly to the floor when she stood erect. She died young, and her death was a terrible blow to her husband, who was warmly attached to her, and whose turbulent nature she could control with a word. Notwithstanding this attachment, and his apparently unsubdued grief, he soon married another woman, left the community and his children amongtheir relatives, and was never after heard from by his family. Wilburn's first realization of the loss of his parents, and a circumstance that seems to have been burnt into his memory by bitter tears, was in being carried away on a horse by a strauger, and adopted into a white family several miles away from the little circle he had known as kindred and friends.

Of course the children — even the oldest not being able to provide for himself — became sepa rated, and in the providence of God were never reunited as one family again. Soon after his father's second marriage and disappear ance from the neighborhood, Wilburn, then about three years old, was taken to the house of Mr. Frank Flournoy, on Ready's river, in Wilkes county, where he remained between two and three years. Here, when between four and five years old, he gave the first evidence of his natural fondness for daring and adventure. Following some ladies out one Sunday afternoon to the bank of the river, where there was a shelving rock reaching down into the water at a very deep and rapid place in the stream, he was greatly interested in seeing them each in turn slide down the face of the rock as near to the edge of the water as possible without getting in, and where the rock was so steep they could not get back without help.

Refusing to permit him WILBURN WATERS. to try the experiment, he determined to dodge them on their return to the house, go back to the stream, and see if he couldn't get farther down on the rock than any of them had gone and get back without aid. He carried out his plans, let himself down the steep face of the rock to the very edge of the water by inserting his fingers in the crevices, and then discovered that it was impossible to get back. Young as he was, he took in tlie situation at a moment, and governed himself accordingly. Still cling ing to the rock, with his hold weakening every moment, and being aware that he was bound to drop in, he noticed which way the currant ran, and that some willows just below the rock shot out their roots on the bottom of the stream, he determined to let all holds go, drop to the bot tom, and then make his way as fast as possible on all-fours to the roots and work himself out.

His plan succeeded, and he returned to the house perfectly elated that he had performed a feat that none of the young ladies had accomplished. After remaining with Mr. Flournoy till he was nearly five years old, he was apprenticed to a saddler by the name of John Ernest, high upon the Yadkin, where he found his first bee-tree, cut it down and got a gallon of honey. Here, too, he got his first whipping for taking a whole day to go an errand not requiring more than half an hour. Knowing that he deserved it, he submitted to the chastise ment without complaint, though it was very mortifying to his pride, and made him wonder why it was that one per son should have the right to punish another. At the expiration of the first year, Ernest sold his time WILBURN WATERS. to Nelson Alloway, sheriff of Wilkes county, for §30.

Here he remained eleven years, or till he was about seven teen years old. When about twelve, he had his first adventure with a bear — a pet, chained to a stake. It was at the house of a neighbor, and he went to it when no one was about, and was feeding it chinquapins. While engaged in this, the bear became very friendly, and laid one paw upon his shoulder. Feeling complimented by this manifesta tion of so much affection, he kept feeding the animal, which became still more affectionate by placing the other forepaw on his other shoulder. This, he thought, was re markably kind, but in a moment he was brought to a sense of his danger by the bear clapping both of its hind feet upon his knees. He now found himself in bruin's power, and saw in a moment that there was but one way of escape from a hug that didn't exactly comport with his sense of propriety.

He formed his plan in a moment, which was to slowly and carelessly recede till the chain became tight, and then to spring off suddenly, tearing himself loose. He did so, leaving part of his clothing in possession of the bear, which became terribly enraged at his escape. About this time he had his first adventures with a deer, a copper-head snake and a mad dog. Being on the river bank one morning, he saw a deer that had been run down by dogs lying in the bushes near the edge of the stream. Seeing that it was not disposed to move at his approach, he took a cord from his pocket and tied it around one of its hind legs, when the deer gave a sudden flirt, and striking Wilburn with both hind feet, plunged him into the middle of the stream, nearly stripping his clothes from his body and lascerating his person.

He then called up a dog and caught and killed the animal, as much safer and quicker than attempting to lead it home with a cord. Being bitten on the ankle by a copper-head, he was dis abled six weeks, and was only relieved by the application of a chicken cut open and the warm insides applied to the wound, which he still regards as a sovereign remedy. During this year, or when he was about thirteen, he was out in the field one day, and saw a strange dog passing near him, which he called and tried to coax to him. The dog passed on without noticing him, and bit a horse and a hog near by. In a little while several men passed along in pursuit, and informed him that the dog was mad. He considered his escape a special providence. He became excessively fond of rabbit-hunting and fish ing, and followed one or the other pursuit .nearly every Sabbath.

He had but little respect for religion at that time, as the family he lived with were very strict on Sun day and very profane through the week. Seeing a very large yellow-jackets' nest, a man told him he could easily whip it out, as they couldn't sting in that time of the moon. He undertook the job and soon found his pants and hair full of the little torments, and didn't get rid of them till he ran to the river and dived. He has never since had much faith in moon signs. Wilburn had a great many little adventures while in bis early teens, showing his recklessness aud presence of mind in extricating himself. For instance, he several times became lost in the mountains, but discovered by ex perience that by taking the opposite direction to that he WILBURN WATF.RS. believed to be, or rather seemed to be right, he always found himself without difficulty.

When about fifteen, he offered up his first prayer. He had climbed a very large blackoak after squirrels. Getting some ten feet above the first limb, which was sixty or seventy feet from the ground, he found it very difficult and dangerous to get back. He fastened his fingers in the bark, but could get no purchase for his legs or feet. He then held on with his hands and prayed to the Lord for assistance. Then, making another effort, his legs took hold and he got down safely. He is still satisfied the Lord heard his prayer and relieved him.

Chapter III. The Indian Nature Developed

— LYING OUT THREE MONTHS — FIRST SCHOOLING— HIS GREAT STRENGTH AND ACTIVITY. Wilburn, now in his seventeenth year, begins to show the spirit of retaliation and vindictiveness of the Indian. Mr. Alloway having chastised him for some trivial offence, with the promise of repeating it the following morning, he sharpened his tomahawk and knife and ran fifteen miles to a mountain, near where his oldest brother lived, where he laid out three months, sometimes coming down to his brother's cabin in the night. His brother begged him to return and finish out his time, and Mr. Alloway proclaimed so that he got to hear it, that if he would return and stay till he was of age he would give him twelve months' schooling, and a horse, saddle and bridle. He would listen to no proposition, but when he heard that Alloway was hunting for him, and sometimes saw him from his mountain perch riding among the settlers in search of him, he determined that he would never be taken alive, and that he would kill any one who attempted to arrest him.

After spending three months in the mountain, he left there, and went to live with a man by the name of John Cox, in Ashe, now Alleghany county. Here he remained only about a year, the Indian propensity at retaliation making it necessary for him to change quarters. He set some traps near the barn, and caught a number of partridges one afternoon. As Mr. Cox, who was absent, was very fond of birds, Wilburn put four of them away to save for him. In the morning they had disappeared, and some one of the family having told a hired woman that Wilburn accused her of eating them, which he disclaimed, she flew into a violent rage, and declared that he should catch no more birds, as she would go right straight and destroy his traps. She started to do so, and as the traps were within view from an upper window in the room where the woman slept, and where she had a bran new feather-bed of her own, he went up there to watch her motions.

There were four traps, and as she approached the first she destroyed it, As soon as he saw this, he deliberately took out his knife and split the tick of her own bed half-way along. She then demolished a second trap, and he finished that side of the tick with his knife. As the third trap was scattered, half the other side of the tick had a slit in it, and as the fourth and last trap shared the fate of the others, the last slit was made in the tick and the bed was in two pieces. Having finished the traps, she returned to the house still mad with passion, and said to Wilburn: "Now go and fix up your traps if you want them." " All right," said he, " and if you want to sleep on your new bed to-night, you had better go up to your room and fix it." Suspecting something wrong from his countenance and manner, she ran upstairs and found the feathers all over the floor and the tick in two pieces.

This made the house too hot for him. and he had to leave. Having had no education or good counsel up to this time, he felt his great need of both, and determined to go to his oldest brother, William P. Waters, for advice and direction, who was keeping a school at a place called Whiteoak Grove, in Wilkes. He carried out his determination, was kindly received by his brother, taken into the school, where he continued six months, paying his board at a neighboring house by working nights and morn ings and Saturdays. While going to school he cut down and split up two very, large hickory trees for a flax and cotton shirt. When the school term was out he hired himself to a man by the name of Hanks, on Elkin, in Wilkes, at twenty-five cents per day. One afternoon Hanks and another man proposed to go to a deep hole in the creek to bathe, and in vited Wilburn to go with them for the purpose of having some sport at his expense.

He discovered this from their talk and manœuvres, and determined to keep even with them if he could. They were under the impression that he couldn't swim, and intended to amuse themselves with him in deep water. When the other man got in the water Hanks ordered Wilburn to strip off and jump in, telling him the man in the water would not let him drown, but would learn him to swim. Pretending to be willing to comply, he prepared himself, and just as Hanks approached to push him off the bank into the water, he suddenly caught him (Hanks) by the ankles and tossed him over his head backward into the middle of the stream, with his hat, boots and all his clothes on. Wilburn then quietly dressed himself and walked back to the house, Hanks taking it all in good part, or at least saying nothing about it.

Hanks was himself a laborer, and a very poor man, and hired Wilburn, as the latter discovered, at twenty-five cents per day for the purpose of hiring him out at fifty, thus making a quarter clear per diem. So the next day after the adventure in the creek, Hanks and Wilburn went to work for Thomas Bryant in the same neighborhood, where Hanks was to receive a dollar per day for the two. Mr. Bryant, thinking this not exactly fair, said to Wilburn : "Why work for Hanks, he will never pay you anything, but come and work for me and I will pay you something." This suited Wilburn's views of things, so he quit Hanks and went to live with Bryant, particularly, as he said, they lived light at the liouse of Hanks, while there was always plenty at the house of Bryant, and he was fond of good living. He remained with Mr. Bryant two years, was kindly treated, had wholesome moral instruction, and was promptly and liberally paid for his labor.

Shortly after going there to live, there was a corn-shuck ing and quilting at Mr. Bryant's, which drew together a large number ofthe men and women ofthe neighborhood. After the men had come to the house, Mr. Bryant directed Wilburn to chop and carry in some wood. He chopped it, and was about to carry in a log first to put on behind, when oiy5 of the men sat down on it. Wilburn asked him to get up as they were in a hurry in the house for a fire, when the man rose and demanded a scuffle. Wilburn, Indian-like, had no disposition for that sort of amusement, and took it in solid earnest. Finding the man disposed to keep it up, he krew back and knocked him some twelve or fifteen feet, the man turning some two or three somer saults before he stopped. This exasperated the men, and they determined to so annoy him after supper as to make him understand a joke.