Seems as though every single thing on God’s green earth possesses a subtle, inescapable, somewhat droll sense of humor. Even the basic, rudimentary forces of nature herself have a way of laughing/poking fun at you when you least imagine or expect it... And if a lad (or in this case, several lads) be smart, they’ll learn to laugh right along with Ma Nature and/or everybody else.
The Historic Wolf Hills | John Curry | Muzzle Blasts Archives
“I first set foot in this Green River country in the spring of 1769. Jim Knox, from the Wolf Hills on the Holston, led a party of us into Kentucky to hunt. Folks called us the Long Hunters because we stayed gone such a time. The country was wilderness in those days. But few white men had ever seen it, and none had settled here.”
So begins an unassuming little book called “The Kentuckians”. The great Janice Holt Giles’ epic tale of a young longhunter’s amazing experiences during the late 1760’s in that vast, totally uninhabited expanse known as “the dark and bloody ground”. Lazy High School student that I was, I chose to read The Kentuckians under odious decree of a compulsory, English class, book report. Drat! My selection of this thoroughly astounding tome, owing mainly to its diminutive and insignificant size. Little did I know… Talk about lightning in a bottle! Hah! Right then and there began my irrepressible zeal for the saga of the longhunter which still holds me in its burly grip yet today.
Once anyone becomes seriously entangled amidst the bona fide history of true, classic longhunting; various intriguing references and allusions to this place called “the Wolf Hills” begin to pop up regularly. Arising from the most inauspicious, trifling parties you seldom ever hear about to the best known and most famous woodsmen of that age: “…Daniel Boone, accompanied by several hunters, visited the Holston and camped the first night in what is now known as Taylor’s Valley. On the succeeding day, they hunted down the South Fork of Holston river and traveled thence to what was known as the Wolf Hills, where they encamped the second night near where Black’s Fort was afterwards built. It is interesting to note at this point that Daniel Boone and his companions, immediately after nightfall, were troubled by the appearance of great numbers of wolves, which assailed their dogs with such fury that it was with great difficulty that the hunters succeeded in repelling their attacks and saving the lives of their dogs, a number of which were killed or badly crippled by the wolves. The wolves had their home in the cave that underlies the town of Abingdon. The entrance to this cave is upon the lot now occupied by the residence of Mr. James L. White.” 2 Yes… Actually, the huge entrance to the infamous Wolf Cave of so much extraordinary, longhunting lore, is now wholly contained within the backyard of a beautiful, Victorian house - located in central, downtown Abingdon!
For no more than were involved in this precarious, wild and woolly vocation; the Wolf Hills became a rather well known,
far-western landmark of its time. A sort of gathering point if you will, for longhunters headed west. Practically speaking, the stalwart pre-Revolutionary War era frontiersmen who took part in these lengthy, deepwoods ventures would in fact originate from all over the southern
and mid-Atlantic colonies. Renowned longhunting leader, Isaac Lindsay was from the
tiny settlement of Newbury in western South Carolina while his older brother, Thomas Lindsay lived in Pennsylvania. The illustrious James Harrod (an important longhunter in his own right) hailed from southern Pennsylvania as well. James Knox and Henry Skaggs were both from Virginia whereas the previously mentioned, larger-than-life, Daniel Boone owned a farm in the Yadkin Valley of North Carolina. Usually rallying… joining forces under the guidance and direction of one or two experienced, highly competent men who would serve as a Captain of sorts. (And by the term “Captain”, I use that in its most vague and innocuous connotation.) The Wolf Hills of southwestern Virginia served as something of a pre-appointed, “meeting up” place where groups of professional hunters bound for the fabled, Can-tu-kee would assemble and mobilize in preparation to their impending departure.
Having no specifically appointed date, some might get there many days in advance, setting up their camp and waiting for their friends. Some might arrive shortly before - some arriving just in time to head out – with others not infrequently arriving a tad late and having
to track the company down just to catch up. The most common collection period being late spring, like May
or June, however companies of longhunters could find themselves encamped and lingering at the Wolf Hills in any month, during any season. . A general, basic date would be communicated amongst everyone connected with a particular longhunt, to present themselves there at the Wolf Hills with all the intended participants made aware of it. Typically, a comfortable amount of time would be allowed for each man to fully arm and equip himself, in addition to furnishing all the necessaries. This might encompass two or three pack horses plus his own mount, tack, powder, bar lead, trail gear, salt, a blanket or two, along with anything else he might think of: i.e. mittens, a mending box, spare flints, fishing kit, basic blacksmithing tools, etc. These obligatory essentials together with enough jerk, parched corn, coffee and sugar as he might see fit… At least enough to last until he finds himself surrounded by the unbroken forest and is able to hunt for victuals with his trusty firelock.
All this acquired, organized, packed up - and he’s ready to head out. Now repeated selection and usage of the Wolf Hills vicinity didn’t just happen by accident. All these groups of highly experienced woodsmen weren’t just stomping around in the wilderness and suddenly decided “hey, let’s set us up a camp and wait for everbody right here”. No, no. Merely arriving at this crucial place meant you’d already done your homework, received an invite, knew what you were doing and you had some pretty big plans. The Wolf Hills (as a point of embarkation) was in fact, quite strategically located upon what had been recognized from
pre-Colombian times as the old, Warriors Path. A main artery penetrating into the uncharted, unknown, colonial far-west with its major branches extending all the way out to the Mississippi as well as northward into the eastern Great Lakes. This thought-provoking moniker was in due course changed and the ancient trail itself significantly modified during the longhunting era to become “The Hunters’ Trace”. An untrustworthy, bewildering passageway beginning in earnest from Staunton, Virginia; drifting through Cumberland Gap and ultimately reaching its western terminus way out in modern-day, south-central Kentucky and further on into the French Lick region of Middle Tennessee.
Once through Cumberland Gap the tremendous amounts of game became incredible. Moving from one area to another in four week to six month intervals; semi-permanent, working/living sites better known as “station camps”; centrally established within game-rich hotspots possessing curious names like Wasioto Pass, Stinking Creek, Raccoon Springs, Skin House Branch, Knob Licks, Big South Fork and the Barrens would serve as these longhunters’ various and sundry, homes-away-from-home… Any given company sustaining this rootless, nomadic lifestyle most often for a grand total of anywhere from one to two and a half years. Common procedure was for hunters to radiate out from those temporary station camps in all directions – north, south, east and west. Either by themselves or in little groups of two or three for a period of roughly, ten days to nearly three weeks. Due to the sheer numbers of hides and furs, game would be skinned on site and brought back to the station camp for half-dressing, then stored away in large hide houses to await their eventual transportation back over the mountains to the trading posts. This comprised the everyday business of the longhunter: Roam the Hunters’ Trace into the west. Establish station camps here and there. Kill/process game. Take it all back east - and reap your new-found wealth. Notwithstanding… Right here, in the Wolf Hills of Virginia. Just a stone’s throw east of Moccasin Gap - is where the game was initially set in motion.
A fleeting handful of years and the grand adventures passed on by with southwestern Virginia becoming increasingly more populated... By degrees, more civilized and conspicuously developed. Homesteads, towns, stockades springing up here and there. The days of an unsettled, wild and unbroken Virginia frontier were slowly turning into timeworn, half-forgotten memories. Our youthful, vibrant nation had determined to improve and cultivate the west. Longhunting was on the wane and a different kind of frontier was emerging: “Soon after the arrival of Mr. Robertson on the Watauga (1772)… it became settled from the Wolf Hills, where Abingdon, in Virginia, now is, to Carter’s Valley.” 3 Alas (as with everything else in the course of history) the Wolf Hills, longhunting and indeed, the longhunter himself shortly thereafter, slipped away; almost imperceptibly fading off into obscurity. But not the wolf! Distinguished Revolutionary War era, Virginia/Kentucky frontiersman, William Clinkenbeard laments: “The wolves used to come and take the pigs and things close up around the Station...”4 (I’ll bet they did.) Virginia would be a while yet shaking off her wolf population. Not unlike the vanishing longhunter during his brief heyday… hunting was in their blood. They knew nothing else. If the situation wasn’t working where they were, if problems developed, if the game played out – they’d simply adjust or otherwise drift off entirely, to another “canine” station camp.
The Wolf Hills might be lost… a thing of the past but this to the wolves was only a minor, inconsequential setback. The wolves would never yield. They weren’t created to yield. In the midst of unendurably hard times, they merely repositioned themselves; while simultaneously adapting and redefining their tactics for survival with regard to these strange, dangerous, highly sophisticated, human predators. Avoid them when they had to; eat them when they could… Food is where you find it ya know – either at home or on the trail.
Traveling westward into Kentucky with his family and a small group of settlers, late eighteenth century pioneer John Hedge tells us: “Wolves came around the wagons again. They were mighty bad in them days in Kentucky, on young cattle, horses and calves.”5 Cattle and horses, huh? Consider yourselves lucky! Guess they figured if the loathsome humans drove them off, at least they could supply ‘em with a cow or a horse every now and then… Got to do what ya got ta do, right? And pretty much nobody cares about the wolves but the wolves.
Well… Wolves are long gone now. From around these parts anyways. Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and all through the Ohio Valley. Just like the longhunter - gone. You gotta admit though, they put up
a darned good fight. Word is they still have a few wolves way out in the modern-day west. A very few… But from what I hear, most people out there (farmers, ranchers and such) don’t particularly like ‘em and their days (similar to their eighteenth century cousins), sound ominously numbered. Being a carefree rambler, a roving, habitual wanderer and an unapologetic hunter myself, I’ve always sort of identified with wolves. My path through the
forest is my own. Imperfect, unexceptional no doubt, but mine nonetheless. I chase my tail, howl at the moon and drift with the wind, as my instincts decree. Yet my hunting grounds dwindle and in many places I’m no longer welcome. That wild, uninhibited, wide-open deepwoods lifestyle I’ve grown to love is increasingly becoming harder and harder to attain. Reputable, historically legitimate longhunters of today are hard pressed as well, to find even the ever-
receding scraps of it. Still we continue to roam, prowl, dream, hope against hope; hunt where/when we can. And then we move on... Sometimes I think, in my last life – I was born a wolf.
John Curry
References:
1 Giles, Janice Holt, The Kentuckians, p. 2.
2 Summers, Lewis Preston, Southwest Virginia, 1746- 1786, p.76.
3 Haywood, John, Civil and Political History of the State of Tennessee, p. 55.
4 John D. Shane’s interview with William Clinkenbeard, Filson Club Quarterly, Vol. 2, No. 3, April 1928, p.105.
5 John D. Shane’s interview with John Hedge, Filson Club Quarterly, Vol. 14, No. 3, July 1940, p.181.
Featured
Over the Falls by John Curry | Muzzle Blasts Archives April 2020
The Bevel Brothers RELOAD : Grass Wads | Muzzle Blasts Archives
Written by The Bevel Brothers
Bevel Up: Back about 20 years ago we wrote an article about hunting loads for smoothbore muzzleloaders. The question had to do with the best loads for small game using shot and deer using patched round ball. One of our “recommended” loads for shot included the use of field expedients such as grass or corn shucks as over powder and overshot wads.
Bevel Down: That brought in some hate mail from a few naysayers who contended that the use of anything other than a commercial card and fiber wads in a shotgun was dangerous. The alleged danger was supposed to come from the wadded up grass or leaves or corn shucks some-how turning into a barrel obstruction and causing the whole thing to blow up in our collective faces.
Eventually, we were able to rally enough experts on the subject to say that there was and is no such danger. But even though we were eventually vindicated, there is still a persistent belief that only properly sized and perfectly cut card and fiber wads (or patched round ball) should be used in smoothbore muzzleloaders. Back when we were interested in doing things in a “period correct” way so as to know what it was like to hunt the way the old-timers did, we used leaves and corn shucks in our shotguns out in the woods all the time. We still do it sometimes if we forget to bring the right cut wads when we leave the house. It’s not the best wad material, but if the choice is shooting with less than perfect wads versus not shooting, we always pick the alternative that keeps us in the woods and shooting.
Bevel Up: I have to admit that I do most of the smoothbore/shotgun shooting in this family. I’m finding that as my eyes age up over the 70-year mark, the sights on my Tennessee squirrel rifle are getting harder and harder to see. My favorite muzzleloaders for squirrels and rabbits these days are a 20 gauge flintlock trade gun, an old original Bannerman conversion 1863 Springfield musket cut down and bored out to a 17 gauge smoothbore, and an old Damascus-barreled percussion English double that has one barrel bored 15 gauge and the other 13 gauge. I like that double because I can put a little bit heavier load in the bigger barrel for a little bit more range if I need it.
All of those guns take a different sized wad and I’ve got commercially made wads for all of them. You can get good commercial wads in just about any size you need from Circle Fly (online at Circlefly.com) or from Mike Eder (at his booth on Commercial Row at Friendship or at his shop at 6929 Beech Tree Rd., Nineveh, IN 46287).
But there are times when I just grab the wrong bag on the way out the door, or forget to re-stock my wad sup-ply in the right bag, or I sometimes get to fooling around shooting at dirt clods or wasp nests and just plain run out.
That’s when I look around for something else I can use for wads. Usually, that’s grass or weeds like foxtail grow-ing up in a ditch or next to the fence, or some leaves if they’re not too dried up and crumbly.
Bevel Down: We always knew that a wadded up handful of grass wouldn’t produce as good a gas seal in front of the powder, and would probably get tangled up with some of the shot pellets and thin out the pattern. So we didn’t expect to get the performance out of grass and leaves that good precision cut card wads would give.
But we had never actually tested them against each other. So big brother grabbed an old 11 gauge Belgian double barrel of his and we headed to the Bevel Brothers Scientific Range Lab up at Wiseacres (my farm).
Bevel Up: We set up the Oehler 33 chronograph and cast about for some suitable “field expedient” wad material, which turned out to be some old damp foxtail grass grow-ing next to the range. I loaded up a more or less standard charge for that shotgun (90 grains of 2fg GOEX with
an ounce and an eighth of shot) using the regular card and cushion wads in one barrel and the grass in the other. The other barrel got the grass over powder wad which was a gob about two and a half inches long and somewhat bigger around than the bore diameter so that it would be good and tight when I crammed it into the barrel. I pounded the ramrod down on the grass several times so as to get it good and tight and compacted over the powder. After that, I poured in the shot charge and used a thinner bit of grass folded up so as to be about a quarter-inch thick for an overshot wad to hold everything in place. I have to admit that we were surprised at the chronograph results. Even though we expected the grass to lose some velocity, it turned out to be much more of a loss than we anticipated. The shots using regular card and cushion wads averaged 1050 feet per second at about 10 feet in front of the muzzle (what the experts call an instrumental muzzle velocity because it isn’t actually measuring the speed of the shot right at the muzzle). But the shots using grass wads averaged only 650 feet per second – about 40 percent less than with card wads! Patterns at 20 yards were a little bit thinner with the grass wads, too. Not so bad that you couldn’t kill a squirrel or a rabbit with it, but there was always a noticeably thinner area in the middle of the pattern, and the center of the pattern seemed to be about four to six inches lower with the grass wads.
Bevel Down: So then I got to thinking that maybe grass was just too spindly and loose to make a good wad. May-be leaves, being more like sheets of paper would sort of fold or mat up into a better gas sealer than the grass wads.
So I picked up a bunch of oak and maple leaves from last fall and sort of worked them into a ball like you would roll a ball out of clay or cheese or cookie dough. We tried a few shots with those over the chronograph and found that they shot on average about 100 feet per second faster than the grass wads. So the leaves made a little bit better over powder wad than the grass, but the patterns using folded up leaves for the overshot wad tended to have a more pronounced donut hole in the middle than the grass over powder wad did. That’s probably because it was hard to make an effective overshot wad out of the leaves without using quite a lot of them, which made the top wad almost as big and heavy as the bottom (over powder) wad. The lesson there is if you have to shoot this way use a ball of leaves over the powder and some folded up grass over the shot.
We also noticed that fouling from all of these grass and leaf loads was much worse than with the card wads. We suspect that is mostly due to the lack of compression giving a less than complete burn of the powder charge, but the lack of a tight-fitting card wad and lubricated cushion wad to scrape the crud off the bore every shot might also have something to do with it.
Leaves seem to make a slightly better over powder wad than grass.
Felt recoil with both types of loads seemed to be pretty close to the same, with the leaf load maybe generating
a little less recoil than the grass, but both pretty close to what the card wads produced. That was a puzzlement until we got home and weighed some of the wads. Turned out that the old (slightly damp) grass wads weighed on av-erage about 130 grains and the leaves weighed around 110 grains. That amounts to adding about the equivalent of an extra quarter ounce or so of shot to the total charge weight of a regular card wad load, which would account for that extra recoil even with lower velocities.
The calculated free recoil energy of the grass and leaf loads was about 36 to 38 foot pounds while the card wad load at the much higher velocity was about 41 foot pounds.
Bevel Up: So what did we learn from that experiment? First off, yes, you can use wadded up grass and leaves for wadding in a smoothbore. The problem is that your patterns are going to be thinner and you’ll lose close to half the pellet velocity and energy, which will drastically reduce the effectiveness of your shot. The retained pellet energy using the grass wad is about the same at 20 yards as a charge of shot using a card wad at 40 yards. It’s a little better for the leaf wad load, but not much. And with just a wad of grass holding the shot charge in place you’re also likely to lose that load of shot once in a while if you’re not real careful about not jostling the gun around too much chasing up and down hollers after little furry beasts.
So unless you are just absolutely left with no other solution, you need to use real card wads and real cushion wads if you are going to get optimum results with shot out of your smoothbore. You’ll get far more power, less fouling, and better patterns with regular card wads.
And by the way, we don’t recommend using plastic shotgun wads. Plastic wads are banned from use at the Friendship shotgun ranges. That’s because black powder burns at a higher temperature than smokeless powder and will partially melt regular one-piece plastic wads. That little bit of melted plastic then tends to leave bits of itself in the bore that can build up and then smolder and ignite the next powder charge you pour down the barrel. I’ve tried using plastic wads and AA hulls with black powder in a breech loading shotgun and found that it not only melts the wads, but also the plastic shotgun shells. That melted plastic and black powder fouling gunk made a mess that was exceptionally difficult to clean out, too. And besides, it just isn’t natural -- using plastic in a muzzleloader, that is. So that’s why now I only use paper shells and card wads to reload black powder ammo for my old Damascus double – just like they did in the old days.
There are some advantages to using a shot cup like those plastic wads have, though, so one of our upcoming research experiments will look at making and using paper shot cups to improve shot patterns.
Featured
Executive Committee Message, March 2021
Letter from the Editor, Muzzle Blasts March 2021
The Hawken Halfstock How-To Part 1 | Muzzle Blasts Excerpt
The Lost Brigade Revisited | Muzzle Blasts Excerpts
Seems as though every single thing on God’s green earth possesses a subtle, inescapable, somewhat droll sense of humor. Even the basic, rudimentary forces of nature herself have a way of laughing/poking fun at you when you least imagine or expect it... And if a lad (or in this case, several lads) be smart, they’ll learn to laugh right along with Ma Nature and/or everybody else.
A Collaboration in Gun Building | Chuck Edwards and Hershel House, Muzzle Blasts Archives2004
I first met Chuck Edwards in October of 2001 at a rendezvous in bis hometown of Bloomfield, Missouri. I recognized him from a photograph in an article written by Ted Franklin Belue entitled "Chuck Edwards: Steeped in the Woodbury Tradition." As a gun builder myself I have been a longtime admirer of Hershel House (ever since the Foxfire 5 article), and more recently of Chuck Edwards.
The Twentieth Century Story of Two Extraordinary Frontier Guns, Part 1 Wallance Gusler
The '·pursuit of happiness" presents an endless array of opportunities. Over sixty years ago the pursuit of the 18th century American frontier became the major direction of my life. The two flintlock firearms that are the focus of this series (figs. 1 & 2) are extremely important as landmark survivals of the mid-18th-century frontier. They represent the conflict between Colonialism, becoming Americans, and the collision with American natives.
New Discoveries Alter Old Perceptions of Indiana Gunsmith Washington Hatfield Part II
Despite substantial information surviving on George Washington Hatfield himself, only a handfitl of his rifles were known until recently. This two part article reexamines the work of Indiana’s “Wash" Hatfield in light of two recent discoveries. In Part I we took a look at the two newest Hatfield Finds, in Part II we will take a look back at the other known Hatfield rifles to get a better understanding of the scope of his rifle building skills and his place among Indiana rifle makers.
Take a look inside the August 2020 issue of Muzzle Blasts Magazine!
Bicentennial Flag Day 1976 | Muzzle Blasts Archives
There is scarcely a more fitting way of celebrating Flag Day, June 14th, the anniversary of the adoption of the "rebellious stripes" by the Continental Congress, in this bicentennial year than by creating copies of those Revolutionary banners that were carried by the Heroes of '76, flying them at the head of your parading NMLRA re-created Militia or Continental army unit.
A Visit with Chief Gray Lock and Other Abenaki Stories : Book Review by Eric Bye
This is a book like few others, from an author like few oth-ers. For many years Peskunck Larrabee has been a known author and illustrator in the Northeast and beyond. He is the illustrator for the “Junior Blasts” column in Muzzle Blasts magazine, and he has contributed stories and artwork to Muzzleloader, Black Powder Times, and other publications dealing with American history and Native cultures. Because of his dedication to Native ways he was accepted into the Abenaki-Sokuakiiak Nation of Missisquoi in a Sweat lodge ceremony some three decades ago. He has long been known and respected as an ambassador of Abenaki culture to modern inhabitants of the North-east.
The Bevel Brothers RELOAD : Grass Wads | Muzzle Blasts Excerpts
Written by The Bevel Brothers
Bevel Up: Back about 20 years ago we wrote an article about hunting loads for smoothbore muzzleloaders. The question had to do with the best loads for small game using shot and deer using patched round ball. One of our “recommended” loads for shot included the use of field expedients such as grass or corn shucks as over powder and overshot wads.
Bevel Down: That brought in some hate mail from a few naysayers who contended that the use of anything other than a commercial card and fiber wads in a shotgun was dangerous. The alleged danger was supposed to come from the wadded up grass or leaves or corn shucks some-how turning into a barrel obstruction and causing the whole thing to blow up in our collective faces.
Eventually, we were able to rally enough experts on the subject to say that there was and is no such danger. But even though we were eventually vindicated, there is still a persistent belief that only properly sized and perfectly cut card and fiber wads (or patched round ball) should be used in smoothbore muzzleloaders. Back when we were interested in doing things in a “period correct” way so as to know what it was like to hunt the way the old-timers did, we used leaves and corn shucks in our shotguns out in the woods all the time. We still do it sometimes if we forget to bring the right cut wads when we leave the house. It’s not the best wad material, but if the choice is shooting with less than perfect wads versus not shooting, we always pick the alternative that keeps us in the woods and shooting.
Bevel Up: I have to admit that I do most of the smoothbore/shotgun shooting in this family. I’m finding that as my eyes age up over the 70-year mark, the sights on my Tennessee squirrel rifle are getting harder and harder to see. My favorite muzzleloaders for squirrels and rabbits these days are a 20 gauge flintlock trade gun, an old original Bannerman conversion 1863 Springfield musket cut down and bored out to a 17 gauge smoothbore, and an old Damascus-barreled percussion English double that has one barrel bored 15 gauge and the other 13 gauge. I like that double because I can put a little bit heavier load in the bigger barrel for a little bit more range if I need it.
All of those guns take a different sized wad and I’ve got commercially made wads for all of them. You can get good commercial wads in just about any size you need from Circle Fly (online at Circlefly.com) or from Mike Eder (at his booth on Commercial Row at Friendship or at his shop at 6929 Beech Tree Rd., Nineveh, IN 46287).
But there are times when I just grab the wrong bag on the way out the door, or forget to re-stock my wad sup-ply in the right bag, or I sometimes get to fooling around shooting at dirt clods or wasp nests and just plain run out.
That’s when I look around for something else I can use for wads. Usually, that’s grass or weeds like foxtail grow-ing up in a ditch or next to the fence, or some leaves if they’re not too dried up and crumbly.
Featured
The Historic Wolf Hills | John Curry | Muzzle Blasts Excerpts
The following article appeared first in the June 2020 Issue of “Muzzle Blasts Magazine”, the official magazine from the National Muzzle Loading Rifle Association.
“I first set foot in this Green River country in the spring of 1769. Jim Knox, from the Wolf Hills on the Holston, led a party of us into Kentucky to hunt. Folks called us the Long Hunters because we stayed gone such a time. The country was wilderness in those days. But few white men had ever seen it, and none had settled here.”
So begins an unassuming little book called “The Kentuckians”. The great Janice Holt Giles’ epic tale of a young longhunter’s amazing experiences during the late 1760’s in that vast, totally uninhabited expanse known as “the dark and bloody ground”. Lazy High School student that I was, I chose to read The Kentuckians under odious decree of a compulsory, English class, book report. Drat! My selection of this thoroughly astounding tome, owing mainly to its diminutive and insignificant size. Little did I know… Talk about lightning in a bottle! Hah! Right then and there began my irrepressible zeal for the saga of the longhunter which still holds me in its burly grip yet today.
Once anyone becomes seriously entangled amidst the bona fide history of true, classic longhunting; various intriguing references and allusions to this place called “the Wolf Hills” begin to pop up regularly. Arising from the most inauspicious, trifling parties you seldom ever hear about to the best known and most famous woodsmen of that age: “…Daniel Boone, accompanied by several hunters, visited the Holston and camped the first night in what is now known as Taylor’s Valley. On the succeeding day, they hunted down the South Fork of Holston river and traveled thence to what was known as the Wolf Hills, where they encamped the second night near where Black’s Fort was afterwards built. It is interesting to note at this point that Daniel Boone and his companions, immediately after nightfall, were troubled by the appearance of great numbers of wolves, which assailed their dogs with such fury that it was with great difficulty that the hunters succeeded in repelling their attacks and saving the lives of their dogs, a number of which were killed or badly crippled by the wolves. The wolves had their home in the cave that underlies the town of Abingdon. The entrance to this cave is upon the lot now occupied by the residence of Mr. James L. White.” 2 Yes… Actually, the huge entrance to the infamous Wolf Cave of so much extraordinary, longhunting lore, is now wholly contained within the backyard of a beautiful, Victorian house - located in central, downtown Abingdon!
John Curry
To read the full article, subscribe to Muzzle Blasts TODAY
References:
1 Giles, Janice Holt, The Kentuckians, p. 2.
2 Summers, Lewis Preston, Southwest Virginia, 1746- 1786, p.76.
3 Haywood, John, Civil and Political History of the State of Tennessee, p. 55.
4 John D. Shane’s interview with William Clinkenbeard, Filson Club Quarterly, Vol. 2, No. 3, April 1928, p.105.
5 John D. Shane’s interview with John Hedge, Filson Club Quarterly, Vol. 14, No. 3, July 1940, p.181.
Featured