weather, and relieved as far as was in their power, the physical suffering 

of a scattered population. Many stories were told by the physicians of 

their race with death, often through fierce storms of sleet and snow. 

Sometimes they were followed by a pack of wolves, and sometimes startled 

by the scream of the panther or wildcat. Such experiences were common at 

the time of the first settlement on Mud River, and the section between 

this valley and the Ohio was infested by wolves and panthers up till about 

the year 1830. 

Churches

The first church in this section, as well as the first in Cabell County, 

was the Mud River Baptist Church at Blue Sulphur which was organized in 

1807. Rev. John Alderson from the Greenbrier Baptist Church at Alderson, 

and Rev. John Lee from southwest Virginia, were the ministers actively 

engaged in the organization. Rev. John Lee became the first pastor and he 

served the church with great devotion for many years. Twenty members 

composed the membership at first, and they included mainly the heads of 

the families of the earliest settlers. Their names are recorded in the 

roll of members in the church records. Twenty-one other Baptist churches, 

not including any of those in the City of Huntington, have been organized 

within the territory originally allotted to this church, and twelve 

ministers of the gospel have gone out from its membership. The church was 

first organized on its present site and a church house built there, but 

the deed to the property was not secured till the year 1821, when Henry 

and Thomas Dundas made a deed for one acre to the Mud River Baptist 

Society. 

The first recorded effort toward establishing a church of the Methodist 

faith in the neighborhood was in the year 1811, when a revival was held at 

some home in the neighborhood. This revival was under the leadership of 

Rev. Samuel West, a minister of the faith on the Guyandotte circuit, Ohio 

Conference. In 1813 a camp meeting was held in the neighborhood under the 

leadership of Rev. David Young, presiding elder in the district. The next 

Methodist minister who held services at different homes in the community, 

was Rev. Samuel Brown. Among the class leaders at that time was Robert 

Caseboult, who moved out of the neighborhood late in the year 1813. In 

1814 Rev. John Cord became the minister on the circuit, and he appointed 

Thomas A. Morris class leader. Later Thomas A. Morris became a minister in 

the Methodist church, held many responsible stations in the church, and 

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