Barboursville

The County Court; George Grobe, Thomas Bias, and George Hackworth, found out 

they could not legally give the property away, but if a stock company was 

formed they would put the price at one thousand dollars and deed it and 

take a lien for the purchase money. E. W. Blume, Henry Poteet, Henry 

Stowasser, Charles H. Miller, and Fredrick Miller or his son Will, each 

took two hundred dollars stock. The deed was made and a lien taken which 

was paid and released at the close of 1888. This Institution was turned 

over by the Stock Holders as a Conference School to the M. E. Church 

South, until 1901. The Institution was known as Barboursville College. In 

consideration of the liberality of Morris Harvey. The trustees changed the 

name to Morris Harvey College, the building and grounds have been greatly 

improved and beautified and the faculty increased. Rev. T. S. Wade was the 

first president and Rev. G. W. Hampton vice president. 

It must not be thought that because our mothers and grandmothers brought 

the products of the farm to the stores to trade for other goods that they 

did not have any fine clothes. On extra occasions their silks would stand 

alone and when our sisters came out in their imported organdies and 

Empress Cloth dresses covered with a hand made silk or lace shawl that 

touched the ground they would get a beau in about fifteen minutes. Flax, 

hemp, and cotton were raised on every farm as part of the crops and had to 

be worked up. 

Barboursville has kept up in the march of progress; she has grown until we 

reach from hill to hill. After being scored we feel proud of our score; 

perfect in transportation; perfect in our boys who have made prominent 

men. Sometimes we imagine we see the original owners of this land, John 

Samuels, and William Merritt walking over our town and looking over the 

improvement we have made and hear them say what fools we were to give this 

valuable property away. 

I cannot close this history without saying something about our old time 

colored people. In making this state we took from Virginia more than half 

her territory, but we only inherited four per cent of the slaves. I never 

witnessed any of the cruelties Harriett Beecher Stowe tells us about in 

Uncle Tom's Cabin. The slaves were respected and honored by all regardless 

of the station they occupied in life. They received their freedom with 

full honor; they helped to carve this country out of a wilderness and no 

man can say aught against them. I call to mind a negro man my father 

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