who were recognized as leaders among their fellow citizens. Among them 

were James Poteet and James O. Cox, early general merchants at Howell's 

Mill; Asa L. Wilson, a capable and active church and social leader in all 

the affairs of the neighborhood at an early date and down to a few years 

ago; Charles W. Handley, a successful farmer and early magistrate in the 

district court; James T. Herndon, a man of quiet bearing, but one of the 

safest counsels among his neighbors; and William and Daniel Love, both of 

the best type of citizenship ever represented in the county. Others fully 

as worthy could be named, but the list cannot be extended further in this 

sketch. 

When West Virginia was severed from the Mother State in 1865, one of the 

wisest provisions of her constitution was that providing for a general 

system of free education. During the remaining years of the Civil War, and 

for some time after its close, the establishment of the new educational 

system was of necessity slow. Schools both public and private were 

conducted in the neighborhood for a time with a varied success. But from 

the start the public generally received the new public school idea with 

favor, and within a few years the whole community centered its school 

interest around the public schools. 

The first public school teacher in this immediate neighborhood was George 

Bryant, a former Confederate soldier who taught at several different 

places during his years of service as a teacher. His first school was 

taught at Howell's Mill. It is related of him that, while his teaching was 

generally of a high order, he was decidedly at variance with the accounts 

then given in the chapters of history on the recent Civil War. His terms 

of disapproval are said to have been as forceful as they were original. 

At Blue Sulphur, Miss Agnes Dundas, now Mrs. J. D. Sedinger of Huntington, 

was among the first public school teachers. She is remembered by her 

pupils for her efficiency, gentleness, and hopefulness displayed in that 

time of new adjustments in the old neighborhood. 

Other teachers in the public schools in the community of the earlier 

period were Joseph A. Buckner, Calvary A. Morrison, Daniel L. Duncan, 

Chester Cheesman, Edward S. Doolittle, J. F. Herndon, Henry Childers, 

Thomas Lackland, Thomas B. Summers, Edward Summers, T. West Peyton, Sr., 

Edward Gardner, John Black, Henry Lambert, William Bramlett, and the 

Misses Sallie and Fanny Morris. 

( 15 )

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