Doolittle so backed the water up the river as to drown a mill early 

established near Yates's Crossing by Adam Black. It is a matter of 

tradition that the damage to the Black mill was amicably adjusted between 

the parties directly interested. In 1857 Armstead B. Howell purchased an 

interest in the Ambrose Doolittle estate, and later became sole owner of 

the mill property. After that time the place was called Howell's mill. 

Another flour and grist mill was built at an early date over the Great 

Falls of Mud River. John Dundas was the builder and first owner, but the 

property later passed into the hands of David Harshbarger by purchase. 

This mill was burned sometime near the Civil War, and was later rebuilt. 

The location did not prove to be an advantageous one, owing to the fact 

that the main roads did not converge at that point, and for the further 

reason that the rapids in the river above the falls did not permit the 

storage of an ample water supply to last through the dry seasons of the 

year. So this mill was allowed to fall to decay. 

About 1855 Dr. Alexander McCorkle, a native of Rockbridge County, 

Virginia, but for some years previous a resident of Guyandotte, married in 

the neighborhood and located on the old Thomas A. Morris farm near 

Howell's Mill, then the property of the heirs of John Handley, decreased. 

Under the direction of Dr. McCorkle a tannery of considerable proportions 

was built and put into operation on that farm. For a number of years the 

tannery proved a profitable investment with practical tanners employed to 

run the plant. After the death of Dr. McCorkle in 1867 the venture ceased 

to be profitable, and the plant lapsed into neglect. Today no sign of the 

tannery can be seen on its former site. 

Most of the early settlers on Mud River, and especially between Milton and 

Barboursville, came from eastern Virginia, or from other sections of the 

South. Like other settlers in a new country nearly all of them, together 

with their families, engaged in farm labor and other neighborhood 

enterprise. Most of them belonged to the class of comfortable livers, when 

they worked to that end. Not a few of them, in addition to their own 

families, brought a number of slaves from the older settled sections. 

Slavery existed in its mildest form here, and while by no means universal, 

it was quite general. Most of the slave groups consisted of only a few 

negroes, but a few farms assumed the proportions of plantations and the 

number of slaves exceeded a half-hundred. The following heads of families 

( 6 )