suit and came on to the bank of the Ohio at Leading creek a
few minutes after the whites had left it with their boat and
were in the middle of the river. They were seen by the men
in the boat, who felt how narrowly and providentially they had
escaped."
The first settlers here got their salt from these Scioto salt
works. The writer remembers hearing his father tell of taking
a horse and pack saddle and going to the "Scioto Licks," as
they were then called, and working a week for a sack of salt.
His business was drawing salt water by means of a hand pole
affixed to a sweep above. After receiving his wages, put his
salt on the pack saddle and made his way home. Those salt
works were under the superintendency of a state officer, and
by a law passed January 24th, 1804, renters had to pay a tax
of 4 cents per gallon on the capacity of the kettle used in
making salt, provided always that no person or company shall
under any pretense whatever be permitted to use at any time a
greater number of kettles or vessels than will contain 4000 gal-
lons, nor a less number in any one furnace than 600 gallons.
After the salt works on the Kanawha were started the people
here depended on Kanawha for salt, and for many years it was
a place of considerable trade. Young men, on coming of age,
went to Kanawha to chop wood or tend kettles when they
wished to obtain a little money. It was hardly expected to get
money at any other place, and salt seemed to be the medium
by which trade was conducted.
Keelboats were used as a means of transportation, and ship-
ments were made by them of salt to Marietta, Pittsburg and
the lower Ohio. In order to give some knowledge of the origin
and progress of the Kanawha salt business, we append a letter
which appeared in the Niles Register, Baltimore, Md., in April,
1815, and we copy from the Meigs County Telegraph, April,
1884.
