Excerpt from History of West Virginia, Vol. 1 of 2: In Two Parts In thus presenting to the public the present volume the author disclaims any merit for it except that of accuracy. All he dares to assert is that he has brought to the task of its preparation an enthusiastic admiration for his subject - an admiration for the men who first dared the perils of the western wilds, and crossing the Rocky Barrier, reared their cabin homes amid the hills and vales of the solitudes of what is now West Virginia - an admiration for these same men who, during the American Revolution, warred alike against the savage from the wilderness and the Briton from the sea - an admiration for their descendants who in later years laid a firm foundation and reared thereon the perfect and enduring Commonwealth. Throughout the work will be found hundreds of the names and many biographical notices of these men - men from whom have descended a large proportion of the population of the State, now numbering nearly three-quarters of a million. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.