Tom Moses Trips, West Virginia, 1885
“On a trip to Blackwater Falls we experienced a hard battle to get through the laurel, not so much ourselves as the unwieldy stools, easels and paint boxes, which managed to get caught at every other step, sorely impeding our progress.
On reaching the brink of the Falls we discovered a very precipitous bank, impossible of descent. We made a couple of sketches up the river from the brink, then tried to figure out some way to get below, for that was the sketch we wanted. Tryon was not quite through with his sketch, but agreed to follow us, so Young and I forged ahead down the river, trying to find a place to crawl down.
We went fully a mile before we found an opening; then the walk back to the falls was pretty hard – mostly over rocks in midstream, which was madly rushing over and around them. It was hard to keep our feet from slipping on the wet stones.
On reaching the bottom of the Falls we were surprised to find Tryon calmly sketching and smoking his big pipe and quietly giving us the merry “Ha! Ha!” We were quite anxious to know how he did it. He explained that he had come down on a big pine tree which grew within three feet of the bank and was fully sixty feet high. He had dropped his stool and easel before going down himself. For a wonder, nothing was broken; they just happened to fall on a lot of moss and leaves. One look at his clothes, face and hands proved that he had paid the price, but he did not mind that. The pleasure of beating his two young students (as he always called us) was all he cared for. The effort of getting down and back was offset by the good sketches we had made. On returning we asked Tryon why he did not return the same way he had dropped into the pocket. He looked at the big tree, shook his head – then went back with us.
Several years ago, possibly ten, a hunter was lost in the wilderness near Davis. His dogs returned to the settlement and were fed, but were unable to return with help. Two years before our visit the hunter’s remains were discovered in the thickest mass of laurel that could be found. He was identified by the papers in his pockets. Whether he was lost or attacked by man or beast will never be known.
It is hard to realize that within a shirt distance from hustling cities there is to be found such a virgin forest, affording the artist all kinds of motifs. As we went down the river from the Falls we discovered quite a drop, the numerous cascades being small in themselves but in the aggregate nearly two hundred feet. The Falls are about eighty feet high.”
Historical note: Blackwater Falls State Park lies just west of the Allegheny Front, a high ridge that acts as the drainage divide between the Ohio and Potomac River systems. The Blackwater River originates in the southern end of Canaan Valley, travels north and then west to reach Blackwater Falls where the water plunges 57 feet. An illustration of Blackwater Falls was published in an article from Harper’s Magazine Vol. 61, N. 362, pages 167-185. The article was “Bi-paths in the Mountains” by Rebecca Harding Davis.
