William Alexander Stuart’s private empire in Elk Garden continues to stand as mute testimony of the wealth created by the Salt and Plaster works at Saltville.  The Stuart Land and Cattle Company has been broken into mostly two large fragments.  The original company continues to operate in the cattle business along US 19 and along the Little Fork of the Clinch River.  A very large portion of the original Company centered in Elk Garden is now under the ownership of the Ratcliffe Foundation, which is committed to preserving it forever as a showcase of rural beauty, and of the preCivil War plantation culture.

 

            The enormous wealth of William King was added to that of his brother, James King.  From this combined fortune came King University and Steel Creek Park in Bristol, and the City of Kingsport, Tennessee.

 

            Though little known or appreciated, the painful litigation process that went on for half a century after the Revolution concerning the ownership of the land at Saltville, and of the fortunes that it generated, has left its large footprint in Virginia and in American law to this day. 

 

            The Fincastle Resolutions were drawn up at the Lead Mines in 1775, and were the first document to call for violent revolution against Great Britain.  The Declaration of Independence that followed the next year was a direct result of this ground breaking document.  Among the fifteen signers of the Fincastle Resolutions were the following men mentioned in this account of Saltville:  General William Campbell, Col. Arthur Campbell, Col. William Christian, Thomas Madison, and William Preston.  One of the numerous David Campbells was clerk.

 

            Three generals are associated with Saltville – General William Russell, General William Campbell, and General Francis Preston.  Add to this list Col. Arthur Campbell and Major David Campbell, and consider their contributions to the formation of our country.  Russell helped save Southwest Virginia and Kentucky from the Shawnee and Cherokee before he became an officer in the Continental Line.  William Campbell was commander at the Battle of King’s Mountain, the turning point of the Revolution.  Arthur Campbell kept the Tories away from the Lead Mines and out of the Holston Valley while most of the militia was at King’s Mountain.  David Campbell commanded the Holston Militia at the Battle of Cowpens, which drove Lord Cornwallis to Yorktown, and Preston helped preserve the nation during the War of 1812.  One could legitimately wonder if we would even have a country if it were not for these gentlemen with ties to Saltville.

 

            Saltville’s place in the history of the nation’s struggle to preserve the integrity of its environment cannot be over estimated.  The mindset of the country before 1971 was that the environment would cleanse whatever refuse we threw upon it.  No one imagined that the Federal Government either could or would close down a facility that had worked so closely with it in the nation’s interests as at Saltville.   

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