Taken in part from:
Border Settlers of Northwestern Virginia
Written by Lucullus Virgil McWhorter
In 1770 or 1771, Jesse Hughes was married to Miss Grace Tanner, and settled on Hacker's Creek, about a one mile above where West's Fort was afterwards built, and at the mouth of a stream which has since been known as Jesse's Run. Here he built his cabin on the site of an old Shawnee village. This was embraced in a homestead certificate, issued in 1781 to "Jesse Hughes for 400 acres on Hacker's Creek, adjoining lands of Edmund West to include his settlement made in 1770."
In this lonely cabin, standing, as it did, on the western out-skirts of the most western
and remote settlement on the (West)Virginia frontier, this
young couple experienced many thrilling adventures incident to border life in the virgin wilderness. The wife possessed the sterling qualities of
rugged and noble woman- hood. Endowed with that fearlessness and energy of character which a life of constant peril on the border
engendered, she was admirably fitted for the companionship of her half-wild, yet renowned husband, whose savage temper was not
conducive to domestic happiness. It was in this cabin that they had a thrilling experience with a rattlesnake. One night Jesse
was awakened from a sound sleep by feeling a living creature trying to work its way upward between his throat and the
close-fitting collar of his homespun shirt. The contact of a cold, whip-like body with his own, caused him to
suspect instantly the nature of his bed-fellow, and fully aroused him to a sense of his
danger. With that rare self-control and presence of mind that served him so well in more than one instance of deadly peril, he softly
spoke to his wife, waking, and telling her of the threatened danger, and directing her to get out of bed with their child, and remove
the bed-clothing. This she did so gently that the restless intruder , who was still endeavoring to force its broad flat head under the
obdurate shirt-collar, was not disturbed. The covering removed, with a single lightning-like movement, Jesse bounded to the floor
several feet away. A huge yellow rattlesnake fell at his feet.
With an angry whir-r-r-r it threw itself into the attitude of battle, but was soon dispatched. The next morning Jesse went prospecting
for snakes, and found in the end of a hollow log which was built into his cabin, five copperheads and one rattlesnake.
From his advent into the Buckhannon settlement in 1769 to the year 1778, we find no mention of the name of Jesse Hughes
in border annals. But it is not to be supposed that so restless and daring a man
would remain inactive while such scenes of bloodshed were being enacted about him. His insatiate passion for Indian blood
precludes this idea, and investigation proves the fallacy and adds strength
to the statement of Mr. Bond, that the chronicle of Withers is but a partial and fragmentary history. While living on Hacker's Creek,
and within rifle-shot of his own door, Jesse consummated a deed, which, for needless and unprovoked treachery, was scarcely surpassed by the Indians in all their ravages of the Virginia border. He arranged a meeting with a friendly Indian for the ostensible purpose of spending a day in hunting. To reach the place of rendezvous the Indian had to cross Hacker's
(Creek) on a "foot-log," a tree felled across the stream to form a means of crossing. The time of meeting was appointed for an hour when the sun should reach a certain
point above the tree-tops. Long before that time Jesse stealthily repaired to the spot and concealed himself in a position which commanded an unobstructed view of the foot-log, and there awaited the coming of his
unsuspecting victim. At the appointed hour the Indian issued from the deep tangle of the valley forest. An eye
gleamed along the barrel of the deadly rifle, the Indian reached the middle of the log, a report of the rifle
reverberated through the valley, and the lifeless body of the Indian fell forward into the stream. Hughes claimed
that the Indian approached in a suspicious manner, wary and watchful, and that he
felt justified in killing him. It is not at all probable that an Indian brought up amid the dangers of the wilderness, would traverse
a forest path other than with every faculty alert to hidden danger . His very training would preclude this and his caution was no
evidence that he intended treachery. Had he meditated evil, he would more likely have followed the course
pursued by Hughes. Not only did Hughes engage in Indian killings not chronicled
by Withers, but he was a leader in the terrible massacre of the Bulltown Indians, an account of which must form a separate
chapter of this narrative.
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