98 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 127 
acteristic of the Botetourt or Fetzer formations. These siliceous limestones are 
overlain by about 600 feet of slabby, carbonaceous limestone and shaly limestone 
similar lithologically to the Liberty Hall facies of Virginia. 
Only at the type section is the Whitesburg of such great thickness. Wherever 
it was recognized elsewhere by Ulrich and Butts it is some 50 feet or less thick 
and is a siliceous, brown-weathering, resistant limestone underlying the “Athens” 
but overlying “Lenoir” or “Holston.” The Lenoir and Holston in these instances 
are the Lincolnshire and Murat formations. In Catawba Valley this remnan- 
tal Whitesburg is well developed and interfingers with Effna limestone. Cooper 
and Cooper (1946, p. 80) named this resistant thin bed the Botetourt member 
(now formation) of the Edinburg formation. 
In Alabama the Pratt Ferry limestone of Cooper and Cooper was also referred 
by Butts and Ulrich to the Whitesburg formation, but it actually occupies a posi- 
tion somewhere within the Little Oak. Inasmuch as the several hundred feet of 
the Whitesburg, like the Virginia “Athens,” are conspicuous in the Bulls Gap 
area, the name is used locally. 
Dark, thin-bedded limestone overlying the Effna formation at Porterfield 
Quarry near Saltville, Va., carries a holdover fauna of the Effna and is here as- 
signed to the Rich Valley formation. Brachiopods of the Whitesburg are: 
Anisopleurella inaequistriata Cooper L. spicata Cooper 
Camerella sp. 4 Multicostella bursa (Raymond) 
Conotreta magna Cooper Paterula perfecta Cooper 
C. multisinuata Cooper Trematis ? parva Cooper 
Ectenoglossa nymphoidea Cooper Trematis sp. 1, 2 
Elliptoglossa ovalis (Bassler) Triplesia sp. 1 
Leptellina bella Cooper W estonia sp. 1 
Lingulella lirata Cooper 
Witten formation.—This name was proposed by Cooper and Prouty (1943, 
p. 877) for limestones overlying the red Bowen formation in Virginia and East 
Tennessee. The formation is especially characterized by Crytophragmus which 
is often found in calcarenites. Camarocladia-bearing limestone is also a promi- 
nent feature of the formation. In places tongues of mudrock appear. The forma- 
tion is widespread in southern Virginia and many of the belts of East Tennessee. 
The red Bowen formation usually separates the Wardell and Witten formations, 
but where it is absent faunal differences may be relied on. The Witten forma- 
tion contains numerous brachiopods, but they are often not well preserved or are 
difficult to extract from the rock. Brachiopods are as follows: 
Doleroides sp. Rostricellula compressa Cooper 
Hesperorthis aff. H. tricenaria (Conrad) R. subtransversa Cooper 
Oligorhynchia bifurcata Cooper Sowerbyella cf. S. lebanonensis Bassler 
Pionodema minuscula Willard Zygospira “recurvirostris” (Hall) 
Correlation of Witten formation.—This formation is correlated with the Leba- 
non of the Central Basin of Tennessee because of the common presence of Piono- 
dema minuscula Willard and Rostricellula compressa Cooper. It also records 
the earliest occurrence of Zygospira in the Appalachians. 
