9 GEOLOGY OF OHIO. 



The Sheridan Coal, which completes the section, is found at an elevar 

 tion of seventy feet above the Gray Limestone. It is less steady as a 

 Beam than the New Castle Coal. It is, however, quite well shown in the 

 section under consideration. It is opened in W. D. Kelly's orchard, where 

 it has a thickness of three feet. The coal gets its southern name, viz., 

 the Sheridan seam, in this vicinity. The mines of Hon. E. Nigh, which 

 are located about seven miles above Irontoh, have received this designa- 

 tion, but no new name would have been affixed to the seam if it had been 

 distinctly understood that the Sheridan Coal and the Ashland Coal were 

 the same. The latter ooal is widely and favorably known. No question 

 in regard to these coals being one and the same seam can now oe raised. 

 The sections on opposite sides of the river are identical through at least 

 three hundred and fifty feet of strata. The character of a coal can not 

 be inferred from the name by which it is known. Coal No. VI, the Nel- 

 Bonville seam, is certainly the most valuable coal of the district, but por- 

 tions of it are to be found of sulphurous and otherwise inferior quality. 

 It seems to contain a larger measure of sulphur in the Ohio Valley than 

 at the northward, but there are in this general region large areas in which 

 it displays its greatest excellence. The Walnut township Coal, of Gallia 

 county (lower seam), according to all investigations thus far made, com- 

 pares well with the best showing of the Hocking Valtey Coal, except in 

 thickness. It yields at least five feet of coal for a large area. The seam 

 at Sheridan, as at Coalton, Kentucky, shows in places a large percentage 

 of sulphur, but there is a great deal of excellent coal at each of these 

 localities. Experiments have been lately made in coking the coal at the 

 Kheridan mines, but the result has not been learned. None of the trials 

 thus far reported in coking Coal No. VI in this district has been entirely 

 successful. The coal can be charred, but its slack has never yet been 

 taken up. 



The characteristic features of the section just given are apparent. No- 

 where else in the district is there such a development of sandstones as 

 in the southern part of Lawrence county. Four great ledges, no one of 

 them less than twenty feet in thickness, have been found in the one hun- 

 dred and eighty feet already traversed ; and the sandstone next to be 

 named, is quite as massive and conspicuous as any thus far described. 



The section now described does not terminate with the Sheridan Coal, 

 but one hundred feet of strata overlie this horizon in the hill belonging 

 to W. D. Kelly, Esq., and also in the adjoining land of John Campbell, 

 Esq. It has been found more convenient, however, to break the section 

 at this point, as just about the same number of feet remain to be de- 

 scribed. 



