WASHINGTON COUNTY. 487 



thickness of six feet, and the seam is found every where at its proper 

 horizon in the hills bordering the creek. The tendency of the coal is 

 to grow thinner westward and thicken to the north-east, hut there are 

 doubtless many local exceptions. The Ohio Coal Company has opened 

 a valuable mine in the hills east of Macksburg, where the seam is six 

 feet thick. The mine is probably in Enoch township, in Noble county. 

 The coal is shipped to Marietta by railroad. The coal is of good quality 

 for domestic use and for the generation of steam. It has also been used 

 largely and with acceptance in the Marietta rolling-mill. It is a coal of 

 good heating power. It is easily mined, and can be furnished in Mari- 

 etta at very reasonable rates. The people of Marietta have found the 

 great advantage of a regular railroad supply of" Coal from Duck Creek 

 coal field over the precarious supply of the Ohio River. Manufactures 

 of all kinds in which cheap fuel is a principal factor can be established. 



Salt. — Besides the abundant coal, an unlimited supply of good brine 

 for the manufacture of salt can be obtained in this part of the Duck 

 Creek valley. On the fiat below Macksburg a coarse sandrock contain- 

 ing brine is reported to be struck in the oil wells at ninety feet below the 

 surface, but a more copious supply is obtained in another sandrock three 

 hundred and eight feet below the surface. Deeper borings should strike 

 the Upper Waverly sandrock, from which abundant supplies of brine 

 are obtained at Pomeroy and other parts of the State. 



The record of a deep well bored by Mr. Blauvelt, given hereafter, 

 shows that the upper Waverly contains brine. It is always difficult to 

 determine the strength of brine in any of these wells unless the fresh 

 water, which enters almost all wells, be tubed off. If extensive mining 

 of the coal should be carried on in Aurelius, the fine, or slack coal, which 

 is not merchantable, could be profitably used in boiling salt. At many 

 places in the State refuse coal is exclusively used in the salt works. 



Petroleum — Aurelius township has heretofore furnished large quantities 

 of excellent petroleum. One of the earliest wells bored in 1860, on the 

 land of James Dutton, Esq., yielded many thousand barrels of heavy 

 lubricating oil. It was only fifty-six feet deep. The daily yield at first 

 must have been, from the reports, from one hundred to two hundred bar- 

 rels. This well caused no little excitement, and many other wells were 

 bored, many of which yielded remunerative returns. The Buell well, 

 named from the Hon. B. P. Buell, of Lowell, one of its owners, has pro- 

 duced oil steadily for seven or eight years, and yet averages five barrels 

 a day. The Mattison well is reported to have yielded an average of 

 fifteen barrels a day for eight months. Other wells yielded considerable 

 quantities. But most of this oil was produced before the Marietta, Pitts- 



