On the sixth day of his visit, Byrd left the Spotswood's home, but he was accompanied by the entire group as far as the furnace. Most of them rode in a coach, but the "little Master", who was under no government rode on a horse. The "little Master" was Spotswood's eldest son, who was about six or seven at the time. Before leaving, Byrd gave a Pistole, a Spanish coin, to Mr. Russell to distribute among the staff. This seems to have been a common practice for visitors to do.
The road to the furnace was good, and thirteen miles in length, as was clearly marked on the trees along the way. Much of the land bore marginal trees; the value of the land was in the ore under the surface. The first stop was at the mines, which were a mile closer to Germanna than the furnace. They watched the Engineer use blasting powder to loosen some of the ore. There seemed to be much ore in the vicinity.
At the furnace, there was no activity, as Spotswood had taken his people to Massaponux to work at the air furnace there. At the furnace, a water wheel about twenty feet in diameter drove the bellows. Water was scarce, and it was necessary to run water to the furnace from two streams, one of which was at a distance of almost two thousand feet. The water was carried in wooden pipes.
The Founder (the head man in charge of the furnace) was an Irishman who received three shilling and six pence per ton of iron. He favored the charcoal from red oak trees. The Founder was not entirely happy with Spotswood's leadership, as he moved people around at the whim of the moment.
The charcoal was brought in wagons and dumped at the furnace site. It was desirable not to treat the charcoal too harshly or it would break. Spotswood had tried to make charcoal at some distance from the furnace, but it had not withstood the travel very well. Very likely, this experiment had involved the Second Germanna Colony people, who were up the river about eighteen miles.
After a picnic-like lunch, the group split up and went their different ways. Byrd rode about ten miles to Col. Harry Willis' place, where he dried out from the rain he had encountered. He kept his pores open with a little wine. Byrd did not arrive home for a few weeks, since he inspected other sites on the way.
The involvement of the Germanna Colonists in the iron furnace of Spotswood was minimal. The First Germanna Colonists had been settled in their new home at Germantown for a few years before the furnace was built. So, the First Colony had nothing to do with the furnace. Their contribution had been to develop the mine. The Second Colony was involved with the furnace only to the extent of the experiment in making charcoal. Even for this, probably hardly any of them actually visited the furnace site.
(07 Nov 00)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.