The Wheeling Repository

REPORT.

The undersigned commissioners appointed under the law of the United States, entitled "An act to regulate the laying out and making a road from Cumberland, in the state of Maryland, to the state of Ohio," in addition to the communications heretofore made, beg leave further to report to the president of the United States,

That, by the delay of the answer of the legislature of Pennsylvania to the application for permission to pass the road through that state, the commissioners could not proceed to the business of the road in the spring before vegetation had so far advanced as to render the work of exploring and surveying difficult and tedious, from which circumstance it was postponed till the last autumn, when the business was again resumed; that, in obedience to the special instructions given them, the route heretofore reported has been so changed as to pass through Union Town, and that they have completed the location, gradation and marking of the route from Cumberland to Brownsville, Bridgeport and the Monongahela river, agreeably to a plat of the courses, distances, and grades, in which is described the marks and mountains by which the route is designated, and which is herewith exhibited; that by this plat and measurement it will appear (when compared with the road now travelled,) there is a saving of four miles of distance between Cumberland and Brownsville, on the new route.

In the gradation of the surface of the route (which became necessary to confine it within the limits prescribed by the law) is ascertained the comparative elevation and depression of different points in the route, and taking a point ten feet above the surface of low water in the Potomac river at Cumberland, as the horizon, the most prominent points are found to be elevated as follows, viz.

Feet & decimals.

Summit of Will's mountain, 581.03

Western foot of ditto, 304.04

Summit of Savage mountain, 2022.20

Savage river, 1741.60

Summit of Little Savage m'n. 1900.40

First western water, 1669.90

Summit of Red hill, 1914.13

Summit of Meadow mountain, 2026.16

Little Yohogany; 1322.60

East fork of Shade run, 1538.92

Summit of Negro mountain, 2328.12

Western foot of ditto, 1360.50

White's creek, 1195.50

Big Yohogany, 645.00

Summit of River hill west of Yough, 1514.50

Beaver run, 1123.80

Summit of Laurel hill, 1550.16

Court-house in Union-town, 274.65

Monongahela, at the mouth of Dunlap's creek, in Brownsville, 10 feet above low water mark, 119.26

The law requiring the commissioners to report such parts of the route as are laid on the old road as well as those on new grounds, and to state those parts which require the most immediate attention and amelioration, & the probable expense of making the same passable in the most difficult parts and through the whole distance; they have to state that from the crooked and hilly course of the road now travelled, the new route could not be made to occupy any part of it (except an intersection on Will's mountain, another at Jesse Tomlinson's, and a third near Big Youghogany, embracing not a mile of distance in the whole) without unnecessary sacrifices of distance and expense; that therefore, an estimate must be made on the route, as passing wholly through new grounds.

In doing this the commissioners feel great difficulty, as they cannot, with any degree of precision, estimate the expense of making it merely passable; nor can they allow themselves to suppose that a less breadth than that mentioned in the law was to be taken into the calculation. The rugged deformity of the grounds rendered it impossible to lay a route within the grade limited by law, otherwise than by ascending and descending the hills obliquely, by which circumstance a great proportion of the route occupies the sides of hills which cannot be safely passed on a road of common
common breadth, and where it will, in the opinion of the commissioners, be necessary by digging, to give the proper form to thirty feet, at least in the breadth of the road. to afford suitable security in passing on a way to be frequently crowded with waggons moving in opposite directions, with transports of emigrant families, and droves of cattle, hogs, &c. on the way to market.

Considering therefore that a road on those grounds must have sufficient breadth to afford ways & water courses, and satisfied that nothing short of well constructed and completely finished conduits can secure it against injury which must otherwise render it impassible at every change of the season, by heavy falls of rain or the melting of the beds of snow with which the country is frequently covered ; the commissioners beg leave to say, that in a former report they estimated the expense of a road on these grounds, when properly shaped, made and finished in the style of a stone covered turnpike, at six thousand dollars per mile, exclusive of bridges over the principal streams on the way ; and that with all the information they have since been able to collect, they have no reason to make any alteration in that estimate.

The contracts authorized and which have been taken under the superintendence of the commissioner, Thomas Moore, (duplicates of which accompany this report) will shew what has been undertaken relative to clearing the timber and brush from part of the breadth of the road.

The performance of these contracts was in such forwardness on the first instant, as leaves no doubt of their being completely fulfilled by the first of March.

The commissioners further state, that to aid them in the extension of the route, they run, and marked a straight line, from the crossing place on the Monongahela to Wheeling and had progressed twenty miles with their usual and necessary lines of experiment in ascertaining the shortest and best connection of practicable grounds, when the approach of winter and the shortness of the days afforded no expectation that they could complete the location without needless exposure in the most inclement season of the year ; and presuming that the postponement of the remaining part till the ensuing spring would produce no delay in the business ( 358 ) of making the road, they were induced to retire from it for the present.

The great length of time already employed in this business makes it proper for the commissioners to observe, that in order to connect the best grounds with that circumspection which the importance of the duties confided to them demanded, it became indispensably necessary to run lines of experiment and references in various directions, which exceed an average of four times the distance located for the route, that through a country so irregularly broken, and crowded with very thick underwood in many places, the work has been found so incalculably tedious, that without an adequate idea of the difficulty it is not easy to reconcile the delay.

It is proper to mention that an imperious call from the private concerns of commissioner Joseph Kerr, compelled him to return home on the twenty-ninth of November, which will account for the want of his signature to this report.

All which is, with due deference, submitted, this fifteenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight.

ELIE WILLIAMS,
THOMAS MOORE.