Sanders Mill/Dusenberry Mill at Martha

Introduction

Text-to-speech Audio

This was an old mill site on Mud River first owned by the Ward family and operated by Joel Estes and family. Sampson Sanders purchased the site from Estes and made it the best and most productive mill in Cabell County before 1850. Martha was named for Sampson Sanders mother. The mill produced the wood for the rafts that took Sanders' manumitted slaves to Cincinnati.

Backstory and Context

Text-to-speech Audio

Sampson Sanders purchased many acres in Cabell and operated several businesses to raise enough money to manumit his slaves and to provide for his legal heirs.

First located by Jeremiah Ward, this mill site was operated by Ward, Joel Estes, Sampson Sanders and William Dusenberry.This mill produced all the flour and meal for the county seat Barboursville as well as sawing many feet of lumber. This site on Mud River was where the manumitted slaves gathered, built the rafts and left for Michigan in 1849. The mill was sold to William Dusenberry and operated until the Civil War when great floods destroyed the dam and mill.

Sources

Cabell County Deed Books

Cabell County Will Book I

Cabell County Minute Books

William Dusenberry Diaries (private collection) Morrow Library, Marshall University, Huntington, WV