|
|
|
|
|
|
Most historical accounts credit William Robinson as Grafton's first settler, constructing a cabin in 1773.
Pruntytown is the oldest community in present-day Taylor County. It was settled during the mid-1770s and was initially called Cross Roads because it was located at the intersection of the Washington Post Road and the Fairmont-Booths Ferry Pike. Moses Hustead, Elijah Sinsel, and Frederick Burdett were among the earliest settlers in the area.
The City of Grafton was chartered in 1856. It is believed to have been named after John Grafton, a civil engineer of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
Civil War Era:
The first Union casualty of the Civil war was Private Thornsbury Bailey Brown, a member of the Grafton Guards. He was killed by a sniper on May 22, 1861 in Fetterman.
The Union Army maintained control over Grafton throughout the war. The only skirmish in Grafton took place on August 13, 1861 when 200 Confederate soldiers attempted to take the town. Twenty-one Confederate soldiers died during the battle.
The only two national cemeteries in West Virginia are located here.
The Grafton National Cemetery was completed in 1868. During 1867 and 1868, 1,251 bodies of soldiers killed during the Civil War were exhumed from cemeteries throughout West Virginia and nearby states and reburied at Grafton National Cemetery. Private Thornsbury Bailey Brown was interred there in 1903.
The Cemetery reached its capacity in 1961. In 1987, a new, 100-acre National Cemetery was established in Pruntytown.
Anna M. Jarvis, founder of Mother's Day, was born in Webster, near Grafton, on May 1, 1864.
Sources: [wikipedia.org; http://www.polsci.wvu.edu/wv/Taylor/tayhistory.html]
Copyright © Genealogy Trails