"Ole Briary", West Virginia

The property is my home place. 115 acres of memories. Purchased decades ago by my grandfather as a place to 'get away' in solitude and as a hunting property. The old roadbed that follows the creek below the house used to be a state maintained road once upon a time. It is still a great hiking trail and is used by some to ride ATVs. We are not particularly fond of having our property tore up with people riding ATVs on the property so please respect that wish. 

The valley leads onto more private land and into Elsey Creek and meets up with another road bed at that point. It is near this intersection that the legend of 'Peddlers Glory' is of folklore. As legend has it a peddler was murdered while peddling his wares to the local inhabitants. He was buried near where he lost his life. They say that no grass, leaves, or snow would fall upon his grave. I have never found the location as it is long unmarked. The legend also tells that on a quiet night you can hear his pans and wares clanging up the road and if you call out to the peddler, "Peddler, why were you killed?" He will reply, "For no reason at all." Well, I have never yet had the courage to test the theory. I must say that area can be quite eerie indeed after the sun sets. 

A side story of this legend that was never written or made public I do know. On "Ole Briary" a strange car was one day parked at the trail-head to the old state road into Elsey. The car was there for a few days before my grandfather called the local law enforcement. He had originally thought it was just someone who hiked down into the hollow to fish for native brook trout. The car had Pennsylvania plates. A search down into 'Peddlers Glory' found the young man dead. Fast forward several more years. I was a young boy but still remember the car coming down the drive to Ole Briary. A car with Pennsylvania plates arrived. Turns out it was the family of the young man who had disappeared years before. They were busy asking my grandfather questions about the property and seeking his permission to walk through into Peddlers Glory. Of course he agreed. Turns out from that conversation that the young man had been reading various folklore including the story of the peddler. For whatever unknown reason he left home and drove down to West Virginia to find 'Peddlers Glory'. It was there that he died. The strangest part is that the family stated that there had been no cause of death other than just simply 'natural causes'. Strange but true... 

Many many years ago the road down Elsey Creek was a main road linking Terra Alta and Albright, WV. When I was a child you could still find the remains of the many house foundations that used to line the road. Long since abandoned to the forest there were many 'treasures' to explore as a youngster. Our property is bordered mainly by private land and one large acreage owned by the Kingwood Water Department. The old state roads that no longer exist are considered right of ways. Basically this is just the side of the creek bed from Route 7 down valley to Albright, WV.