History of Tucker County, West Virginia #267552

Had some things been different from what they were, I believe that I could have made the History of Tucker County better than it is. The labor required to collect and arrange the material was greater than would be supposed by one who has never undertaken a task of similar nature. No previous history, covering the period and territory, has ever been compiled, and I had to enter upon original and unexplored fields wherever I went. There was no scarcity of subject-matter; but, at times, it was not easy for me to decide what to use and what to reject. I am not certain that I have not erred seriously in one thing — that I trusted more to the whims of others than to my own judgment. The plan of the work would have been quite different had I followed mv own inclination to make the whole thing one connected story'instead of biographical fragments, as it is. Yet, as it is, it will please more people than it would if cast in the mold for which it was first intended. I was not wri ting it for myself, but for others; and, as my tastes and fan cies differ from those of others, I thought it best to suit the book to those for whom it was intended.