THE MOUNT STERLING---POUND GAP ROAD

      Mount Sterling-Pound Gap Road was Eastern Kentucky’s main highway. Horses,

      cattle and hogs raised in Central Kentucky were driven over the road to

      livestock markets in Abingdon, Lynchburg, and other Virginia towns, and it

      was also used by the Iron-Salt trade. Originally a series of Indian

      trails, it was maintained and improved at state expense by local

      contractors using picks and shovels and horse-drawn graders.

      The first survey of the road was authorized in 1817. It began at Mt.

      Sterling, Kentucky, and extended southeast through Hazel Green, Licking

      Station, Prestonsburg, Laynesville and Pikeville to the Virginia State

      Line at Pound Gap. Horses, cattle and hogs raised in Central Kentucky were

      driven over the road to livestock markets in Abingdon, Lynchburg, and

      other Virginia towns, and it was also used by the Iron-Salt trade.

      Freighters using wagons drawn by oxen carried salt from the salt mines in

      Saltville, Virginia to markets in Central Kentucky and returned to

      Virginia carrying iron ingots smelted in the Bath County ironworks. 

      The state appropriated $2,700 for the road in 1824 and $23,000 in 1836,

      $8,000 of which was spent on the most rugged section of the road, the

      section extending from Pikeville to Pound Gap. The contractor who improved

      this section was Thomas May of Pike County, brother of Floyd County

      politician Samuel May and owner of a large farm on Shelby Creek.   

      During the War Between the States, the road served as the main

      thoroughfare for troops moving between Central Kentucky and Eastern

      Kentucky. In the days preceding the Battle of Middle Creek, after vacating

      their trenches at Hager Hill, Marshall’s four regiments marched up the

      Prestonsburg Road to the mouth of Abbott Creek, where that road

      intersected the Pound Gap Road. Then they moved up Abbott Creek on the

      Pound Gap Road and over the ridge to this location, the Forks of Middle

      Creek, which was traversed by an alternate route of the Pound Gap Road.

      Marshall decided to make his stand at the Forks for several reasons. He

      had received intelligence that Cranor’s 40th Ohio was moving east from

      Licking Station to reinforce Garfield. He also knew, of course, that

      Garfield was pursuing him from Paintsville. By placing his army at the

      Forks of Middle Creek, Marshall was in a position to intercept Cranor’s

      force if it advanced east along the Pound Gap Road and Garfield’s force if

      it advanced west along the Pound Gap Road from the mouth of Middle Creek. 

      The position also afforded him a victory route and an escape route. If

      victorious, he could move his army via the Pound Gap Road into Central

      Kentucky. If defeated, he could escape by way of the road leading up the

      Left Fork of Middle Creek. As things turned out, he was forced to retreat

      from the position using the latter road. Marshall retreated through

      modern-day Goodloe and Pyramid, over Brushy Mountain, and down Brush Creek

      to Hueysville, where he established a camp at the Joseph Gearheart Farm.

      Tradition says that his men burned all the fence posts on the farm in

      order to keep themselves warm. An unidentified Confederate soldier died of

      his wounds during the encampment and was subsequently buried in the

      Gearheart Cemetery. After camping for a week at Hueysville, Marshall moved

      his men farther up Right Beaver Creek to Martin’s Mill (modern-day

      Wayland), where they received a warm welcome from Confederate loyalist