Jett Ford

On April 6, 1794, Chief Benge and six warriors raided the home of Sarah Livingston near Mendota, Virginia. They killed Sarah in her garden where she was working. They tomahawked three children, killing one of them. They set fire to the Livingston home, forcing those inside to come out. They took three women, two men, and three children hostage and retreated across the North Fork of the Holston River here at this location. They stopped for a while near the home of Abraham Fulkerson where they watched as settlers had gathered there for a house raising. When they continued on, they crossed Clinch Mountain at Hamilton Gap. At nightfall, they camped at Copper Creek.

Source: "Benge!" by Lawrence J. Fleenor, Jr.

Abraham Fulkerson House

From the application for National Register of Historic Places: "The two-story Fulkerson-Hilton House, built around 1800, is of mixed log construction consisting of oak, pine, and poplar hewn logs. The logs are joined using half-dovetail notching. The house rests on a limestone foundation on its original site. The south side of the house, which is the front, has a roofed veranda that was added in 1936. In 1949, a kitchen and dining room shed-roof extension was added to the north side of the house. At present, the exterior of the house is covered with yellow-poplar siding painted white. The west side of the house has a two-story sandstone chimney. Single-beaded tongue and groove vertical boards divide the interior of both floors of the log portion of this house. In addition, the two log rooms constituting the first floor are lined with similar tongue and groove boards. The two upstairs rooms are not lined. The lean-to added in 1949 is of frame construction with a sheetrock interior. Both rooms have pine floors and are structurally unaltered to this day."

The house was built by frontier settler Abraham Fulkerson for whom the Fulkerson District of Scott County, VA, is named. Fulkerson, who "fought in the American Revolution, purchased the designated land in 1782, and subsequently operated a mill there before becoming one of the first Scott County commissioners at the time of the creation of the county in 1814."

Frontier preacher Samuel Hilton "established two Baptist churches in the area and purchased the designated land and house in 1816. The Fulkersons and Hiltons intermarried, and the house remained in possession of their heirs . . . until 1871." Samuel's grandson, Enos Bird Hilton, built a house nearby that would serve as a post office, thus establishing the name of "Hilton's."