A river supplies a man-made canal, builds an island of industrial prowess then washes it all away! Virginius Island was created when the Shenandoah Canal was cut through a section of Harper's Ferry between 1750-1820 to create a bypass for boats to avoid the shallow and rocky rapids of the Shenandoah River. The canal also would power the soon to boom industrial village that would be built there before being abandoned due to destruction from the Civil War and washed away in a series of floods from 1855-1890.
This 1857 lithograph, a small series of foundations and ruins spanning 13 acres, and the current day railway line for Amtrak and CSX railroad is all that remains of the bustling island. Once home to a variety of mills, a tannery, approximately a dozen residences, and the connection of the Winchester and Potomac (W&P) railway which connected the Baltimore and Ohio (B&O) railway to the Chesapeake and Ohio (C&O) Canal through Harper's Ferry.
A U.S. Naitonal Park Service visitor plaque shows the assumed waterway that would have powered the Valley and Cotton mills that were first constructed on the island.
These "Head Gate" ruins would have controlled the water flowing into the tunnels from the Shenandoah River. Now dried on low water days like this, the silt and sand deposits are still present. The far right gate in this photo felt like walking on a beach with so much sand still in it!
From the head gates, water would have been channeled into this basin where it would split and feed the Valley mill to the right of this photo and flow into the pressure tunnels seen here.
The foundation of the Valley mill here is what sits to the immediate right of the basin.
Downstream from the basin, is an access where water would be pushed through a series of shrinking tunnels to pressurize it for when it hits the turbines of the Cotton mill ahead!
The inflow chambers of the Cotton mill. Here water would be directed into the turbine space then off to the sides and back out into the Shenandoah River.
Because the original turbines were made of wood, then replaced with more modern styles, the only remaining portion visible are these iron Leffel turbine supports in the turbine chamber. (Although technically fenced off to prevent visitors from falling into the closed off rooms, one can slip under the split rail fencing and peer down into this area.)
*NOTE: I do NOT condone trespassing or ignoring a park's safety features!
After spinning the turbines and powering the mill, the water would be sent through openings in the walls on either side of the turbine chamber and out of these outlet chambers back into the river.
The Shenandoah from the foundations!
A discarded mill wheel along the trail. Look close, almost a perfect square of the holes where pegs would have secured the beam to the wheel are still visible!
This small bridge connects the main road to the island where another inlet was built off of the canal.
Another view of the Shenandoah from the top of the head gate ruins! The riverside wall almost creates steps as it goes towards the water.
Some discarded railway lumber and replaced iron sections sit beside the CSX line as it cuts through the trees that have grown on Virginius Island.
A CSX train makes its way across the elevated tracks from the former covered bridge that connected Harper's Ferry to Maryland before crossing over Virginius Island and heading East into West Virginia!
