The other tract whose history it is worth our while to follow consisted of twelve hundred acres on the Youghiogheny River, likewise not far from Pittsburgh.  It bore seams of coal, which Washington examined in 1770 and thought “to be of the very best kind, burning freely and abundance of it.”  In the spring of 1773 he sent out a certain Gilbert Simpson, with whom he had formed a sort of partnership, to look after this land, and each furnished some laborers, Washington a “fellow” and a “wench.”  Simpson managed to clear some ground and get in six acres of corn, but his wife disliked life on the borderland and made him so uncomfortable with her complaints that he decided to throw up the venture.  However, he changed his mind, and after a trip back East returned and, on a site noticed by the owner on his visit, built a grist mill on a small stream now called Washington’s Run that empties into the Youghiogheny.  This was one of the first mills erected west of the Alleghany Mountains and is still standing, though more or less rebuilt.  The millstones were dug out of quarries in the neighborhood and the work of building the mill was done amid considerable danger from the Indians, who had begun what is known as Dunmore’s War.  Simpson’s cabin and the slave quarters stood near what is now Plant No. 2 of the Washington Coal and Coke Company.  The tract of land contains valuable seams of coal and with some contiguous territory is valued at upward of twenty million dollars.

Washington had large ideas for the development of these western lands.  At one time he considered attempting to import Palatine Germans to settle there, but after careful investigation decided that the plan was impracticable.  In 1774 he bought four men convicts, four indented servants, and a man and his wife for four years and sent them and some carpenters out to help Simpson build the mill and otherwise improve the lands.  Next year he sent out another party, but Indian troubles and later the Revolution united with the natural difficulties of the country to put a stop to progress.  Some of the servants were sold and others ran away, but Simpson stayed on in charge, though without making any financial settlement with his patron till 1784.

At the close of the Revolution Washington wrote to President John Witherspoon of Princeton College that he had in the western country patents under signature of Lord Dunmore “for about 30,000 acres, and surveys for about 10,000 more, patents for which were suspended by the disputes with Great Britain, which soon followed the return of the warrants to the land office.  Ten thousand acres of the above thirty lie upon the Ohio; the rest on the Great Kenhawa, a river nearly as large, and quite as easy in its navigation, as the former, The whole of it is rich bottom land, beautifully situated on these rivers, and abounding plenteously in fish, wild-fowl, and game of all kinds.”