In their brave hope of extending Virginia's boundaries beyond the Blue Ridge, a band of early settlers carved out homesteads in the Native American-dominated wilderness of what is now southwest Virginia in 1748.  On July 30, 1755, the Shawnee Indians, who had heretofore ignored the vanguard of white settlers, attacked and massacred all but a few of the valley families.  Two that survived were the Pattons and the Ingles.

       Colonel James Patton, who had been given a Crown Grant of 120,000 acres in 1745, headed the valley's militia.  A widower, aged 63, he took the responsibility of guarding the valley very seriously.  When the French and Indian War began, George Washington stopped in the New River Valley to warn him of the war's potential danger to the settlers.  As Washington had foreseen, the war did come to the valley.  Colonel Patton died during an attack by indigenous tribes.  The Ingles family, who farmed a small homestead on land they had purchased from Colonel Patton, were also grievously affected.

      Mary Draper Ingles's mother, Eleanor, who years earlier had lost her husband to marauding Braves, was killed in the massacre.  Mary Ingles, 23, and her two boys, age two and four, were abducted by the Shawnees (also abducted was her sister-in-law Bettie Draper).  They were forced to walk hundreds of miles to the tribal camp near what is now Cincinnati, Ohio.  During their trek Mary bore a daughter.  After months of captivity Mary escaped with an elderly Dutch woman.  Following the Ohio River, they made their way back across 850 miles of uncharted wilderness before Mary Ingles finally rejoined her husband and brother.

     This dramatic story is re-created each summer in the outdoor dramatization, The Long Way Home.  It is performed in an amphitheater beside the Ingles Homestead in Radford, Thursday through Sunday at 8:30 P.M.  For many years the role of Elenor Draper was played by her great-great-great-great granddaughter, Mary Ingles Jeffries.  Reviewers of outdoor drama give high marks to this stirring production.  In addition to seeing the performance visitors can tour the amphitheater and a part of the Wilderness Road. For ticket information call (540) 639-0679 or write The Long Way Home, P.O. Box 711, Radford, VA 24141.  The novel, Follow the River, by James Alexander Thom, also tells the story of Mary's kidnapping and her 42-day walk to freedom.

      Despite the adversity, the Ingleses did not abandon the Virginia frontier although they did for a time move to a protective fort before returning to the New River Valley.  Neither did the Patton-Preston family.  From 1772 to 1774, James Patton's nephew, William Preston, who had been visiting in the New River Valley at the time of the massacre and narrowly escaped death himself, built a story-and-a-half white frame  house he called Smithfield after his wife, Susanna Smith.  Preston represented the area in the Virginia House of Burgesses and was County Surveyor, County Lieutenant, Colonel of the Militia (like his uncle) and a member of the Committee of Safety.

The Smithfield Plantation in Blacksburg is no rough country house; it is furnished in a style William Preston copied from Williamsburg.  The drawing room fireplace duplicates the one that can be seen in Raleigh Tavern (see Williamsburg Tavern selection).  In this formal room you'll also see a copy of the Gilbert Stuart portrait of James Patton Preston.  One of William and Susanna's 12 children became governor of Virginia (1816-1819).  Several terms later James's son-in-law, John Floyd, Jr. became governor (1830-1852).  Another grandson, James McDowell, also served as governor (1843-1846) but unlike the others he never lived at Smithfield.

Today, only 11 of the original 2,000 acres are still part of the plantation.  On these stand the house, outbuildings and interpretive gardens.  Four acres are landscaped as they would have been in the 18th century with grazing lawns, shade trees and a kitchen garden of herbs, perennials, fruits and period crops. Costumed docents interpret the five period-furnished rooms: the drawing room, dining room, master chamber, schoolroom above-stairs chamber and below-stairs winter kitchen. One of the few pieces of furniture you see that belonged to the Preston family is the walnut corner cabinet in the dining room.  It was made on the plantation and displays Chinese export china.  The staircase to the upstairs, carved in the Chinese Chippendale pattern, also reveals the influence of the Far East.  The Georgian-style looking glass in the passageway belonged  to William Preston’s mother.  It was carried in the hold of Colonel James Patton’s ship with the possessions of the senior Prestons.  James Patton was originally a ship’s captain from the Ulster area of Northern Ireland who sailed to ports along the “new country.”  He persuaded his sister and husband to bring their children to the new land.  One of those children was William Preston.

Smithfield Plantation is open April to November on Thursday through Sunday from 1:00 to 5:00 P.M. Admission is charged.

Outdoor enthusiasts may want to add a stop at one of the two nearby lakes to their outing.   Mountain Lake is just 20 miles north of  Smithfield.   Claytor Lake State Park and Camping Grounds is 30 miles south.

Directions:  From I-81, take Exit 118, U.S. Route 460 By-Pass, around Christiansburg and  Blacksburg.  Smithfield Plantation is adjacent to the Virginia Tech campus off Route 314.  For the Ingles Homestead Amphitheater take Exit 105 off I-81 and go 1/4 mile on Route 232 toward Radford.

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