The first battle of Saltville
Most American historians with any sensitivity to the strategic significance of salt will recognize that Saltville, VA, in the far southwestern corner of the Old Dominion, was the scene for two major battles as the Confederacy fought to protect its sole source of this crucial mineral and the Union tried to tighten its economic blockade.
Retired Virginia Tech chemistry professor Jim Glanville has done more than any person to restore the luster of Saltville's rich heritage, including a steady publicity effort. His latest media foray appeared in today's Richmond Times-Dispatch, entitled "A similar tale predates Pocahontas " in which Glanville tells the story of an early Indian "chieftainess" who married a European (acually, one of two recorded).
As Virginia prepares to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the Jamestown settlers in 1607, Glanville recounts the documented vist -- a full 40 years earlier -- of 15 Spanish conquistidores who sacked the fortified Indian village erected at Saltville to obtain salt from the saline springs there. The Spanish boasted of burning 50 huts and killling 1,000 defenders, though Glanville considers this hyperbole. In any case, the "first battle of Saltville" was 290 years before the Civil War clash.
