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Of the 25 townships in Bedford County, Southampton Township is the second largest in square miles but the least populated.  There are only twelve persons per square mile.  One third of our land is designated as State Forest or State Game Lands.  We have a total of 37 miles of township roads while the rest of the roads in Southampton are maintained by the State.  The 2010 Census shows 976 people living here with 557 of them as registered voters. 

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It all began with a court order in April, 1799, when the boundaries of Southampton Township were formed from Providence and Colerain Townships.  (Monroe seceded in 1840 from Southampton and Providence Townships.  On December 8, 1876, Mann seceded from Southampton.)  Boundaries are a common occurrence in our township, with Tussey Mountain dividing Beans Cove from Chaneysville, and, of course, the Mason-Dixon line which separates us from Maryland.  The townships of Colerain, Mann, Monroe, and Cumberland Valley surround us.

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According to The Kernal of Greatness, a book by the Bedford County Heritage Commission:

     "the first white men on record to set foot in what is now Bedford County, Pennsylvania, were those of the Thomas Powell expedition in 1625."

This expedition began in Jamestown, Virginia, and followed the rivers and streams in to what is now Southampton Township.  They explored Town Creek and Sweet Root Creek, and followed the North Star to the top of Tussey Mountain in to Friends Cove, just short of Ashcom, before returning to Virginia.  In his journal, Thomas Powell wrote, "there were lots of Indians here; they showed us all the friendship they could".  Unknown to these first white men, they were walking on the paths of the Indians who had full run of our township before white men arrived.  One of the longest Indian trails in American, the "Warriors Path" of the "Five Nations" (later termed the Six Nations) ran through our township connecting central New York to the Carolina Mountains.  The Warriors Path crossed the Juniata River at Bloody Run (now Everett, Pennsylvania) and then ran between Warrior Ridge and Tussey Mountain southwest through the Black Valley.  About six miles in to the valley, the Indians picked up Clear Creek and followed it.  Three miles later, Clear Creek came to Sweet Root Creek that flowed southward.  The Indians followed it for four and a half miles, hugging Warrior Ridge's steep slopes for the next five miles.  Just before it reached the mouth of the Black Valley Gap, the Creek turned, and, for the next five miles, kept close to Iron Ore Ridge going in to Maryland.   Then at the Flintstone Gap, the Creek turned east in to Murley's Gap and the route that the Indians took ascended to the top of Warrior Mountain.  For the next ten miles, the Indians ran along the summit before descending toward the Potomac River at Opessah's Town (now Old Town, Maryland) where the Iroquois had a permanent camp near Thomas Cresap's trading post.

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In 1728, one hundred and three years after that first expedition, Joseph, a descendant of Thomas Powell, led a group of thirteen settlers in to the valley surrounding Town Creek, south of Chaneysville.  They included John Spergen, Thomas Prather, Richard Iames, Robert Fleehart, George Painter, Heredius Blue, Philip Broadwater, Ignatius Rock, John Still, Archer Worley, Michael Huff, Joseph Johnson, and George Tunis.  These brave men were trappers, hunters, and millwrights.  But more importantly, they knew how to carve farmland out of the surrounding wilderness.  Prather, Blue, Fleehart, Painter, Broadwater, and Rock were drowned on Town Creek while trapping (that is why there is a Blue Hole and a Rock Hole on Town Creek).  George Tunis, the only single man in the group, was an Indian fur trader.  Robert Fleehart erected the first mill near Sweet Root.  Later it was torn down and moved further downstream. 

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In 1731, John Spergen also built a mill.  Joseph Johnson died that same year and was buried in the Shawnee Graveyard.  John Still married an Indian and had three children and operated a mill on Town Creek until his death.  Michael Huff was a trapper and hunter.  Archer Worley bought the "Indian Orchards" from the Indians.  Richard Iames was the progenitor of the Iames family of this area.  Joesph Powell went back to Virginia, only to return again with his brother George six years later.  Joseph set up a trading post on Sweet Root Creek near the "old Iroquois Indian Trial", the same year his cousin Robert Ray had his post near Bedford.  Today, you can still see the cut stones of this foundation.  It was said that when Ray took sick at his post, George Powell and some other men carried him to Joseph's post.  When he felt better, he walked about 6 miles to the home of his sister, Mrs. Sarah Perrin, where he died a few days later.

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Another early settler, Michael Huff, mined the saltpeter cave near Sweet Root Creek for Jacob Rowland who made gunpowder for the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.  (Black powder consists of potassium nitrate (saltpeter), sulfur, and charcoal.)  You can still climb up the steep terrain of Tussey Mountain to crawl inside the cave.  The stone ceiling has shifted over time and has divided the cave in to two sections.  By 1790, David Roland had built a mill on the Black Valley branch of Sweet Root Creek.  He later sold it to another miller, Simon Howsare.

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In 1794, Southampton Township was definitely up in arms over the Whiskey Rebellion.  Rye and wheat were the chief products of our farmers.  It is easy to understand why they chose to change their grains in to whiskey in order to transport it over our mountains on horses to make a profit.  One keg of whiskey was the equivalent to 24 bushels of rye and wheat.  The farmers thought the tax was unjust, oppressive, and discriminated against their way of life since many of them were Scotch-Irish or German immigrants who were brought up on whiskey, ale, and beer.  Needless to say, stills remained active, long after George Washington left Bedford and on in to the later years with prohibition,

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In 1862, during the Civil War, Confederate Calvary scouts entered Black Valley from Flintstone, Maryland, and camped near Chaneysville.  There were no battles actually fought in our township, but we supplied a lot of men to fight on both sides of this bloody war.  Many of those who fought were eventually buried beneath our soil.

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