Julie Register looked for this once famous springs resort in September 2011 on her Driving Tour of the Historic Springs of the Virginias

We tried to find Red Sulphur Springs, but the best we could do was to find the historic marker. We believe the actual spring was across and down the road a bit on the other side of a chain link fence. Apparently, nothing remains of what was once one of the largest and most popular springs resorts in the area except the spring itself and its rock foundation.

Red Sulphur Springs in Summers County, West Virginia

History

In 1809, John Caldwell wrote about Red Sulphur Springs in his book, A Tour Through Part of Virginia, in the Summer of 1808 including an account of...the Different Medicinal Springs, Hot and Cold Baths visited by the Author.

"This place is forty miles from the sweet springs, in a westerly direction. Union-town, the capital of Munroe county, is halfway, and consists of a jail, court house, and about a dozen dwellings. About twenty miles to the northward is Lewisburgh, the capital of Greenbriar county...The virtues and medicinal qualities of these Red Sulphur Springs were known, it is supposed, for ages by the Indians, but the first intimation the present possessors had, of there being so great a treasure on their farm, arose from the circumstance of deer and other tenants of the woods frequently resorting to it. It has, within these six or eight years, became a place of great celebrity, though I think their situation very unfit for delicate constitutions. I would recommend invalids bringing with them warm clothing, some wine, and a supply of such medicine as they may be in the practice of using at home. We seldom see the sun until nine, nor after five o'clock, and heavy fogs are so frequent, that we found 1 it necessary to burn fires in the mornings and evenings of the month of August, while many invalids kept their rooms until the mists would be dispelled by the force of the sun beams. The water is very sulphurous, but so extremely cold as to be hurtful to many who used it incautiously. I was, however, witness to surprising cures performed by it. In the vicinity of this place is a sycamore tree, perfectly sound, with most amazing extended branches, of a great height, and thirty-six feet round; I measured it at some distance from the root. Indian creek is crossed thirty one times between Union Town and this place. It runs through a cave in a mountain of a quarter of a mile in extent, where are manufactories of salt-petre."

The Mineral Springs of Western Virginia; with Remarks on Their Use and the Diseases to Which They are Applicable, written in 1846 by William Burke, M.D., describes Red Sulphur Springs resort in its heyday. The author purchased the property in 1832, developed the resort and was the proprietor.

"The Red Sulphur Springs are situated in Monroe county, 42 miles from the White Sulphur, 39 miles from the Sweet Springs, 32 miles by the partly-made turnpike road, from the Blue Sulphur, and 17 miles from the Salt Sulphur. In extent of accommodations, which is sufficient for 350 persons, as well as in the number of visitors and duration of the season, this Spring ranks next to the White Sulphur, The improvements consist of the Hotel, 180 feet by 42, two stories, containing dining room, drawing-rooms, and bar and store-rooms, etc., with a double piazza the whole length; Alabama Row, 300 feet long, with a piazza the whole length, and a neat two-story building at one end; Philadelphia Row, 200 feet long, with a piazza; Bachelor’s Row, 104 feet long; Carolina House, 112 feet long, and two stories high. Between the two last ranges is a house for the reception of visitors on their arrival. There is a continuous piazza from the extreme end of Philadelphia Row to that of Carolina House, 471 feet in length. Above Bachelor's Row, on a terrace, is Society Hall, 80 by 42 feet, two stories and a basement, having a portico supported by nine Ionic columns, 25 feet high, and presenting a very imposing front from the valley. Besides these ranges, there are numerous cottages and offices, and at the entrance a mercantile establishment; but the structure most deserving of notice is the Pavilion over the Springs.

"This beautiful edifice was erected in 1830 after a design of Mr. Strickland of Philadelphia. It is a dome 42 feet in diameter, supported by 12 Ionic columns. The height from the base to the top of the entablature is about 30 feet. The Springs rise 10 feet beneath the natural level of the valley, and their depth being over 4 feet, you descend 5 feet by circular steps. The whole height from the level of the water to the top of the dome is about 50 feet. The Springs rise horizontally in two marble reservoirs. They derive their name from a rich lake colour deposit which is sometimes seen in large quantity on the sides of the fountains. Their waters are conducted into a wooden reservoir in the centre, and thence by pipes to the bathing-house. On the summit of the beautiful southern hill that overlooks the village, and which is named Mount Ida, is a handsome octagonal summer house, 45 feet in diameter. It was from near this spot that the view, now to be seen at the Exchange Hotel, Richmond, was taken in 1836 by George Cooke, Esq. It does not, of course, exhibit the subsequent improvement; but otherwise gives a most correct idea of the scene.

"The Red Sulphur Springs came into the possession of the author of this work in the autumn of 1832 by purchase. It would be difficult to conceive a spot better calculated to discourage an attempt at improvement, and indeed many had declared it impracticable to any extent. Such, however, was not our opinion: we were aware that it was only necessary to follow, rather than subdue Nature, and that by doing so we might make something interesting out of this wild and unpromising gorge. It is not too much to say that the result has corresponded with our anticipations, and that whether as a whole, or in detail, this little valley may compare favourably with any merely rural scene in America."

Dr. Burke goes on to provide more details of the resort, analyses of the water and many letters sent to him from guests stating how their stay at the resort had improved their health.

Edward Beyer Lithograph of Red Sulphur Springs in Summers County, West Virginia from his 1857 Book, Album of Virginia

In 1839, Mark Pencil wrote about his visit to Red Sulphur Springs in his book, The White Sulphur Papers, or Life at the Springs of Western Virginia.

"Dr. Hunt, in his pamphlet, gives the following directions for using the water of the Red Sulphur:— " Commence by taking one glass of water at bed time, and one before breakfast: after a few days, take two glasses at bed time, and two before breakfast; one at 11 a.m., and at 5 o'clock, p.m. This quantity will generally operate freely on the bowels. If it is desired to act on the kidneys, increase the quantity of water to three or four glasses, between a light supper and bed time, and the same quantity between day light and breakfast time; two glasses at noon, and one or two glasses about 5 o'clock, p.m., taking care to exercise freely after drinking.

"We left the Salt Sulphur next morning after breakfast, not intending this should be our last visit, and continued our route to the Red Sulphur, the distance to which from this place, is seventeen miles, over a very good road, through a wildly beautiful and uncultivated part of the country, telling of romance and adventure in every sedge and cavern and shaded stream, which you pass on your route. You have a fine view of the whole establishment of the Red Sulphur at a sudden turn of the road before you reach the springs.

"The buildings consist of two large and commodious hotels, and several rows of neat cabins; the walks are well planned which intersect the lawns, and abound with large trees, of the sugar maple; a beautiful green hill in the vicinity forms a fine promenade in the evening. The accommodations are excellent for invalids and others, and the place is much resorted to of late years, by persons suffering with pulmonary complaints, and it is thought when the water here, fails to effect a cure, there is no remedy beyond.

"The spring takes its name from the red precipitate at the bottom: the water is sedative in its effects, and reduces irritation and the pulse. It is mostly taken before going to bed at night, and before breakfast. Its principal ingredients are sulphate of soda, lime and magnesia, carbonate of lime, and muriate of soda.

"There is more quietude here than at the other springs, and the sound of some lone flute in the valley, will carry back the listener to the history of the Pantheon and the Sylvan deities. They dance here, as at all the springs, and...a musician is never out of the way. Our companions, the most of them being gay Lotharios, from the White, could not be prevailed on to remain more than one evening, and we left this romantic spot on the next morning to return to the White, a distance of forty five miles."

In his book published in 1870, The Virginia Tourist. Sketches of the Springs and Mountains of Virginia; Containing ...Accounts of its Mineral Springs and a Medical Guide to the Use of the Waters, Edward A. Pollard describes the healing properties of the water of Red Sulphur Springs.

"The location of the Red Sulphur Springs we have already described as about forty miles from the White Sulphur. The situation is a romantic one, on Indian creek. The spring is on one side of a small, triangular plain, almost buried in mountains. The water is clear and cool—its temperature being 54° Fahrenheit—is very strongly charged with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, and contains portions of several neutral salts. Its effects are directly sedative and indirectly tonic, alterative, diuretic and diaphoretic. It has been found efficacious or beneficial in all forms of consumption, scrofula, jaundice and other bilious affections, chronic dysentery and diarrhoea, dyspepsia, diseases of the uterus, chronic rheumatism and gout, dropsy, gravel, neuralgia, tremor, syphilis, scurvy, erysipelas, tetter, ringworm and itch; and it has long been celebrated as a vermifuge. With reference to the value of the water as a cure for consumption, the reports of medical men have detracted something from the exaggerated public opinion that, many years ago, pointed out this place as a security against this fell disease, so 'often supposed to be put at defiance, and yet (we must sadly confess it) still unconquered by anything in the science of man or in the bounty of nature. A physician of South Carolina, who passed the summers of 1822, 1823 and part of that of 1824 at the Red Sulphur Spring, after giving a detailed report of three cases of pulmonary irritation connected with hremoptysis that were cured by the use of this water, makes the following observations: " I do not wish to be understood as stating that the water of the Red Sulphur will cure confirmed phthisis or tuberculous consumption; but I believe we are very often mistaken in supposing a case of pulmonary irritation more desperate and hopeless than it really is; and I believe that in most cases, if this spring is resorted to early, and the clothing and diet and exercise duly attended to, its waters will be found a most powerful adjunct and assistant in the management of these hitherto unmanageable cases."

Perceval Reniers discussed Red Sulphur Springs in his book, The Springs of Virginia: Life, Love, and Death at the Waters 1775 -1900.

"The upsurge of prosperity touched off a building boom at the Springs and one of the maddest of all the builders was Dr. Burke down at the Red Sulphur...The good doctor was convinced that he had found the one water in the world for the cure of phthisis pulmonalis [Tuberculosis] in its milder manifestations, and since phthisis pulmonalis was far and away the most desperate scourge of the country, any resonable person could understand that a cure for it would pack any gorge, no matter how deep, right to the top with consumptives. In the end, the little village that the doctor prepared for them was as trig as any you could hope to see anywhere, all shining with white paint and interlaced with walks, which he bordered with neat white railings.

"The big surprise at the Red Sulphur was the Social Hall. It stood, or hung, on a terrace cut into the steep hillside positioned precariously above Bachelors' Row. It was eighty feet long, forty-two feet wide and had a frontage of nine Ionic columns twenty-five feet high. Who else had a Social Hall? Nobody else, nobody at all. The White didn't even have a drawing room, nor the smug Sweet either, and the affair that Fry [Warm Springs] called a drawing room in his hotel wasn't big enough to turn a goat cart in. The Social Hall was a measure of the doctor's superiority as a proprietor and a builder.

"He was mad about piazzas. He could never get enough piazzas and he could never get them long enough. Ranged along the foot of the hill on one side of his ravine were three cottage rows in the Virginia manner, that is, long narrow ranges under a single roof divided up into compartments euphemistically called cottages; first Carolina House, then after an interval Bachelor's Row (with cabins hardly larger than those on an American packet) and after another interval Philadelphia Row, the abode of families since it boasted two rooms per section. Each of these ranges had its piazza but that wasn't enough for Dr. Burke; there were gaps between them and he didn't like gaps. By filling between Carolina House and Bachelor's Row with a receiving room and by running a covered way between Bachelor's an Philadelphia row, he got what he wanted, which, in his own proud words, was "a continuous piazza from the extreme end of Philadelphia Row to that of Carolina House, four Hundred and seventy-five feet in length."

"On the other side, along the foot of the opposite hill, the piazza display was quite as proud, prouder, what with a two-story portico in front of the Hotel proper and three hundred feet of covered way in front of Alabama Row. The doctor wanted his patient to be able to take their constitutionals, rain or shine. Besides his endless porches he had other little ways of giving pleasure to his guests; good ventilation in the ballroom, a musician's gallery above the dancers, ice cream on the menu every day and a carpet on the floor of the drawing room.

"In the extent of accommodations, he could say finally, "this Spring ranks next to the White Sulphur." In a way, he was over modest. The White had so little ventilation in the ballroom that people complained of the "effluvium," and it certainly had no carpet anywhere, not to speak of a Social Hall and four hundred and seventy-five feet of piazza.

"...there was a cool green valley and one comodious establishement with room for everybody. In the dining room there were only two hundered people in a space designed for three hundred; you were blessed with attentive waiters, place card sand wonderful to behold a series of those broad Southern fly fans hanging from the ceiling over the long tables, all connected together so that one ... could swing the lot of them at once.

"So the dining room was only two-thirds full. Dr. Burke could not have been so pleased with that. He had spent about $100,000 on the place, much of it borrowed, and he would have preferred at least some genteel crowding. People should have been rushing to this water. Not only could it take phthisis pulmonalis in its stride, it and a remarkable efficacy for allying the rapid pulse and putting over-excited folk to sleep, so that the place came to be known as "Sleepy Hollow."

"As if that wasn't enough, the doctor discovered that it was splendid for sterility, the kind that came from menorrhagia, a disease of the uterus. You couldn't beat the Red Sulphur water at that, not even the Sweet Spring could hold a candle to it. In fact the Red Sulphur was the only water known that could cure sterility from menorrhagia, said Dr. Burke, cornering the market. Charming women, he said whose hopes of fruitfulness had been blighted, would if they followed his directions faithfully, present their lords with new and improved editions of themselves or perchance their lords. The doctor welcomed the barren, sped the pregnant guest. He had proof he could point to many striking instances of the kind. Dr. Lewis at the Sweet was not the only one who could blow the sterility trumpet.

"Somehow social life at the Red sulphur never quite emerged from under the pall of invalidism. For example, there was a great deal of spitting that wasn't just the customary tobacco juice, while they had music and balls like the other Springs and pretended it was gay and carefree, the music stopped early so the invalids could get to bed at a decent hour; and that gave the show away. Also, Burke would not allow the musicians to play the new and popular operatic gem, "home, Sweet Home," because it made the mothers homesick for their children and obstructed the cure.

"If the hale and hearty objected to these things and went away, the doctor had confidence that double the number of the afflicted would take their places. He and the Richmond Whig were in perfect accord on the prospects, "the high prices of cotton and tobacco in the South, " said the paper, "and the superabundant capital in the North, will bring multitudes to the mountains who have never before experienced the incalculable value of these fountains of health." And the dotor built on furiously, optimistic for the future.

Sadly, the future didn't unfold as Dr. Burke had hoped. He sold his beloved spa before the Civil War. The resort was converted to a military hospital during the Civil War. After the war, the resort changed hands several times, and in 1890 the property became the Red sulphur Springs Company. Shortly thereafter, Levi Morton, a banker, congressman and vice president under President Benjamin Harrison, purchased the resort. He built a new dining room, bath houses and bowling alley, and he had a telephone line installed to connect the spa to nearby Talcott. The old hotel held 400 guests and board was then $10 to $17 a week. The business ultimately failed, and Morton offered it to the state to use as a tuberculosis sanitarium. The state turned him down, and he sold it in 1915 to a group of investors that tried to operate it as a resort. The business again failed, and the investors sold the property to Judge C.W. Campbell during World War I. He tore down all the buildings and divided the property into a number of tracts and sold them.