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Mr. Shall wishing to produce a map of Arkansas showing the salt springs, granted to the state, wrote his friend, Gordon Peay for information regarding them. The letter found by Mr. Galloway was Mr. Peay's answer.
Taken from the plat on file in the State Land office, Mr. Shall gave only the quarter section in which each spring was situated---which was sufficient to enable one to lay them down accurately on a map.
A search of the file of early maps of Arkansas at the state house revealed that Mr. Shall made good the use of the information supplied by Mr. Peay on one of these old maps,---signed by him:---"All the State Salt Springs" were clearly marked.
A search of the records at the state house failed to reveal just how extensively the salt springs were worked. Nor do they show how much revenue they yielded. The grants proved valuable and in 1847 Congress passed an act consenting to the sale of the whole or any part of the saline grants.
In 1832-1833 Colonel William Hickman a man of considerable wealth, who came to the county of Hempstead in 1819 or 1820, then removed to Louisiana, owned the property known as "Saline Salt Works" or "Saline Lick" in Sevier County and Howard County.
- Colonel Elijah Ferguson came to Hempstead County in 1830 from Kentucky.
He was employed by Colonel Hickman to go to his salt works and take charge
of some slaves and superintend their labor in making salt as an overseer.
All of the salt used in southwest Arkansas at that time was manufactured
at salt springs and wells, of which there were several in the country,
and salt sold from one to two dollars per bushel. At Hickman's works, the
water from which the salt was made was procured from wills sunk in the
earth, from which it was pumped and thrown into troughs and run to kettles,
the latter being arranged in a kind of furnace in which the water was evaporated
by boiling and the salt gathered from the kettles. The pumps to lift the
water were rigged so as to be run by horse power and were operated night
and day. The cabin in which the overseer lodged and lived was some distance
from the well and furnace.
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