Mondongachate

Mondongachate was an Indigenous name associated with the river later called the New or Wood's River. Unlike the rivers flowing east to Chesapeake Bay, its waters cross the Appalachian country toward the Ohio basin. English explorers reached its upper course in 1641; thirty years later, Thomas Batts and Robert Fallam followed a creek to the river during another expedition into the mountains. The river country formed part of a landscape used by Indigenous peoples long before colonial claims reached across the watershed.