The Sacrifice of Lilly and Gad
By | January 12, 2019

Back in the 1700s, Robert and Frances Lilly, accompanied by Josiah Meador and their families, settled in what would later become Summers County of West Virginia. The settlement came to be known as Lilly, West Virginia. According to the legend, they arrived with nothing but “a bible, an ax, and a gun.” The area was chosen for its plentiful natural resources. The settlement eventually grew into a community of subsistence farmers, consisting of more than thirty families, and several buildings sprang up, including a schoolhouse, a church, and several houses.

Unfortunately, the area was prone to flooding, as were the neighboring communities. As a result, the government in the 1940s decided to build Bluestone Dam in an attempt to prevent some of the floodings. The only problem was that the new dam was expected to leave the village of Lilly underwater. The residents of the village were forced to leave their homes, though they were given financial compensation for their land, with one farmer reported to have been paid $1,750 for his property. Buildings were torn down or moved and ancient cemeteries were relocated, with many graves being left unmarked in their new location.


While the remains of the village of Lilly are scarce, the same cannot be said for another West Virginia town that was sacrificed to prevent flooding. Located in Nicholas County, Summersville Lake is a popular recreational attraction, offering activities such as swimming, snorkeling, and scuba diving. However, it is also the home of the sunken town of Gad, which according to scuba divers is still intact.

It turns out that the lake is actually a man-made reservoir, created in the 1960s by the United States Army Corps of Engineers to prevent flooding in the neighboring communities. The village of Gad was a farming community dating back to the 1800s. The town consisted of a general store, a post office, and a school, in addition to the many houses of its residents. As with Lilly, the residents were forced to sell their land and move away. While dams are typically named after the nearest town, the powers that be opted to avoid the unfortunate moniker of “Gad Dam” and chose to name it after the next nearest town of Summersville instead.
