Joe Parsons
He was a hunter only, and did not try to permanently locate on a farm or earn a living, other than by hunting and trapping. His wife is said to have been a wild untamed creature named Mat, who, though scalped and left for dead by the Indians at the destruction of the Buckhannon fort, was not half so easily killed as that, but recovering, came to Mill Creek and lived for many years more.
There is much confusion as to Joseph Parsons and his son, known as "Devil Bill", for both led wild roving lives without a fixed habitation, simply building a pole cabin and "squatting" at a place as long as suited their convenience. The cabin of Joe Parsons is said to have stood on the left of the creek, near the old ford below the Center View Church, but whether it was there or across the point on the run itself, it could have given a name to the stream, for the other Parsonses at Sycamore, if hunting among the hills at its head, would naturally have distinguished it from the other streams by the appellation Joe's Run. This cabin was built about 1812, or not long thereafter, and was standing in 1828. Joe Parsons afterward squatted at the mouth of Little creek, farther up stream. About 1820, he was living on what is now the Knopp farm, at that place, and there we lose sight of him.
This group were members of the "Hellfired Band" who roamed from place to place discouraging improvements in order to keep the wilderness a paradise for hunters.
This band was known as the "Bug Hunters" during the war and robbed and terrorized along the Parkersburg Turnpike (Booger Hole)