Centerpiece - On the Trail of Nelson County
By Russell W. Kempton

The Nelson County iron meteorite is a story of curious coincidence, historical consequence, and unanswered questions. It is a story that began for me in 1992 when, through exchange, we acquired a 7 kg center section of this unusual iron. After a period of examination and study, I remarked to a co-worker, Carolyn King Hurd, that it was found in 1856 somewhere in Nelson County, Kentucky - her home state; but that the exact location and details of the find had been lost over time due to the American Civil War. Her response brought all work to a halt, "Oh, that's probably the one that was found across the road from my Dad's farm!" Over the past three years I've pursued that response.

Cox's Creek, Kentucky - 1856

In the northernmost section of Nelson County, Kentucky, about 15 miles north of Bardstown lies a rural farming area known as Cox's Creek. The Beard farm, owned by Alex and his wife Francis, covered over 1,000 acres. As was normal for this pre-Civil war period, slaves worked the soil by horse and plow. Sometime in 1856, an iron mass was plowed up in one of the fields. It stayed around the farm until 1860 when it was purchased by J. Lawrence Smith.

J. Lawrence Smith (1818 - 1883) was a noted professor and chemist from Louisville, Kentucky who actively collected meteorites. At the time, Smith was heralded as one of the greatest scientists in America and one of the last scientists of the period to sustain the hypotheses that all meteorites were of lunar origin. While his lunar origin theory was incorrect, he appears to be the first to propose that lunar material could be "scraped and propelled" (ejected) from the moon by impact. It is not known how he became aware of the Beard meteorite find, but in July 1860, Smith was successful in bartering two slaves for the entire 73 kg iron mass.

Smith described Nelson County ("Description of three new meteorites", Mineralogy and Chemistry, Smith, 1873) as being, "...obtained from a plowed field where it may have laid for a considerable length of time. It is a flattened mass of tough metal, a little scaly at one corner, being seventeen inches long, fifteen inches broad, and seven inches in the thickest part, shelving off like the back of a turtle, and weighs one hundred and sixty-one pounds."

At some point in 1862, with 28,000 Confederate soldiers camped out in Bardstown (Kentucky was striving to stay neutral), Smith became despondent over the course of the war and decided to sell, not only the Nelson County mass, but his entire collection to Professor Charles Upham Shepard. Shepard, who assembled what was to become perhaps the finest mineral collection of the Nineteenth Century, sectioned the 73 kg Nelson County mass and sold a 32 kg mass to the Natural History Museum in Vienna. However by 1866, J. L. Smith was again actively collecting meteorites and he acquired a 19 kg mass of the Nelson County find from Shepard. At the time of Smith's death in 1883, the Collection of J. Lawrence Smith, which was sold to Harvard University, contained 250 localities.

A Violent Beginning

The Nelson County iron is a coarsest octahedrite with etched sections displaying a very irregular kamacite lamellae that range from 1-10 mm in width. Based upon the two trace elements gallium and germanium, it is classified as a IIIF - a rare class of iron meteorites; only six have been found. The exterior is smooth except for a torn area at one end which may indicate fragmentation during atmospheric deceleration.

Nelson County is the most thoroughly deformed (pre-terrestrial, cold-worked) iron meteorite known. All structural elements - kamacite, plessite, taenite, and troilite - are heavily kneaded and sheared. The kamacite has Neumann lines that are bent and faulted. The taenite and plessite fields are sheared and torn apart as is the schreibersite. This is indicative of a violent, plastic deformation event. Simply stated, Nelson County looks as if it has been hammered and squeezed between two cosmic anvils!

Clark County

Curiously, one other member of the six known IIIF iron meteorites - Clark County, Kentucky - was found less than 100 miles from Nelson County in 1937. Clark County is a medium octahedrite that is chemically and, in part, structurally remarkably similar to Nelson County. Clark County, however, does not exhibit the same deformation as Nelson County. Two rare meteorites of the same class found less than 100 miles apart? Could they be paired? From the same fall? Or, are these two falls distinct and therefore simply an incredible coincidence?

Orbital Streams

The past decade has produced several research papers about meteoroid streams. In essence, they present related theories in which several or more members of collisional remnants and fragments of broken asteroids travel in clusters or streams. The Nelson County and Clark County meteorites, as a result of their similar structural and chemical composition, may very well have originated from the same parent body. Perhaps, after the destructive event that shattered the iron core of the IIIF parent body, various pieces from different sections and depths of the core traveled in clusters.

The iron core which may have been "clumpy" in nickel/iron compositions could have produced both Clark and Nelson County. The specimen recovered in Nelson County however, would have been much closer to the impact point as evidenced by the deformation. Further research is needed, but for now, it seems beyond coincidence that a second member, chemically and structurally similar, of this very rare group could be found so close together and not be looked upon with suspicion as being from the same fall.

Cox's Creek - Today

In 1993, I visited Cox's Creek. The Beard farm is now the Wells farm, owned by Danny Wells, a descendant of Alex Beard. What seemed feasible during the planning phase of our search, now became daunting as we looked out over hundreds of acres. But family history is heritage, and the finding and selling of an object as unusual as a meteorite becomes a story that is recorded and passed down from generation to generation. Prior to my arrival, and in the hopes of finding additional pieces of Nelson County, Danny Wells had cut an area of the field to aid our search. It came as a bit of a surprise when Danny and neighbor Bob Stayton walked me to the area where they had both heard Danny's father, Yelverton Wells, tell them, "This is the spot where the meteor was found!"

We spent three days scanning the fields with detectors, taking measurements, and talking with Danny Wells and his neighbors. If Nelson County was part of a meteoroid stream, and paired with Clark County, then additional pieces should be close by. Judging from the fragmentation reported by Smith and also visible on our piece, it would seem likely that there is at least one more piece . . . somewhere.

Did we find any? No, but we were successful in recovering valuable information about the Nelson County meteorite lost during the Civil War. Did we record the spot where Yelverton Wells told his son it fell? Yes. It's about 160 feet off the West side of King Road at 37° 57', 22" N, 85° 27', 16" W. . . . . happy hunting!

Acknowledgments

The author expresses appreciation to Mr. Danny Wells for sharing the Wells and Beard family history. Special thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Bill King for their hospitality while in Kentucky, to Mr. Bob Stayton for his enthusiasm and help, and to Carolyn King Hurd for extensive research assistance.

References

The Filson Club, Louisville, Kentucky. (A private archival repository of Kentucky History).

Buchwald, V. F., Handbook of Iron Meteorites, 1975.

Burke, J. G., Cosmic Debris, 1986.

"Obituary of J. L. Smith", Louisville Evening Post, October 13, 1883.

"Sketch of Dr. J. Lawrence Smith", Popular Science Monthly, 1874,pp. 232-236.

Smith, J. L., Mineralogy and Chemistry, 1873.

Smith, J. L., Memoir on Meteorites, 1873.

Smith, S. B., The History of Nelson County, 1982.

Russell W. Kempton is the Director of New England Meteoritical Services based in Mendon, Massachusetts, USA.