Bens Run, West Virginia is a small community perched right along the Ohio River in Tyler County. But what many people don’t realize is that this small, quiet community hides a big, historic secret: ancient earthworks.

In fact, some claim the massive system of earthworks discovered here are the most extensive in the entire United States! Tragically, though, we'll never know for sure.
Grave Creek Mound Archaeological Complex / Facebook
Although the Bens Run earthworks were formally recognized by the Archaeology Section of the West Virginia Geological and Economic Survey in the 1960s, and although many ancient artifacts have been found in this portion of the Ohio River Valley, at that time, nothing visible remained of these ancient structures except for one single burial mound.
Grave Creek Mound Archaeological Complex / Facebook
That's right, these earthworks, which still baffle archaeologists to this day, have been completely lost to history.
The earliest modern record of this extensive system of earthworks built on a terrace of the Ohio River is found in the journal of Lewis Summers, dated 1808. He describes the ancient encampment as comprised of square trenches covering ten acres. Ten years later, Thom Nuttall writes of a square embankment in the same area containing a single acre.
Internet Archive Book Images / Wikipedia
Pictured here is a drawing of another Ohio Valley earthworks located in Ohio. Did the Bens Run encampment look like this one? Perhaps.

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The writings of Nuttall and Summers are likely the most accurate representations of this system of earthworks, although later writings peg the dimensions of the earthwork walls as double walled, four miles in length, six to twelve feet high, and enclosing nearly 400 acres. Several earthen burial mounds were reported in the area as well, both within and outside the enclosure walls.
Grave Creek Mound Archaeological Complex / Facebook
Despite these multiple eyewitness reports, and the evidence of artifacts, an archaeological survey in the 1990s found no evidence of the earthwork walls.
Grave Creek Mound Archaeological Complex / Facebook
Perhaps they never existed, although that is highly unlikely. Perhaps they were erased by a hundred years of modern plowing and farming - a much more likely fate.
Kristian Casey / AllTrails
The wall pictured here is still standing along Bens Run about an hour south of the supposed earthworks, but it's the modern remnants of an old dam, not ancient remnants of a native civilization!

Had you ever heard the rumors of this massive system of earthworks, perhaps the biggest in the United States, that used to be found right here in West Virginia? Obviously, there’s nothing left to visit of these ancient walls, but here’s the info about the modern Bens Run Dam ruins if you want to check those out next time you are in the area.

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Bens Run, WV 26146, USA