On the eighteenth of December, 1850, the legislature of Kentucky, by special act, (2 Laws 1850, c. 96, p. 73,) created a corporation known as the 'Maysville & Big Sandy Railroad Company,' (hereinafter called the 'Big Sandy Company,') with power to construct and maintain a railroad, commencing at or near the city of Maysville, Kentucky, and running thence to the Big Sandy river, by such route as might be found practicable. The act gave authority to the counties of Mason, Lewis, and Greenup, and to any town in any of those counties, to subscribe to the stock of the company, when authorized by a majority of the voters of the county or town, the proposition to be submitted to them by the directors of the company; and the issue of bonds by the counties and towns in aid of the railroad was provided for. This indicated that the route of the road was expected to run through the counties above named. Maysville is in Mason county, on the south bank of the Ohio river. Lewis county adjoins Mason on the east, and Greenup adjoins Lewis on the east. All three of them ile along the south bank of the Ohio river. The next county in Kentucky east of Greenup is Boyd, and the Big Sandy river, after being for some distance the boundary between Kentucky and West Virginia, empties into the Ohio river, in Boyd county, only a short distance eastward of the line between Greenup and Boyd counties. For the railroad to reach the Big Sandy river it was necessary it should pass for a short distance through Boyd county. The company was organized and began the construction of the road in 1853, and after expending a considerable sum of money, claimed to have been $300,000, it became financially embarrassed, and suspended the work permanently in 1854. To secure certain of its croditors, it executed one or more mortgages to them on its road and all its franchises and chartered privileges.
By an act of the legislature of Kentucky approved February 17, 1866, (Laws 1866, c. 755, p. 664,) those mortgages were declared to be legal, and authority was given to foreclose them by proceedings in the Mason circuit court, with power to that court to sell the road, with all its property, rights of property, franchises, and chartered privileges at public sale; and the act provided that the purchasers at the sale, after it had been approved by the court, should be invested with the title to the road, and all its franchises and chartered privileges, and should have power to reorganize the company under its charter, and, for the purposes of its charter, to 'make contracts with individuals, corporations, and other railroad companies for the building, completion, and operation of said road, or any part thereof.' The foreclosure proceedings were had in 1869, resulting in a decree, and a sale thereunder, at which M. Ryan, H. Taylor, Elizabeth Gray, W. H. Wadsworth, John B. Poyntz, and John G. Hickman, trustee of Charles B. Coons, deceased, became the purchasers of what the act of 1866 authorized to be sold, and a deed of it was made to them, but was not recorded until 1875.