Jeanna Duerscherl | The Roanoke Times

Mary Morris (left) and Bo Nichols of the Old Dominion Veterinary Clinic wash a dog rescued Tuesday in Alleghany County.

Ralph Campbell, friends and family say, was a calm country man from Alleghany County who spent his days buying and selling scrap metal, drinking coffee in a restaurant near his home and feeding and petting his more than 15 dogs.

Sometimes he would buy dog food in a store near his trailer home outside of Covington, sometimes he would drive to a grocery store in Clifton Forge -- and he would always take in a dog looking for a home.

"He loved those dogs," his sister Nellie Andrews said Tuesday.

But on Sunday, eight days after Campbell, 65, died of complications related to lung cancer and weeks after he'd become bedridden and unable to care for the animals himself, authorities rescued at least 15 dogs outside Campbell's home. The response included officials from the Alleghany County Sheriff's Office and from Clifton Forge and Covington animal control agencies.

Most of the dogs were emaciated black and tan coonhounds, authorities said. Their skin was bald in spots and they were covered with fleas.

"Several of them, we had to pick up and carry out because they couldn't stand up on their own," said Jill Deegan, a Botetourt County assistant commonwealth's attorney who specializes in animal cases and is a member of the Virginia Animal Fighting Task Force.

Six dogs were taken to Richmond by the American Black and Tan Coonhound Rescue, and nine to the Old Dominion Veterinary Clinic in Troutville. There, the dogs were cleaned and fed through IV tubes.

By Tuesday afternoon, a 6-month-old dog that hadn't been able to raise his head two days earlier was walking, and another dog had given birth to a litter of five puppies, said Sabra Lucas, the veterinarian who owns the clinic.

Now the clinic is at capacity and is looking for people who will foster a dog.

"Most of these dogs will be recovering for quite some time," Lucas said. "Most of them, it'll be a while until they become normal playful dogs."