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REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 02303 2789
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THE
HISTORY OF KENTUCKY
V.1
FROM ITS EARLIEST DISCOVERY AND SETTLEMENT TO THE PRESENT DATE, EMBRAC- ING ITS PREHISTORIC AND ABORIGINAL PERIODS; ITS PIONEER LIFE AND EXPERIENCES ; ITS POLITICAL, SOCIAL, AND INDUSTRIAL PROGRESS ; ITS EDUCATIONAL AND RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT; ITS MILITARY EVENTS AND ACHIEVEMENTS, AND BIOGRAPHIC MENTION OF ITS HISTORIC CHARACTERS.
BY
Z. F. SMITH,
EX-SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION OF KENTUCKY.
THE PRENTICE PRESS : (COURIER-JOURNAL FOR PRINTING COMPANY) Louisville, Ky., 1895.
DØDICHTORY.
1686613
O THE memory of the pioneers of Kentucky, whose stalwart virtues and gallant deeds are unsurpassed in any age or by any people, and who builded the first temple of liberty in the transmontane wilderness, this history is reverently dedicated. This tribute is offered by a grateful and admiring eulogist, who deems it a proud memento of his life to have been born and reared upon the soil of the " Dark and Bloody Ground," watered with the blood of its heroes; and all of whose ancestors for two generations sleep beside them, and under the same sod. A common citizenship holds sacred in the urn of memory the exalted manhood and imperishable fame of an ancestry who command their own tribute of affection and the admiration of the world. These grand men answered the call of Providence for a grand work, and, like the chosen of old, and for other ends, many sealed their mission with the blood of martyrdom. Their labors are done; their mission ended. The world will not see their like again.
" Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead ! Dear as the blood ye gare ; No impious footsteps here shall tread The herbage of your grave ; Nor shall your glory be forgot While Fame her record keeps, Or Honor points the hallowed spot Where Valor proudly sleeps.
"Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone, In deathless song shall tell, When many a vanished year hath flown, The story how ye fell ; Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's bl Nor time's remorseless doom, Can dim one ray of holy light That gilds your glorious tomb." -O' Hara.
To the Youth of our Commonwealth we would as earnestly consecrate this book; that the virtues of manly courage, of high resolve, and of heroic sacrifice, which achieved success with our noble forefathers, may inspire laudable ambition and emulation in the respective spheres of life in which they may act.
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
In view of offering a new history of Kentucky to the interested public at this day, the author desires first to express his appreciation of the value and merits of the several standard works of this class of literature which have appeared at intervals for a century preceding. Filson's brief history and map of pioneer Kentucky, in 1784, is the most valuable contribution of the kind before the incoming of the present century; and fortunate. in- deed, is it for the following generations that both are preserved. Early in the nineteenth century, Marshall, McAfee and Butler, learned and able men, brought up the history of the Commonwealth successively to the sev- eral dates of the publication of their works, and wrote of much that was contemporaneous. especially the two former. Messrs. Collins. father and son, practically occupy the field for the next half century, and, with great in- dustry, research, and ability, have gathered together and compiled an im- mense amount of historic matter never before in print. The last enlarged issue by Dr. Richard H. Collins, in two 8vo. volumes, forms a cyclopedia of Kentucky history. but not in narrative form. This work has proven of inestimable value to the historian of to-day, who has drawn liberally and often from the materials of this rich store-house of information. More re- cently we have been favored with that admirable treatise, "Kentucky Com- monwealth," by Professor Shaler, of Harvard. It does not pretend to be a history of Kentucky; but, as a philosophic generalization of that history. it is unique, learned, and of great value. All these histories have been liber- ally drawn upon. A most appreciable source supplementary to these works has been found in the gathered records of the Filson Club, of Louisville, an organization containing among its members some of the most learned authorities in early cismontane history, and especially that of Kentucky, associated together solely to search out and safely place on file all new mat- ter that may be found in existence. Besides the Polytechnic library, the extensive libraries of Colonel R. T. Durrett and Dr. Richard H. Collins, gathered in the last quarter of a century from every antiquarian source in America and Europe, have been generously opened to the author. The library of Colonel Derrett is the fullest and richest in the world of this class of literary treasure. The many thousands of volumes upon its shelves, gathered from the book-stalls of Europe during three protracted visits there,
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
and from every available source in this country embrace nearly all that is needed in antiquarian historic lore. So prized is this vast collection that the offer of an ample fortune in dollars would be no temptation to sell it. Not only have the owners offered the use of these treasuries of knowledge, but, together with Professor William Chenault, have continuously devoted much time and labor to the critical examination of the text before finally going to press. On a few specialties requiring the skill of the professionalist, the author has laid under contribution several esteemed friends. For the use of the paper on education read before the Filson Club, and for contributive assistance on the history of jurisprudence in Kentucky, he acknowledges in- debtedness to Professor William Chenault, of the Louisville Law School ; to Colonel R. T. Durrett, for the material to make the list of the historians of Kentucky, embracing the introductory ; to Colonel John Mason Brown, for the account of the siege of Bryan's station and the battle of Blue Licks ; to Dr. Dudley S. Reynolds, for the early history of medical men and medical science in Kentucky ; to Major William J. Davis, for the treatment of the geology and soils of Kentucky, and to Professor John R. Procter, for accurate geological and geographical information. Acknowledgments are tendered for many valuable favors extended from citizens throughout the State. From Gayarre's late history of Louisiana, much of the correspondence between the Spanish commandants at New Orleans and other Spanish officials and General Wilkinson and others involved in the protracted intrigues to seduce and detach Kentucky from the Federal Union is reproduced as of peculiar historic interest. This correspondence is from the copies on file at Baton Rouge, taken by order of the government of Louisiana and with consent of Spain from the Archives at Madrid. It officially settles the mooted question of Wilkinson's guilt, and has never appeared in previous Kentucky history.
But we forbear further to enumerate. The multiplied authorities for varied and special research in historic information are as ample for an ac- curate and complete history of our Commonwealth as are those of any other. For the benefit of the reader or student who may in future wish to pursue his investigations in this field, we follow this preface with an introductory, in which is recited all known histories or historic papers bearing directly or indirectly on the events and affairs of Kentucky history.
THE AUTHOR.
INTRODUCTORY.
PART I .- Historians and Histories of Kentucky.
The writers of histories of Kentucky to the present time have not been numerous ; and with the exception of Marshall and Collins, their works have not been elaborate. Frequent occa- sions have been found during the prog- ress of this work to refer to anterior histories, and if some have been omit- : ted that ought to have been noticed, a formal enumeration of previous au- thors and their works will not only supply the omissions, but afford to some extent the much-needed bibliog- 2 raphy of Kentucky histories and the sources of Kentucky history. We ; know of no collection of Kentucky books so complete as that of Colonel R. T. Durrett-there is none such extant-to all of which free access JOHN FILSON. was given in the preparation of the work now offered to the public ; and from the books in his library the following list, preserving the chronolog- ical order of their publication, has been made :
1784.
First-"The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucke, and an essay toward the topography and natural history of that important coun- try ; to which is added an appendix containing, first, the adventures of Col- onel Daniel Boon, one of the first settlers, comprehending every important occurrence in the political history of that province; second, the minutes of the Piankashaw council, held at Post Saint Vincent's, April 15, 1784; third, an account of the Indian nations inhabiting within the limits of the thirteen United States, their manners and customs, and reflections on their origin : fourth, the stages and distances between Philadelphia and the Falls of the
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
Ohio, from Pittsburgh to Pensacola, and several other places-the whole illus- trated by a new and accurate map of Kentucke and the country adjoining, drawn from actual surveys. By John Filson." Wilmington : Printed by James Adams, 1784.
This was the first attempt at a history of Kentucky, and its title-page has been copied in full. It is a small octavo volume of one hundred and eighteen pages, and has become so excessively rare that a single copy has been sold for one hundred and fifty dollars. It has been several times republished, and some of the reprints have also become very rare. The following edi- tions may be enumerated : M. Parraud, Paris, 1785; Ludwig Heinrich Bron- ner, Frankfort, 1785; John Stockdale, London. 1793 ; Samuel Campbell. two volumes, New York. 1793: Gilbert Imlay. in his topographical description of the Western territory of North America. London, 1793 and 1;97.
But little was known of the author of this first history of Kentucky until the Filson Club. in 1884, just one hundred years after the appearance of his work, published an account of his life and writings. He was born in Chester county, Pennsylvania, about 1747, and came to Kentucky possibly as early as 1782. He was certainly here in 1783. writing his history and preparing his map of Kentucky. In September. 1788, while prospecting to establish Losantiville, now Cincinnati, he disappeared in the Miami woods, and was never afterward seen. He was supposed to have been killed by the Indians on the Ist of October. He left a sketch of the Illinois country, and several other manuscripts, which have never been published.
1786.
Second-"The Discovery. Purchase, and Settlement of the Country of Kentuckie." By Alexander Fitzroy, Svo., pp. 15. London, 1786.
Nothing is known of the author of this little work, even more rare than that of Filson. It was evidently compiled from Filson. and the author was probably one of the numerous speculators, both in this country and in Europe, at that date engaged in buying and selling Kentucky lands.
1792.
Third-"A Description of Kentucky in North America." Svo .. pp. 124. Printed in November, 1792.
Neither the author's name nor the place of publication appears upon the title-page, but the work is known to have been written by Harry Toulmin, and printed in London. Mr. Toulmin was born in England in 1740, and was a Baptist minister by profession, but decidedly inclined to Unitarianism. He was president of Transylvania University in 1794-95. and secretary of state under Governor Garrard. In iSo2. he published a collection of the laws of Kentucky, and in iSo4. in connection with james Blair, a review of the criminal laws, in three volumes. He finally moved to Alabama, where he was appointed United States district judge, and died in 1815.
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INTRODUCTORY.
1792.
Fourth-"A Topographical Description of the Western Territory of North America." By Gilbert Imlay. Svo., pp. 247. London, 1792.
Mr. Imlay was born in New Jersey, and was a captain in the rebel army during the revolution. In 1784, he was appointed a deputy surveyor under George May, at Louisville. His work was enlarged to four hundred and fifty-five pages, and reprinted at London in 1793, and also at New York, the same year, in two volumes, 12mo., pp. 260 and 204. Again. in 1797. it was still further enlarged-8vo., pp. 626-and reprinted at London. He was also the author of the "Emigrants, or the History of an Exiled Fam- ily," in three volumes, 12mo., printed at London in 1793. In after years. he became connected with the celebrated Mary Wollstonecraft, whose sad letters show him to have been unworthy of even the kind of trust that gifted but unfortunate woman reposed in him. 4
1806.
Fifth-"Political Transactions in and concerning Kentucky." By Will- iam Littell. Svo., pp. 66. Frankfort, 1806.
Mr. Littell was a lawyer by profession, and the author of law collections now rare and valuable. The first of these was " Principles of Law and Equity," which appeared at Frankfort in 1808. In 1809. he began his Laws of Kentucky, which extended to five volumes, the last in 1819. In 1822. he published, in connection with Jacob Swigert, a digest of the Kentucky statutes, in two volumes. In 1823, appeared the first volume of his reports of the decisions of the Court of Appeals, which extended to five volumes. He also published a sixth volume of select cases. To these publications he added "Festoons of Fancy." a collection of poems, and a large contribution to the newspapers of the day. His numerous publications do not seere to have brought him fortune, and he died at Frankfort in 1824. leaving prop- erty requiring a special act of the Legislature, approved January 6. 1825, to make the assets meet the debts.
1807.
Sixth-" The General and Natural History of Kentucky." By Robert B. Mcafee.
This history is in manuscript and was never published. It was written between the years 1804 and 1807. General McAfee was the author of sev- eral other works, hereafter to be mentioned in their proper place. He was born in Mercer county, in 1784. and died there in 1849. In iSto, he was elected to the Legislature, and from that date until about four years before his death he was almost constantly in public service. He was a soldier In the war of 1812, and a historian of the conflict. In 1854. he was elected lieutenant-governor, and in 1833. appointed charge d'affairs to the republic of Colombia.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY. .
1812.
Seventh-" The History of Kentucky." By Humphrey Marshall. Svo., PP. 407. Frankfort, 1812.
This work was published by Mr. Marshall as the first of two volumes, but the second of the edition never appeared. In 1824, he published at Frankfort, a rewritten and enlarged work in two volumes, Svo., pp. 474 and 524, which was the first elaborate history of the State. He was a Vir- ginian by birth, and came to Kentucky at the early date of 1780. He therefore lived through nearly the entire period about which he wrote, and had it not been for the fierce political conflicts in which he engaged, and the color they gave to the portraits he sketched of opponents. his work would have been accepted by posterity with a credence worthy of its great ability. He was a member of the convention which effected the separation of Ken- tucky from Virginia, and repeatedly in the Kentucky Legislature. In 1795, he was elected to the United States Senate, where he served until 1801. He was a constant contributor to the newspapers, periodicals, and pamphlet literature of his day, and in 1810, started, as editor and proprietor, the American Republic, at Frankfort. He died in 1842, at the age of fourscore and two.
1824.
Eighth-" Ancient History, or Annals of Kentucky." By C. S. Rafi- nesque. Svo., pp. 39. Frankfort, 1824.
The author of this work was a native of Turkey, born near Constanti- nople, in 1784. In 1819, he came to Kentucky and was made professor of sciences in Transylvania University. In 1825, he left this State, and finally settled in Philadelphia, where he died in 1840. He was more of a scientist than historian, and, in fact, distinguished himself as a botanist, geologist, conchologist, philologist, geographer, ethnographer, paleontologist, etc. He published a number of learned treatises.
1827.
Ninth-"Notes on Kentucky." By John Bradford. Lexington. Ky., 1826-29.
These were a series of articles, originally published in the Kentucky Ga- sette, at Lexington, beginning with No. 1. August 25. 1826, and ending with No. 62. January 9. 1829. John Bradford was born in Virginia in 1749. and came to Kentucky in 1779. In 1787, he established the Kentucky Ga- zette, at Lexington, and issued the first number August rith, on a half sheet of course printing paper, ten and a half by seventeen inches. He died while sheriff of Fayette county, the last of March, 1830.
18.32.
Tenth-"Sketches of Western Adventure." By John A. McClung. 12mo., pp. 360. Maysville, 1832.
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INTRODUCTORY.
Subsequent editions of this work were published at Philadelphia, Cincin- nati, and Dayton; and in 1872, an enlarged edition, Svo., pp. 398, with a likeness and biography of the author, was published at Covington by Richard H. Collins & Co. Mr. McClung was born in Mason county in 1804, and when he reached manhood became a Presbyterian minister. In 1830, he published, through Carey & Lea, of Philadelphia, a novel, entitled .. Cam- den," a story of the revolutionary war, and was the author of the outline history of Kentucky that appeared in the work of the elder Collins in 1847. In 1857, he was sensibly failing, and while on a tour for health he lost his life in the river, near the falls of Niagara. On the 6th of August. 1857. his clothes were found on the landing at Schlosser, above the falls, and on the roth his body was rescued from the eddy, near the mouth of the river below the cataract. It was supposed that while bathing he was borne away by the current and swept over the falls.
1834.
Eleventh-" The History of the Commonwealth of Kentucky." By Mann Butler. Svo., pp. 396. Louisville, 1834.
A second and enlarged edition of this work, Svo., pp. 551, was pub- lished in Cincinnati in 1836. Mr. Butler was born in Maryland in 1784, and moved to Kentucky in 1806. He came to this State for the purpose of practicing law, but soon gave up the bar for the school-room, and was an eminent educator here for nearly forty years. His writings outside of his history of Kentucky were numerous, and principally of an historic character. The most important of them are mentioned in their appropriate place in this article. In 1845, he removed to St. Louis and lost his life in 1852. in the great disaster of the falling of the Gasconade bridge on the Pacific railroad.
1847.
Twelfth-" Historical Sketches of Kentucky." By Lewis Collins. Large Svo., pp. 560. Maysville, 1847.
Judge Collins was born in Fayette county, Kentucky, in 1797, and died at Lexington in 1870. He was editor and proprietor of the Maysville Eagle from 1820 to the publication of his history, a period of nearly thirty years. during which time there appeared in his columns many valuable historic articles. Not the least important of these were reprints of the .. Notes on Kentucky," which John Bradford contributed to the Kentucky Gacette. In 1851. he was made judge of the Mason County Court, and held this office until 1854.
1852.
Thirteenth -.. The History of Kentucky." By T. S. Arthur and W. H. Carpenter. temo .. pp. 316. Philadelphia. 1852.
Mr. Arthur, a well-known writer of fiction, was born in New York in 1809. In 1852, in connection with Mr. Carpenter. he prepared this history of Ken-
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
RICHARD H, COLLINS, LL. D.
tucky, which was published by Lippincott, Grambo & Co., of Philadelphia, as the first of what was known as the "Cabinet Histories of the States." Most of the States of that date were embraced in the series.
1872.
Fourteenth - " A History of Ken- tucky." By William B. Allen. 8vo., pp. 449. Louisville, 1872. -
Colonel Allen, a native Kentuckian, was born near Greensburg in 1803. He was a lawyer by profession and at one time a member of the Legislature. In 1859, he published the "Kentucky Officers' Guide."
1874.
Fifteenth-" Collins' Historical Sketches of Kentucky." History of Kentucky, by Richard H. Collins, two volumes, large 8vo., pp. 683 and 804. Covington, 1874.
The author of this, the most elaborate and valuable history of Kentucky yet published, was born in Maysville in 1824. He is a lawyer by profes- sion, and successfully practiced at the Cincinnati bar for eleven years, but has since devoted most of his time to literary and historic pursuits. He was editor of the Maysville Eagle for about ten years, and the establisher and publisher of the Danville Review in 1861. His contributions to the news- papers and periodicals of his day have been many; and while yet in the prime of life, he died in 1889, at the home of a daughter in Missouri, whom he was visiting.
1884.
Sixteenth-" Filson Club Publications, No. 1." The life and writings of @ John Filson, the first historian of Kentucky. By R. T. Durrett, 4to., pp. 132. Louisville, 1884.
This work, though designed as a biography, is here placed among the histories of the State, because of the new matter from original sources it added to the Kentucky narrative and the first map of the district, which it rescued from destruction. Colonel Durrett. the author, was born in Henry county in 1824. and. although a lawyer by profession. has always been led by his tastes into literary, historic, and antiquarian studies. He was editor of the Louisville Courier in 1858-59, and ever since he left college has been a contributor of both prose and verse to the newspapers and periodicals of the day. In 1880. he began a series of historic articles in the Courier- Journal, which have at intervals been continued in this and other papers and magazines. His last contribution was to the Southern Bivouac on the
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INTRODUCTORY.
Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 and 1799, beginning with the March number for 1886. He has the largest private library in the State, and of Kentucky books the most complete collection ever gathered to- gether.
Seventeenth - " American Common- wealths." Kentucky a pioneer Common- wealth. By N. S. Shaler, 12mo., pp. 433. Boston, 1885.
:
The author of the above work is a na- tive Kentuckian, and bears a distinguished reputation as a scientist. He was State geologist of Kentucky from 1873 to 1880, and is now professor of paleontology in Harvard University. This work is one of COLONEL R. T. DURRETT. a series to embrace the different States of the Union, of which several have already been issued.
Eighteenth-Z. F. Smith, author of the present "History of Kentucky," was born in Henry county, Kentucky, at the homestead farm of his mater- nal grandparents, Joseph Dupuy and Ann Peay, who moved from Virginia and settled there about 1795. His paternal grandparents, Captain Jesse Smith and Joanna Pendleton, moved out from Virginia about the same time and settled three miles north-east of Danville, Kentucky, near Dick's river. His mother, Mildred Dupuy, was a direct descendant of the old Huguenot refugee, Bartholomew Dupuy, a captain of the king's guard, who fought his way out of the bloody massacre which followed the revocation of the edict of Nantes by Louis the Fourteenth in 1685, and, with his young bride be- hind him, fled on horseback to the sea coast and escaped to Virginia ; and from him were descended the Dupuys, the Trabues, the Caldwells, the Pitt- mans, the Thomassons, the Owens, the Brannins, the Majors, the Mc- Clures, and other families numerous in Kentucky and in the South and West. The author's father, Zachariah Smith, born near Danville in 1799, was a descendant of the Pendletons of Virginia and an old Virginia family of Smiths of German origin. He died within five months after marriage, and the issue was a posthumous child, the subject of this sketch. The widow and mother never married again. Z. F. Smith was educated in the country and town schools of the vicinity, and completed his studies at Bacon Col- lege. He engaged in farming and stock-raising in early manhood ; during the war period successfully conducted Henry College, at Newcastle, as its president ; was elected and served four years as superintendent of public in- struction for Kentucky; was the originator and successful promoter of the Cumberland & Ohio Railroad Company, and president of the same four years ; was several years associated and interested in the construction of rail-
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
roads in Texas ; was four years manager for a department of the publishing house of D. Appleton & Co., of New York, and engaged since May, 1885, in writing the "History of Kentucky." From his earliest manhood, Mr. Smith has devoted much of his time zealously to the causes of education and religion. As a ruling and teaching elder in his church; as one of the founders and promoters, and for twelve years the president, of the Kentucky Christian Education Society ; as a curator, since its incorporation, of Ken- tucky University ; by his writings and addresses and in other ways, he has given much of his life and labors to the public. In 1852, Mr. Smith was married to Miss Sue, daughter of William S. Helm, Esq., of Shelby county, who bore him eight children, four of whom are living. In 1890, he was again married to Miss Anna M. Pittman, of Louisville.
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