USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 1 > Part 11
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His father died intestate, and by the laws then in force, the lands were his by primogeniture, to the exclusion of his younger brothers and sisters. He scorned to avail himself of this legalized robbery, and with his mother's consent sold the land not susceptible of partition, and divided the proceeds to those whom a vicious law had disinherited. To provide for his mother a. comfortable residence, he united his funds to those of one of his brother's, and with this purchased another tract of land on a fork of James river, and secured the title to her for life, if so long she chose to remain on it, with the remainder to his brother in fee. Having done this, he next determined to provide a home for himself. With tearful farewell, and a mother's "God bless you," Logan turned his steps to the cheap lands of the West, and with his little remnant of money purchased a home on Holston river, married, and settled down to farming.
At an early age, he had shown a predilection for military life, and at twenty-one had accompanied Colonel Bosquet in his expedition against the Indians of the north, as a sergeant. In 1774, he was with Dunmore, in the campaign against the Miami confederation. In 1775, he resolved to come to Kentucky, and with but two or three slaves set out to see the land and lay the foundations for a settlement. In Powell's valley, he met with Boone, Henderson, and others, on their way to Kentucky. With them he traveled through the wilderness, but not approving of their plan of settle- ment, he separated from them on their arrival in Kentucky, and turning
I Marshall, Vol. 1., pp. 29-30; Collins, Vol. II., p. 469.
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KENTON ENTRANCED BY THE CANELAND.
westwardly, after a few days' journey, pitched his camp in the present county of Lincoln, where he afterward built his fort. Here, during the same year. he and William Galaspy, with several servants, raised a small crop of Indian corn. In the latter end of June, he returned to his family, on the Holston.
In the fall of the same year, he removed his cattle and the residue of his slaves to the camp, and leaving all in the care of Galaspy, returned home with a view of moving out his family, which was done the next year. These journeys and the exposure in camp to continued peril and privation show the hardihood and energy of his mind, as well as his physical endurance and vigor. Though on his first entrance into Kentucky he met the returning explorers, and heard the stories of Indian massacres and perils, his dauntless spirit led him forward with his little band of comrades, with that determina- tion of will that characterized him throughout his eventful life. Whether Logan took active part for or against the plans of Henderson & Company or not, does not clearly appear. In the Boonesborough Convention the names of Todd, Dandridge, Floyd, and Wood appear as delegates from St. Asaphs, but no mention is made of Logan in this connection. Bold as he ever was in the hour of necessity and duty, severe experience had taught him the value of discretionary reserve.
Other bold adventurers appeared at remoter points in Kentucky during this same year of 1775. Simon Kenton, after spending the winter of 1773-4 in his favorite role of border life-a hunting camp on the Big Sandy-sought refuge in Fort Pitt on the breaking out of the Miami Indian war. 1 Volun- teering in person, he performed active and invaluable services as a spy, shifting his movements between the armies of Lord Dunmore and General Lewis, and adroitly moving along the picket lines of the advancing Indian army, for information as a spy. After an honorable discharge from service. he returned to his former camp and hunting-ground, on the Big Sandy, in the autumn of 1774, with Thomas Williams. The old yearning for the "caneland" came over them. Disposing of their furs, they embarked down the Ohio, and one night put in their canoe at the mouth of Cabin creek, Mason county, about six miles above the site of Maysville. Next day, while hunting out from the river, the sight of the longed-for cane-brakes burst on the enraptured vision of Kenton, who had come to be incredulous of the stories of his old comrade, Yeager, of what he had seen in the mystic inte- rior of Kentucky. Here was land richer than he had ever seen before, perennial herbage, and limpid springs. He was entranced, and bearing the cheering news to Williams, they determined to tarry near. Sinking their canoe, they entered the forest, and in May, 1775, built their camp within a mile of the present town of Washington, Mason county. Here they cleared up an acre of ground, and planted it with a portion of corn they had received from the French trader to whom they sold their furs. Before the harvest matured they feasted on the first roasting-ears that ever grew by the hands
I Marshall, Vol. I. p. 39; Collins, Vol. II., P. 442
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
of a white man on the south side of the Ohio river in that vicinity, and on a spot of land as fertile and beautiful as sunshine ever gladdened. The upper and lower Blue Licks lay less than half a day's journey to the south-west, on Licking river, and beaten paths or traces led to these from the grazing grounds of cane and bluegrass, along which buffalo, elk, and deer were constantly passing to and fro .. Following one of these traces, Kenton and Williams found the hills and valleys around the licks covered with herds of these wild animals, and in this new hunter's paradise reveled in sport and feasted on the spoils of the chase.
They were surprised at meeting one day, at the lower Blue Lick, two men, Fitzpatrick and Hendricks, who had wandered thus far interior without food, or guns to procure it. their canoe having been upset in a squall on the Ohio. Hendricks acceded to Kenton's invitation to join their station, while the other insisted on returning to Virginia. Leaving Hendricks at the camp, Kenton and Williams conducted Fitzpatrick to the Ohio, equipped him with gun and ammunition, and took leave of him on the north side of the Ohio, opposite Maysville site. At once returning, they were surprised and alarmed to find the camp unoccupied and in disorder. Not far away they discovered smoke ascending in a ravine, and at once divined the situation. Hendricks had been captured by Indians, and they fled to the woods. Next morning, cautiously approaching the spot where the smoke was seen, they found that the savages had departed. Inspecting more closely, they were horrified to find the skull and bones of unfortunate Hendricks. The fiends had burned him at the stake. Such an act of cruel barbarity seemed incredible to the young frontiersmen, and they reproached themselves that they had not made an effort at rescue. Believing him a prisoner, they had thought it better to leave him to the chances of escape, rather than jeopardize his and their own lives by a doubtful attack on the captors. Returning to the camp at Wash- ington site, they escaped the notice of the prowling Indians. Toward fall, they met with Michael Stoner, who had accompanied Boone to Kentucky the year previous, at Blue Lick, who informed them for the first time that there were many others in Kentucky this year beside themselves. Stoner bearing them company to their camp, they soon after gathered up their prop- erty and went with him to the settlements already formed in the interior. Kenton passed the next winter at Hinkson's station, in the present county of Bourbon.
Other improvers appeared in Mason county this year. In May, Samuel and Haydon Wells, with seven others, came from Virginia to survey and enter lands. They camped on Limestone creek, and surveyed fifteen thou- sand acres between the Ohio and north fork of Licking, from above Mill to the mouth of Battle creek-the latter so called from a fight between John Rust and Haydon Wells, so prolonge I and desperate that Matthew Rust, in a deposition after, speaks of it as a "damnation fight." The creek is now known as Wells creek.
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JOHN COOPER MASSACRED.
In April, Charles Lacompte, Andrew McConnell, John McClelland, and comrades, from the Monongahela country, came down the Ohio and passed up the Kentucky river to the Elkhorn region. In June, they set out to return, and crossing the country to Mason county, remained through the summer in the vicinity of Washington. During the few weeks they were on Elkhorn, they made some improvements in what is now Scott county, building a cabin at the Royal Spring, which lies at the present western limit of Georgetown. In November, John McClelland, William McConnell, and five others of this party, joined by Simon Kenton and Colonel Robert Patterson, of Pennsylvania, returned to the Elkhorn improvements, and extended and strengthened the buildings at Royal Spring. McClelland's house of that date was the next summer, by the same party and in the same spot, converted into McClelland's station, the first fort known to have been built in Kentucky north of Kentucky river. In its construction, several others from John Hinkson's cabin on South Licking. and from a cabin improvement at Drennon Lick in Henry county, co-operated. This year John Cooper raised a small crop of corn on Hinkson in Bourbon county; and at his hospitable cabin, Simon Kenton and others passed the winter of 1775-6; where in July following, being left alone, the host was massacred by the savages. 1
2 Butler, upon the authority of some of the pioneers yet living as late as 1833, computes the number of explorers and settlers who were in Kentucky by May, 1775, at three hundred; and that these planted and raised not less than two hundred and thirty acres of corn. During this year also the seeds of fruits were planted by some of the most thoughtful, and the foundations laid for orchards, which bore abundantly, a few years after, harvests of rich fruit to reward the grateful palates of the backwoodsmen.
The main settlements at Boonesborough and Harrodstown were destined to an acquisition in the autumn of this year, which would bring sunshine and joy to the social circle, and an air of contentment and home comfort to the restless and adventurous men of the wilderness. Daniel Boone was in buoyant hope and spirit over the successful venture of this year, and saw in it the realization of the day dream which had haunted his imagination for years. . About the Ist of September, he took a party of men and returned to his old settlement on Clinch river, determined to set an example to others by removing his family to the new land of his adoption. The praises of this land were ever on his lips; and the spies who returned to the children of Israel from prospecting the land of Canaan told no more marvelous sto- ries of wonders seen, than Boone and his comrades related to their curious and willing neighbors of the colonies. His little band was re enforced, not by men only, but wives and mothers and maidens, in turn, showed a willing- ness to follow westward the fortunes of husbands and sons and brothers, and the example of Boone's household. About the Ist of September he
1 Collins, Vol. II., p. 549-11.
2 Butler, p. 31.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
set out again for Kentucky with his wife and children and a few followers. In Powell's valley, he found Hugh McGary, Richard Hogan, and Thomas Denton, with their families and followers, awaiting his arrival. Thus in- creased to twenty-six men, four women, and four or five children-half- grown, perhaps-he placed himself at the head of the little colony, and gallantly led it through Cumberland Gap and into the mysteries of the great wilderness beyond, where it was destined to be of the germ of a sovereign commonwealth and the plant of a new civilization. 1
When the party reached the headwaters of Dick's river, in Rockcas- tle county, McGary, Denton, and Hogan, following their preference for a location, with their families and a few comrades separated from the others. and leaving "Boone's Trace," made their way through the forest toward Harrodstown, where they arrived on the 8th of September. On the same day Boone, with his party, reached Boonesborough. Of this achievement, the old backwoodsman proudly says in his narrative: "My wife was the first white woman who ever stood on the banks of the Kentucky river." It may as truly be said that Mrs. McGary, Mrs. Hogan, and Mrs. Denton became the centers of the first family circles that were ever formed at Harrodstown, and were the first white women upon the waters of Salt river. These ad- vance pioneer women were followed soon by others. The families of Colonel Richard Callaway, William Poague, and John B. Stagner reached Boones- borough on the 26th of September. 2 William Poague removed his family to Harrodstown in February following ; and Stagner must have done like- wise soon after, as in June, 1777, we learn that he was killed and beheaded by Indians half a mile only from that fort. "Boone's Trace". now afforded a comparatively good road for pack-horses in single file from the settlements on Holston to Boonesborough, and upon this path through the wilderness there was frequent travel to and fro by the autumn of 1775.
The romantic origin of the name borne by the city of Lexington is given in the eloquent address of Governor James T. Morehead, in 1845, at the celebration of the first settlement of Kentucky at Boonesborough, in the following language : "In the year 1775, intelligence was received by a party of hunters, while accidentally encamped on one of the branches of Elkhorn, that the first battle of the Revolution had been fought in the vicinity of Boston between the British and provincial forces; and that in commemora- tion of the event they called the spot of their encampment Lexington. No settlement was then made. The spot is now covered by one of the most beautiful cities on the continent."
In confirmation of the truth of this incident, in April, 1775, Joseph Lindsey, Garrett Jordan, John Vance, and others started from Drennon's Lick, in Henry county, and came up the Kentucky river to Elkhorn, where John Lee and Hugh Shannon joined them. Following Elkhorn to the forks, thence by way of the Royal Spring, they came to the spot where Lexington
: Hartley's Daniel Boone, pp. 105-6. 2 Collins, Vol., Il., pp. 520 and 616.
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FIRST SETTLEMENT AT LEXINGTON.
now stands. Remaining here in camp for a day or two on account of rainy weather, Patrick Jordan discovered a large spring down the fork on which they camped. When he returned and told of his discovery, Joseph Lindsey promptly paid two guineas to Jordan to go with him and show the spring, and allow him to locate there. There the Jordans aided Lindsey to make a cabin improvement, and to clear away and plant half an acre of ground in corn. In September, Lindsey had a supply of garden vegetables and roasting-ears, the first eaten in that section. 1
The battle of Lexington was fought on the 19th of April. . There were some forty settlers on Hinkson and Licking, within twenty or thirty miles, and these and others doubtless visited the party in the Lexington locality. The tradition was often repeated and accepted without question, in after time, that when the news of the battle was brought, the foresters in camp upon the spot, in honor of the event, gave to the place the name Lexington, and by this it was always known after.
The Hinkson and Licking settlements alluded to above were important. In March or April, 1775, a party of fifteen men, under the lead of John ยท Hinkson and John Haggin, came down the Ohio and up Licking river in canoes, and landed at the present site of Falmouth, remaining there some days on account of rains and high water. The hackberry tree, out of the side of which Samuel Williams cut a Johnny-cake board, near the mouth of Willow creek, was standing in 1803 with the scar of the deep wounds. Pro- ceeding up Licking to the buffaloes' trace below Lower Blue Lick, they dis- embarked and followed the trace north-westward to a point between Paris and Cynthiana, and there made clearings and a settlement for each man of the party. These were the foundations for Hinkson's and Martin's stations, about one mile above Lair's depot, on the Kentucky Central Railroad, and here the foresters raised corn and vegetables, which not only supplied their rude tables, but gave seed for succeeding crops there and to neighbors. 2
But a few days behind these, another party of fourteen, led by William and John Miller, came the same canoe route and fell in with Hinkson's band near Lower Blue Lick. Following the same old main trace, the same that led by the site of Lexington, they separated at a branch trace in Bour- bon county, and turning westward, camped on Miller's run, near the cross- ing of Ruddle's road, as afterward known. In this vicinity they made fourteen improvements, one for each of the party. These two neighboring settlements became a common point of rendezvous and dispersion for pass- ing bands of explorers, scouts, and hunters, of little less importance than the stations on the south side of Kentucky river.
A letter of Colonel Henderson to his associates in North Carolina, of date June 12, 1775, sums up the geographic situation in terse and general terms, and we quote as follows:
"We are seated at the mouth of Otter creek (Boonesborough), on the
1 Collins, Vol. II., p. 177.
2 Collins, Vol. II., p. 325.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
Kentucky river, about one hundred and fifty miles from the Ohio. To the west, about fifty miles from us, are two settlements some six or seven miles apart (Harrodstown and Boiling Spring). There were, some time ago, about one hundred at the two places, though now not more than sixty or seventy, as many have gone up the Ohio, and others, by the way we came, to Vir- ginia and elsewhere. These men, in the course of hunting provisions, lands, etc., are some of them constantly out, and scour the woods from the banks of the river fifty miles southward. On the opposite side of the river, and north from us about forty miles, is a settlement on the crown lands of about nine- teen persons (Hinkson's); and lower down toward the Ohio, on the same side, there are some other settlers (Miller's)-how many, or at what place, I can't exactly learn. There is also a party of ten or twelve with a surveyor, who are employed in searching through that country and laying off officers' lands. They have been for more than three weeks within ten miles of us, and will be for several weeks longer, ranging up and down that country."
The latter survey party were probably the Douglas and Gist party, who, with James Harrod and others, under the guidance of David Williams, explored and located many lands from Stoner southward toward the Ken- tucky river, as did Douglas, Floyd, and Hancock Taylor, on the same and a wider field the year previous.
SKETCH OF GEORGE ROGERS CLARK.
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CHAPTER X.
Opening of the Revolutionary war. Declaration of Independence.
Menace of Kentucky from British posts in the North-west.
General George Rogers Clark.
His life and services to Kentucky and the Union.
The " Hannibal of the West."
From the Dunmore war, he comes to Kentucky with a major's commission.
Declines to enter the English army.
Counterplots the plans of Transylvania Company.
Chosen a commissioner to Virginia.
Returns there through great privations.
Asks supply of ammunition for Ken- tucky.
Virginia's doubtful jurisdiction.
Clark declines to assume the responsi- bility for her.
His alternative.
Virginia finally consents.
Clark and Jones induce the Burgesses to create Kentucky county out of part of Fincastle county.
Indian spies watch the convoy of powder to Kentucky.
It is landed on the banks of Limestone in Mason county, and hid there.
Captain Todd attempts to convey it in. Is attacked and defeated by Indians.
Clark, with a troop, brings in the pow- der.
Boonesborough startled by the capture of Boone's and Callaway's daughters.
The pursuit.
The rescue and return of the maidens to their parents.
Tactics in trailing Indians.
Leestown, at Frankfort, established.
Hinkson's and other stations abandoned. Sandusky station, Washington county. Whitley station founded near Crab Or- chard.
Colonel Patterson starts to Pittsburgh for ammunition.
Party attacked at Kanawha.
Patterson desperately wounded.
Indian methods in sieges and attacks.
McClelland's, at Georgetown, attacked. Repulsed.
The place soon after abandoned.
First divine services.
Characteristics of the people.
In the spring of 1775 there appeared at Harrodstown, with some mystery attending his coming, a man who was destined to act a conspicuous part in the early history of Kentucky, and whose genius and enterprising ability did more than that of any other man to secure to the united colonies the conquest and settlement of the entire North-west, to the Lakes on the north and to the Mississippi on the west. George Rogers Clark was born in Albe- marle county, Virginia, November 19, 1752. Little is known of his earlier years, excepting that he was engaged in the business of land surveying. From an interesting pen-picture of his early life by Mr. Bodley, we quote :
"If you will let your imagination roam with mine for a moment, we will go-we are there-on that beautiful slope of rolling country east of the Blue Ridge, in Albemarle county, in Virginia, in 1773, on an early April morning, chill and crisp and clear. And as we move along the farm-bor-
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
dered country road, here before us is the entrance of an old-time, broad- porticoed Virginia farm-house; and there seems to be some excitement here- about, for over there, hanging just back of the porch-corner, is a gathering of evidently curious negro slaves of all sorts and of all ages-an old, trem- bling, gray-haired man, leaning on his long, hickory stick, ebony women in blue check aprons and yellow bandanas, and children of every size in cotton gowns that look like meal-bags with arm-holes cut in and the ends cut off. And here in front, standing hat in hand, is a well-dressed young negro man holding a saddled horse. That tells the story -; somebody is going away. Presently the door opens, and a young man, a mere light- haired boy, but very tall and noble to look upon, turns and bends to kiss his mother, then his sister, then again his mother. . Good-bye, brother; be sure and send the powder. Good-bye.' And presently up yonder where the road is entering the forest, he turns in his saddle and waves a farewell to the gathered ones at home.
"That was George Rogers Clark, the founder of this Commonwealth, then leaving his home a young soldier-engineer of twenty-one to seek adventure and cast his fortune with the people in the wilds of Kentucky.
"In that day, the young men of Virginia rarely engaged in mercantile pursuits, and those who did not choose to enter one of the learned profes- sions, and for whose restless energies farming was too prosaic a life, found at once a reputable, active, and congenial occupation in land surveying. It is a singular fact that from Washington down a large proportion of the emi- nent men of action in the Southern colonies were, in their younger days, engaged in this pursuit. And so it was that young Clark and the two of his `five brothers who afterward won distinction, the one as the first major- general of the State of Virginia, and the other as a general and the first governor of Missouri, were in their earlier manhood surveying engineers."
Clark commanded a company in the Dunmore war, and bore an active part against the Indians, though he was then but twenty-two years old. At the close of hostilities, he was offered a commission in the English service, but was induced, by the threatened rupture between Great Britain and the colonies, to decline the appointment.
Of Clark, Marshall says: "His appearance, well calculated to attract attention, was rendered particularly agreeable by the manliness of his de- portment, by the intelligence of his conversation, the vivacity and boldness of his spirit for enterprise, and the determined interest he manifested to make of this country his home. He fixed on no particular residence, and was much in the woods ; incidentally visiting the forts and ostensible camps, cultivating the acquaintance of the people, and acquiring an extensive knowledge of the objects presented to his curiosity and for his inspec- tion."
In stature, some six feet three inches in height, of well proportioned body and shapely limbs, Clark was of that imposing presence and dignity that
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CLARK BREVETTED MAJOR.
commanded the tribute of deference from all who approached him, and yet so gentle and affable to all that the magnetism of his person won the confi- dence and secured the friendship of those around him. The description of person and bearing reminds one of the great Washington, and the unselfish nobility of his character, his civic and military genius, and his devoted patri- otism, made him, in the obscure field of the mighty West, a hero only less than Washington by the limited theater of his opportunities.
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