USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 1 > Part 19
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This was the first permanent improvement and settlement on the site of the commercial metropolis made by the frontier settlers. We have noted the fact that Captain Thomas Bullitt laid off a town site on another portion of Louisville, nearer the mouth of Beargrass creek, in August, 1773; but for years this pioneer work was not followed up with practical results toward the founding of a great city.
In the summer of 1832, in excavating the cellar of John Love's business house on Main street, opposite the Louisville Hotel, some of the wooden remains of this fort were dug up. The name, Louisville, is supposed to have been given in honor of the unfortunate French monarch, Louis XVI., who had recently negotiated the treaty by which his troops became aliies to the Americans, in the war for independence, and under an impulse of gratitude on the part of the hardy frontiersmen.
In the latter half of the year 1778 the Indians made no formidable incur- sions into Kentucky, no doubt diverted by the extraordinary flank invasion of their own territory by Clark, and the successful demonstration on their lines of communication with their British allies. Scurring parties, however, from time to time reminded the settlers that they must not relax their vigi- lance in defense.
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In September, as a party of sixteen whites was passing from Harrodstown to St. Asaph's, when near the site of Danville, they were fired on by Indians concealed in a cane-brake. All escaped unhurt, except William Poague, who failed to make his appearance. He was wounded by three balls, but had clung to his horse until it carried him out of reach of the enemy, when he concealed himself in a field of cane. Next day two parties went in search of their lost companion. one of whom passing near and in hearing of the suffering man, he hailed them to come to his relief. They carried him to
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DEATH OF WILLIAM POAGUE.
Field's "lottery cabin," a little over one mile west of Danville, and camped for the night. The Indians fell on their trail, and following it to the spot, lay in wait to attack in the morning. Fortunately, the whites discovered the danger, and at dawn of light sallied out, surprised them in ambush, and routed the reds, who left four of their slain comrades on the ground. One of these had possession of Poague's horse, which was retaken and presented to his son, Robert. The wounded man was then placed upon a horse, and in the supporting arms of William Maddox behind him, was borne back to Harrodstown, where, in the midst of sorrowing family and friends, he died the next day.
The loss of this man to the community was a very serious one, apart from the services of a good neighbor, a good citizen, and a good soldier. He was remarkably ingenious, as well as industrious. In these distant wilds, the people were often in want and inconvenienced for the simplest articles of household and personal use. There were few of such articles the creative and ready mind and nimble fingers of William Poague could not supply on demand. Buckets, milk-pails, churns, and tubs, all were turned out from his shop; the wood stock for the first plow-share used in turning the unctuous soil followed, and soon after the first loom. on which flax and woolen cloths were woven for the homespun garments of the settlers, was constructed and put in successful use, by sinking posts in the ground and piercing the beams and braces to them. His wife, Mrs. Ann Poague, was no less a model of that energy and character which distinguished the pioneer women in their domes- tic sphere, as well as the men in the field and forest. She brought to Ken- tucky the first spinning-wheel, and made the first linen ever known to be made in the country, and from lint gathered of nettles. Widowed by the killing of her husband, she was again married, in 1781, to Captain Joseph Lindsey, who, one year after, fell in the disastrous and bloody battle of Blue Licks. Widowed again, some years after, she became the wife of James McGinty, and long esteemed for her venerable years and worth as Mrs. Ann McGinty.
In "Spaulding's Sketches," the incident of an attack on a corn-shelling party is narrated. About thirty men were sent out from Harrodstown to a plantation seven miles distant, for the purpose of shelling corn for the supply of the fort. They were divided in pairs, and each pair assigned the task of filling a sack with the shelled grain. While thus engaged, they were fired on by a band of some forty Indians, who had managed to conceal themselves in an adjacent cane-brake. Seven fell, killed or wounded, at the fire, while eight others escaped to an opposite cane brake. 1 The remainder, rallied by the orders of Colonel Bowman, seized their rifles, and sheltering in a cabin near, and behind trees, made an effective defense. Coomes, of whose narrow escape at the sugar-camp we have before spoken, was so near to his comrade at the bag, who was among the wounded. that his face was
t Collins, Vol. II., p. 613; Spaulding's Sketches.
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stained with the spurting blood. One of the whites, mistaking him for a painted Indian, cocked and leveled his rifle to shoot him. Coomes observed the movement just in time to stay the trigger, and save his life. Colonel Bowman dispatched a courier to the fort for re-enforcements .. The mes- senger sped upon his way unharmed to his destination, though through a rattling fire from the ambushed enemy. and by another body of Indians in ambush on the road he had to travel. In a few hours the anxiously-awaited relief came, and the baffled Indians betook themselves to flight. The dead were buried, the horses were loaded with the full sacks of corn, and all returned by nightfall to the shelter of the station.
A body of Indians, probably the same who shot William Poague, made demonstrations of attack on Harrodstown during the fall. John Gist and. a number of others sallied out to give them battle. Gist was struck by a bullet on the chin. just deep enough for the concussion to knock him down. The Indian who fired the shot ran up to scalp him, when Gist raised his loaded rifle and shot him dead, and made his escape into the fort.
Two or three Indian raids were made into Scott county, in the neighbor- hood of Johnson's mill, and some killed and wounded on retreat and pursuit. They killed a white boy of the settlement on one excursion, and had three killed in return. A singular maneuver, illustrating at once the devotion and fertile cunning sometimes displayed by the savages, was made by a retreating party on one of these raids. In May, they stole some twenty horses from the same vicinity. 1 Captain Herndon, with a small party, pursued and over- took them in a copse of wood, where they had halted. The whites were just ready to fire, when the Indians perceived them, gave a loud yell, and darted into the woods. Herndon, in pursuit. noticed one who, remaining in view of the whites, continued to yell and gesticulate, to fly from one tree to another, and to spring wildly up and down. as if frantic. This strange conduct so engrossed the whites that they found no opportunity to fire until the other Indians were beyond danger, having secured their guns and blank- ets. The acting maniac. having no doubt accomplished the heroic purpose of saving his comrades by this remarkable sham play, suddenly dropped the curtain and ended the performance by as suddenly disappearing in the brush as he had evacuated the camp.
The active and enterprising spirit of Simon Kenton had led him to join the expedition of Clark to the North-west, in which he performed invaluable services as scout and spy, and in which no backwoodsman was considered so expert and daring. After the fall of Kaskaskia, Kenton, with a small party, was sent to Kentucky with dispatches, and on the way they fell in with a camp of Indians with horses, which they broke up, took the horses and sent them back to Kaskaskia, and then directed their route to Vincennes. Entering that place by night. they traversed its streets without being discov- ered, and departed after taking two horses to each man. White river being
: Collins, Vol. II., p. 700.
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CAPTURE OF SIMON KENTON.
much swollen, they made a raft to transport themselves, their guns, and bag- gage, while the horses were made to swim across. To their dismay, a band of Indians appeared on the other shore just in time to catch the horses on the bank. Thus intercepted, they allowed the raft to float down stream to a landing, and concealed themselves until night; then making another raft, they successfully crossed, and arrived safely in Kentucky with their letters and documents, some of which were for the Virginia seat of govern- ment.
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He was in Kentucky but a short time before his restless and almost reck- less spirit of adventure led him to join a party to cross the Ohio and make reprisals for horses stolen by the Indians from the settlers. His companions were killed, or escaped, in a rencontre with a body of savages, while Ken- ton, his rifle having flashed in the face of the foe, found himself surrounded by an overwhelming force, and compelled to surrender.
Yet young in years, but a veteran in experience, Kenton was well known, and a peculiar object of hatred and dread to the Indians. He was unlike Boone in this respect. He had no dissemblance, nor art of double acting in his nature. He was terribly combative, and knew the Indians only as enemies to be killed or injured at all times and in every way, so long as they were at war, and he had never known them in any other way than at war. The Indians unfortunately caught their implacable enemy with a number of their ponies, on his way back to Kentucky. They at once began to beat him with sticks and whip him with switches, all the while upbraiding him as a "hoss steal," as though they could not have called him brother in the prac- tice. They might have ended his career then and there. But the prisoner was no ordinary catch, and they intended to bear him into the village camp and make a holiday of him. After they tired of beating and taunting him, they secured him for the night. Laying him flat upon his back, they drew his legs apart and lashed his feet tightly to two saplings; a pole was next laid across his breast, and his hands tied to each end, and his arms lashed with thongs to the same. His head was then stretched back, and his neck was tied to a stake in the ground, but not so as to choke him if he lay quiet. In this manner he passed the night, without the relief of a moment's slumber, in unrecorded reflections on the vicissitudes of hunting Indians and stealing their ponies.
They soon after painted him black, and informed him that they would carry him to Chillicothe, where he would be burned at the stake. One day, to vary the monotony of torture, and as a fresh amusement for themselves, his captors tied him securely on an unbroken horse and turned him loose in the woods, to run through the bushes and among the trees. This he did, capering and prancing through thickets of undergrowth and amid the limbs of the trees, trying in vain to discharge the load. His clothes were torn from his body, and his flesh pierced and bruised in many places. The horse at last stopped the performance from sheer exhaustion, quieted down, and
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
joined the cavalcade. 1 Kenton, no less exhausted, was borne along with the band until relieved.
Arrived at Chillicothe, they prepared the stake, tied him to it, and left him in that condition for twenty-four hours without applying the torch. Why not, he could only conjecture. He was finally untied and compelled to run the gauntlet. At this place there were assembled some six hundred Indians of all ages and sexes. All were placed in two opposite rows from the coun- cil house, extending nearly half a mile out, armed with switches, sticks, and every conceivable hand weapon available. Kenton was now directed to run between these files, to the beat of the drum at the council house door, and if he could get into the council house he should escape death: but he must expect a blow from each Indian as he passed. He started on his hard race with all the will and energy of his nature, and after many blows and many escapes he had almost reached the coveted door of deliverance, when he was knocked senseless by a blow from a club in the hands of a warrior, severely beaten, and again taken into custody.
In the wretched and hopeless condition into which the repeated and varied barbarities of the savages forced him, Kenton was beginning to feel" . that life was becoming an intolerable burden. He was marched from town to town, seemingly the object of exceptional malice and cruelty on the part of the red men. Eight times he was compelled to run the gauntlet, and on one occasion he became desperate enough to attempt to escape, even at the risk of his life. Starting down the gauntlet line, he suddenly turned and dashed through the ranks at a weak point, and sped on his way, the motley crowd in pursuit. He had almost reached the brush, which might offer him safe shelter, when he was met by a lot of warriors coming in on horseback, and compelled to surrender.
Several different times he was condemned to be burnt at the stake, and the sentence was at last to be executed at Lower Sandusky. But again he was fated for an unexpected deliverance. Here resided Simon Girty, the notorious renegade white, who had caused himself to be adopted into a tribe and made a great leader among the Indians, just returned from an unsuc- cessful excursion against the frontiers of Pennsylvania. For alleged wrongs he was the implacable foe of his own people, toward whom he had become a sort of Ishmaelite with an ever ready hand of vengeance. Hearing that a white prisoner was in town. he sought him, and began a merciless abuse of words and blows. Before Girty had joined the Indians, he and Kenton had been spies and scouts in the same expedition against the savages, and were well known to each other. Recognizing him, Kenton exclaimed: "Why, Simon Girty, do you treat an old boyhood friend in that way? Don't you know me?" Girty was amazed as he identified the unfortunate man as a comrade of former years. His better nature prevailed, and, relent- ing, he raised him from the ground, offered him his hand, and promised to
I Collins, Vol. II., p. 447.
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KENTON CARRIED A PRISONER TO DETROIT.
intercede for his relief and final release from captivity. At Girty's request a council was called, the sentence of death at the stake revoked, and the prisoner delivered into the hands of his opportune friend. The latter took him to his house, washed his wounds, decently dressed him, and bestowed all the privileges of hospitality. The rebound from despair and torture to hope and comfort was most timely and grateful to Kenton, and in this con- dition of rest and relief he continued five days.
Some chiefs of neighboring towns, hearing that Kenton was set free, and knowing the prowess of the man as an enemy, indulging the ferocity of their natures, violently protested against such leniency, and demanded another council. In this, notwithstanding the exertions of Girty, he was again made a prisoner, and the sentence of death at the stake renewed against him. He was marched to Lower Sandusky to have this sentence executed.
The varying fortune which seemed to coquette with alternate smiles and frowns seemed again, in the fickle humor of indulgence, to beam in favor toward the devoted victim. The celebrated Mingo chief, Logan, whose wrongs suffered at the hands of the whites had not obliterated the nobility of his nature, became interested in the romance of a life that seemed to be charmed or fated. Perhaps this interest may have been enlisted by Girty, determined not to be foiled. Logan prevailed on a Canadian trader, Peter Druyer, who was on a visit from Detroit, to purchase the prisoner from his Indian claimants, and succeeded in negotiating a trade on mutually-agreed terms with the council. He carried Kenton with him to Detroit and deliv- ered him to the British commander. Here he remained a prisoner, but with humane treatment paroled to report at nine o'clock daily. He was surprised to meet several old companions-Jesse Cofer, Nathaniel Bullock, and oth- ers-who were also prisoners, and together these passed the time in compar- ative comfort until about the Ist of June, 1779, working for the garrison at half pay, or at other occupation.
Within the circle of frequent association with the prisoners was a comely, sympathetic, and spirited woman, the wife of an Indian trader by the name of Harvey. A first acquaintance grew into friendly intimacy between Ken- ton and Mrs. Harvey, and finally into an active interest in his welfare. The veteran in war and in all the experience of frontier life was but twenty-four years old at this time. A companion who served with him says "he was fine looking, with a dignified and manly deportment, and a soft, pleasing voice, and was, wherever he went, a great favorite with the ladies." Another who knew him intimately writes this description :
"Kenton was of fair complexion, six feet one inch in height, and, in the prime of life, weighed about one hundred and ninety pounds. His carriage, standing or walking, was very erect. He was never inclined to be corpulent, although of sufficient fullness to form a graceful person. He had a soft, tremulous voice, very pleasing to the hearer. He had laughing gray eyes, which appeared to fascinate the beholder. His hair was a dark auburn. He
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
was a pleasant, good-humored, and obliging companion. When provoked. to anger, or excited, as sometimes the case, the fiery glance of the eye would almost curdle the blood of those he came in contact with. His rage, when aroused, was like a tornado. In his dealings he was honest and unsuspi- cious. His confidence in man approached credulity, and the same man might cheat him twenty times; and then, if he professed friendship, he might go on cheating him."
Such was the child of the forest, untutored in the lore of science, yet graduate in the knowledge and arts of the life he was called to follow; with- out the training and drill of rehearsal or the ordering of usher, yet a mighty actor in the building of States and civilization upon the theater of a terri- torial empire; his deeds unwritten and unheralded by the pen of fame, yet ingenuously carving for his name an immortality out of the wilds and solitudes of nature. Simon Kenton was one of the cruder types of God's nobility, gifted with a genuine and original manhood, ordained for a mis- sion, and complete in the powers and symmetry which best qualified for the sufferings and labors of its work. With time, the testimony of history will illustrate the rugged virtues of his heroic life all the more brightly, because they stand out from a background of obscurity and of unpretentious mod- esty. His deeds fitted him to be the Hector of a Kentucky Ilium, who lived. only too late in the world's age of progress to find a Homer. He was simply the greatest among the great of his day, in the unblazed paths and the ad- venturous deeds of pioneer life; and posterity will not withhold its admira- tion of the hero, because of the humble sphere in which he did so faithfully and so nobly the task that Providence assigned him.
It was not strange, then, that a bright and appreciative woman should have her sympathies aroused for a man of such qualities, and to become keenly enlisted for his relief from the midst of misfortunes that appealed so strongly to womanly nature.
At Kenton's urgent solicitation, she consented to aid himself, Cofer, and Bullock to escape. Once enlisted, she engaged with womanlike unselfish- ness in the adventure. On the 3d of June, a large body of Indians assem- bled at Detroit for a general carouse. They stacked their guns near the residence of Mrs. Harvey, who, when the savages were in their drunken oblivion, stole out and selected three of the guns, and concealed them in a patch of pea-vines in her garden. She then collected ammunition, food, and supplies for a journey, and hid them in the hollow of a tree some dis- tance out from the town; all of which she advised Kenton of in detail. She told him further that he would find a ladder at the back of her garden at midnight, by which he could climb over the pickets and get the guns. No time was lost, and at the hour named, Kenton entered the garden, where he found the faithful woman and ally sitting by the guns, and awaiting to see that all plans for their departure worked safely. The gentle, brave woman seemed an angel in the eyes of the youthful and ardent hunter, as.
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TRANSYLVANIA PURCHASE AGAIN DECLARED VOID.
his heart throbbed with the pulsations of gratitude for the service she had done him; and he parted from her with emotions, the impressions of which were never effaced from his memory. As for his deliverer, she took an affectionate leave of him, and with many tender wishes for his safety, urged him to go and place himself beyond danger. Kenton never saw her after- ward, but never forgot her. Years after, and in venerable age, the old pioneer delighted to dwell on the kindness, and expatiate on the courage and virtues, of his benefactress, the trader's gentle and comely wife. In his reveries, he often said, he had seen the angel woman a thousand times, sitting in the starlight, by the guns in the garden.
The fugitives directed their steps toward the prairies of Indiana and the Wabash tributaries, and after thirty days of dangers and hardships, reached Louisville in July. From this point, after a short rest, Kenton shouldered his rifle and started for Vincennes to join Colonel Clark, now quartered there, and to tender his services as needed.
It was in November of this year. 1778. that the Virginia Legislature, by act passed and approved, again voided the purchase by Henderson & Com- pany, at Wataga, for the Transylvania Company; and in compensation for their outlay and improvements made, granted the said company two hun- dred thousand acres lying at the mouth, and on both sides, of Green river, and now a part of Henderson county.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
CHAPTER XIV.
(1779.)
Critical situation of Clark at Kaskaskia. The British General Hamilton recapt- ures Vincennes.
Threatens Clark with eight hundred British and Indians.
Delayed in this, Clark marches on Vin- cennes with one hundred and seventy men, in winter, and through the swamps flooded with water.
Incredible endurance and hardships.
Account from Bowman's memoirs.
From Clark's memoirs.
The amphibian soldiers reach Vincennes and invest it.
Hamilton surprised, capitulates, after much parleying.
The boats arrive after the surrender.
Awaits re-enforces to march on Detroit.
Disappointed, returns to Kaskaskia.
The Mississippi and Ohio country, north- west, saved by Clark's achievements.
Increased immigration to Kentucky.
Miami tribes troublesome.
Bowman's expedition.
His failure and retreat.
Logan covers latter.
Gallantly drives back the enemy, with severe loss.
Chaos of war over the colonies every- where.
Industrial and monetary depression.
Virginia seeks to replenish by sale of Kentucky lands.
Land law passed.
Provision for " squatters."
Disputes over claims settled by a com- mission.
Isaac Shelby's claim first presented.
Three hundred family boats reach the falls in the spring of 1780.
Corn reaches one hundred and sixty- five continental dollars per bushel.
Many locate and improve at Lexington.
Description then.
Bryan's station established.
Pittman's station, near Greensburg, built.
Squire Boone builds Painted Stone sta- tion, near Shelbyville.
McAfees return to their old station, in Mercer county.
The "hard winter " of 1779-80.
The McCoun boy taken prisoner and burnt at the stake.
Rogers and Benham attacked on the Ohio river.
Nearly one hundred men slain.
Ferocious Byrd.
Benham's peril and suffering .. Rescued at last.
As the end of 1778 drew nigh, Colonel Clark was made gravely appre- hensive of the condition which the affairs of the North-west were threatening to assume. The auxiliary forces which he had expected and fondly wished for had not arrived. Virginia was too deeply involved in the revolution- ary struggle to sparere-enforcementsso much needed. The colonial army under Washington had passed through the discouraging gloom and distress of Valley Forge, in the previous winter, and every soldier was needed for the continental army at the opening of spring. True, the alliance by treaty with France had given an inspiration of hope to the rebels; but the French
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THE BRITISH RECAPTURE VINCENNES.
auxiliaries had not arrived in numbers sufficient, as yet, to afford relief. Captain Helm was compelled to depend entirely upon the loyalty of the newly-converted French and Indian population to maintain his established authority at Vincennes, not even being supplied with a body-guard of Ken- tuckians.
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