USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 1 > Part 21
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"Here the detachment halted at an early hour in the night, and, as usual, sent out spies to examine the condition of the village. Before midnight they returned, and reported that the enemy remained unapprised of their being in the neighborhood, and were in the most unmilitary security. The army was instantly put in motion. It was determined that Logan, with one- half of the men, should turn to the left and march half way around the town, while Bowman, at the head of the remainder, should make a corre- sponding march to the right; that both parties should proceed in silence until they had met at the opposite extremity of the village, when, having thus completely encircled it, the attack was to commence.
"Logan performed his part of the combined operation with perfect order and in profound silence; and having reached the designated spot, awaited with impatience the arrival of his commander. At length daylight appeared. Logan, still expecting the arrival of Colonel Bowman, ordered the men to conceal themselves in the high grass, and awaited the expected signal to attack. No orders, however, arrived. In the meantime, the men, in shift- ing about through the grass, alarmed an Indian dog, the only sentinel on duty. He instantly began to bay loudly, and advanced in the direction of a man who had attracted his attention. Presently, a solitary Indian left his cabin and walked cautiously toward the party, halting frequently, rising upon tiptoe, and gazing around him.
"Logan's party lay close, with the hope of taking him without giving the alarm; but at that instant a gun was fired in an opposite quarter of the town,
1 Butler, pp. 108-9.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
as was afterward ascertained, by one of Bowman's party, and the Indian, giving one shrill whoop, ran swiftly back to the council house. Conceal- ment was now impossible. Logan's party instantly sprang up from the grass and rushed upon the village, not doubting for a moment that they would be gallantly supported.
"As they advanced they perceived the Indians of all ages and of both sexes running to the great cabin near the center of the town, where they collected a full force and appeared determined upon an obstinate defense. Logan instantly took possession of the houses which had been deserted, and, rapidly advancing from cabin to cabin, at length established his detachment within close rifle shot of the Indian redoubt.
" He now listened impatiently for the firing which should have been heard from the opposite extremity of the town, where he supposed Bowman's party to be; but, to his astonishment, everything remained quiet in that quarter. In the meantime, his own position had become critical. The Indians had recovered from their panic, and kept up a heavy and close fire upon the cabins which covered his men. He had pushed his detachment so close to the redoubt, that they could neither advance nor retreat without great expos- ure. The enemy outnumbered him, and gave indications of a disposition to turn both flanks of his position, and thus endanger his retreat.
"Under these circumstances, ignorant of the condition of his commander, and cut off from communication with him, he formed the bold and judicious resolution to make a movable breastwork of the plank which formed the floors of the cabins, and, under cover of it, to rush upon the stronghold of the enemy, and carry it by main force; but before the necessary steps could be taken, a messenger arrived from Bowman with orders to retreat.
" Astonished at such an order, at a time when honor and safety required an offensive movement on their part, Logan hastily asked if Bowman had been overpowered by the enemy? No. What, then, was the cause of this ยท extraordinary abandonment of a design so prosperously begun? Logan, however reluctant, was compelled to obey. A retreat is always a dispiriting movement, and with militia is almost certain to terminate in a complete- rout. As soon as the men were informed of the order, a most irregular and tumultuous scene commenced. Not being buoyed up by the mutual confi- dence which is the offspring of discipline, and which sustains regular soldiers under all circumstances, they no longer acted in concert.
" Each man selected the time, manner, and route of his retreat for himself. Here a solitary Kentuckian would start up from behind a stump, and scud away through the grass, dodging and turning to avoid the balls which whistled around him. There a dozen men would run from a cabin, and scatter in every direction, each anxious to save himself, and none having leisure to attend his neighbors. The Indians, astonished at seeing men rout them- selves in this manner, sallied out of their redoubts and pursued the strag. glers, as sportsmen would cut up a flock of wild geese. They soon united
145
CHIEFS BLACKFISH AND RED HAWK KILLED.
themselves to Bowman's party, who, from some unaccountable panic, had stood stock still near the spot where Logan had left them the night before.
"All was confusion. By great exertions on the part of Logan, well sec- onded by Harrod, Bulger, and the gallant Major Bedinger, of the Blue Licks, some degree of order was restored, and a respectable retreat commenced. The Indians, however, soon surrounded them on all sides, and kept up a hot fire, which began to grow fatal. The sounds of the rifle-shots had, how- ever, completely restored the men to their senses. and they readily formed in a large hollow square, took trees, and returned the fire with equal vivacity. The enemy were quickly repelled, and the troops recommenced their march.
"But scarcely had they advanced half a mile, when the Indians reap- peared, and again opened fire upon the front, rear, and both flanks. Again a square was formed and the enemy repelled; but scarcely had the harassed troops recommenced their march, when the same galling fire was opened upon them again from every tree, bush, and stone capable of concealing an Indian. Matters now began to look serious. The enemy were evidently endeavoring to detain them until fresh Indians could come up in sufficient force to compel them to lay down their arms. The men began to be unsteady, and the panic was rapidly spreading from the colonel to the privates. At this crisis, Logan, Harrod, and Bedinger selected the boldest and best-mounted men, and dashing into the bushes on horseback, scoured the woods in every direction, forcing the Indians from their coverts, and cutting down as many as they could overtake. This unexpected aggressive move from a retreating foe put the enemy on a final rout.
"In the beginning of the retreat, the noted chief, Blackfish, was killed, when Red Hawk, a new chief, took command. In the charge on horseback, he, too, was killed, when the Indians fell back in precipitate retreat. The loss of the whites was nine killed and several wounded. As usual, it was difficult to judge of the Indian losses; but the fall of the two chiefs and the repulse of the Indians, and their inability to pursue further, led to the belief that it was far in excess of that of the Kentuckians. A portion of Chillicothe was burned, and a considerable amount of personal property destroyed or brought away. Among the latter were over one hundred and sixty horses, which the whites managed to gather up from the town and vicinity, and bring off with them."
Butler states that Colonel Bowman was informed by a negro, just before the time for attack, that Simon Girty, with one hundred Mingos, had been sent for by a runner, to come to the relief of Chillicothe. General James Ray says that the vigorous fire of the Indians from their shelter kept Bow- man from giving Logan the signal.
The whole country, from Maine to Georgia, and from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, was a maelstrom of war; the roar of the cannon heard, and the tomahawk brandished. The industrial and financial conditions were greatly demoralized. Paper bills had been issued and substituted for coined
IO
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
metals without a basis of redemption, and its quantity so increased that its depreciation was sensibly felt, and rapidly progressing. Could it even have. been absorbed by taxation, there was nothing to supply its place as a circu- lating medium, without again putting the same money into circulation; nor could the colonies prosecute the war without the continuance of the old, or the issue of new, bills.
In this emergency, Virginia began to look to the sale of Kentucky lands as an important source of replenishment for her overstrained treasury. This disposition was encouraged, in the doubts and disputes about titles, by some who wanted the sanction of law to support their existing claims, and by others to acquire a safe possession in the soil so fertile and inviting. The whole people of Virginia desired it as a relief from the growing burden of war-taxes, now more onerous than the impositions of the British Government which provoked the people to take up arms. Such are the variable calami- ties of war.
1 At the May session of the Legislature, the Land Law of Virginia was passed, by which the terms of allodial property in the soil were prescribed. This was an event of more than ordinary importance. and being coincident with the brilliant conquests of Colonel George Rogers Clark, seemed to open a new era in the affairs of Kentucky. In many districts of Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina, the marches and conflicts of the contending armies of the English and Continentals had made residence and property as insecure as it was on the distant frontiers of Kentucky under the dangers from Indian incursions. The new law gave the people all they could ask-a pure fee simple in the land already acquired or to be purchased hereafter. It went further, and required that no citizen should be eligible to a seat in the General Assembly unless he was the possessor in his own name and right of a freehold estate ; and to secure the citizen in his domicile. the law partially exempted this freehold estate from liability of sale for debt. Whatever may be thought of these provisions, they were highly esteemed and lauded by some of the leading political economists of the day.
Marshall says of them: "These are the great sheet anchors of the public policy of Virginia, and of her private morality. To these, she owes her stability, her consistency, and her influence, as well as her dignity and her prosperity. Yielding enough to democracy, which is ever to be re- spected when duly restrained. and never disparaged but in its excesses, she has wisely embraced in her constitution of government some restraints to its licentiousness, some checks to its violence, and some security against its follies."
The emphasis of these sentiments will be better understood when viewed in contrast to the acquisition and tillage of the soil in the first settlement of Virginia. The first settlers were under direction of powerful and wealthy land companies, which ordered the cultivation of the soil in common, with-
1 Marshall, pp. 73-89.
147
THE LAND LAW OF 1779.
out any interest on the part of the agriculturist in the soil until long after, and upon conditions. Under the operations of such a land monopoly, there was a repetition of defective crops, notwithstanding the fertility of the James river bottoms and the mildness and salubrity of the climate. The worn and wasted lands of Virginia attested the impolicy of repeating such experiments in the new West. In the first explorations in Kentucky, attempts were made by prior surveys and assumed rights of claim on the part of land monopoly companies to absorb the more desirable tracts, and to find a speculation in the colonization of these on an extended scale.
The Ohio Company was formed previous to the rupture with England, under a charter from the latter Government, consisting of great personages on both sides of the Atlantic. It had employed a few active agents, who had explored and surveyed much of western Virginia and Kentucky, with a view of obtaining patents therefor. Christopher Gist was commissioned by this company "to go out westward of the great mountains and search out and discover the large bodies of good and level lands on the Ohio river, as far down as the falls." Gist reached the Shawanee town, now Portsmouth, on the Ohio river, in 1751, and found about one hundred houses on the Ohio side and forty on the Kentucky side, the only Indian residents known in Kentucky by the whites. Here were found also English and French traders, and we learn that here Colonel George Croghen and Andrew Mon- tour made speeches to the Indians in council. We hear of them soon after marveling over the wonders of Big Bone Lick, and subsequently of their divers surveys. For these, the deranged state of the country and the out- break of the rebellion prevented the issue of patents.
The Indiana Company was much similar, and shared a similar fate. The Transylvania Company followed, and would have fared no better, save the indemnifying grants of two hundred thousand acres each by Virginia and North Carolina. Many other surveys had been made on various claims, some of which were exceedingly mythical, and afterward came in for a share of the land litigation over Kentucky.
The Land Law of 1779 set forth that-
"WHEREAS, the various and vague claims to unpatented lands, previous to the establishment of the Commonwealth's land office, may produce tedious litigation, discourage the taking up of lands, and frustrate the raising of funds for the public debt and expenses; therefore.
"Be it enacted, That all surveys of waste and unappropriated lands made prior to January 1, 1778, by any county surveyor commissioned by the mas- ters of William and Mary College, and founded upon charter duly proved and certified, and upon entries made before October 26, 1763, and not exceeding four hundred acres, etc., shall be and are hereby declared good and valid; but that all surveys of such lands made by any other person, or upon any other pretense whatsoever, shall be and are hereby declared null and void."
148
HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
But many worthy and meritorious claimants had, with honest intent to become permanent settlers, "squatted" on lands and made improvements, without an opportunity of survey and entry in the disturbed condition of affairs. For such it was enacted "that such persons as have, at their own charge, settled upon or settled others upon any unappropriated lands which no other person hath any legal right or claim to, shall be allowed, for every family so settled, four hundred acres or less, as the party may choose, for which two and one quarter dollars per hundred acres shall be paid."
Thus was the fee simple to be completed. This was not all the privilege granted, however. To every person entitled to a settlement, there was, at his option, allowed a pre-emption of not exceeding one thousand acres ad- joining his settlement. For this he was to pay the State price, at the rate of forty dollars per hundred acres.
1 The question of land titles having now been settled, and every influ- ence being auspicious, the emigration mania seemed to spread abroad among the people like an epidemic of fever. The autumn of 1779 was made mem- orable for the removal of great numbers from Virginia and the bordering States. Four commissioners were appointed to hear and determine all dis- putes relative to land claims, and to grant certificates of having settled in the country and of prior rights to purchase, or of pre-emption rights to those entitled to them. The first board for Kentucky county was composed of William Fleming, Edmund Lyne, James Barbour, and Stephen Trigg, all non-residents of the county. On the 13th of October this important land court was opened at St. Asaph's, in Lincoln county, and John Williams, Jr., appointed clerk. The commissioners afterward held court in turn at Har- rodstown, Falls of Ohio, Boonesborough, and Bryan's station.
The first claim presented was that of Isaac Shelby, to a settlement and pre-emption about two miles south-east of Knob Lick, on the divide of the waters of Dick and Salt rivers, for raising a crop of corn in the country in 1776. This perfected his title to four hundred acres, and gave him a prior claim to enter one thousand acres more adjacent. For the first he paid two and a quarter dollars per hundred acres, and for the second forty dollars per hundred acres. This seemed an overflow of charity and consideration for the hardy settlers, to sell them farms on such low terms, and, under another provision, on credit; but never was a measure more fruitful of dire woes and calamities to any people than the Land Law of Virginia proved to be to the Kentucky community. It was the Pandora's box in after years to lure the confiding to investments of fancied security, only to trick them out of the fruits of years of toil and sacrifice, distracting the courts and Legislatures with endless perplexities and doubtful interpretations.
The tide of "movers" once set in seemed to swell into the flow of a mighty stream by the next year. The emigration was unprecedented, and Anglo American conquest and occupancy in Kentucky and the North-west
I Marshall, Vol. I., pp. 98-99.
17"
149
PERMANENT SETTLEMENT OF LEXINGTON.
became a manifest destiny. Clark's master-stroke of generalship and states- manship was the pivotal point on which balanced the fate of empire.
Colonel Floyd afterward writes: "Three hundred large family boats arrived during the spring of 1780 at the falls, and as many as ten or fifteen wagons could be seen daily going from there. By this time there were six stations on Beargrass creek, with a population of six hundred souls. The price of corn fluctuated from fifty dollars per bushel in December, 1779, to one hundred and sixty five in January, 1780, and thirty dollars in May. These prices were at a season of obstructed navigation during the unparal- leled cold winter of 1779-80, and in continental paper which had depreciated as forty to one at the close of the year 1779, as seventy-five to one at the end
STOCKADE AT LEXINGTON. of 1780, and as one thousand to one in December, 178t." 1 In April of this year the first permanent settlement of Lex- ington as an important station was made. A number of citizens of Harrodstown and vicinity came over to the north side of Kentucky river to locate and improve this place. Among these were Robert Patterson, James Morrison, Samuel Johnson, David Mitchell, Josiah Collins, Elijah Collins, James Parberry, William McCon- nell, Hugh Shannon, John Maxwell, James Masterson, and James Duncan, a number of whom were noted as among the most enterprising and daring of the pioneers of Kentucky. As improved and fortified during the year, Lexington consisted of three rows of houses or cabins, the two outer rows constituting a portion of the walls of the stockade. These extended from the corner of a square, afterward known as Levy's corner, to James Master-
1 Collins, Vol. II., p. 179; Ranck's History.
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HISTORY OF KENTUCKY.
son's house, on Main street. The intervals between the houses were stock- aded. The outlet was a puncheon door with a bar to secure it. A block house commanded the public spring, and a common field included the site of the court-house square. Though the discipline about the fort is said never to have been very rigid, nor the stockade kept in strict order, this sta- tion escaped any serious danger from Indian attack.
Out of this little plant grew the neat and beautiful city of Lexington, the charmed center of the famed Bluegrass region of Kentucky. Its beginning was under the fostering energy and care of Colonel Robert Patterson, a brave and meritorious adventurer among the frontiersmen who laid the foundations of the Commonwealth in the cement of blood and toil. He owned and improved the property on the hill in the western part of the city.
In this same year Bryan's station, about five miles north-east of Lexing- ton, was settled by four brothers from North Carolina, one of whom, William Bryan, had married a sister of Daniel Boone. 1 This vicinity was afterward much infested by the Indians.
Martin's improvement on Stoner, three miles below Paris, was reoccupied and strengthened with stockade defenses between the cluster of cabins that formed the main outline of the station. Isaac Ruddell also rebuilt and for- tified Hinkson's in the same way, and the two became this year the main rendezvous for the settlers on the waters of Licking.
Pittman's station, one of the earliest in the Green river country, was established on the right bank of Green river, in this year, and about five miles west of Greensburg, near the mouth of Pittman's creek, showing a disposition to extend the settlements to regions distant from the first cen- ters.
One of the most important stations erected during the year was that by a party led by Squire Boone, in Shelby county. Besides himself and fan- ily, the following men, some of them with families, were of the party: Evan Hinton, Alexander Bryan. Richard Cates, John Stapleton, and George Yunt. ? Squire Boone referred to this in a subsequent deposition as "his station on the Painted Stone." It was located on Clear creek, near the present site of Shelbyville, and for two years was almost the only settlement between Beargrass and Leestown, now Frankfort.
This year brought back to Kentucky, and to their old survey improve- ment on Salt river. the McAfee brothers and their families. The war with England, in which several of the family participated, and the derangement of home affairs, had kept them nearly three years away, during which time their cattle had run wild in the woods, or fallen a prey to Indian marauders. They were once more back on the old ground of their first choosing, having passed Cumberland Gap with pack-horses. They at once proceeded to for- tify their position by erecting the usual quadrangular enclosures of cabins and stockades, well known subsequently as McAfee's station.
I McClung; Collins, Vol. II., p. 186. 2 Collins, Vol. II., p. 710.
151
CAPTURE AND DEATH OF JOSEPH M'COUN.
The winter of 1779-80 became noted in history as the severest in the early annals of Kentucky. From the middle of November to the middle of February there was no cessation of cold, and thick ice and deep snow continued without thaw. Many of the cattle perished. and numbers of bears, buffaloes, deer, wolves, beavers, and wild turkeys were frozen to death. Some- times the famished wild animals would come up in the yards of the stations along with the tame cattle. Such was the scarcity, from the interruption of transportation and the increase of population, that a single johnny cake would be divided into a dozen parts, and distributed around to the inmates of the house, to serve for two meals. Even this supply gave out, and all were compelled to live for weeks on wild game.
Early in the spring, some of the men from McAfees went to the Falls of Ohio, where they purchased some corn at sixty dollars a bushel, the Ohio river being for months frozen over. This was an enormous price, even at the value of the depreciated money; yet it was better than starvation. For- tunately, a delightful spring opened, and the rapid growth of vegetation promised relief from these privations. They saw the peach-trees they had planted five years before break out in full bloom. and bear loads of young fruit, most luscious to their tastes when matured. The young apple-trees, too, were growing well, and gave to all a homelike air.
Dr. Davidson's narrative continues :
"Plenty and happiness smiled upon the settlement, and all seemed pro- pitious, when their flattering prospects were all at once damped by a mel- ancholy event that filled every heart with gloom.
"Joseph McCoun, a promising lad, the youngest and favorite of the whole family, was surprised and carried off by a party of Shawanee Indians, while looking after some cattle in an adjoining glade. His companion es- caped, and immediately gave the alarm ; but pursuit was vain. The savages carried their unhappy victim to a little town on the headwaters of Mad river, about six miles above the spot now occupied by the town of Springfield, Ohio, where they tied him to a stake, and burned him with excruciating tortures. After this heartrending event. which took place in March, 1781, the families, seven in number, abandoned the farms they had been culti- vating, and took refuge in the station. This step was rendered absolutely necessary, for the Indians were prowling in every direction, stealing horses, attacking the armed companies that passed from one station to the other, and killing and scalping every unfortunate straggler that fell into their hands. The expedition under General Clark, in which the men of the Salt river set- tlement, burning for vengeance, participated, daunted them for a time, and restored quiet.
"The insecurities of the settlers, and the hazards to which they were exposed about this period, appeared to have been very great. There was no communication between the stations, of which there were now several, except by armed companies. The inhabitants, not daring to spend the night
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