USA > Virginia > Tazewell County > Tazewell County > Annals of Tazewell County, Virginia from 1800 to 1922 > Part 1
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY
L 3 1833 02379 5757
GENEALOGY 975.501 T21H v. 1
C BACHRACH
John Newton Harman Sen
ANNALS
OF
Tazewell County, Virginia
From 1800 to 1922
IN TWO VOLUMES
By -
F
1
JOHN NEWTON HARMAN, SR.
Tazewell, Virginia Member Virginia Historical Society
VOLUME I-IN TWO PARTS
PART I Containing Records of Courts, etc., from 1800 to 1852
PART 2
Containing a Republication of Bickley's History of the "Settlement and Indian Wars of Tazewell County," published 1852
1922 W. C. HILL PRINTING COMPANY RICHMOND, VIRGINIA
COPYRIGHT, 1923, BY JOHN NEWTON HARMAN, SR.
-
1190736
DEDICATED
To the Memory of the Pioneer Families of Tazewell County, Virginia
They felled the forests; built their cabins; protected their homes from savages; fostered education; believed in, and lived the Christian Religion, thereby leaving to us, their descendants, this priceless heritage.
Preface to Volume One and Announcement of Volume Two
During several years we have been gathering information for the purpose of publishing a Genealogy of the Harman family of Southwest Virginia, and of related families. In pursuance of this purpose, we made inspection of records of the Land Office and the Public Library at Richmond; of the County Court Records of Frederick, Shenandoah, Rockingham, Augusta, Montgomery, Wythe, Smythe, Washington, Giles, Russell and Tazewell Counties.
Later it occurred to us that a similar genealogy of other pioneer families of Tazewell County would be as interesting to their descendants as that of the Harmans and related families is to us. This led us to undertake the publication of the "ANNALS OF TAZE- WELL COUNTY" from 1800 to 1922.
We now present to the reader Volume One of the ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY from 1800 to 1852, which contains extracts from the court records during that period of general public interest and which are of special interest to the descendants of the pioneer families of the county.
During the period covered by Volume One the County of Taze- well embraced the territory now composing the County of Buchanan and parts of Giles and Bland Counties in Virginia, and the County of McDowell and parts of Mercer and Logan Counties in West Virginia.
Volume One, Part 1, contains extracts from court records per- taining to court orders, wills and deeds; the names of all civil and military officers of the county; all lawyers admitted to the bar; all preachers licensed to celebrate the rites of matrimony, and an exact copy of the marriage registers from 1800 to 1852; every deed made to churches of all denominations from 1800 to 1922; the names of all the representatives in the General Assembly of Virginia from 1800 to 1852; the Governors of the State, and a list of Revolutionary pensioners, and various other records in the clerk's office of general interest.
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ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY, VIRGINIA.
Part 2 of Volume One is a republication of Bickley's History of the "SETTLEMENT AND INDIAN WARS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY," published in 1852. This first history of Tazewell, by Dr. Bickley, is a most valuable volume.
ANNOUNCEMENT.
Volume Two, which will contain an extension of nearly all the features of Volume One, will also embrace, in addition thereto, a list of Confederate soldiers, and a complete roll of the soldiers in the World War who went from Tazewell County. All these records will be brought down to 1922.
A special feature of Volume Two will be a genealogy of old Tazewell families, together with biographical sketches of many who have achieved official professional or industrial distinction in the county ; also a list of the incorporated towns in the county, together with the names of the mayors, town sergeants and present popula- tion.
Another important feature of Volume Two will be a short his- tory of the beginning and progress of the different religious denomi- nations in the county, provided representatives of the several churches will prepare and furnish these historical sketches.
We have not written a history of Tazewell. We have simply presented history as already officially written in the public records of the county. We have not copied all the records of general public interest, but have selected those most intimately connected with the pioneer families of the county.
J. NEWTON HARMAN, SENIOR. Tazewell, Virginia, December, 1922.
Before the Gates of the Wilderness Road
THE SETTLEMENT OF SOUTHWESTERN VIRGINIA. By JUDGE LYMAN CHALKLEY
Taken from the Virginia Historical Magazine with permission of the Author.
In speaking of the conditions existing in Virginia and North Carolina immediately preceding the trip of Boone, when he is sup- posed to have blazed a trail through the mountains to Kentucky, which, after his time, came to be called "The Wilderness Road," Speed, in his history of that road, describes somewhat carefully a thoroughfare and highway from Philadelphia through Winchester, Staunton and other points in the Shenandoah Valley, extending "to an important station at the waters of New River which run to the west. At that point another road which led out from Richmond through the central parts of Virginia intersected the one just described. Thus were brought together two tides of immigrants. Near the forks of the road stood Fort Chissel, a rude blockhouse built in 1758, by Colonel Bird immediately after the British and Americans captured Fort Duquesne from the French." And the same authority says further: "Beside the road which passed along the Valley of Virginia, and the one which ran out from Richmond to the intersection at New River, there werc other travelcd ways or traces which lcd up to Cumberland Gap from the Carolinas and through the mountains of East Tennessee." He concludes: "Thus it appears that all the roads from the Atlantic States converged upon the points, Fort Pitt and Cumberland Gap." Of Fort Chisscl (Chiswell) he says: "It is a point of great interest in studying the Kentucky immigration. It was there the immigrants reached the
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ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY, VIRGINIA.
borders of the great wilderness. The wild, rough, dangerous part of the journey commenced when New River was crossed at Inglis' Ferry, and the travelers turned squarely toward the setting sun."
Monette tells us, as of the year 1762, "the people from the sources of James were crossing the dividing ridges and descending upon the Greenbrier, New River and other tributaries of Kenhawa. Others from Roanoke and North Carolina were advancing westward upon the sources of the Stanton, Dan, Yadkin, Cataba and Broad, along the eastern base of the Blue Mountains, with wistful eyes upon the beautiful country of the Cherokees." And again Monette says, as of 1767: "Settlements were now advancing rapidly from the eastern portions of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia, and emigrants were pressing forward upon the upper tributaries of the Monongahela and upon the great branches of Cheat River. On the south, the frontier counties of Virginia and North Carolina were pouring forth their hardy pioneers who were still advancing and already settling the fertile regions upon the headwaters of New River, as well as upon the sources of Greenbrier. Others full of enterprise and western adventure were exploiting the country drained by the great branches of Clinch River, and were forming remote, isolated settlements in Powell's Valley, still further north and west, and also upon the waters of the North Fork of Holston, in the regions near the present towns of Abingdon and Wytheville.
"The counties of Rockbridge, Augusta, Greenbrier and Frederick were frontier regions, occupied by a sparse population, exposed to the dangers of savage massacre; the towns of Staunton, Lexington, and Winchester were remote frontier trading posts, inhabited by a few persons, who formed a connecting link between the Indians and the eastern people of Virginia."
So far, the references have been to that portion of the territory which lies within the present borders of the State of Virginia. To the south of the present Virginia-Tennessee line lay a narrow strip running northeast and southwest, mountain and valley, watered by the Holston, Clinch and Powell rivers. This is a continuation of the same fertile valleys and rugged mountains of the Virginia side, where all these rivers have their rise. This district north (that is, west) of the Holston was at first believed to be within the bound- aries of Virginia, and settlers acted accordingly. They pre-empted their lands under Virginia laws and protection. They formed the
9
BEFORE THE GATES OF THE WILDERNESS ROAD
Watauga Association, according to Phelan, in 1772. He tells us: "But a still more serious trouble was impending over the infant communities. About 1769 Colonel Donelson had made a treaty with the Indians by which Virginia bought what was called the western frontiers. By this treaty, it was supposed that the Watauga region went to that colony. Believing themselves in Virginia, the Watauga people supposed themselves governed by Virginia laws, and looked to that State or colony for protection against Indian aggressions and the raids of horse thieves. North Carolina, her- self, took no steps looking to the exercise of any authority over the settlements, many of which had been made in violation of the treaty with the Cherokces at Lochaber in 1770. It had everything to lose and nothing to gain by recognizing them as being on North Carolina territory, which recognition would carry with it the obligation of protecting them against the inroads of the Indians."
These extracts from familiar authorities have been quoted in the hope that through their means would be recalled most readily that portion of the sources of the Ohio which lies in the extreme southwestern corner of the present State of Virginia and the extreme northeastern corner of Tennessee contiguous. This section had been known to the white, and a path marked out by travel certainly fifteen years prior to the earliest date that has been mentioned. It also appears that there was an established traffic over this district between the whites of the eastern settlements and the Cherokees as early as 1740. Heyward is authority for it that: "A Mr. Vaughan, of Amelia County, Virginia, went, in 1740, as a packman with trad- ers to the Cherokees. He found the country west of Amelia sparsely inhabited, the last hunter's cabin he saw was on Otter River, a branch of Stanton (Roanoke) now in Bedford County (which lies east of the Blue Ridge). He described the trading path from Vir- ginia, crossing New River, English's Ferry, Seven Mile Ford on the Holston, Grassy Springs, Nolichucky and the French Broad." In 1741, John Smith, Zachariah Lewis, William Waller, Benjamin Waller, Robert Green and James Patton were granted an order of Council of Virginia for one hundred thousand acres on James River and Roanoke, and extending to and including waters of the Indian or New River. Patton was manager and employed Smith, who was the Colonel John Smith who was captured by Indians and had many experiences which are familiar. These two were occupied in induc-
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ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY, VIRGINIA.
ing immigration until 1751. Patton eventually bought out all the patentees except Smith and Lewis. These were the worthies of the land in their generation, and many incidents in their careers might be detailed. They were of the Scotch-Irish settlers in the Shenan- doah, the centers of which was Augusta County, from whose records the data here presented will be mainly taken. This county was formed in 1745 and until 1769 included all the territory that has been mentioned. The records of the District and Superior Courts having jurisdiction over practically the same territory until nearly 1800 are also there. Prior to 1745 there are perhaps additional data of record in Orange County and at Richmond which have not been carefully examined, but the writer had not had access to them. Perhaps, also, much could be gathered from the files of the courts of Fincastle, Botetourt and Washington counties, which were all erected early from the territory of Augusta, but they are not readily accessible. No doubt, the papers of Lunenburg and other counties adjacent on the east, on the other slope of the Blue Ridge, would contain material and incident. The investigator is confined for the present to the movement of that body already mentioned, who migrated in mass from Pennsylvania into the Shenandoah Val- ley, blazing the way, settling and cultivating the soil, driving out the Indians, establishing churches and schools and a distinctive civilization, making clear and safe the avenue right up to the very entrance of the wilderness. These hardy, courageous, prudent, foresighted people were fortified and prepared by long tradition of migration and colonization, of coveting the land and driving out the Canaanites. The conditions were somewhat analogous in America and in Ireland. Their historian in Kentucky says: "After the subjugation of Ulster, in the reign of James I, the semi-barbarous natives were replaced by a colony of tenants from Great Britian, attracted thither by liberal grants of land." Smythe says of them: "The more decidedly a man is Presbyterian the more decidedly is he a Republican." Davidison says: "The Presbyterians of Virginia, like the rest of their brethern were marked by an inextinguishable love of liberty, and during the Revolution were staunch Republicans to a man. At the very first meeting of the Presbytery of Hanover after the Declaration of Independence, they sent a memorial to the House of Delegates identifying themselves with the common cause. They presented others in 1777 and 1784, protesting against a general
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BEFORE THE GATES OF THE WILDERNESS ROAD
assessment for the support of religion. And still another petition in 1785, signed by 10,000 persons, was argued before the House of Delegates for three days. The main object of all these petitions was to complain of the partial and peculiar privileges still continued to the Episcopal, late the established church and its vestrymen."
The Synod of Philadelphia, before the erection of the Virginia and Transylvania Synods (the Transylvania Synod included the churches and communities in Kentucky) had these worthy people under its immediate charge. The ecclesiastical patriarch of the flock was the Rev. John Craig. He has left a name and character of honor and a memory of worthy service. At an early time he was sent to visit the brethern on New River and Holston. On his return, he reported such a surprisingly large list of elders whom he had ordained in that sparsely settled region, that the Synod remon- strated and asked questions. He defended himself by saying, "Where I cudna get hewn stones, I tuk dornaks." Wherever they established a church they established a school. In 1774 those of the faith established two academies, one Hampden-Sidney, in the eastern, and Liberty Hall (now Washington and Lee University) in the western part of the State, giving each a name indicative of their desire to be free.
The authorities of the colony of Virginia, in looking to the pro- tection of its western frontier, had erected a series of forts on the "Western Waters," as this district was called. There were local stockades were the people gathered in time of peril, at various places. Indeed, nearly every early settlement seems to have been at some time looked upon as the fort of its own immediate vicinity. But they were not continuously occupied for any considerable period by royal troops. Of these, the most prominent was Fort Lewis, a few miles east of the present town of Salem, in Roanoke County. At the time of Colonel Bird's (Byrd's) expedition against the southwestern Indians, this was the frontier settlement of Vir- ginia. In August, 1760, Colonel John Smith, of the Virginia regi- ment under Byrd, sent out against the Cherokees, was in command at Fort Lewis. Captain John Blagg, commanded a company under Smith. Joseph Ray was contractor and commisary for the army. In 1763, colonization had progressed so far that it was necessary to build a road between New River by Fort Chiswell to Fort Lewis. Notwithstanding the statement from Heyward that this was the
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ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY, VIRGINIA.
frontier settlement in 1759, we should not take it that the country had not been settled before that time; for, in the records of the vestry of Augusta Parish, we find that William Bryan and Jas. Neilley were appointed processioners in 1747 for the country con- tiguous to the fort.
Vaux's Fort lay on the Roanoke, higher up. In 1756 it had been devastated by Indians and twenty-seven people were killed or taken prisoners. Heyward says that after this massacre there were left no settlers west of the Blue Ridge except a few men who worked at the lead mines. Shortly after Colonel Byrd's expeditions, how- ever, that is in 17.63, John Smyth, William Grymes, James Nealey and Israel Christian were appointed to view the roads that led from Vaux's over the New River on the lands of John Buchanan and likewise by Ingles' Ferry to the lead mines. And in 1767 James Neeley, Philip Love, William Christian and William Bryan were appointed viewers of a road from Vaux's by Ingles' Ferry to Peak Creek on the north side of New River. The petitioners were all men of note in the development of the country: Frederick Stern, Isaac Job, Thomas Grayson, John Bell, Henry Skaggs, Joseph Hix, John Draper, George Baker, Joseph Hord, Levy Smith, Erasmus Noble, Samuel Peffer, James Coudon, Edward Vansell, Humphrey Baker, Anthony Bledsoe, James Newell and Alexander Page.
Colonel Byrd, in 1758, built two forts at the command of the Colonial Government, Fort Chiswell, near the forks of the roads from Pennsylvania, and from Richmond, on the waters of New River, and the fort at Long Island, on Holston River, in the present County of Sullivan, Tennessee. Monette states that this was the first fort established on the Holston. The year before, that is in 1757, Fort Loudoun was established by Andrew Lewis on the Ten- nessee River at the mouth of Tellico. It was afterwards known as Watauga. The next year, in 1758, 200 settlers went there in a body. Phelan states: "Fort Loudoun was garrisoned by royal troops, and the Cherokees, regarding it as a protection against the vengeance of the French offered donations of land to artisans as an induce- ment to come there. The warfare between the English and the French which raged in all parts of the world, was too far from the region of East Tennessee to affect it, otherwise than indirectly." It was the scene of a terrible massacre immediately after the reduc- tion of Duquesne, the Cherokees captured it and all in the fort were
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BEFORE THE GATES OF THE WILDERNESS ROAD
destroyed. This fort has the distinction of having been manned by twelve cannon, which will testify to its importance. It was near the present city of Knoxville, the center of a district tacitly under the protection of the colony of Virginia, although none of the county governments exercised jurisdiction.
The most northerly limits of the section lying before Cumber- land Gap and the entrance to the Wilderness Road are along the divide which separates the waters of the James and Roanoke (or Stanton) rivers, both of which take their rise west of the Blue Ridge Mountains and break through that range, flowing east and southeast; the sources of the Shenandoah and New Rivers (or Woods River) flowing north and northwest, and the Holston and its tributaries flowing south and southwest. The tide of migration had been steady from the beginning southwards from the Shenandoah Scotch-Irish settlements of Augusta. There was here the usual course of settle- ments following the streams and valleys. The leaders of this migra- tion had kept in close touch with the authorities at Williamsburg, with which place communication was open and constant. Its gen- eral course seems to have been directed from the capital with decision, promptness and wisdom. Indeed, these leaders were men of large caliber and great force, and had a motive sufficiently excit- ing to keep them active. It must be admitted that the main object of the leaders was self-aggrandizement. A bureaucracy and cabal were in complete control and there was the opportunity to establish families and fortune through grants of large tracts of land, which were no sooner marked out than they were taken under the military protection of the colony. The grant to Jas. Patton, Smith and Lewis, and others of 100,000 acres in 1741 has already been men- tioned. This lay upon the headwaters of the Roanoke and James, and Monette says: "In none of the provinces had the infatuation for western lands been carried to a greater extent than in Virginia. Blair reported in 1757 to the Executive Council of Virginia that the quantity of lands then entered to companies and individuals amounted to three millions of acres, a large portion of which had been granted as early as 1754." The most important of these grants within the borders of the section now under consideration was that to the Loyal Company on the 12th of July, 1749. It was 800,000 acres beginning on the North Carolina (Tennessee) line and running westward on condition that it should be divided into plats and sur-
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ANNALS OF TAZEWELL COUNTY, VIRGINIA.
veys made and returned to the secretary's office within four years. It was not completed in four years, and in June, 1753, the Council granted four years' further time. This was interrupted by the French and Indian War, and at the close the Council was restrained by the British Government. Afterwards, the officers and soldiers entitled to lands under the proclamation of 1763, began to make settlements, and the agents and settlers under the company peti- tioned the Council that they might hold of the company and soldiers might be restrained from interfering with them; and in 1773, the Council allowed the settlers to make surveys and return them to the office. In 1753, a survey was made under this grant for Timothy Cole, of 190 acres in Washington County, in Rich Valley, on the waters of the North Fork of Holston River. The company gave titles upon payment of surveyor's fees and £3 for every one hundred acres. Dr. Thomas Walker had the management of the affairs of the company, as well as being a member, and he appointed William English his agent. Cole abandoned his land, and then in 1768 Joseph Scott and Stephen Trigg paid the fees on the same tract and they conveyed to David Ross in 1775. The affairs of the Loyal Company were before the Supreme Court of Virginia and, in 1783, the title of the company to all lands surveyed under it prior to 1776 was established. In 1803, action was brought by Edmund Pendleton and Nicholas Lewis, surviving partners of the Loyal Company, against one of the earliest settlers, John Crunk.
Among the very early settlers under the Loyal Company, were members of the Harman family. The general course of business under that company and the trials of settlers may be gathered from depositions relating to their early settlement. In 1751, Henry Har- man and his uncle Valentine Harman, were on a hunting expedition when they camped on Sinking Creek of New River, in the present Giles County, and Valentine made what was called an improvement by killing trees. In 1754 he procured a survey under the Loyal Company. In the same year Valentine made a contract with a Dunker, George Hoopaugh, who, it was alleged was poor and lived on Valentine's charity, that George should go and live on the place as tenant. In 1757 Valentine was killed by Indians, in the pres- ence of his nephew, Daniel Harman, and Daniel was taken prisoner, but escaped. No one but George Hoopaugh (Hoopack) lived on Sinking Creek at the time. He continued living there until 1775,
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BEFORE THE GATES OF THE WILDERNESS ROAD
when he moved off because of fear of the Indians. He returned, however, when he claimed the land as by settlement and made a con- veyance of it. Although the grantees of the large tracts were speculators on a large scale, yet the same was not generally true of the settlers. While they were, no doubt, influenced by the prospect of rich lands at a small price, yet as a rule they were looking for a place for bona fide settlement, to make their abiding place, establish their households and pursue their fortunes. They were following upon the footsteps of numerous traders, hunters and trappers who had traversed the wilderness, back and forth, named its hills and streams and acted as prospectors and guides, but their mission was ended with the coming of population. The land speculator was not popular. The titles were but badly recorded and became matter of dispute as the lands became more valuable. These troubles became frequent about 1800, when nearly every piece of land was subject of controversy in the courts in some form. One of the most frequent causes of complaint was that officers and soldiers had located bounty warrants for service in the French and Indian wars so as to conflict with the prior rights of actual settlers. In 1770 James Anderson made a settlement on Cove Creek of North Fork of Holston in Washington County. The next year Samuel Lammie (Lamie, Lamme, Lamb) settled and improved near him and then bought out Anderson. He continued to live there until 1774, when he was killed by Indians, whereupon his brother, Andrew Lamie, took pos- session and lived there until 1805, when action was brought against Arthur Campbell, who set up a claim. Arthur Campbell claimed that Andrew made no lawful settlement because he had no family, and claimed that in 1770 Andrew and Samuel Lemmie settled three or four miles higher up Cove Creek. In 1774 Samuel was captured by Indians and carried to Canada. Previous to that time the belief prevailed in the new settlement that single men, by what was called "taking up land," might hold the same, and this taking up was com- monly designated by marking trees with the initial letters of the claimant's name, making a few brush heaps near the center of the land, and sometimes a log pen or small cabin. Andrew Lammie con- tinued on the place, according to Campbell, during the Revolution, and was an avowed adherent to the enemies of the country and spurned the offers of the Commonwealth. After the Revolution Andrew moved to the place his brother had claimed and settled on it. Arthur Camp-
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