KENTUCKY'S PATH OF THORNS
The preliminary articles of peace between the United States and Great
Britain had been signed on the thirtieth of November, 1782; but it was
not until the following spring that the news reached Kentucky. The
northern tribes had information of the peace quite as early; and
discouraged at apparently losing their British allies, who had fed,
clothed, armed, and paid them from headquarters in Detroit, for a time
suspended their organized raids into Kentucky. This welcome respite
caused immigration to increase rapidly.
We have seen how the old system of making preemptions and surveys led to
the overlapping of claims, the commission of many acts of injustice, and
wide-spread confusion in titles. Late in 1782, Colonel Thomas Marshall,
the surveyor of Fayette County, arrived from Virginia, and began to
attempt a straightening of the land conflict. Boone was now not only
the surveyor's deputy, but both sheriff and county lieutenant of
Fayette, a combination of offices which he held until his departure from
Kentucky. It was his duty as commandant to provide an escort for
Marshall through the woods to the Falls of the Ohio, where was now the
land-office. The following order which he issued for this guard has been
preserved; it is a characteristic sample of the many scores of letters
and other documents which have come down to us from the old hero, who
fought better than he spelled:
"Orders to Capt. Hazelrigg--your are amedetly to order on
Duty 3 of your Company as goude [guard] to scorte Col
Marshshall to the falls of ohigho you will call on those
who was Exicused from the Shone [Shawnese] Expedistion and
those who Come into the County after the army Marched they
are to meet at Lexinton on Sunday next with out fale given
under my hand this 6 Day of Janury 1783.
"DNL BOONE"
Another specimen document of the time has reference to the scouting
which it was necessary to maintain throughout much of the year; for
small straggling bands of the enemy were still lurking about, eager to
capture occasional scalps, the proudest trophies which a warrior could
obtain. It also is apparently addressed to Hazelrigg:
"orders the 15th feberry 1783
"Sir you are amedetly to Call on Duty one thurd of our
melitia as will mounted on horse as poseble and Eight Days
purvistion to take a touere as follows Commanded by Leut
Col patison and Rendevues at Strod [Strode's Station] on
thusday the 20th from there to March to Colkes [Calk's]
Cabin thence an Este Corse till the gat 10 miles above the
uper Blew Licks then Down to Lickes thence to Limestown
and if no Sine [is] found a stright Corse to Eagel Crick
10 miles from the head from then home if Sine be found the
Commander to act as he thinks most prudent as you will be
the Best Judge when on the Spot. You will first Call on
all who [were] Excused from the Expedistion Except those
that went to the falls with Col. Marshall and then Call
them off as they Stand on the List here in faile not.
given und my hand
"DANIEL BOONE C Lt."
In March the Virginia legislature united the three counties into the
District of Kentucky, with complete legal and military machinery; in the
latter, Benjamin Logan ranked as senior colonel and district lieutenant.
It will be remembered that when the over-mountain country was detached
from Fincastle, it was styled the County of Kentucky; then the name of
Kentucky was obliterated by its division into three counties; and now
the name was revived by the creation of the district, which in due time
was to become a State. The log-built town of Danville was named as the
capital.
It is estimated that during the few years immediately following the
close of the Revolutionary War several thousand persons came each year
to Kentucky from the seaboard States, although many of these returned to
their homes either disillusioned or because of Indian scares. In
addition to the actual settlers, who cared for no more land than they
could use, there were merchants who saw great profits in taking
boat-loads of goods down the Ohio or by pack-trains over the mountains;
lawyers and other young professional men who wished to make a start in
new communities; and speculators who hoped to make fortunes in obtaining
for a song extensive tracts of fertile wild land, which they vainly
imagined would soon be salable at large prices for farms and town sites.
Many of the towns, although ill-kept and far from prosperous in
appearance, were fast extending beyond their lines of palisade and
boasting of stores, law-offices, market-places, and regular streets;
Louisville had now grown to a village of three hundred inhabitants, of
whom over a third were fighting-men. Besides Americans, there were among
the newcomers many Germans, Scotch, and Irish, thrifty in the order
named.
At last Kentucky was raising produce more than sufficient to feed her
own people, and an export trade had sprung up. Crops were being
diversified: Indian corn still remained the staple, but there were also
melons, pumpkins, tobacco, and orchards; besides, great droves of
horses, cattle, sheep, and hogs, branded or otherwise marked, ranged at
large over the country, as in old days on the Virginia and Carolina
foot-hills. Away from the settlements buffaloes still yielded much beef,
bacon was made from bears, and venison was a staple commodity.
The fur trade was chiefly carried on by French trappers; but American
hunters, like the Boones and Kenton, still gathered peltries from the
streams and forests, and took or sent them to the East, either up the
Ohio in bateaux or on packhorses over the mountains--paths still
continually beset by savage assailants. Large quantities of ginseng were
also shipped to the towns on the seaboard. Of late there had likewise
developed a considerable trade with New Orleans and other Spanish towns
down the Mississippi River. Traders with flatboats laden with Kentucky
produce--bacon, beef, salt, and tobacco--would descend the great
waterway, both of whose banks were audaciously claimed by Spain as far
up as the mouth of the Ohio, and take great risks from Indian attack or
from corrupt Spanish custom-house officials, whom it was necessary to
bribe freely that they might not confiscate boat and cargo. This
commerce was always uncertain, often ending in disaster, but immensely
profitable to the unprincipled men who managed to ingratiate themselves
with the Spanish authorities.
Boone was now in frequent demand as a pilot and surveyor by capitalists
who relied upon his unrivaled knowledge of the country to help them find
desirable tracts of land; often he was engaged to meet incoming parties
of immigrants over the Wilderness Road, with a band of riflemen to guard
them against Indians, to furnish them with wild meat--for the newcomers
at first were inexpert in killing buffaloes--and to show them the way to
their claims. He was prominent as a pioneer; as county lieutenant he
summoned his faithful men-at-arms to repel or avenge savage attacks; and
his fame as hunter and explorer had by this time not only become general
throughout the United States but had even reached Europe.
His reputation was largely increased by the appearance in 1784 of the
so-called "autobiography." We have seen that, although capable of
roughly expressing himself on paper, and of making records of his rude
surveys, he was in no sense a scholar. Yet this autobiography, although
signed by himself, is pedantic in form, and deals in words as large and
sonorous as though uttered by the great Doctor Samuel Johnson. As a
matter of fact, it is the production of John Filson, the first historian
of Kentucky and one of the pioneers of Cincinnati. Filson was a
schoolmaster, quite devoid of humor, and with a strong penchant for
learned phrases. In setting down the story of Boone's life, as related
to him by the great hunter, he made the latter talk in the first person,
in a stilted manner quite foreign to the hardy but unlettered folk of
whom Boone was a type. Wherever Boone's memory failed, Filson appears to
have filled in the gaps from tradition and his own imagination; thus the
autobiography is often wrong as to facts, and possesses but minor value
as historical material. The little book was, however, widely circulated
both at home and abroad, and gave Boone a notoriety excelled by few men
of his day. Some years later Byron wrote some indifferent lines upon
"General Boone of Kentucky;" the public journals of the time had
accounts of his prowess, often grossly exaggerated; and English
travelers into the interior of America eagerly sought the hero and told
of him in their books.
Yet it must be confessed that he had now ceased to be a real leader in
the affairs of Kentucky. A kindly, simple-hearted, modest, silent man,
he had lived so long by himself alone in the woods that he was ill
fitted to cope with the horde of speculators and other self-seekers who
were now despoiling the old hunting-grounds to which Finley had piloted
him only fifteen years before. Of great use to the frontier settlements
as explorer, hunter, pilot, land-seeker, surveyor, Indian fighter, and
sheriff--and, indeed, as magistrate and legislator so long as Kentucky
was a community of riflemen--he had small capacity for the economic and
political sides of commonwealth-building. For this reason we find him
hereafter, although still in middle life, taking but slight part in the
making of Kentucky; none the less did his career continue to be
adventurous, picturesque, and in a measure typical of the rapidly
expanding West.
Probably in the early spring of 1786 Boone left the neighborhood of the
Kentucky River, and for some three years dwelt at Maysville (Limestone),
still the chief gateway to Kentucky for the crowds of immigrants who
came by water. He was there a tavern-keeper--probably Mrs. Boone was the
actual hostess--and small river merchant. He still frequently worked at
surveying, of course hunted and trapped as of old, and traded up and
down the Ohio River between Maysville and Point Pleasant--the last-named
occupation a far from peaceful one, for in those troublous times
navigation of the Ohio was akin to running the gauntlet; savages haunted
the banks, and by dint of both strategy and open attack wrought a heavy
mortality among luckless travelers and tradesmen. The goods which he
bartered to the Kentuckians for furs, skins, and ginseng were obtained
in Maryland, whither he and his sons went with laden pack-animals, often
driving before them loose horses for sale in the Eastern markets.
Sometimes they followed some familiar mountain road, at others struck
out over new paths, for no longer was the Wilderness Road the only
overland highway to the West.
Kentucky was now pursuing a path strewn with thorns. Northward, the
British still held the military posts on the upper lakes, owing to the
non-fulfilment of certain stipulations in the treaty of peace. Between
these and the settlements south of the Ohio lay a wide area populated by
powerful and hostile tribes of Indians, late allies of the British,
deadly enemies of Kentucky, and still aided and abetted by military
agents of the king. To the South, Spain controlled the Mississippi, the
commercial highway of the West; jealous of American growth, she harshly
denied to Kentuckians the freedom of the river, and was accused of
turning against them and their neighbors of Tennessee the fierce
warriors of the Creek and Cherokee tribes. On their part, the
Kentuckians looked with hungry eyes upon the rich lands held by Spain.
Not least of Kentucky's trials was the political discontent among her
own people, which for many years lay like a blight upon her happiness
and prosperity. Virginia's home necessities had prevented that
commonwealth from giving much aid to the West during the Revolution, and
at its conclusion her policy toward the Indians lacked the aggressive
vigor for which Kentuckians pleaded. This was sufficient cause for
dissatisfaction; but to this was added another of still greater
importance. To gain the free navigation of the Mississippi, and thus to
have an outlet to the sea, long appeared to be essential to Western
progress. At first the Eastern men in Congress failed to realize this
need, thereby greatly exasperating the over-mountain men. All manner of
schemes were in the air, varying with men's temperaments and ambitions.
Some, like Clark--who, by this time had, under the influence of
intemperance, greatly fallen in popular esteem, although not without
followers--favored a filibustering expedition against the Spanish; and
later (1788), when this did not appear practicable, were willing to join
hands with Spain herself in the development of the continental interior;
and later still (1793-94), to help France oust Spain from Louisiana.
Others wished Kentucky to be an independent State, free to conduct her
own affairs and make such foreign alliances as were needful; but
Virginia and Congress did not release her.
Interwoven with this more or less secret agitation for separating the
West from the East were the corrupt intrigues of Spain, which might have
been more successful had she pursued a persistent policy. Her
agents--among whom were some Western pioneers who later found difficulty
in explaining their conduct--craftily fanned the embers of discontent,
spread reports that Congress intended to sacrifice to Spain the
navigation rights of the West, distributed bribes, and were even accused
of advising Spain to arm the Southern Indians in order to increase
popular uneasiness over existing conditions. Spain also offered large
land grants to prominent American borderers who should lead colonies to
settle beyond the Mississippi and become her subjects--a proposition
which Clark once offered to accept, but did not; but of which we shall
see that Daniel Boone, in his days of discontent, took advantage, as did
also a few other Kentucky pioneers. Ultimately Congress resolved never
to abandon its claim to the Mississippi (1787); and when the United
States became strong, and the advantages of union were more clearly seen
in the West, Kentucky became a member of the sisterhood of States
(1792).
It is estimated that, between 1783 and 1790, fully fifteen hundred
Kentuckians were massacred by Indians or taken captive to the savage
towns; and the frontiers of Virginia and Pennsylvania furnished their
full quota to the long roll of victims. It is impossible in so small a
volume as this to mention all of even the principal incidents in the
catalogue of assaults, heroic defenses, murders, burnings, torturings,
escapes, reprisals, and ambushes which constitute the lurid annals of
this protracted border warfare. The reader who has followed thus far
this story of a strenuous life, will understand what these meant; to
what deeds of daring they gave rise on the part of the men and women of
the border; what privation and anguish they entailed. But let us not
forget that neither race could claim, in this titanic struggle for the
mastery of the hunting-grounds, a monopoly of courage or of cowardice,
of brutality or of mercy. The Indians suffered quite as keenly as the
whites in the burning of their villages, crops, and supplies, and by the
loss of life either in battle, by stealthy attack, or by treachery. The
frontiersmen learned from the red men the lessons of forest warfare, and
often outdid their tutors in ferocity. The contest between civilization
and savagery is, in the nature of things, unavoidable; the result also
is foreordained. It is well for our peace of mind that, in the dark
story of the Juggernaut car, we do not inquire too closely into details.
In 1785, goaded by numerous attacks on settlers and immigrants, Clark
led a thousand men against the tribes on the Wabash; but by this time he
had lost control of the situation, and cowardice on the part of his
troops, combined with lack of provisions, led to the practical failure
of the expedition, although the Indians were much frightened.
At the same time, Logan was more successful in an attack on the Shawnese
of the Scioto Valley, who lost heavily in killed and prisoners. In
neither of these expeditions does Boone appear to have taken part.
The year 1787 was chiefly notable, in the history of the West, for the
adoption by Congress of the Ordinance for the government of the
Territory Northwest of the River Ohio, wherein there dwelt perhaps seven
thousand whites, mostly unprogressive French-Canadians, in small
settlements flanking the Mississippi and the Great Lakes, and in the
Wabash Valley. Along the Ohio were scattered a few American hamlets,
chiefly in Kentucky. In the same year the Indian war reached a height of
fury which produced a panic throughout the border, and frantic appeals
to Virginia, which brought insufficient aid. Boone, now a town trustee
of Maysville, was sent to the legislature that autumn, and occupied his
seat at Richmond from October until January. While there, we find him
strongly complaining that the arms sent out to Kentucky by the State
during the year were unfit for use, the swords being without scabbards,
and the rifles without cartridge-boxes or flints.
A child of the wilderness, Boone was law-abiding and loved peace, but he
chafed at legal forms. He had, in various parts of Kentucky, preempted
much land in the crude fashion of his day, both under the Transylvania
Company and the later statutes of Virginia--how much, it would now be
difficult to ascertain. In his old survey-books, still preserved in the
Wisconsin State Historical Library, one finds numerous claim entries for
himself, ranging from four hundred to ten thousand acres each--a tract
which he called "Stockfield," near Boonesborough; on Cartwright's Creek,
a branch of Beech Fork of Salt River; on the Licking, Elkhorn, Boone's
Creek, and elsewhere. The following is a specimen entry, dated "Aperel
the 22 1785," recording a claim made "on the Bank of Cantuckey"; it
illustrates the loose surveying methods of the time: "Survayd for Dal
Boone 5000 acres begin at Robert Camels N E Corner at 2 White ashes
and Buckeyes S 1200 p[oles] to 3 Shuger trees Ealm and walnut E 666 p to
6 Shuger trees and ash N 1200 p to a poplar and beech W 666 p to the
begining."
It did not occur to our easy-going hero that any one would question his
right to as much land as he cared to hold in a wilderness which he had
done so much to bring to the attention of the world. But claim-jumpers
were no respecters of persons. It was discovered that Boone had
carelessly failed to make any of his preemptions according to the letter
of the law, leaving it open for any adventurer to reenter the choice
claims which he had selected with the care of an expert, and to treat
him as an interloper. Suits of ejectment followed one by one (1785-98),
until in the end his acres were taken from him by the courts, and the
good-hearted, simple fellow was sent adrift in the world absolutely
landless.
At first, when his broad acres began to melt away, the great hunter,
careless of his possessions, appeared to exhibit no concern; but the
accumulation of his disasters, together with the rapid growth of
settlement upon the hunting-grounds, and doubtless some domestic
nagging, developed within him an intensity of depression which led him
to abandon his long-beloved Kentucky and vow never again to dwell within
her limits. In the autumn of 1788, before his disasters were quite
complete, this resolution was carried into effect; with wife and family,
and what few worldly goods he possessed, he removed to Point Pleasant,
at the junction of the Great Kanawha and the Ohio--in our day a quaint
little court-house town in West Virginia.