Of the origin of Benjamin Borden, Sr. (the name was mispronounced Burden, on the frontier), little is known. He was probably from New Jersey, and early became a fur trader on the Virginia frontier; later he was in Lord Fairfax’s employ as a land agent. As such, he visited Governor Gooch and obtained from him several valuable tracts––one of them (October 3, 1734), Borden Manor, on Sprout run, Frederick county; another, 100,000 acres at the head of the James, on condition of locating thereon a hundred families. At the end of two years he had erected 92 cabins with as many families, and a patent was granted him November 8, 1739, for 92,100 acres. He died in 1742, before further development of his enterprise. His son Benjamin succeeded to his vast estate, but died of small-pox in 1753. In 1744, he married the widow of John McDowell, mentioned on the next page, who had been killed in the Indian fight of December 14, 1742.––R. G. T.
The daughter of John Patton subsequently became the wife of Col. W. Preston, and the mother of James Patton Preston, late a governor of Virginia.
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Comment by L. C. D.––This note of Mr. Withers, derived from Taylor’s sketches (mentioned below), is erroneous both as to Patton and Preston. Col. Patton’s first name was not John, but James, as both the records and his own autograph sufficiently attest. Neither did John Preston, nor his son Col. Wm. Preston, marry Col. Patton’s daughter, but John Preston married his sister. Miss Elizabeth Patton, while crossing the Shannon in a boat, met the handsome John Preston, then a young ship carpenter, and an attachment grew out of their accidental meeting. But as Miss Patton belonged to the upper class of society, there was a wide gulf between their conditions, and a runaway match was the only way out of the difficulty. Gov. James Patton Preston was named after his grand-uncle. James Patton was born in County Londonderry, Ireland, in 1692. For many years he was a prosperous navigator, and crossed the Atlantic twenty-five times with “redemptioners” for Virginia; he was also an officer in the royal navy in the wars with the Netherlands. Having obtained a grant of 120,000 acres above the Blue Ridge, he himself settled in Virginia in 1735. A man of wealth, enterprise and influence, he was a justice, sheriff, Indian treaty commissioner, and finally county lieutenant of Augusta. In 1755, he was killed by Indians while conveying ammunition to the borderers.
Capt. John McDowell was of Scotch descent, and born in Ulster, Ireland, but in early manhood came to America, settling first in Pennsylvania, and then the Virginia Valley (autumn of 1737). He at once became one of Benjamin Borden’s surveyors, and for five years made surveys on Borden’s Manor. Becoming a captain in the Augusta militia, he was ordered to go out against a party of Northern Indians who, on the war-path against the Catawbas, had taken in the Virginia Valley on their way, and annoyed and plundered the white settlers. The savages were overtaken on the North Branch of James River, some fifteen miles from McDowell’s place, and an engagement ensued (Dec. 14, 1742), in which McDowell and seven others lost their lives. The Indians escaped with small losses. This was the first battle between whites and Indians, in the Virginia Valley.––R. G. T.
This incident is well authenticated. See the deposition of Mrs. Mary Greenlee, preserved in the famous Borden land suit, among the court records of Augusta county, Va. Mrs. Greenlee was the sister of Capt. John McDowell, and among the very earliest settlers of that part of Augusta, now Rockbridge county. Mrs Greenlee’s deposition is published in full in Peyton’s History of Augusta County, Va. (Staunton, Va., 1882), pp. 69-74.––L. C. D.