Before the close of April, Colonel Henderson arrived with a reinforcement of thirty men and a quantity of tools and ammunition. In the succeeding months arrivals were numerous from various quarters and by different routes. During the course of the year upwards of five hundred men from the frontiers of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina went into Kentucky, but the majority of them were not settlers. Some were merely hunters but the greater number land speculators or “cabiners,” as they were termed, who ran up a shanty on a piece of land as evidence of occupation and returned to the colonies in the hope of selling the tract.
At the close of the summer Boone brought in his family from the Clinch Valley and his wife and daughters were, as he proudly declared, “the first white women to stand on the banks of the Kentucky.” Shortly afterwards, several other families came in, and there were before the end of September four or five settlements, the principal being Boonesborough and Harrodsburg, about fifty miles to the west of the former place. Two or three hundred acres of corn had been planted, fruit trees had been set, and horses, cattle and hogs had been introduced.
The settlers were for the most part of Scotch-Irish extraction, sturdy, patriotic men, attaching themselves to the soil with a tenacity that nothing could shake. In the struggle to maintain their homes in the new territory they greatly aided their countrymen in the Revolution, which was just about to break out. Indeed, they guarded the western flank of the colonies and even carried the war into the Crown dominions on the north. Among those who came into Kentucky in this first year of its settlement were a number whose names figure prominently in border story and in the history of our western march—George Rogers Clark, Simon Kenton, the Lewises, Benjamin Logan, James Harrod, John Todd, the brothers McAfee, Bowman, Hite, Randolph, McClellan.
During the latter months of 1775 the Indians gave little trouble and many settlers began to congratulate themselves upon the prospect of occupying the land without serious opposition, but in the closing days of the year several attacks were made on the whites at different points. These were the signal for the hurried departure of the timid, and of speculators, surveyors, and others who had no permanent interests in the country, making it apparent that in time of stress the tenure of the land would depend upon a few bold spirits.
In order to dispose of the Transylvania Company once for all, we shall anticipate the course of time somewhat. The settlers found many causes of dissatisfaction with the Company’s methods of managing affairs, and the declaration of independence by the colonies in July, 1776, made it evident that a proprietary government could not long exist. Under the circumstances, the settlers of Kentucky wished for definite inclusion in the new republic and with that view they sent a delegation to the Virginia Assembly praying that body to give them recognition as part of the State. In accordance with this petition, Kentucky was organized as a county of Virginia, with David Robinson as county lieutenant, John Bowman colonel, Anthony Bledsoe and George Rogers Clark majors, and Daniel Boone, James Harrod, Benjamin Logan and John Todd captains. Ultimately the Transylvania Company was compensated for the forfeiture of its possessions by a large grant of land.
But before all this happened, Kentucky had entered upon the stormy days that earned for it the grim title of “the dark and bloody ground.”
[V.]
IN FAIR KENTUCKY
The settlers find themselves in a rich and beautiful land—But soon learn that they must fight for the possession of it—A night alarm on the border—How a woman and two children defended their home—The stockade at Boonesborough—Two girls carried off by the savages—Hardy raises an alarm and a party is soon in hot pursuit—Boone circumvents the wily redskins—They are overtaken and caught unprepared—A volley, a charge, and the girls are safe—Back to Boonesborough and a happy reunion.