In 1775, James, George and Robert McAfee, and James McCowen went to the territory on a surveying tour. In 1778 Capt. James Grattan, John Tuel and John McManus were among those who laid the permanent foundation of the city of Louisville. Bryan’s station was one of the earliest garrisons for protection against the Indians, and two of the prominent Indian fighters were Captains Orr and Shannon.
Captain Flynn was one of the founders of the town of Columbia, 1787, and Dr. John Connelly was agent in 1778 for the British government in the territory. The first newspaper established northwest of the Ohio, in Cincinnati, was by William Maxwell, of the same stock.
Col. John Lutteral, an Irishman, was one of a party which left North Carolina for Boonesboro’, Ky., in April, 1775. He was one of the pioneers and a noted man for years. He was accompanied by John Hart and John Kennedy. Daniel Boone was the leader. Captain Flynn, who has been mentioned as one of the founders of Columbia, had as associates Francis Dunleavy and John Riley.
Among the first settlers of Harrodsburgh were the families of McGarry and Hogan, welcome acquisitions on account of their wives and children. Major McGarry was one of the bravest, as well as one of the best known, Indian fighters in Kentucky, having for an associate a brother Celt named Major McBride, and another named Captain Bulger. The recital of their deeds would alone fill a good-sized volume.
In an attack on Bryan’s station, a garrison named after another Celt, by a party of 500 Indians, in 1782, the savages were repulsed, but some of the women were killed. This enraged the whites in the vicinity, and a party of 160 met at the station to arrange for the pursuit and punishment of the Indians. The cooler heads, led by Daniel Boone, tried to dissuade the hotheads from making the attempt, but in the midst of the discussion the impetuous McGarry, putting spurs to his horse, cried out for all but the cowards to follow him, and galloped in the direction taken by the savage foe. Every man of the 160, nettled by the taunt, followed him, but the result which was predicted, followed. They fell into an ambuscade and sixty of the number were killed, among them McBride and Bulger. McGarry fought like a madman and escaped unhurt.
Among the first Presbyterian ministers in the state were James McCready, William McGill, Samuel McAdoo, Henry Delaney, A. M. Bryan, William McGee, William McMahon and John Dunleavy; and among the first Methodist ministers were James O’Cull, William Burke, William McMahon and John and William McGee, all Irish enough in appearance to be staunch Catholics of the old Milesian type, and it is not unlikely their fathers may have been.
Among those who distinguished themselves in the history of the state as legislators, soldiers or writers, were Wm. T. Barry, who was chief justice of the court of appeals in 1825; one of a commission to digest a plan of schools for common education; lieutenant-governor in 1820; member of the National House of Representatives in 1810–’11; and in the United States Senate in 1814–’16.
Gen. John Adair held high command in the War of 1812–’15; received the thanks of the Kentucky legislature for gallantry at New Orleans; was governor of Kentucky in 1820; in the National House of Representatives 1814–’16, and had served in the United States Senate in 1805–’06. John Rowan was secretary of state in 1804; Benjamin Logan was presidential elector in 1793, William Logan in 1809, and Robert Ewing, William Irvine, William Casey and William Logan in 1813.
The indomitable Matthew Lyon who went from Vermont to Kentucky was again sent from Kentucky to congress in 1829–’33–’35, and his son, Chittenden Lyon, was there in 1827–’35. Colonel Chittenden Lyon was a veritable giant in size, being considerably over six feet in height and weighing over 350 pounds. The admixture of Irish and Yankee blood in his make-up, if anything, increased the pugnacious spirit inherited from his father, who had married one of the Vermont Chittendens; and the stories told of his prowess as a wrestler and a boxer are countless.
Being at one time a candidate for a public office, when the margin was close, he was approached by a political opponent, his rival in fisticuffs as well as in politics, and fully his equal in size and weight, and challenged to a boxing match, the condition being that the loser would vote for the winner. This Lyon agreed to, and they went at it, over 700 pounds of bone and muscle. After a severe contest the spectators interfered and it was declared a draw, Lyon, however, receiving his rival’s vote.