those daring explorers and hunters was James Harrod, at the head of a party of Kentuckians from the shores of the Monongahela. They followed the Kentucky River into the interior, and left it at a place afterwards known as "Harrod's Landing." Moving further westward they located themselves in a beautiful and attractive section, where they erected the first log-cabin ever built in Kentucky.
This was near the present town of Harrodsburg, in the spring of 1774, and this place, therefore, may claim to be the oldest settlement in Kentucky. Harrodsburg is now the capital of Mercer county, and is thirty miles south of Frankfort, with a population of about 2,500. It is an attractive summer retreat, and enjoys a fine reputation for its mineral waters.
As we have stated, the most remarkable of the many associations formed for the settlement of Kentucky was that organized by Colonel Richard Henderson of North Carolina.
It was intended to obtain by purchase from the Cherokee Indians their right to the same, and then to take possession of the immense area. As soon as the organization of the company was effected, Daniel Boone was fixed upon to conduct the negotiations with the Cherokees. As might have been anticipated, he met with perfect success, and Colonel Henderson went to Wataga, a small place on the Holston River, where, in solemn council, on the 17th of March, 1775, he delivered to them a consideration in merchandise, for which he received in return a deed to Kentucky, signed by all the leading chiefs.
This was a most important step indeed, but another of no less importance remained to be taken, and that was to assume possession of the territory claimed by Colonel Henderson.
This gentleman was too energetic and clear-sighted to delay such a necessary measure, and his wisdom was further shown by fixing upon Captain Daniel Boone for the carrying out of his intentions.
A small company of brave and trustworthy men were at once selected, who were sent to Kentucky under the direction of Boone, with instructions to open a road from the Holston to the Kentucky River, and to erect a station at the mouth of Otter Creek, on the latter stream.
This was serious business, and none appreciated it more than Boone and his companions, who knew that the treaty signed with the chiefs would not afford them the slightest protection against the treacherous Indians. They proceeded with the greatest care and caution, keeping their most vigilant sentinels on the lookout at night, while every man, it may be said, was on guard through the day.
They pushed steadily forward, until they reached a point about fifteen miles from where Boonesborough stands, using all the dispatch possible, and escaping molestation up to that time. But at the place named, they were suddenly fired upon by Indians, who, springing up from their ambush, attacked them with great ferocity. Two of the whites were killed and two wounded, but they repulsed their assailants a few minutes later.
Boone and his friends lost no time in pressing ahead; but three days later, they were fired upon by Indians again, and two of their number were killed and three wounded. Well might Kentucky be named the Dark and Bloody Ground, for its soil has been crimsoned with the life-current of its earliest pioneers, from the very hour they first placed foot within its borders.
The settlers, however, had no thought of turning back, but fought their way, as may be said, to the Kentucky River, which they reached on the 1st of April, 1775, and began the erection of the fort of Boonesborough at a salt lick, about two hundred feet from the south bank of the river.
A few days later, the Indians shot one of the men, but the others paused in their work only long enough to give their late comrade a respectful burial, and to shed a few tears of sympathy over his loss, when they resumed cutting and hewing the logs and placing them in position.
They continued steadily at work, and the fort was finished by the middle of June following, when, having satisfactorily discharged his duty, Boone returned to his family at the Clinch River settlement.
Kentucky was formally taken possession of on the 20th of April, 1775, which, it may be stated, was on the very day that Colonel Richard Henderson reached the age of forty years, there being about two months difference between his age and that of Daniel Boone.
Henderson was a native Virginian, who had been a judge in the Superior Court of the Colonial Government of North Carolina; but the halls of justice were shut up by the anarchy occasioned by the Regulators, and he engaged a number of the most influential of North Carolinians in the Utopian scheme of founding the Republic of Transylvania. It was with this grandiloquent project in their mind, that Kentucky was taken possession of on the date named, and everything considered necessary was done for laying the foundation stones of the model republic in the heart of American territory.
The death-blow of the grand scheme was received before it was fairly born. Governor Martin of North Carolina issued a proclamation, declaring the purchase of the lands by Colonel Henderson and his association from the Cherokees illegal; but, as a matter of equity, the State subsequently granted 200,000 acres to the company.
Virginia did the same thing, granting them an equal number of acres bounded by the Ohio and Green Rivers. Tennessee claimed this tract, but gave in compensation therefor the same number of acres in Powell's Valley. Thus ended the attempt to found the Transylvania Republic, but the original projectors of the movement acquired individual fortunes, and Colonel Henderson himself, when he died, ten years later, was the possessor of immense wealth, and was loved and respected throughout the entire territory.
The old fort at Boonesborough, being the first real foothold gained by the pioneers, was sure to become most prominently identified with the Indian troubles that were inevitable. It was to be a haven of safety to many a settler and his family, when the whoop of the vengeful Shawanoe or Miami rang through the forest arches, and the sharp crack of the warrior's rifle sent the whizzing bullet to the heart of the white man who had ventured and trusted his all in the wilderness.
It was to be the lighthouse on the coast of danger, warning of the peril that lay around and beyond, but offering protection to those who fled to its rude shelter, as the cities of the olden times received and spread their arms over the panting fugitive escaping from his pursuers.
The old fort was a most notable figure in the history of the West, a hundred years ago. There have been gathered in the structure of logs and slabs, the bravest men who ever trailed the red Indian through the wilderness. There those mighty giants of the border, Boone, Kenton, Wells, M'Clelland, the Wetzel and McAfee Brothers, M'Arthur, and scores of others converged from their long journeyings in the service of the Government; and, closing about the fire, as they smoked their pipes, they told of the hand-to-hand encounter in the silent depths of the woods, of the maneuvering on the banks of the lonely mountain stream, of the panther-like creeping through the canebrake on the trail of the Indian, of the camps at night, when the Shawanoes were so plentiful that they did not dare close their eyes through fear that their breathing would betray them, of the smoking cabin with the mutilated forms of husband, wife, and babe showing that the aboriginal tigers had been there, of the death-shots, the races for life, and the days of perils which followed the daring scout up to the very stockades of Boonesborough.
Sometimes one of the rangers of the wilderness would fail to come into the fort when expected. There would be mutual inquiries on the part of those who had been accustomed to meet him. Perhaps some one would say he was scouting for the Government, but nothing would be known with certainty, and a suspicion would begin to shape itself that he had "lain down," never to rise again.
Perhaps some ranger in threading his way through the long leagues of trackless forests would stop to camp from the snow which was whirling and eddying about him, while the wintry wind moaned and soughed through the swaying branches overhead; and mayhap, as he cautiously struck flint and steel in the hidden gorge, he saw dimly outlined in the gathering gloom the form of a man, shrunk to that of a skeleton, in which the spark of life had been extinguished long before.
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