stratagem, and on the 20th day of August, raised the siege and departed. During this formidable siege, which seemed to threaten so dreadfully, the garrison "had but two men killed and four wounded; besides a number of cattle" destroyed. A degree of injury almost incredibly insignificant, under such fearful odds of numbers; while the enemy's loss amounted to "thirty-seven killed, and a great number wounded." "One hundred and twenty-five pounds of bullets were picked up about the fort, besides those which had penetrated into the logs of the walls." Thus most fortunately terminated an expedition strong enough, under a persevering and energetic commander, with suitable followers, to have stormed every fort in the country; and to have swept it clean of the white man. Providence ordered it otherwise, and as the author confidently believes, for the good of mankind; which can never be extensively promoted under the dominion of the ignorance, the brutality, and the ferocity, incident to a savage state. Sickly must the benevolence of that bosom be, which sighs over the triumph of civilization, even in its ruder forms; for they are the harbingers of brighter and better days of diffusing light, and learning, and religion.

many

The fall of 1779, was memorable for the removal of a great families from the interior of Virginia and from the neighboring States.* This extended emigration is attributed to the law then adopted by Virginia respecting the disposition of her vast empire of new and unappropriated lands. "By this law, commissioners were to be appointed to hear and determine all disputes relative to land claims, and to grant certificates of having settled in the country, and of rights to purchase before others; or pre-emption claims, as they were called, to those entitled to receive them."t The county of Kentucky, then synonymous with the subsequent boundaries of the State, was placed

Three hundred large family boats arrived during the ensuing spring at the Falls; and as many as ten or fifteen wagons could be seen of a day, going from them. By this time, there were six stations on Beargrass creek, with a population of six hundred men. The price of corn fluctuated from fifty dollars per bushel, in December 1779, to one hùndred and sixty-five dollars per bushel, in January 1780, and thirty dollars in May. These prices were at a season of obstructed navigation, and in depreciated paper; but its value in gold and silver is not known.-Colonel Floyd's Correspondence.

† Marshall, 1, 97,

under the jurisdiction of this board, composed of four members with appropriate judicial powers. This Court had jurisdiction on these most interesting matters involving the whole real estate of the country, without appeal; unless where one of the parties could not procure the attendance of witnesses; in which case, the claim was to be adjourned to the general Court for final decision. Exceptions were made in favor of military officers in the service of the United States or the State of Virginia, who had a year from their resignation or discharge to perfect their claims. These privileges interfering so much with the rights of innocent parties, were afterwards limited. The commissioners appointed to execute this momentous trust for Kentucky, were William Fleming, Edmund Lyne, James Barbour, and Stephen Trigg, all resident in other parts of Virginia. On the 13th of October, this great land Court was opened at St. Asaph's and John Williams, Jr. was appointed clerk. Some specimens of their adjudications shall be presented for the curiosity of their nature. The first claim presented, was that of Isaac Shelby, (afterwards twice Governor of the State,) to a settlement and pre-emption, as it was termed, for raising a crop of corn in the country in 1776. It was granted: these technical terms in the land law of Virginia, require explanation to a general reader. A settlement, consisted in an allowance of "four hundred acres, or such smaller quantity, as the party may choose to include his improvement or cultivation, granted to any person, who should at any time before the 1st of January 1778, have really and bona fide settled himself or his family, upon any waste and unappropriated lands on the Western waters, to which no other hath any legal right or claim." For this grant, two dollars and a quarter per hundred acres, were exacted by the State. A pre-emption was nothing more than a right (which every person entitled to a settlement possessed,) to pay the State price for any quantity of land adjoining his settlement, not exceeding one thousand acres. These latter claims were to be paid for at the rate of forty dollars per hundred acres; various other most equitable and beneficent provisions were enacted for other claimants on the bounty of the State. Yet with

this generous character plainly represented on the face of the land law, even to an overflowing of charity and consideration for the poor, selling them farms even on these low terms, upon credit; never was a measure of legislation so fruitful of curses and calamities to any community of people, as the land law of Virginia. It has proved a perfect Pandora's box to Kentucky, constantly tricking her industrious and enterprising citizens out of the fruits of their brave and hardy exertions; distracting our courts and legislatures with its endless perplexities and refinements. But of this on another occasion. The court of land commissioners assembled at different parts of the county from Harrodsburg to the Falls, and on the 26th of January, 1780, declared its dissolution, after having adjudicated upon three thousand land claims.

About the first of April, 1779, a block-house was built where the neat and beautiful city of Lexington now adorns the State with her literary and scientific institutions. Here a settlement was begun under the auspices of Robert Patterson, who was an early and meritorious adventurer, much engaged in the defence of the country. Colonel Patterson was joined by the McConnels, Lindseys and James Masterson; soon after, Major John Morrison removed his family from Harrodsburg, and Mrs. Morrison was the first white female settled in Lexington.

This name was given to commemorate the battle of Lexington, in Massachusetts, at the commencement of the Revolutionary war. A name finely calculated to perpetuate the noblest of the patriotic associations, for which the people of Lexington have ever been distinguished.*

Lexington consisted at this time, of three rows of houses or cabins; the two outer rows constituted a portion of the walls of the stockade. These extended from the corner of the city, now known by the name of Levy's corner, to James Masterson's house, on Main Street. The intervals between the houses were stockaded; the outlet a puncheon door with a bar to secure it. A block-house commanded the public spring, and a com. mon field included the site of the present court-house. The discipline about the fort is, however, said never to have been very rigid: nor was the fortification very strictly kept in order.

It is not generally known, that the south-western part of the State was settled as early as 1782. In the testimony on record, in the case of Craddock against William Russel's heirs, in the Court of Appeals, Colonel Abraham Smart deposed, that his father had, at that time, settled on Red river; and about five miles above the mouth of the Elk fork of Red river, south-west of the present town of Russelville. Its noble spring was well known in 1784.

To this may be added the following information respecting the same section of Kentucky. Judge Underwood informs the author, that his uncle, Edmund Rogers, had ob

Bryant's station, about five miles north-eastward of Lexington, was settled by the Bryants in 1779, and several stations were erected in the neighborhood of the present town of Danville. This notice must suffice for the rise of our towns, now merging fast into the general settlement of the country in its wide extent.

CHAPTER VII.

Colonel David Rogers' Expedition to New Orleans-Defeat-Captain Benham-Colonel Bowman's Expedition-Colonel Byrd's Expedition up Licking-General George Rogers Clark's march from Fort Jefferson-Shuts up the Land office at HarrodsburgExpedition against Pickaway.

The annoyance of the Indians still continued, occasionally infesting the stations, and intercepting the traveler and the hunter; yet the people pursued their business in the midst of hostility.

There was a melancholy illustration of this, in an encounter of memorable fatality, which took place between a large party of Indians, and Colonel David Rogers, and Captain Robert Benham,* commanding a couple of keel boats loaded with military stores, and manned by about one hundred men. The former officer had been dispatched by the executive of Virginia in the preceding year, to New Orleans, for the purpose of procuring supplies from the Spanish government at that place; in order to support the military posts on the Upper Ohio, and the Mississippi. This is mentioned in a letter of Governor Henry addressed to Lieutenant Colonel Clark, and dated January 15th,

served the following circumstances, before there was any settlement south of Green river. "There was a beech tree standing in a bottom on the margin of the east fork of the south branch of Little Barren river, about a quarter of a mile from Edmunton, in Barren county, which had upon it the name of "James McCall, of Mecklenburg county, North Carolina, June 8th, 1770." These words were cut in very handsome letters, with several initials of other names. Also on the Sulphur fork of Bay's fork of Big Barren river, at or near the Sulphur Lick, now in Allen county, south-east of Bowling Green, the following words were found by the same ancient settler, cut in the hark of a beech tree-"James McCall dined here on his way to Natchez, June the 10th, 1770." Judge Underwood when a boy, has frequently seen these memorials of early visitors to Kentucky. The party must, in all probability, have perished; unless some record of their visit may be preserved, in North Carolina.

The father of Joseph S. Benham, Esq., of the Louisville Bar.

1

1778. *When Rogers arrived at the mouth of the Ozark, since called Arkansas; he sailed up that river, some twelve or eighteen leagues, to the head of the back water, or overflown ground; and there he deposited his boats, and stationed his men, and proceeded with six or seven, including Captain Robert Benham, down the Mississippi to New Orleans. When he arrived at that city, he found a British sloop of war in the port, the Captain of which, suspicious of the object of an American party from such a direction, (a circumstance of no common occurrence at that day,) watched his movements narrowly, and impeded his business with the Spanish officers. For although they were privately disposed to promote the American interests, yet as the courts of Madrid and London were not openly at war, embarrassment was unavoidable in the presence of a British force. The situation of Major Rogers was truly critical and perplexing; under these circumstances, he found it neces sary to send Captain Benham through the appalling extent of Indian country, on the west side of the Mississippi, with dispatches (it is conjectured) for the government of Virginia. Benham, with the hardihood characteristic of the times, subsisting principally on Indian corn boiled in lie, to save it from the weavil, passed through the Indian wilderness, reached Kaskaskia, then under the American arms; and proceeded to the falls of Ohio, in the spring of 1779. Soon after his arrival at this place, owing to some unexplained succcess, Colonel Rogers, with two keel boats ascended to the same place, on his return to Pittsburg, and most joyfully took Captain Benham on board. The latter gentleman was then placed in command of one of the boats, and the little American squadron, the second escort of military supplies procured by. our countrymen from New Orleans, moved on its destination up the Ohio. When Colonel Rogers reached the sand bar above the present city of Cincinnati, he found it bare more than half the width of the river. He now discovered a number of Indians on rafts and in canoes, coming out of the mouth of the Little Miami river, which was then high, and shot its waters,

* Judge Dunlavy, of Ohio. †The declaration of war took place January 16th, 1779.