NATIVE INHABITANTS

Most discussions of the frontier era gloss over the native population, because it was relatively small compared to bording states. By the mid-18th century, Kentucky was primarily a hunting and trading ground between Indian nations.

Lesson 14: Native American-White relations

John Filson visited Kentucky in 1783 when the white population of the state was estimated to be over 30,000. He described in his book, The Discovery, Settlement, and Present Situation of Kentucke, the location of 28 Indian nations east of the Mississippi. Those that traveled or lived in Kentucky included the Cherokee, "Chicamawgees," Cheegee, Chicasaw, Choctaw, Creek, Uchee, Catauba, Delaware, Mingo, Wyandott, Shawanese, Piankashaw, Vermilion, Wyantinaw, Ozaw, Kakasky, and Illinois.

THE EMIGRANTS

The earliest Europeans to live in Kentucky were surveyors and land speculators. In the second half of the 18th century, paid surveyors sent reports back East describing the Kentucky territory as a western paradise, practically empty of inhabitants and totally uncultivated. The purpose of such glowing reports was to attract permanent settlers from across the social and economic stratum with the promise of cheap land.

Prior to the Revolutionary War, Kentucky was part of Virginia, making up the vast Fincastle County. In 1774, Lord Dunmore, Governor of Virginia, offered lands in Kentucky to the veterans of the French and Indian War. The post-revolutionary government also offered free land to war veterans in order to populate this new region. There was a strong cultural belief among 18th and 19th century Americans that wilderness areas should be settled and cultivated by white families in order to spread American civilization and impose a sense of order on the land. To clear acreage, plant crops, and build on it was to "improve" the land.

Most of the people who came to Kentucky during the late 18th and early 19th centuries were originally from three states: Virginia, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. Most of the early settlers traveled as families or even whole communities.

Lesson 1: John Filson's 1784 Map of Kentucky
Lesson 2: Filson's Description of Kentucky

GETTING TO KENTUCKY

It was safer to travel in large groups in order to deter Indian attacks. The vast majority of those migrating from Virginia and western North Carolina took the Wilderness Road, a rough narrow footpath across the Appalachian Mountains that took four weeks to travel. Those moving further into the interior used a number of Indian trails. The preferred means of travel for wealthier people was to travel by boat down the Ohio or Cumberland rivers. Both had their perils. Travel by boat did not mean greater security from Indian attacks but it was less ravaging than travel by foot--stories of the dangers of the Wilderness Road survive in letters:

I cannot omitt Noticeing the many Distressed families I passed in the Wilderness...to see women and children in the month of December. Travelling a Wilderness Through Ice and Snow passing large rivers and Creeks with out Shoe or Stocking..." Moses Austin

Of course, not everyone who came to Kentucky was eager to move. Women, children and slaves had little say in the decision.

Lesson 3: Diary of Ferdinand Rozier
Lesson 8: Robert Strother's Will (addresses slavery and women's rights)

SETTLING THE LAND

The early settlements were forts or stations located primarily in the Bluegrass region. Settlers lived in barricaded outposts for protection. When the Revolutionary War broke out, the Indian tribes sided with the British believing that the colonists would lose the war. The British also promised to restrict westward immigration to Indian lands. During the war years, attacks on settlements increased making a lone homestead too difficult to defend. Not all Indians participated in these raids. The Cherokee and Shawnee also hoped to restrict trade and settlement to a few towns but signed an agreement that they would not attack settlements.

The fort system offered safety from attack but also subjected the settlers to starvation. People could not leave the forts to tend their crops without risking their lives and as a result, there was often too little food to feed everyone.

After the war, settlers moved back out to the isolated frontier. People obtained deeds to their land from the land speculators. A man who bought land from a dishonest surveyor might have had to hire a lawyer and go to court to establish his claim if his property line overlapped that of another. It was not uncommon for people to end up paying twice for the legal deed to the land. Settlers too poor to pay became squatters. They could legally claim a vacant piece of land if they could establish that they had lived on it for three years and made improvements such as building a house and planting crops.

Families and former neighbors settled near each other, working collectively to get started. The task of clearing land, building a starter home, and planting the first crops was too large a task for a single man. Still, rural farms were miles apart. In some areas of the Bluegrass region and a few trading posts, population density was great enough after a decade or two of immigration to form townships. For most people, however, life on the frontier was very isolated. Yet even without regular mail service, early Kentuckians managed to elect representatives to Congress.

Lesson 4: Letter from Daphne Tiller to her mother (1794)

Lesson 6: Daniel Drake's reminiscence of food in early years

EARLY KENTUCKY FLORA AND FAUNA

Filson describes seeing in Kentucky, coffee trees, paw paw trees, black mulberry trees, wild cherry trees, buck-eyes and magnolias in abundance. The most common types of fish were the buffalo fish, catfish, salmon, mullet, rock, perch, garfish, eels, suckerfish and sunfish. He noted the presence of turkeys, ducks, pheasants, partridges, ravens, and the "perraquet."

The native animals once included buffalo but by the time Filson visited Kentucky in 1783 he found that they only remained in large numbers "in the exterior parts of settlement." Among other animals now gone or rare in Kentucky are the elk, bear, wildcat, and wolf, and river otter. Foxes, rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, groundhogs and possums were numerous. In his book The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucke, Filson recorded that a skeleton had been excavated in Kentucky near the Ohio river, whose bones "bear a great resemblance to those of the elephant." He was aware of other such skeletons having been found on other continents. He commented on the curiosity of such an animal existing in so many varied places and speculated that "animosities among the various tribes must have been suspended until the common enemy, who threatened the very existence of all, should be extirpated."

 

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Created by Jennifer Small and maintained by DLSC faculty and staff. Last Modified July 19, 2005. All Contents Copyright © 2005.
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