There was no Washington then...

Andrew Thompson. Near by Martha Mills. (An old man, just marrd. To a young girl. Quite certain of his statement, when I had read it to him, and very enthusiastic.)
Came down the river in a boat belonging to Silas Dexter. And landed at now Maysville, in 1783. Dexter was bringing a family, & going to the south of the Ky., near to Dick’s river, where his wife’s brethren, Asahel & Wm. Davis lived. Old Col. Marshall, that opened the land office, came passenger, with a parcel of his negroes. When we 1st landed, Marshall & some others went on; the early part, about the 1st of Nov. But Dexter & I were there, with other fams., just below Washington, about 2 mos., whh, flung us into 1784. The winter at last set in so hard, we had to break up.               In 1783-4, at the time above mentioned, a family started to come from now Maysville, to Bryant’s Station, (one of the above fams.) & lost their way, and staid out 30 days; during which time the woman had a child; and it was a deep snow. John Smith’s & Garret Fernanner’s, or Ferlammer’s, were the 1st 2 waggons that were ever driven from Maysville to Lexington. It was before any road had been cut out.

The last of March, or the 1st of April, 1784, I retd. From the Dick’s river settlement, & put up at Mrs. Martin’s, at Lexington, and the next day set out as a hunter to the surveyors going to the mouth of Licking. The works were retd. To Col. Marshall, below Lexington. In 1784, the people began to scatter. Johnson made a settlement on North Elkhorn. A block-house was put up at Maysville, rather at the head of Lawrence Creek, in 1784, by Ned Waller. Simon & John Kenton each put up a house at their places, both below Washington, upon the waters of the North-fork, and these were the 1st strokes in those parts. Dexter kept the trace, and was employed in helping on, with the pack-horses he had, the people moving. Marshall had sold us land, which Simon Kenton was to, & did point out to us. 4 of us were concerned in Dexter’s Co. I was employed 7 weeks, & had cleared about 4 acres, when the 3 of us who were at work, John Byles, Peter Dewitt & myself, were driven off by the indns, with the loss only of our horses. We gave it up then. This was in June 1784. There was no Washington then.            On the 8th of May, 1785, I came back, (having been gone to the Monongahela,) and the Feb. while I had been gone, (as I understood,) the settmt. Had been (at Washington) commenced. And there I found Dexter & his family.

Feb. 1785, Arthur Hoy & Wm. Wood (a bapt. pr.) having bought a ------- acres of land, of Simon Kenton, laid off Washington, as I have sd. Henry Lee made a settlement about the same time. Had a station. One Clerk, also, had a station.

In 1786, I was under Logan. Went out under Kenton (Kenton & Lee’s difficulty.) Bro’t 33 prisoners, & 11 scalps. We crossed & recrossed the Ohio at Maysville. McGary killed Malunphy [?] there. I was within 25 or 30 steps at the time. Malunphy was cutting tobacco in his hand at the time.               After this, the indns. Were very troublesome. And Kenton’s Co. was again called upon, & we went to Paint Cr. Obannions, from the falls, & Harding came & insisted on my going to the other side of the Ohio, to make surveys. We commenced above the mouth of the Little Miami. These were the 1st chains ever drawn, across the Ohio.

Cassidy’s & Fleming’s stations were settled the same spring, & Stockton’s the year before. They had a crop. Some small truck. Parks & I got out of bread. We went to Cassidy’s, 3 ms., & chopped rails at a . . .[It ends there]

from the Draper Papers, 12CC235

Lyman C. Draper (1815-1891) collected information on America’s first frontier and its notable figures and events, such as Daniel Boone, George Rogers Clarke, and The Battle of King’s Mountain. Draper’s papers include a treasure trove of information on the frontier settlers of the Carolinas, Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania.

The original papers are held at the Wisconsin Historical Society. They include thousands of handwritten letters of correspondence comprising nearly 500 volumes of information not available anywhere else about the pioneer settlers of the trans-Allegheny West.