Plan Of Battle Of Kings Mountain

Commanded by Colonel Ferguson:

Source

'The cleared area or bare summit of the King's Mountain range,' a narrow, stony ridge; on which Ferguson pitched his camp, has an outline not unlike that of an Indian paddle...".

Story Of My Life And Work

Story of my Life and Work....George Frederick Wright

Grandfather Enoch Wright

"Another political bit of wisdom illustrates how mistaken political shibboleths are wont to be. I do not know how I should remember it since I was so young when it was made, but I do remember that one of my uncles berated Lewis Cass in my presence for asking for appropriations to improve St. Clair Flats. The contempt that he threw into the words St. Clair Flats was most impressive. When now I pass Detroit and go through St. Clair Flats and note that the tonnage passing through the canal which Cass with such forethought promoted, is many times that passing through the Suez Canal, this mistaken political shibboleth always comes to mind."

The Affair At King's Mountain

Source

View From Stirling Castle

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View from Stirling Castle

"It is at Stirling that the traveler from the South first begins to discern the immensity of the mountain region to which he is directing his way... ." 

"...the region that lies about the Highland Railway affords the most varied as well as the wildest and most magnificent range of scenery. The line really starts from Perth, but the access from Stirling is an appropriate and striking introduction to its wonders, although it may be approached a little more directly from Edinburgh by crossing the Firth of Forth and proceeding through Fifeshire. A detour by Dunfermline and Kinross we found very pleasant... ."

Lewis Brothers At Braddock's Defeat

Jefferson Davis's First Day At Fortress Monroe

Source

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Legacy From The Estate Of Ambrose Bush

Source

"Under a power of attorney given by Hyronimus and wife, authorising Jenkins to sell a legacy which the wife was entitled to from the estate of Ambrose Bush, deceased, Jenkins sold the legacy to the defendant in error, Jeremiah Bush.... ."


"Hyronimus" was Pendleton Hieronymus and his wife was Mary (Bush) Hieronymus.  Mary was the daughter of Ambrose Bush and Lucy (Gholson) Bush. 

Kentucky Surveying Mural

The Hieronymus's daughter, Julia, wrote the autobiographical book, Sixty years in a school-room: ..., (excerpted below):

My Grandfather Ambrose, the youngest child [of Philip Bush] save one, married a Gholson a family from whence originated statesmen and orators. My great-uncle, Billy Bush, came to Kentucky with Daniel Boone on his second trip. He was fortunate in securing the fairest portion of the land in Clarke County...from Winchester to Boonesborough. He gave away or sold for a trifle farm after farm to his friends and relatives that they might be induced to settle near him."

Note:  My ex-brother-in-law is the fourth great grandnephew of Ambrose Bush.

The Doctor Who Wrote The Prison Life Of Jefferson Davis

Marker At Fort Monroe, Virginia

Prison Life of Jefferson Davis: Embracing Details and Incidents in His ..., By John Joseph Craven

Scarcely Any Taxes - Illinois In 1817

Lincoln-Berry Store In Illinois

Letters from Illinois ...., By *Morris Birkbeck, John Melish:

November, 1817

"...a few miles farther West [in Illinois] opened our way into a country preferable in itself to any we had seen... ".  "...foresee greater than in the state of Ohio, being so much nearer the grand outlet at **New Orleans." 

"...we have no rent, tithe, or poor's rate and scarcely any taxes, perhaps one farthing per acre." 

"Where we are settling, society is yet unborn as it were. It will, as in other places, be made up of such as come...".

*Morris Birkbeck's memorial at FindAGrave.

**After Abraham Lincoln returned from taking a flatboat to New Orleans, he clerked in New Salem for Denton Offutt, the boat's owner. A year later he and William Berry bought an interest in a general store... . (Source)

Works In The Northern Army For 1776

Source

Memorandum from Jeduthan Baldwin, Engineer of the Northern Army, whose diary description is online:

"Apparently one of Baldwin's last major constructions was an attempt to build a bridge across the narrow water passage between Ticonderoga and what he first called Independency (later Independence) Point. He seems to have designed it and supervised it for some time. Construction began on March 1, 1777. By the time he left Ticonderoga in early July, construction was still under way, and the Americans were in retreat again, so the bridge probably was never finished...  ."

Source

My ancestor, John Backus was At Mount Independence:

John Backus's Revolutionary War Pension:

...Ticonderoga has been then but a short time when he was placed in a redout a short distance from the main fort as an artillerist together with others of the same regiment.

During the winter there was much work done in making something like a bridge across a marsh or a part of the lake from the fort to the foot of mount independence... . 

Hugh McGary's Encounters With Famous People

Excerpts from THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE The Story of the Natchez Trace, by Nathan Daniels:

1763 Map Of Louisiana, Natchez, And The Missippi River (LOC)

(After they were married, Andrew and Rachel Jackson traveled in a large group from Bayou Pierre in Sept 1791) "Yet only the names of three of its members (of the traveling party) are known: Andrew and Rachel, and a dangerous, swashbuckling, Virginia-born Kentuckian, one Hugh McGary."  "The Jacksons had no reason to fear him."  "McGary's brother [Martin] had married Jackson's cousin [Bettie Crawford]."

"...Marquis James described McGary as a famous 'frontier soldier and Indian fighter." (Jackson's biographer)

Displayed At Harrodstown, Kentucky

"Nine years before he rode up the[Natchez] Trace with the Jacksons, McGary had a similar argument with Daniel Boone about an Indian fight in Kentucky."  Then Kentuckians were pursuing a body of Indians and Canadians who had struck at Bryant's Station.....  (McGary challenged Boone and the reluctant settlers to follow him)  "Many did."  "And in the Battle of Blue Licks, August 19, 1782, one of the bloodiest battles ever fought on the frontier, many died, too..."

Plaque (Partial) At Harrodstown, Kentucky

"Even before that McGary had quarrled with James Harrod over an Indian attack."

The Attack Of Robert Benham And The Aftermath

Source

Robert Benham was under the command of Major David Rogers and was shot in both hips during an attack on the Ohio River.  He hid from the attacking Native Americans and later encountered a Kentuckian whose arms were broken.  Between the two of them they were able to take care of basic needs.  They were rescued and taken to Louisville.

Flotilla Got Past The Guards

Heights (or Plains) Of Abraham And Quebec City  Illustrated on Map (Partial Section - Map Source LOC)

From The Plains of Abraham:

"As it came level with the batteries of Sillery and Samos, the flotilla had reached its crucial danger point. The French had posts passed without incident, but at the second a guard sighted the leading boats and immediately challenged them."

"Invisible in the dark hour before the dawn, his sharp Qui vive? came as an unwelcome shock. A quick-witted officer of the Fraser Highlanders, Captain Donald McDonald, who in his time had served the Jacobite cause in France and spoke the language perfectly, answered in a low voice, "La France!" The sentry was insistent:  "A quel regiment," he demanded--"De la Reine," McDonald ventured, knowing that part of this battalion was with Bougainville. The sentry, apparently satisfied, did not ask for the password."

"A little further on, under the Samos battery, another sentry repeated the challenge and he could just be seen running down to the water within pistol shot. What are you speaking so quietly for, he wanted to know. Provision boats, replied McDonald. Don't make noise or the English will hear us. Again the sentry let them pass."

Move The Land Office

Fort Harrod Reconstruction In Kentucky

From The Kentuckians by Janet Holt Giles:

"They have thought to pacify us by promising to move the land office to Harrodstown.  They know in reason we have been anxious to turn settlers our way, as who wouldn't.  It's but natural we'd ruther see ourselves grow as Boonesburg.  But makes no difference where they put their dratted land office!  The colonel give me his word they wouldn't go up on their prices, nor change any of the conditions they first stated.  And now they're doing it.  My men are riled up a heap over it, and ready to pull out."

Joshua Ross And The Trail Of Tears

Sign At Historic Site In Fort Payne, Alabama

Joshua Ross's biography from this source (The Scotch-Irish In America):

"Joshua Ross, Tahlequah Indian Territory, born February 7, 1833, in Wills Valley, old Cherokee Nation, now State of Alabama; his mother was daughter of Maj. George Lowry, son of a Scot and Irish her mother was Lucy Benge; her parents were white and Cherokee;

"The majority of the Cherokee forced to leave their homes in Alabama were held at Fort Payne (Wills Valley area) and departed in groups with the Benge Detachment from September 29 through October 3, 1838.  They had no military escort or armed guards but were led by Cherokees John Benge, conductor and George Lowery, assistant conductor.  They set off from this site headed west to Indian Territory - an 800 mile journey that became known as the Trail of Tears."

Fort Payne, Alabama

Joshua Ross's father was Andrew Ross, brother to Lewis Ross and Chief John Ross; their father was Daniel Ross, a Scot from Sutherlandshire, Scotland, and Andrew Ross's mother was a Cherokee Indian named Mollie McDonald (McDonold), daughter of Anna Shorey, a Cherokee, and John McDonold, an Indian trader, who came to the Cherokees in 1770 from Inverness; his trading post was in Wills Valley; Daniel Ross had a farm near the foot of Lookout Mountain; Ross's Landing at Chattanooga was owned by Chief John Ross; Joshua Ross's parents moved to the Indian Territory in 1837...".

Winning His Way to West Point

Winning His Way to West Point,  By Paul Bernard Malone:

John Todd At Point Pleasant

Monument At Point Pleasant (West Virginia)

John Todd's Record Book:

"He [John Todd] served as aid to Gen. Lewis at the battle of Point Pleasant and in the campaign of 1774 against the Scioto towns."

Ambushed

From The Kentuckians by Janet Holt Giles:

We can get it (a petition) wrote up in the next day or two, Jim said, and signed and then send it over to the Holston to Billy Russell and let him take it to the spring meeting of the Assembly at Williamsburg.  It was decided that way and the vote was taken to petition the Virginia Assembly in our favor.  They they named Jim and me and Isaac Hite to put it in writing.

Source

I was fixing to leave the next morning when Abraham Hite rode in from Boonesburg with the news they'd had an Indian scare.  A fellow by the name of Campbell and *two lads had crossed over the river to hunt and had been ambushed.  One of the lads was killed and the other one taken captive, but the Campbell fellow got away.

*Sanders and M'Quinney

The Little Force That Was To Decide

"Slipping down the river towards him came the little force that was to decide the fate and future of all North America."

Braddock Grave Sign (NPS) In Pennsylvania

"The Indian raids on the British colonies, Washington's years of endurance on the mountain frontier, the incompetence of Braddock and Loudoun, *Webb and Abercrombie were about to be avenged."[Source - Plains Of Abraham]

*"An English colonel, Daniel Webb, for no historically assignable reason, was then sent over as a place-warmer for two Scotchmen: James Abercrombie, another court favorite, who in turn was to be locum tenens for John Campbell, Earl of Loudoun, though all three were to remain as generals." [Source]

How Much That Sword Looked Like A Baton

Jim's Photo Of Alamo Display

And Wait For The Night by JohnWilliam Corrington (published ca 1964)

Because it struck me how much that sword looked like a baton, and how I had been the bandmaster without knowing it. I don’t know why—I never figured why—but all the fight was gone out of me in an instant. I had come to Mexico to kill as many of ‘em as I could shoot, stab, or ride down. For Travis and Bowie and Bonham. I came to burn or devastate, it didn’t matter who or how. But there I was with a clean sword in my hand and twelve of my own men turning in the hot wind, and the words of politicians and landgrabbers elbowing each other in my memory.….and because anyhow there probably hadn’t been ten men in the Mexican army we were facing who had fought at the Alamo or murdered at Goliad.