The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1872-05-23
THE EARLY SETTLEMENT
OF KENTUCKY.
Who the First Settlers Were,
and When they Came.

The Maysville Bulletin says:
The first white man who ever
entered the State of Kentucky was
John Finley, who came here in
1760. In 1773 he settled at the
Upper Blue Lick Spring, which has
been owned by his family to the
present day. During the revolu-
tionary war he was a soldier in the
Eighteenth Pennsylvania regiment.
In reply to this item the Mays
vile Eagle says:
We find the above in the Louis
vile Courier-JournaI, and cannot
forbear congratulating our neighbor
upon its unusual accuracy of state
ment, which differs from the truth
only in the following unimportant
particulars: First, that John Finley
was not the first white man who
ever entered Kentucky, but was
preceded by Mcbride in 1854, and
by DIR. Thomas Walker in 1853
Joshua Fry married the daughter of
Walker, and from the marriage
Joshua F. Bell, Joshua F. Speed,
Joshua F. Bullitt, the late Rev.
Joshua F. Green, Gen. S. S. Fry,
and the families to which they re-
spectively belong, are descended).
In the second place, John Finley
came over from North Carolina, and
did not come to Maysville. IN the
third place, John Finley, on his sec
Ond visit, in 1869, as the guide to
Boone, upon the capture of Boone
and Stewart, returned to North
Carolina, and did not come back to
Kentucky. In the fourth place this
John Finley was not the John Fin
ley who settled at the Upper Blue
Licks. In the fifth, no John Finley
or Finlay came to Maysville in 1869,
or settled in the Upper Blue Licks
in 1913. In the sixth, no settle
ment was made at the Upper Blue
Licks in 1878 by any one. And in
the seventh, no settlement was made
anywhere in Kentucky in 1873.
With these few corrections the short
paragraph of our neighbor is exactly
correct.
Boone returned to the Yadkin in
1770, but in IT'S guided a party of
surveyors back to Kentucky. In
1775 he began the erection of fort
at the place since known as Boones-
borO, which was the first settlement
made in Kentucky. In 1774 James
Harrod built cabin on the present
site of Harrodsburg, but abandoned
it, and did not make the settlement
there until the succeeding year, and
after that at Boonesboro. The third
settlement was made by Benjamin
Logan, at Logan's fort, in Lincoln
County, the same year. The first
cabin built north of the Kentucky
River was by Simon Kenton, near
Washington, in 1775, after which
he hunted out to the Lower Blue
Licks at which time there was no
settlement of any kind at the Upper
Blue Licks. Upon his return to his
cabin he found one of his comrades
murdered, and then abandoned the
place, and did not again take pos
session until 1884. AS late as 1776
there were no settlements, outside
Of four or five forts, except that
John Haggin lived in single cabin
on HinkstOn for some time during
that year, the only case of the kind
known, as there was no safety ex.
cept within reach of the slender pro-
lection of the palisades. In 1778
Boone, with twenty-seven of his
men, was captured at the Lower
Blue Licks, whittier he had gone
for the purpose of making salt,
showing that the character of the
water was known even at so early a
day. Bryant's Station was settled
in 1879, and after the destruction of
RuddelPs and Martins, for some
time remained the frontier outpost
in this direction. While a survey
ing party, under Gen. Thomas,
from Pennsylvania, landed at Cabin
Creek in 1873, they proceeded no
farther into the interior than the
North fork of Licking, and made no
settlement, and there is no evidence
of any permanent settlement having
been made by any parties coming
down the Ohio River, in this part of
Kentucky, earlier than 1770.