August 13th 1845

These desultory notes I continued to write out at Washington City, living in the family of my esteemed friend Maj. Hampton C. Williams, in the spring of 1845. In April, various engagements compelled me to lay the work aside. On resuming it today, I find myself in possession of fuller, and additional facts in relation to my Grandfather Duncan's life and character, and also some facts in regard to my grandfather Laughlin, which I think it proper to state before I go on with my narrative. There facts have been furnished me in a letter of the 3rd of August, 1845, from Marshall N. Laughlin, the son of my cousin Thomas Laughlin of Monroe Co. Tennessee, who is a student in my office at Hickory Hill---the facts being dictated by my father and written down by Mr. L. The letter will be found in the current volume of my bound letters. I am collecting materials from my further great uncle Benjamin Sharp and others from Lyman C. Draper Esq. of Baltimore who is preparing a volume of Biography of Western Pioneers, and in which I hope to have my grandfather's name inserted.

The true spelling of my grandfather's name I am satisfied is Dunkin, not Duncan. He was born in Lancaster (not Chester) County, Pennsylvania, in 1743---of Scottish parents, his father claiming to be of the clan claiming name and descent (as they yet do in Scotland) from good King Duncan---the true spelling of the patronymic name, as my grandfather and great grandfather contended being Dunkin. My great grandfather's name was Thomas. He had early in life emigrated to Ireland from Scotland, and from thence to Pennsylvania, having married in Ireland a lady of respectable family, named Elizabeth Alexander---she being of Scottish descent.

He (my great grandfather) died in Lancaster Co. Penn. In 1760--leaving one son, my grandfather, four daughters and his widow. John Dunkin, my grandfather, being an only son, and very young at his father's death, had his mother and sisters to support. He married very young, his wife being Ellenor Sharpe, daughter of John Sharpe, the father of my grand uncles John, Thomas, and Benjamin Sharpe, (*Ben Sharpe died in Warren Co., Mo. Jan., 1846.) the latter still living in Missouri as before stated in these notes. By my grandmother Ellenor, he had three children born before he left Pennsylvania which was about 1765. He moved to what is now Russell County, Virginia, on the waters of Clinch river, and settled at a noted place called the Elk Gardens. This was the most remote northwesterly settlement of Virginia west of the Blue Ridge at that time. At Elk Gardens, he was appointed a Captain of Rangers by a Committee of Safety. His company was a small band of choice spirits, always ready as minute men, and qualified by experience and bravery for defending a frontier settlement against the cunning and barbarity of Indian enemies. On one occasion, while he thus lived on Clinch, a predatory band of Indians came into the settlement, and murdered a man named Bush and his wife, and took their children, three daughters and a son prisoners. The son was nearly grown. Capt. D. with a few men, followed the trail, and by hard marching, overtook them, killed three of the Indians, and rescued the prisoners without losing a man. Further to the northwest, where Powell's Valley had begun to be settled, in what is now Lee County, Virginia, the Indians were in the habit of murdering travellers. Before the settlements had become permanent, the great Buffalo trace to Kentucky---or that part of Virginia now forming Kentucky---by way of Cumberland Gap, from 1766 to 1776, was a route for hunters and adventurous explorers, on which numerous murders and robberies were committed by various tribes of Indians, but mostly by Cherokees and Shawnees. Capt. Dunkin and his little faithful band, frequently went out and remained for different periods, on tours of duty in protecting the settlers in their valley and on the road on one of these tours, he and his company fell in with a band of Indians, whom they instantly attacked, killing four and wounding as fifth. They followed the wounded Indian some distance to a place where he had entered a cave. The late Gen. Joseph Martin, under whom my father served in the campaign to Lookout Mountain in 1788---and who had some establishment in that part of East Tennessee which now forms the lower part of Powell's Valley, was along---having, with other rangers, met Capt. Dunkin's Virginia Rangers, was at the time of so tracing the Indian in company with Capt. Dunkin, when it was agreed between the two, that while others kept guard without, they would enter the cave and take the Indian or kill him. They entered, each with a blazing torch in one hand (for the cave was totally dark) and a pistol in the other cocked and primed. After going in sixty or seventy yards, Capt. Dunkin saw the Indian's eyes shining in the distance, and---taking deliberate aim, not knowlng but that the Indian had a gun, and supposing others to be with him, was so lucky as to shoot him right through the bead. Many were the manly and brave acts of Capt. D. and his gallant neighbors.

In the year 1777 he went to Kentucky, raised corn, and made improvements by erecting cabins in the fork between Kingston's and Stoner's forks of Licking River. He had removed his mother and sisters with him to Clinch. After thus preparing in Kentucky in 1777-8, he removed his family, including his aged mother, and two sisters and their husbands Samuel Porter and Solomon Litton, out from Clinch to Kentucky in 1779. I say he removed them, for besides being the head of his own family, he was the commander and leader of the company of immigrants, though Porter and Litton and others who went along, were men of enterprise and soldiers and woodsmen. These two had farms, also begun by improvements near Martin's Station. Martin's Station was on Stoner's river (or fork of Licking) five miles above its confluence with Kingston or Licking---Ruddles Station (pronounced Riddles) was three miles below the junction or forks---consequently the forts were eight miles apart.

The winter of 1779-1780, was unusually severe, and is remembered in the history of the times, and traditionally as the Hard winter. (see Marshall's HISTORY OF KY. v. 1 p. 102). The river and streams were all frozen up---cattle and domestic animals died up by hundreds and thousands, as doubtless did the wild game. Wild meat when it could be procured by the border settlers was very poor; and the corn and grain was early consumed and the people put to great straits to procure subsistence of any sort, however common or coarse. Settlers were reduced to the very point of starvation, so much so that they were compelled to live on the most unwholesome meats without bread. Many families, travelling out to Kentucky, by way of Cumberland Gap and the Wilderness, were compelled to encamp, erect huts, camps as temporary shanties were called, and such other shelters as they could obtain, and subsist of the dead carcasses of their cattle, sheep, etc. as died from the effects of the weather and want.

When the spring of 1780 was ushered in, there was an unusual rustle among the new settlers in Kentucky. They had the finest lands in the world to cultivate, much of it easily cleared so as to fit it for corn crops, potatoes etc. The previous winter had admonished them to the necessity of making as much provisions for the next winter as was possible. In the spring there seemed to be but little danger from the Indians. In the vicinity of the forts, the planters pitched or planted large crops, and everything seemed to smile and promise future prosperity. They seemed to be removed from the constant dangers and troubles which the Revolutionary War still in progress, brought to the neighborhoods and doors of their brethren in all the country east of the mountains. In describing these scenes in Kentucky, Mr. Marshall N. Laughlin, in writing me from Hickory Hill from the dicatation of my father says: "Early the crops of corn began to ripen (summer of 1780) and heaven seemed to be suspending the Cornucopia over the famished land. There was a smile on every man's countenance as he looked out upon the luxuriance of the growing Indian corn. There was happiness and security in the forts---happiness there really was and security there seemed to be---where they all lived, each fort like a great family. While living thus in smug and fancied security, they sang their domestic Te Derms around blazing wood fires, around which was also placed innumerable rich roasting ears of corn arranged at proper distances and positions for being nicely roasted."

While this happy sylvan state of things however existed upon this fair frontier, Col. Byrd was busily employed at Detroit plotting their destruction in combination with the northern nations of Indians in alliance with Great Britain in our revolutionary war---a conspiracy against the peace and happiness of these unoffending frontier settlers which was soon to turn all their rejoicing and supposed security into a scene of sorrow and mourning.

On or about the 1st of June, 1780, Colonel Byrd, a British officer, collected a body of about 600 Canadians and Indians at or near Detroit, and after marching by land to the Great Miami where it was navigable, they took canoes, boats, pirogues and floated down that river to the Ohio, in sight of where Gen. Harrison's tomb at present stands at North Bend, they rowed up the latter river to the mouth of Licking, opposite to where Cincinnati now stands, and on the banks of which at its mouth now stand the two thriving towns in Kentucky of Newport and Covington; thence up the Licking to the mouth of the south fork of that river, a short distance below Ruddle's Station (pronounced in Kentucky Riddle's) and thence by land on the 22nd of June, they appeared suddenly before Ruddle's station, as if they had fallen from the clouds or rose out of the ground by enchantment. The people of the fort hastily closed the gates, and began to prepare for defense, but the show of artillery, and the overwhelming numbers of the enemy appalled the stoutest hearts. They therefore surrendered on pledges of personal safety from the Indians, but the whole of their property was given up to the plunder-and rapine of the savages. After the fort was sacked, and the march was commenced, many prisoners were forced to carry the spoils on their backs for their captors. Every kind of property was taken.

Hearing the roar of artillery at Martin's Station, which greatly surprised the people, two runners, a man named McGuire, and Thomas Berry, a relation of my grandfather, were dispatched to ascertain what was the matter at Ruddle's fort. They were met on the way by the enemy, and on attempting to retreat were fired on. McGuire's horse was killed and he was taken prisoner. Berry escaped back to the fort. On his report, the best preparations for defense were made which the time permitted. On the next day, the enemy appeared before the fort, and summoned them to surrender---Two hours were given these brave men in Martin's Station to consider---and they were notified that if they did not surrender, that the Indians would be let lose upon them, to deal with as they pleased. They surrendered without firing a gun. Withers, in his HISTORY OF BORDER WARS, says that Col. Byrd took pains, and had to exert all his authority to save the prisoners from slaughter. The prisoners taken at Martin's were united to the prisoners from Ruddle's. There was understood to be an agreement between the British and Indians that the prisoners taken at Ruddle's should belong to the Indians, and those at Martin's to the British. Let this be as it may, according to Marshall, Butler, Withers, and the other histories of these times, the whole of the property of all the Americans, including their negros, was given up to the Indians. According to a letter of Maj. Benj. Sharp of Warren Co. Missouri, to myself, dated Aug. 11th 1845, my grandfather John Dunkin, had ten or twelve likely negros, and a fine personal property in stock and furniture etc. of which he was altogether plundered. After the Treaty of Greenville, I think he got back an old African woman named Dinnah, (mother of Easter a negro woman now the property of my uncle Joseph Dunkin) and a boy. I remember Dinnah on Holston, but am not sure as to the boy. This robbery and captivity, reduced my grandfather to poverty. As I have heretofore stated, nothing but a few rags of clothes (for all their best garments were taken) was left to him or his family. The prisoners were all taken down the Licking, by the route by which the British had descended, to the Ohio---down that river to the mouth of the Great Miami---up that river as far as navigable, and thence to Detroit, now in Michigan, and thence to Montreal. My grandfather, and my mother who was old enough to remember, often described to me the sight of the falls of Niagara as they passed round by a portage on their way to Detroit. My mother used, in recounting these adventures to myself and my brothers, to dwell upon the hardships of the whole journey from Kentucky. When the march was first commenced, Grandfather carried one of his children. All packed what few clothes were allowed them. He said the British treated them humanely. The Indians who had the Ruddle's fort prisoners, sold most or all of them to the British for trifles. The British wanted them to exchange for their own prisoners then in the possession of our armies in the then colonies.

The beauty of the lakes, the clear purity of the waters, and her surprise at the boats and small shipping of the British on the lakes, were subjects on which my mother often entertained by long and circumstantial details by our fireside, of long winter nights, when I was a boy.

I do not know, nor do-I remember from the relations of my grandfather, or from the statements of my mother, or her older sister Aunt Betsy Laughlin, whether all the prisoners were carried down to Montreal. My grandfather was however, with his family, and the letter just quoted from Uncle Benj. Sharp, gives the reason why he was imprisoned in jail while at that place. His eldest son John, as will be seen by Maj. Sharp's letter bound up in my book of letters, made his escape from the British at Montreal, and his father, who was known to been a soldier and officer of standing, was suspected of having aided his son to escape to carry communications across the wilderness, through New York to Gen. Washington's army. Maj. Sharp says that Uncle John and another had agreed to make their escape together; but that after they started, the other young man's heart failed, and he went back. Not so, says Maj. Sharp, with little Duncan. He made his way through the wilderness and over rivers to Gen. Washington's army, the headquarters being then perhaps in Pennsylvania, and reported himself to Gen. Washington, by whom he was well provided for until his father and family were exchanged and met him in Pennsylvania on their return home---they having come through western New York, and by Philadelphia, and thence through Pennsylvania, Maryland etc. to that part of Washington County in western Virginia, where or nearly where he had removed from when he went to Kentucky, and there he continued to live for the remainder of his life. After his return, he never went to Kentucky to look after his lands and improvements, and thereby lost a head-right to one of the best tracts of land on the waters of Licking river.

After he settled in what is now Washington County, Virginia, the place where he lived was for many years considered as being in North Carolina, in that portion of what is now Sullivan County, Tennessee, the line between Virginia and North Carolina not being then finally settled. While the line was thus unsettled, and his residence being supposed to be in N. Carolina, the State Convention of 1788 was called in North Carolina, to pass upon and ratify or reject the Constitution of the United States which had been formed in 1787. My grandfather and his brother-in-law John Sharp, their residence being as supposed in North Carolina, in Sullivan County, were elected members of this convention and both voted against ratifying the Treaty. See ELLIOT'S DEBATES, Vol. 3, p. 218. They, under the lead of Willie Jones, the great opponent of its adoption, and against Gen. Wm R. Davie was the master leader in its favor, was the same objections which alarmed Patrick Henry and others in the Virginia Convention. Afterwards, however, when the subject was reconsidered in North Carolina, they both became advocates for its adoption. The Convention of 1788 however, rejected the Constitution by a vote of 184 to 84, see same book. My grand uncle Sharp and my grandfather, became Republicans---of the Jefferson and Madison school under the Constitution and so continued while they lived. When the state line was finally settled, my grandfather's residence fell in Virginia and my uncle's in Tennessee.

My great grandmother, the mother of my Grandfather Dunkin, came from Pennsylvania with him---removed with him to Kentucky---was prisoner with him in Canada, and returned to Holston with him, being seventy when captured, and lived many years after their return.

On the return from Canada, as my father states in a letter to me of the 2nd of August, 1845, written by Marshall N. Laughlin, it is stated, and as my father received the facts from Grandfather himself, that the prisoners came by way of Lake Champlain, by Saratoga, the place of Burgoyne's surrender in 1777---down the Hudson by water, and across through New Jersey to Philadelphia. My mother has often told of the astonishing scenes of rejoicing they witnessed in Philadelphia, at the final achievement of our national Independence as they passed through the city---and of the kindness everywhere of the people to them on their journey.

My grandfather had two sisters, one married to a man named Porter, of Russell Co. Va. whose descendents are living in Missouri as far as I know them---another married to Litton of whose descendents I have no knowledge. Mrs. Porter's name I think was Jane. He had a sister named Mary or Polly, married to a brother on my Grandfather Laughlin, named James, who died at the mouth of Spring Creek where Jonathan King now lives, Washington Co Va. His son James died in Rutherford Tennessee, about 1817---whose son James Y. died also there---and his other son, Steth Mead, died in Arkansas some years since.

The other son of my grand uncle, Alexander, died in Rutherford in 1839 of an abscess in the back, near his kidneys---his widow, who was a McGill, and his sons and daughters have gone, I believe, to Iowa. My Grandfather Dunkin's youngest sister married a man named Robinson or Robertson, in Russell, Virginia, and took her back to Lancaster Pennsylvania where he came from. Grandfather had an uncle named Dunkin---or as he spelt it---Duncan who came from Ireland or Scotland to Pennsylvania after he left that state, and either remained there, or went to Ohio---as my father remembers to have heard my grandfather say---and I have heard the same from my Grandmother Duncan.

These notices, are according to father's letter above referred to, dated 2nd August 1845, and Uncle Sharp's letter before quoted, and my own recollections. I write in a most desultory manner, at snatches of time when not employed in my Office of Recorder of the General Land Office at Washington, and the sketches I can put down in these notes are full of repetitions, but as they are only for the eyes of my children and descendants who may be curious enough to read them when I am no more, it is not necessary for me to take pain with the composition, or to look back to avoid lautology (sic) in words, or repetitions of events.

It is now the 4th of August, 1845, and I am still writing autobiographical sketches which I intended when begun as a mere introduction to a regular Diary. I am trying to collect facts upon which to enable Mr. Lyman C. Draper of Baltimore, who is engaged in writing LIVES OF WESTERN PIONEERS, to give a sketch of the useful and honorable life of my grandfather. My letters from friends, containing information and facts of family history will all be found in my bound books of letters; and the file of letters which I am daily writing home from here to my father and family at Hickory Hill, which will, I hope be preserved, will contain nearly as full accounts of my employment here at Washington City, as a Diary would. But I will try, in a few pages more, to bring up the lagging notices of my own very unimportant Biography. Letters that I have recently received from my cousin Thomas Laughlln, of Philadelphia, Monroe Co. Tennessee; Thos. I. Martin of Nave's Town, Mo.; my nephew John S. Laughlin, son of my brother Nathan from Barry Co. Mo.; from John S. Campbell, son of uncle Samuel Campbell, of Chariton, Mo.; from Grand uncle Benj. Sharp, of Warren Co. Mo. and from my family at home, showing the present condition of my dispersed kindred, will all be found in my bound letter books, as also letters from Uncle Alexander Laughlin, in Coles Co. Illinois, and Cousin James H. Early of Whitley Co. Ky.---and perhaps from Jonathan King of Washington Co. Va.

I will here mention, that since I came to Washington City (my Diaries will show my travel) on the 9th of April, 1845, my son-in-law, Mr. Timothy Kezer, merchant of Nashville, Tennessee, the husband of my daughter Ellen Tempe, died at his own home at the city of Nashville, of dropsy of the heart. He wrote me on the 5th of that he was recovering---but alas, how often in the midst life, how near are we to death! He was a man I esteemed in every respect as a son. He married my daughter in 1833 or late in 1834, and from that time to his death, was ever one of my most fast and faithful friends. Never did any man have a son who treated him always with more kindness and dutiful respect. In 1836 he and Ellen lost their infant son, named after me. In 1842-3, they had an infant daughter, Mary, now living, called for my wife; and since his death, in May or June, Ellen has had a son, called Fredrick Timothy, for Mr. Kezer and his father. He has left his wife comfortably provided for in property---but what can repair the loss of such a husband and father? He died in the full and confident hope of salvation through the merits of Jesus Christ. What a consolatory fact is this in the death of any one we love. May my end, come when it may, be so blest. My dear "wife---my beloved mother, and others died in this blessed hope. May it be my lot!"

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