The Founding of Harman's Station: With an Account of the Indian Captivity of Mrs. Jennie Wiley and the Exploration and Settlement of the Big Sandy ... the Virginias and Kentucky (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from The Founding of Harman's Station: With an Account of the Indian Captivity of Mrs. Jennie Wiley and the Exploration and Settlement of the Big Sandy Valley in the Virginias and Kentucky

In the early days of the settlement of the Big Sandy Valley this stream was known altogether as the Louisa River. As late as 1825 it was generally called the Louisa River. After that time, and to some extent before, the name began to be corrupted to that of Levisa. The name Levisa is now used almost entirely. That the name is a corruption of the true name, Louisa, M181?20are preserved mainly in tradition. Indeed, it is to tradi tion principally that we must look for the sources of much of the history of all Eastern Kentucky. For the history of Kentucky, so far as it has been. Written at all, deals almost wholly with events which transpired in the blue grass region of the State.

Thirteen years after the establishment of the first per manent white settlement of Kentucky at Harrodsburg a strong healthy settlement of hardy, bold, self-reliant back woodsmen was made in what is now Johnson County. Among the founders of this settlement were a number of the most noted explorers, scouts, guides, riflemen, and Indian fighters ever developed by the harsh and dangerous times of the frontier days of Virginia and the Carolinas. Why some substantial account of the station founded by these men in that wilderness was not made a matter of record by some historical writer of those times is one of the strange things occasionally found in the annals of a State. In the company which made this settlement were Matthias Harman, Henry Skaggs, James Skaggs, and Robert Hawes, all members of that famous party known in history as the Long Hunters. These and others of the company had been in the front ranks of those audacious rangers of the wilderness who wrested the Ohio Valley from its savage owners. Through this settlement they seized and finally held the valley of the Louisa River. The contest was desperate, and they were forced to aban don their station for a time by fierce and frequent attacks made upon it by the Indian tribes living beyond the Ohio.

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