University of Louisville ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository Electronic Theses and Dissertations 5-2013 Pioneers, proclamations, and patents : a narrative of the conquest, division, settlement, and transformation of Kentucky. Brandon Michael Robison 1986- University of Louisville Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.edu/etd Recommended Citation Robison, Brandon Michael 1986-, "Pioneers, proclamations, and patents : a narrative of the conquest, division, settlement, and transformation of Kentucky. Electronic Theses and Dissertations.18297/etd/1222 This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository.
This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. For more information, please contact thinkir@louisville. PIONEERS, PROCLAMATIONS, AND PATENTS: A NARRATIVE OF THE CONQUEST, DIVISION, SETTLEMENT, AND TRANSFORMATION OF KENTUCKY By Brandon Michael Robison B., Southern Adventist University, 2009 A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences of the University of Louisville In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Department of History University of Louisville Louisville, Kentucky May 2013 PIONEERS, PROCLAMATIONS, AND PATENTS: A NARRATIVE OF THE CONQUEST, DIVISION, SETTLEMENT, AND TRANSFORMATION OF KENTUCKY By Brandon Michael Robison B., Southern Adventist University, 2009 A Thesis Approved on April 26, 2013 by the following Thesis Committee: _____________________________ Dr. Glenn Crothers Thesis Director ______________________________ Dr.Garry Sparks ______________________________ Dr.
John Cumbler ii DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to my wife Whitney Elaine Robison who has supported and encouraged me so much throughout this process. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my professor Dr. Glenn Crothers for his incredible patience, support, and guidance in the development of this thesis. Without his assistance, this paper would not exist in its current state.
The copious hours he spent editing multiple drafts helped refine both my argument and my prose. I would also like to thank Dr. Daniel Krebs for his inspiration and encouragement in this process. His classes provided the original inspiration for this work, and he played the role of mentor throughout this process.
iv ABSTRACT PIONEERS, PROCLAMATIONS, AND PATENTS: A NARRATIVE OF THE CONQUEST, DIVISION, SETTLEMENT, AND TRANSFORMATION OF KENTUCKY Brandon M. Robison May 1, 2013 This study provides a narrative of Revolutionary Kentucky, focused on three key areas. First, it traces the struggle Native Americans, white settlers and speculators, and the various colonial, state, imperial, and national governments that claimed the territory for control and possession of Kentucky’s lands in the late eighteenth century. Second, this study focuses on the long-term effects of the struggle over Kentucky’s lands, paying particular attention to Virginia’s land laws of 1778-79, which created the framework by which the state distributed Kentucky’s land, and based on poor implementation of Jeffersonian notions of republicanism and allodial land ownership.
Third, this study examines. The region's transition from an Indian hunting ground to an agricultural economy radically changed the ecology; seeing the elimination of Kentucky’s bison as an archetype of the broader environmental changes taking place. This study argues, in short, that the conflict over the use and ownership of Kentucky lands dramatically impacted Native Americans, Euro-Americans, the future course of western settlement, and the ecology of the region itself. v TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE DEDICATION.
3 Literature and Historiography. 10 “A Beautiful Prospect:” “Kentuckee” as a Geographical and Ecological Construct. 10 A Hunting Preserve: Kentucky’s Environment under Indian Stewardship. 13 Indians and Kentucky’s Lands.
17 Virginia’s Claims to the West. 20 A Gentleman’s Club: Planters, Politics, and Profits. 22 The Virginia Land Companies and the Seven Years War. 27 Speculation, Veterans Grants, and the Proclamation of 1763.
34 Explorers and Long Hunters: White Men in an Indian Hunting Ground. 36 Lord Dunmore’s War. 40 First Settlements and the Coming Revolution. 42 Chapter 2: LAWS, LAND, AND WAR.
45 Kentucky, Virginia, and the Revolutionary War. 45 The Revolutionary War in Virginia. 46 vi The Revolution in Kentucky. 47 George Rogers Clark and the Campaign in the Old Northwest.
50 Native Americans and the American Revolution. 58 A Tale of Two Governors. 59 A Summary of the Factors Influencing the Passage of the Land Laws of 1779. 64 The Best of Intentions: The Land Laws of 1779.
70 A Legislative Legacy in the West. 70 1779: Immediate Effects of the Land Law. 70 Problems with Preemptions. 72 Problems with the Warrant Office.
74 The Failure of the Military Component of the Land Laws. 77 Petitions and Independence. 82 The Land Laws and Statehood. 84 Jefferson and His Land Laws.
87 The Legacy of Virginia’s Policies on Other States and Northwest Ordinances in Ohio. 91 Buffalo as an Archetype of Environmental Transformation. 97 The Legacy of Competition After Statehood. 97 Kentucky’s Legacy Outside the State.
111 vii INTRODUCTION John Filson’s famous pamphlet, The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucke (1784), contains a fascinating description of a region in transition. Today, historians often view Filson’s work as an example of clever advertising, rather than a thoughtful study. However, the book possesses important clues about the environmental, political, and social factors driving settlement patterns within the boundaries of Kentucky. Though Filson painted a rosy picture for potential Kentucky residents, his description omitted important details.
Kentucky and the Ohio Valley region were still fraught with violence and Indian wars. Kentucky’s environment was in dramatic transition, and by 1784, much of the vaunted Bluegrass region was already claimed and its environment in dramatic transition. Land, the commodity Filson tried to sell in his work, was not easy to obtain. Law suits already divided Kentucky’s land claimants into decades-long legal wars.
Filson described Kentucky, “As yet united to the State of Virginia, they are governed by her wholesome laws, which are virtuously executed, and with excellent decorum.”1 However, Virginia’s laws and policies generated many of the problems facing settlers of the state’s western territories. The situation threatened Virginia’s cultural and political hegemony over Kentucky and eventually sparked Kentucky’s separation from Virginia and creation as the fifteenth state in the union. Historians have long described Kentucky’s transition from a Native American hunting ground to the first western state. Individual studies have focused on specific subgroups like politicians, Native Americans, squatters, long hunters, planters, and speculators.
However, 1 John Filson, The Discovery and Settlement of Kentucke (Ann Arbor [Mich. 1 historians struggle to integrate these stories into a single narrative. They also fail to articulate the broader impact of Euro-American colonization in Kentucky. In particular, historians have neglected the significance and glanced over the important consequences of Virginia’s land laws of 1778-79, which arose from a complex web of social, military, economic, and environmental factors.
The process that Virginia established to distribute Kentucky’s lands left a chaotic record. Settlers confronted by the challenges accompanied with land ownership in Kentucky frequently moved to other lands further west. Historians have largely done the same, giving the land laws too little attention. Purpose This study has three primary goals.
First, it seeks to trace the struggle over the control and possession of Kentucky’s lands in the late eighteenth century. This narrative involves a large number of historical actors, but it focuses on the intersection of Native Americans, white settlers and speculators, and the various colonial, state, imperial, and national governments that claimed the territory. The decisions and actions of each party influenced the others in important ways as all sought to control Kentucky’s lands to further their varied interests. Second, this study focuses on the long-term effects of the struggle over Kentucky’s lands.
It pays particular attention to Virginia’s land laws of 1778-79, which created the framework by which the state distributed Kentucky’s land. The laws had important social, political, and economic consequences for each of the parties involved. This thesis highlights the role that Jeffersonian notions of republicanism and allodial land ownership played in the formation and legacy of the land laws. Third, this study examines the transformation of Kentucky itself.
The region's transition from an Indian hunting ground to an agricultural economy radically changed the ecology. While 2 Ohio Indians husbanded Kentucky’s herds of bison, elk, and deer, Kentucky’s white population hunted each to the point of local extinction. Seeing the elimination of Kentucky’s bison as an archetype of the broader environmental changes taking place, this thesis considers the fundamental changes in Kentucky’s ecology that resulted from the political, social, and economic transformations of the era. This study argues, in short, that the conflict over the use and ownership of Kentucky lands dramatically impacted Native Americans, Euro-Americans, the future course of western settlement, and the ecology of the region itself.
Questions This study seeks to answer the following key questions. First, what made Kentucky’s lands such prized commodities, and what were the results of the competition between the various parties in Kentucky? The governments of Virginia, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina all worked to claim their portion of the region. Likewise, land speculators, Native Americans, squatters, politicians, and even founding fathers battled aggressively over Kentucky. Each group had different visions for the region and they seldom coincided.
The claimants to Kentucky settled their disputes in court, in the state house, and on the battlefield. The first chapter describes Kentucky’s topography and ecology, and the region’s history prior to the American Revolution. This broad topic raises several smaller questions: How did colonial America’s view Kentucky? What was Kentucky’s natural environment like? How did Virginia substantiate its hegemony over the region? What role did Native Americans play in Kentucky? The answers to these and many other questions highlight the significance of Kentucky during the pre- Revolutionary era. The second question in this study is more specific: Namely, what role did the colony and state of Virginia play in the process of settling, partitioning, and defending Kentucky? To answer 3 this question requires studying Virginia’s official land policies, traditions, politics, and broader issues of the Revolutionary era such as taxation, war funding, recruitment, and national military strategy.
Virginia’s 1778-79 land laws, passed during Thomas Jefferson’s tenure as the state’s governor, are the focus of the second chapter. These laws represented a blueprint for the region’s settlement. Read with care they offer a window into the complex social and political trends of the era. The third chapter of this study confronts the question of legacy: Namely, what were the long term effects of Virginia’s policies and laws on the new United States, Native Americans, and Kentucky and its environment? Virginia’s experience in Kentucky shaped the history of the two states and the national narrative as well.
This study argues, for example, that Thomas Jefferson designed the land allotments of Northwest Ordinance of 1787 to avoid the problems associated with the distribution of land in Kentucky. Likewise, various states designed their land distribution systems to avoid Virginia’s problems with its Revolutionary War veteran bounty program. Literature and Historiography This study covers a broad range of literature including works on the Ohio Indians, Virginia planters, long-hunters, colonial and state politics, and Revolutionary and Indian warfare. However, several works deeply inform this thesis and support its argument.
Thomas Perkins Abernathy’s Western Lands and the American Revolution (1959) remains an exceptionally detailed work about the war on the frontier and the role of the frontier in colonial politics.2 George Morgan Chinn’s Kentucky: Settlement and Statehood (1975) provides the most complete 2 Thomas Perkins Abernethy, Western Lands and the American Revolution (New York: Russell & Russell, 1959). 4 narrative history of eighteenth century Kentucky.3 Even portions of Theodore Roosevelt’s The Winning of the West (1904) provide useful insight into the era.4 Though his thesis remains much derided, his sources are of good quality. Native Americans also feature prominently in this study.