Charles Tracy
was born 1759 in Montgomery Co., Maryland, and died Mar 19, 1834, in Clark County, Kentucky.  He was the father of Naomi Tracy who married Thomas Fowler in Clark County, Kentucky, on October 27, 1814. She died in 1834 and Thomas married Elizabeth Haggard January 13, 1835, in Winchester, Clark County, Kentucky.

This article also can be found at the Clark County KY Public Library
and the Clark County Historical Society. It appears on the Clark County GenWeb Page of the internet. This was a part of a series written for the "The Winchester Sun" in Winchester,
Kentucky, April 23, 1923.

Following is an excerpt from a letter written by Sallie Fletcher Hill August 4, 1965.

"In 1939 Uncle John Ballew, son-in-law of James Fowler, told me the following. Thomas Fowler, Sr., father of James settled in Clark Co. Kentucky between Winchester and Mt. Sterling (Montgomery Co.) (My grandmother Mary Emmeline Fowler Fletcher told me that Thomas lived near Stoner Church on Stoner Creek, near Ruckersville.) Thomas sold 200 acres of land for $40 per acre and bought 1,100 acres in Hopkins Co. Kentucky in 1835. Thomas raised sheep and feed. ..."

A SCRAP OF CLARK COUNTY HISTORY

CHARLES TRACY:  KENTUCKY PIONEER

BUFORD ALLEN TRACY

1890

In the early spring of 1783, a band of hardy, resolute Revolutionary War Soldiers, who had been comrades and messmates throughout the long and bloody war that terminated in our independence from the Government of that old tyrant, King George III, having just been discharged from further service to their country, and finding their homes in many instances in waste, determined to immigrate to the dark & bloody grounds of Ky., having heard very glowing descriptions of its fertility and great abundance of wild game. Accordingly about 15 families, some from Va., others from Md., started from the banks of the Potomac, westward, for Ky., bringing with them some horses, a few cattle, 30 or 40 slaves, and a few necessary household articles. After many hardships and trials, heroically borne by both men and women, they halted upon the banks of "Big Stoner" in what is now the eastern part of Clark Co., & after an examination of the country around, determined to establish a settlement as they learned that there was a considerable settlement 10 miles west of them at Strodes Station and other settlements in other directions, though at much greater distances. The section of the country in which they chose to stop was an undisturbed wilderness, not a single cabin nearer than the neighborhood of Strodes Sta. 

The timber was large and of the most desirable sorts. The cane was thick and high. The wilderness was complete and unbroken, save by a large buffalo trace that passed through this immediate section from the south running north toward upper and lower Blue Licks. A few of the giants of the forest as it then existed are standing yet and many thousands of them have been felled within the recollection of the writer. Of the men and their families who composed this settlement, the writer remembers the names of Edmund Ragland who built his house on the land now known as the Thomas Gardner Farm - Charles Tracy who built his cabin near the site of Elija Miller's present residence - Wyatt Hulett built about half way between Hainey's and Tracy's. The writer remembers Hulett's cabin perfectly well. It was built entirely of white buckeye logs, beautifully hewn. Ezra Brown built a quarter of a mile east of Charles Tracy. William Holley built a quarter of a mile north of Tracy - William Jackson 300 yards west of Holley - Mr. Ladd 200 yards north east of Brown. Thus it will be seen by those acquainted with the neighborhood that Charles Tracy's cabin was built about the center of the proposed settlement, it extending about 3/4ths of a mile in every direction from his cabin. 

It was the month of May when these hardy pioneers called a halt upon the banks of Big Stoner and there decided upon a settlement, and the first duty to call their attention was preparation for planting a crop of corn, potatoes, beans, pumpkins, etc. So whilst their families dwelt in tents and under rudely provided brush shelters, about 30 stout, able-bodied men, including slaves, went forth with axes in hand, and for the first time perhaps in the history of the world, the sound of the ax and the falling timber was heard upon the banks of the Big Stoner. With so many strong, willing men to chop and grub and so many women & children to pile brush and burn, the incredible amount of work was accomplished within a short time, so that at the end of the month they had cleared and planted quite a number of patches amounting in the aggregate to 20 or 30 acres. No doubt in their haste and for want of sufficient tools, much of this work was rudely and imperfectly done. 

The crops planted, their next duty was the building of houses or "cabins" as they were called. Of course the first thing to be done was the selection of a site for the future residents of each individual family. This was not done in accordance with the taste of the present day, for every cabin except two was built on low ground or in a hollow between hills and within a few feet of a good spring. Only two of them, Richard Hainey & Edmund Ragland, built upon high ground. The writer remembers at least one of their homes that was built on a hill side so that one end of the house occupied ground at least 4 or 5 feet lower than the other, with plenty of level ground not far off and as free as the water he drank. The convenience of water doubtless influenced the selection of most of these sites, but the selection of a steep hill side with plenty of level land all around remains unexplained. 

Many of the logs necessary for the building of these "cabins" were doubtless felled and trimmed during the process of clearing land for the crop, yet for various reasons the progress was slow. The crop had to receive a certain amount of cultivation, which owing to the rough condition of the land and the want of proper implements rendered the task slow & tedious. Besides, food for the colony had to be looked after, which consisted chiefly of wild meats such as buffalo beef, venison, with an occasional bear, fish from Stoner, with an abundance of pheasants and partridges caught in traps in winter. These luxuries however had to be partaken of either entirely without or at most a very sparing amount of salt, for be it known that a pint or a quart of salt tied up in a rag was a treasure valued in the colony far above its weight in gold dust. These meats, with plenty of salt and bread, would have been most luxurious living, with plenty of cow's milk that they had, but alas, bread or even a substitute for it was unknown in the colony for several months. In Aug. of that year they were enabled to substitute roasting ears for bread, & a little later they made mortars by hollowing out the ends of logs. In these mortars, by means of a pestle with a smooth stone attached to one end, they pounded their corn into meal so that during the following winter, with plenty of dried beans and dried pumpkins, some potatoes, & sassafras tea sweetened with wild honey, they lived well. Yet their necessaries of life had been raised in such limited quantities that it was essential to practice the strictest economy, but we have digressed and gone ahead of our narration. 

All of the houses in this colony were built of unhewn logs, except Wyatt Hulett's & Edmund Ragland's, & with the exception of Mr. Ragland's were only one story high, being about 7 feet from floor to joist, with loft above. Floors were made of slab or puncheons split out in the woods with one side hewed smooth with broad ax. Doors were made of the same material put together with wooden pins & hung with wooden hinges. Instead of using rafters & sheeting for support of roof, they used what they called "ridge poles". These were put on across the building in the opposite direction from which the roof was intended to run & about 2 feet apart, each rib pole being raised higher than the other by means of end logs. These end logs of course became shorter as the rib poles went up until the last end logs would not be more than 4 feet long. The roof was made of four foot boards put on two double and fastened in place by straight edge logs laid across each course of boards. The first of these roof logs was fastened in place by being pinned to the first rib pole. The next was kept in place by scatches, one end resting against the first roof log and extending to the 2nd and so on to the top or comb. 

A few of the chimneys to these houses were built entirely of stone. William Holley's chimney was entirely of stone & had a fire place on either side so that one chimney did for 2 rooms. Others were built up four, five, or six feet with stone & then finished with sticks and mortar. These sticks for chimney building were riven out about the size, or a little larger than tobacco sticks. The chimney was then built up in the fashion of a chicken coop & the space between the sticks was plastered with a stiff mortar made of yellow clay & some chimneys were built from the foundation with mud & sticks & then protected from the fire by large flat rocks set up at the sides & back of the fire place. 

One of these houses was built entirely of sassafras logs from 12 to 18 inches in diameter, unhewn, but the bark taken off. This house was removed about 60 yards to another site in 1795 & removed again about 30 feet in 1850, & to this day is being occupied by a family 107 years after it was first built, & the logs are apparently as sound as they ever were. 

Edmund Ragland was several years the oldest man in the colony & also the wealthiest man, that is, he had more negroes (sic), more horses, and more cattle. So far as silver and gold was concerned, it was not worth a ban-bee, for there was nothing to buy. So it was decided by the colonist that he should build a much larger & much stronger house than any other in the colony in order that his house might serve as a sort of fort for the colony in the event of a raid by the Indians, which they had many reasons for believing might at any time occur. Accordingly, he built a house 20 by 30 feet, 2 stories high, of very heavy poplar & white oak logs, & made in every way very strong, having a special reference in its building to a defense of the colony from the inside. This house was divided into 4 rooms, 2 below & 2 above, by means of heavy plank partitions, the planks being sawed with whipsaw, with very large stone chimneys at either end of the house. There was so much to be accomplished by this colony, with such an insufficiency of tools, that it was not until after the first snow of the approaching winter had fallen that many of them were able to get into their houses. It must be remembered in addition to the whites, there were 30 to 40 negroes to be provided for with housing. 

Besides the approach of winter brought with it large packs of hungry, ravenous wolves that made it absolutely necessary to build other strong houses or stables for the protection of the live stock & ere this could be done, a favorite horse or cow had often to be taken into the family room at night for its protection from this ravenous beast of the forest. 

In addition to all these cares, they were kept in a state of continual anxiety by rumors of Indian raids upon Strodes Station, Bryants Station, & other places; but whilst there were raids made upon Strodes Station, Bryants Station, Lexington, Boonesboro, Estils Station, & other places, not a single Indian was seen or heard of in the vicinity of Big Stoner Settlement during the year 1783. It is probable that they had not heard of this new settlement & accidentally failed in their rambles to stumble upon it. All possible arrangements had however been made by the colonists for their coming. Mr. Ragland's strong house had been put in the best possible condition. Guns and ammunition were ready at a moment's warning. The few valuables were kept packed ready to be grabbed on the run or else buried where not likely to be found. An agreement had been made with other settlements to warn them by swift messenger of the approach of savages. It had been agreed by the colonists that a certain shrill intonation of the horn, sounded from house to house, should serve as a note of warning & that each family should run with all possible haste to Mr. Ragland's strong house. One of Charles Tracy's daughters, Jahoba, (who became the wife of Edmund Ragland's son Robert) told the writer that at the time of which we write that she was 8 or 10 years of age & how well she remembers this shrill note of the horn & how at its sounding they (to give her words) "all flew to Mr. Ragland's". 

But these alarms, to use their expressions, were frequently false alarms, & it was not until sugar making time in early spring of 1784 that they actually received a visit from the Indians. They had been warned by a swift running messenger from another settlement of their coming. All the people & valuables had been collected at Mr. Ragland's & everything made secure for the safety of the women & children, & then the men sallied forth with guns in hand eager to meet these savages of the forest. 

Travelling northward & keeping near the line of the big buffalo trace. They had gone scarcely a mile when from the top of a hill, they discovered 15 or 20 Indians around Mr. Holley's house trying to effect an entrance & having failed to batter the doors down, one big buck had mounted to the roof & was effecting an entrance by that route. When discovered, the settlers were scarcely a hundred yards off, & a steady aim from one of their rifles brought him to the ground, a corpse. In the fight that ensued 2 other Indians were known to have been killed & several others seriously wounded. The Indians retreated precipitately, the settlers following eagerly but with prudence & caution, coming in sight of them several times but at too great a distance to do further execution. 

Following on for several miles, the settlers saw indications that led them to believe that the party of Indians that they were pursuing were not all that were engaged in the raid, & fearing that another party might have fallen upon their settlement, they hastened to return, only to find all quiet in the settlement & the women & children greatly rejoiced at their safe return. 

These alarms now for a time became quite frequent so that the colony was kept in a state of constant anxiety, & whilst some were at work clearing more land & making preparations for another crop, others with trusty rifle in hand were securing the country around on the watch for the approach of these cruel & bloody savages. 

On another occasion not long after this, they made their appearance on Stoner in considerable numbers but were surprised by the whites in their camp & quickly repulsed with a loss of several of their number. Retreating in the direction of Strodes Station, they were overtaken about the spot where the Newport News & Mississippi Valley Depot at Winchester now stands & in the fight that there ensued, an Indian was killed on the spot now occupied by the residence of Col. Robert Winn. In this fight the whites suffered a serious loss by the death of one of the bravest of their number, a gallant young man, whose name the writer regrets has been lost, but remembers that he was a cousin to the Sphars. Just what became of this band of savages after the fight just alluded to, the writer does not clearly remember, the papers giving an account of this fight having been lost, but thinks it proved to be a part of a large band of Indians that were at the same time menacing Strodes Station & Bryant's Station. 

After the Indian raid last alluded to, the Big Stoner Settlement enjoyed comparative quiet for a considerable period, though never entirely free of anxiety on that account, at least for several years after the time of which we write. 

Mrs. Jahoba (Tracy) Ragland told the writer that after one of these raids and Charles Tracy's family had returned to their own house from Mr. Ragland's, they found a favorite cow, Crumple Horn, and a faithful watch dog, Ruler, had been killed by the Indians during their absence and related how the children & servants of the family wrung their hands & wept in very bitterness of grief over the death of their favorite animals that had accompanied them from the banks of the Potomac. 

Some time after this, Ezra Brown's family had gone to Charles Tracy's to spend a social day. Mr. Brown, being at home all alone & having finished the job of work on which he had been engaged, decided to take his gun & go into the woods & kill a deer. Being desirous of making a still hunt he fastened his dogs Brylo & Sylo in a house so they could not follow him. He had not long been in the woods when he was attacked by a pack of a half dozen wolves. He quickly dispatched one of them with the load in his gun. The other 5 made not the slightest halt but came at him snarling and snapping. He clubbed his gun & at the first blow killed another wolf. But being so hardly pressed he sprang into a convenient tree with the 4 remaining wolves jumping at his legs as he went up. 

He climbed quickly to the top of the tree & began calling lustily for his dogs Brylo & Sylo, who hearing their master's exciting call, after many trials & much scratching & gnawing, finally effected their escape from their prison & went with all speed to their master's rescue. The dogs quickly chased off the wolves & Mr. Brown came down from the tree, picked up the fragments of his gun, and walked home fully resolved never to go into the woods again without his faithful dogs Brylo & Sylo at his heels. 

It might have been stated by the writer ere this, that on some of the numerous raids made by the Indians upon the Big Stoner Settlement that more than one of the settler's houses were burned & others set fire to. But being of green wood, they ceased burning before doing much harm. Quite a lot of their livestock were killed or driven off, much of their scanty household was destroyed, & they were seriously harassed in many ways. But they were a brave, resolute People & finally triumphantly overcame all of these disasters. 

The settlers having relapsed into comparative quietude about the year 1785 or 1786, Richard Hainey proceeded to build the first water mill ever built upon the waters of Big Stoner. The site of this mill was upon the land now owned by & within a short distance of the present residence of deaf Jimmie Ramsey & about a quarter of a mile east and north of Goshen Church. The name of the millwright who constructed this mill for Mr. Hainey was Sabia Petty. The dam was built of stone & brush. The mill house was said to have been small. Indeed it was in every way a rural structure. Just where the beams or stones came from, the writer is unable to state but were probably manufactured on the ground out of material found in the neighborhood. The mill was a small affair but did good work & would grind several bushels of corn into meal in the course of a day & night & was considered lightning & a luxury compared with the old method of pounding corn into meal in a mortar. 

It must be borne in mind that the "Big Stoner", of which we write, a hundred years ago was quite a different stream from the Big Stoner of today. Then it contained within its banks almost as much water as the Red River of today. There were very many places within its banks that would swim a horse at any season of the year, & it was a much wider stream than now & abounded with the finest fish. Charles Tracy, who was probably the most successful fisherman of the colony, did not think anything of going to Stoner with hook & line & catching 40 or 50 pounds of fish in a day, many of his catches weighing several pounds apiece. 

The writer remembers 45 or 50 years ago when the Brandenburg Mill (situated a short distance above where the Hainey Mill had once stood) was in operation nearly the entire year, except in very dry seasons, with 2 sets of stones & saw mill being propelled by a stream that would not now furnish power enough to run the same machinery 30 days in a year. The adjacent forest being cut away, exposing the stream & its banks to the sun, thereby creating a large absorption that had not before existed - hundreds, perhaps thousands of gushing springs that daily emptied their waters into this stream have from cultivation & many other causes disappeared - the washing of plowed soil from either side for many years - has so filled its bed & so narrowed its banks that the "Big Stoner" of today is a mere branch compared with the "Big Stoner" of a hundred years ago. 

During the years 1786 & 1787 the settlement enjoyed some respite from Indian encroachments & made considerable progress. A number of new fields were cleared & put in cultivation. The crops of corn, flax, & tobacco were largely increased, dwellings were made more comfortable, & in some instances added to. Tobacco houses were built, ready for the coming crop. These were built of logs, usually about 20 feet square & often 25 feet to the plates, with tier poles built in every 3 1/2 or 4 feet. They raised what was called Little Frederick & Big Frederick Tobacco & always cured it with fire, using hickory wood for that purpose or else burned coal pits & over charcoal. 

Tobacco soon became the currency of the country. It was so many pounds of tobacco for a day's work or for a horse or cow, & finally when taxes were levied, it was so many pounds of tobacco. Tobacco was sent back over the mountains to Va. on pack horses as a currency rather than as a commodity with which to purchase various articles needed by the settlers. When courts were established in the county, all fees & services of the courts were paid with tobacco. Thus it will be seen that an article unsuitable for either food or raiment, used only to gratify an unnatural but acquired taste for a filthy practice, took position above every other article of production. 

Flax was one of the essential crops of the colony for on this the settlers depended largely for raiment. The stalks, which grew 3 or 4 feet high, were rotted & broken similar to hemp. It was then turned over to the women who by a process called Swingling, separated the coarser fibers from the finer. It was then spun & woven by hand into linen, the coarser fibers being made into what was called towlinen & used for working suits for men & for the negroes of both sexes. The finer linen was used for shirts, for sheets for the beds, for men's best suits, & for ladies' dresses, & many a coy maiden has appeared to very decided advantage robed in a dress of this material. 

Cotton was also grown in small quantities by some of these settlers, though in the climate it grew scarcely higher than a man's knee with a very limited number of bolls to the stalk, yet it was very essential to the settlers. The seed had to be separated from the lint to rolls by hand, spun by hand, and used for the most part as warp in the making of janes & linseys. All the wool used (a very limited amount) by these settlers for several years was obtained from Virginia & brought out in the usual way - upon pack horses. Wool like cotton was carded, spun, and woven by hand. The writer has seen in his day some most beautiful dresses of linsey, similar to those made by the settlers, possessing perhaps the advantage of better coloring material than that used by the settlers. 

It must not be supposed that during the years 1786 & 1787, of which we have been writing, that everything in the settlement was serene & lovely - far from it. Whilst this colony did not receive a single visit from the Indians during either of those years, they heard of frequent depredations upon other settlements & of the most shocking murders, so that they were often in a state of the greatest consternation. Night was frequently made hideous by the hooting owls, the most piercing screams of panther, the howling of a pack of hungry wolves, the bellowing of a score of mad buffalo bulls, & the fierce baying of the watch dog. Amid this confusion, sleep was driven from every eye, & often a timid maiden would steal softly, noiselessly from her bed to see if the doors were securely barred. But the hardships, the trials, the heart rending sorrows experienced by these dear people who rid this goodly country of ours of the deadly savages, the vicious wild beast, the poisonous reptiles, & put it in a state of cultivation for us, cannot be written nor scarcely imagined. Let us hope that by the grace of a merciful God, through the atoning blood of him who suffered & died upon the cross of Calvary, that they are now safely in heaven enjoying that blissful rest prepared for the children of God. 

In the year 1788 & 1789, the Big Stoner Settlement received large accessions to their number & for the first time there were a few houses built on the western bank of Big Stoner. David Brandenburg came & built a house at the foot of the hill just below the present site of Goshen Church. Mr. Brandenburg was by trade a miller & a millwright & in the course of a few years erected a mill on the site known by many yet living as "Brandenburg's Old Mill". Just when and how the Big Stoner Settlement got their first mess of biscuits, the writer is unable to state, but it is certain that the first mill erected in the eastern portion of what is now Clark Co. was Brandenburg's Mill (about the year 1790) in which wheat could be ground into flour. The flour was bolted by means of a bolting cloth stretched on a frame made in the form of a parallelogram. This was set in a frame & turned by hand with a crank, like the old fashioned wheat fan, & required several hours to bolt a hundred pounds of flour. 

Alexander Ramsey came to the settlement in 1788 & settled not far from Mr. Brandenburg & near the present site of Sugar Ridge Church, & by great industry & frugality acquired a large landed estate so that he was enabled after many years to settle a large family of children around him in comfortable circumstances. He was the grandfather, the great, & great great grandfather of all the Ramseys now living in Clark County. 

There also from Virginia, in company with David Brandenburg & Alexander Ramsey, William Wills who settled on the west bank of Big Stoner, near the original site of Sugar Ridge Church & close neighbor to Mr. Brandenburg & Mr. Ramsey & about 1 mile west of Charles Tracy. These three gentlemen - to wit, Brandenburg, Ramsey, & Wills, had been soldiers throughout the Revolutionary War, serving in the same brigade with Ragland, Tracy, Brown, Hulett, Hainey and others of the original Big Stoner settlers. 

Mr. Wills was an industrious, thorough going man possessed of far more than ordinary mental capacity and soon became well to do & one of the leading citizens of the settlement. He had 7 sons and 4 daughters, but all the Wills of Clark Co. sprang from his three sons, Washington, Isaac, and Thornton; the other 4 sons having left the county in their early manhood. 

One of the first, if not the first, marriage ceremony ever solemnized in the Big Stoner Settlement was Mr. Will's daughter, Fannie, to Mr. Luke Hood. From this union sprang all the Hoods of Clark Co. & several of their children and grandchildren became very distinguished citizens of the country. Two of their sons, Andrew & John, are numbered among the most eminent physicians that this county has ever produced. Dr. Andrew Hood's son, James, was not considered a whit behind his father in medical skills, & 2 or 3 other sons were physicians of ability. Dr. Andrew Hood was chosen by the people of Clark County over an eminent lawyer to represent the county in the Constitutional Convention of 1849 & his son Thomas, one of the brightest & most talented young lawyers of the state, was chosen to the same position of Carter County. Thus it will be seen that Mr. Wills had a grandson & a great grandson members of the Constitutional Convention of 1849. 

Dr. John Hood's son, John B. Hood received a military education at West Point & was a Lieutenant General in the late Confederate Army & was numbered among the very hardest fighters in that Army, as the historian can learn by reading of the battles he fought at Atlanta, Ga., & Franklin, Tenn. 

Williams Wills was a Jeffersonian Democrat, as have been nearly all of his descendants. His son William & his son-in-law Luke Hood were soldiers in the War of 1812 & narrowly escaped with their lives from the human butchery of Dudley's defeat, & but few men who ever lived in Clark Co. had as many descendants in the Confederate Army as did William Wills. 

Some time during the year 1788, the colony of Big Stoner learned through immigrants just arrived from Virginia that Gen. George Washington was a candidate for the presidency of the then 13 United States. So some time during the fall of that year, Richard Hainey & Charles Tracy (who by the way were brothers in law), leaving their families in care of 2 young men cousins of theirs, recently from Va., shouldered their trusty rifles & walked back to Va. for the pleasure of voting for their beloved old commander. It will be understood that at this date that Ky. was still territory belonging to the state of Va., and there was as yet no arrangement made for an election in the Territory of Ky., hence this trip to Virginia. 

It would be pleasant indeed to relate the reception given these two pioneers & soldiers by their relatives & friends upon their arrival at their old homes. Their stories of their lives led in the "dark and bloody grounds" & many of their hair breadth escapes from both savage and beast were no doubt listened to with bated breath, very much like the stories of Henry M. Stanley's explorations in the wilds of Africa would be listened to in the present day, but unfortunately we have no account of their arrival or sojourn while there. We only know that they returned safely to their families some time during the winter of 1788-89, bringing with them several immigrants & several pack horses ladened with various articles essential to their families in their wild new homes. Among the articles that Charles Tracy brought home with him was a couple of pear sprouts which he carefully transplanted on the ridge just above his house near the spot where he intended in the near future to build a better residence than he was then occupying. One of these pear trees was blown down by a storm only a few years ago. The other, at more than a hundred years of age, is still standing & bears most delicious fruit every year, except occasionally when nipped by an unseasonable frost. 

It may be stated here that Charles Tracy's next presidential vote was cast for Thomas Jefferson, & his last for Andrew Jackson, & that he and his descendants have voted the straight democratic ticket from Thomas Jefferson to the present year 1890, & if a single one of his descendants ever scratched a ticket, the writer has never heard of it. If it should be so that one of them ever did, the writer would say take him to the cold waters of Big Stoner & duck him good. George Tracy, a grandson, was elected constable of Kiddville Precinct at the first election held under this present Constitution of Ky. & re-elected at the expiration of his term, which is the only instance of one of his descendants ever asking for office at the hands of the people. 

  By the year 1790, the Big Stoner Settlement had increased to several times its original number & had extended over a much larger area of country, though quite a number of its accessions were mere squatters in search of game & adventure, rather than of homes, & as the country opened & the game began to disappear, they moved on westward. But the bona fide settlers were hard at work building more & better houses, clearing other & larger fields, thereby increasing their crops of corn, tobacco, & flax, & quite a number of patches of wheat were being sown for the first time in this settlement. This wheat was harvested with sickles, threshed with flails & separated from the chaff by pouring it slowly from a height of several feet on a windy day, & biscuits made of flour from Brandenburg's mill began to be a Sunday morning's treat. 

It was in this year (1790) that Edmund Ragland had brought down the Ohio River to Limestone (now Maysville) & from thence in some way transported to his home, a small copper still & in that year erected the first distillery ever operated upon the waters of Big Stoner. This proved, as might have been expected, the most unfortunate thing for the colony that could have been introduced. These hardy settlers had been so long isolated from any of the luxuries of life that when an opportunity presented, the scriptural injunction of moderation in all things was frequently unobserved. This became an evil in their midst to be contended with that had not existed heretofore. One of the very sad results of this distillery was that at least two of Ragland's sons became habitual drunkards through life & finally filled drunkard's graves. What must have been the feelings of this good old man when finally he saw the sad results of his folly. All that he had hoped to gain by seeking a home in this distant wilderness among cruel, relentless savages, wild beasts, & poisonous reptiles had been lost by this one mistake. 

The immense amount of labor required to put this country in a state of cultivation can scarcely be conceived by one of the present day. The timber grew thick and large. The undergrowth of cane was large & tall, often 15 or 20 feet high and so thick in many places that it was with great difficulty that a man could penetrate it. All this had to be cleared away & almost every square foot of the ground had to be grubbed with maddocks before the very imperfect plow of that day could be used, if indeed a plow was used at all. But to say nothing of this most formidable undergrowth, the getting rid of the immense amount of large timber was a Herculean task. The settler with his two, three, or half dozen laborers, as the case might be, with constant hard chopping for a month or three months, made but a comparative small impression upon this immense forest, or to use their expression, made "but a small sunlight hole in the woods." 

The settler would work hard with all the force that he could control during the fall & winter, felling the trees & cutting them in lengths that could be handled, & in the spring would invite all of the neighboring settlers in to his "log rolling". These log rollings were always attended by whole families & whilst the stout, stalwart men with hand spikes rolled the logs into great heaps, the women & children were piling & burning cane & brush. These log rollings were always looked forward to by both old & young with the greatest anticipation of enjoyment, fully as much as our young people of the present day look forward to an approaching wedding feast or fashionable ball. Some of their girls who were piling brush in the days of which we write are the grandmothers & great grandmothers of some of the wealthiest & most aristocratic families of today. On these occasions there were many tests of physical strength & the young men who exhibited the greatest strength & skill with the hand spike was the hero of the day & became a universal favorite with the young ladies, being second only to the best marksman with rifle, who was always the hero of every pioneer settlement. 

After a hard day's work, these log rollings were always celebrated by a feast at night. Buffalo beef, venison, & bear's meat were barbecued after the most approved style of the day - hot fish in abundance, with plenty of bread, pickles, & sassafras tea, finished up with pumpkin pies, sweet cakes, & a drink called masigulum. This was made in some way of honey comb & was delightful to the taste. After the feast the older people of the company would gather around large fires built in the yard & while the men told of their exploits as soldiers in the Revolutionary War & of their many adventures & hair breadth excapes from savage Indians & vicious wild beasts, the older ladies gathered in groups & talked of the dear fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, & friends left back at the distant old homes in Virginia & Maryland. The young people cleared the room of tables, benches & beds, & to the music of fiddle, tripped the light fantastic toe, & it was not until the wee small hours that they separated with friendly heartfelt goodbyes to meet again in a few days at another neighbor's "log rolling". In after years these log rolling frolics were changed to the extent of having added to them quiltings, & while the men went to the woods & rolled logs, the ladies remained at the house busily engaged in quilting. 

The writer has been unable to ascertain definitely, but it was probably about this year, 1790, that Ebenezer Chorn & Septimus Davis, with their families, came from Va. & joined the Big Stoner Settlement. Ebenezer Chorn settled nearly a mile east of Absolom & John March on land now owned by John T. Preuitt, better known as the Proctor Farm. This was a very fine selection of land, & having brought with him quite a number of able-bodied slaves, soon had one of the very best farms in the settlement. 

It has often been asserted by the oldest settlers that the first blue grass ever seen in Kentucky was found growing around an old deer lick about 3 miles north of Ebenezer Chorn's in what is now Montgomery County, near the banks of the creek which derived its name from that spot "Grassy Lick". There was not more than an acre or so of this grass, but it grew thick & luxuriantly & from this patch of grass Mr. Chorn stripped seed with his fingers & sowed it upon his farm. His effort to grow this grass was a success from the start. Many others tried to grow it again & again but without success, so that it became the popular opinion of settlers that this much-desired grass would not grow anywhere except upon Ebenezer Chorn's land. People often came from quite a distance to see this wonderful grass & to learn what they could about it and then ride on to the old deer lick to see it in its original state & if possible procure some of the seed or roots. So this is the history of the origin of Kentucky "Blue Grass" as handed down to the writer. We are aware that there are certain very learned agricultural writers who would jump astride of this reputed origin with whip and spurs and quickly ride it out of existence. Nevertheless, what we have written is no doubt the true origin of Kentucky blue grass, at least as far as the Big Stoner Settlement is concerned and there we leave it. 

Septimus Davis settled about a quarter of a mile west of Edmund Ragland on land now owned by John Sumpter, Alvin Bell, and others. Mr. Davis was said to have been an educated, polished gentleman. He took more than ordinary pains to educate his children, and two of his sons, James and Herchel, are numbered among the most distinguished teachers this county has ever produced. Major James Davis later in life became a very able minister in the Christian Church and was still living only a short time since in the state of Mississippi. Mr. Davis' daughters were said to have been beautiful women and were belles in the settlement. The writer does not know whether Mr. Davis was a Revolutionary Soldier or not but supposes he was from the company he stopped in. Our fellow citizens, W.B. Kidd and James Septimus are his grandsons. Written by Captain Buford Allen Tracy