This is an interesting
article that was written many years ago in 1931 by Rev. James F.
Price. It's a look into some of our very early history of the land
and the settlement of our county.
***
The early pioneers of
our Western Kentucky that later would become Crittenden County were a
most neighborly and visit-prone people right from the beginning.
This can be attributed to many factors, not the least of which was
the dark, gloomy, largely unbroken forest which blanketed our virgin
landscape and cast uncontrollable fears of Wilderness Fever caused by
too much loneliness and isolation. Added to this was the nagging
fear of Indian trouble .
The pioneer of original
Livingston County was that hardy breed of perpetual western movers we
term the Scotch-Irish. Even though they were relatively poor, in
most instances, they retained the overbearing family and neighbor
ties as the system was developed in the deep South. There were a few
of the planter-aristocrats who attempted to set up plantation type
farms, these were usually in the river bottoms, but these people soon
realized that this land was just not suitable for such uses, and soon
adapted themselves down to the smaller cropping method of provision
farming.
***
Traveling To Western
Kentucky
The Pioneers migrated to
what became Crittenden County by both the overland routes across the
Cumberland Mountains and across Kentucky or through the Cumberland
River Valley through Tennessee by wagon, foot and pack-horse, and by
the river flatboat route down the Cumberland, Ohio and Tennessee
Rivers.
By far, the former
overland routes were mostly always taken by the home seeking, very
few of whom lived near rivers in Virginia, North and South Carolina,
and Tennessee, and fewer yet had any river boats nor navigation
skills, and since few had money to buy or build boats and rent crews
or pay passage, the river pirate and hostile Indian danger on the
rivers decided the way this county was settled, which was traveling
on land.
The overland travelers
in the virgin Kentucky and Tennessee forests always traveled in
groups as a means of protection against the ever-present larger
savaging-wild animals, such as wolves and panthers, who would follow
the pioneer's herds of cattle, hogs, sheep and poultry in packs
awaiting the opportunity to attack a straggling animal or even a
child.
They also traveled
together for protection from possible attacks of hostile Indians or
robbery and murder by land pirates, although there was less actual
danger of Indian attacks in Kentucky, since they using the state only
as a hunting ground, and had become adjusted to sharing the game with
the white settlers.
When the groups of
overland traveling pioneers arrived in west Kentucky they considered
the wooded rolling hill-land of what was to become Caldwell and
Eastern and Southern Crittenden County as
prime land, for the pioneers were convinced that land that would not
grow trees would grow nothing, and most of them were quite familiar
with hill-farming in their original homes in the south, thus the
first sections of original Livingston County to become settled were
its Eastern and Southeastern half.
The original permanent
settlement of what was to become Crittenden County was determined to
a great extent by the only roadway that naturally led through the
desired homestead country in a south to north direction.
***
Roadway known as the:
Saline Trace, Chickasaw Trail and Flynn's Ferry Road
Geologically a natural
break, formed by parts of Camp Creek and Piney Creek in very early
times formed a basis for a North-South track or trail through the
eastern part of the County from the plains or grasslands of middle
Tennessee and southern Kentucky to the salt-licks along the Saline
River in Southern Illinois.
The first use of this
pathway was made by the great herds of buffalo and other grazing
animals that had inhabited the grasslands from time immemorial as the
route to travel to secure the supply of salt, which was necessary for
their health.
The "Saline Trace"
was built by the buffalo, which has been called the trail maker or
engineer, because of his habit of finding the route of least
resistance between salt licks and cane breaks. His trail, some 4 or
5 feet wide, was hard packed by many hoofs. Indians adopted and
followed his traces, or paths.
Before Crittenden
County was settled, the Chickasaw tribe of Tennessee sent hunting
parties into the area. One of these early camps was located in the
vicinity of Piney Fork church, near whee the present highway crosses
the creek west of the church.
The Kaskaskia Tribe
representing the powerful Illinois nation, often camped on lower Camp
Creek near the site of Weston. Thus these large groups of Indians
often came into conflict over possession of hunting rights in the
land that was to become Eastern Crittenden County.
Early Crittenden County
tradition tells us that in about 1790, warriors of these tribes met
near the Piney Fork campsite, and in a running battle from there to
the river, more than 200 Indians were killed. The Chickasaws won
the battle and immediately made provisions for the spoils to be
transferred to their camp. They cleared a road along the trail for
the use of their wagons, by 1790, the Chickasaw had adopted the full
use of the white man's freight wagon.
When early settlers
located, at what would later become Weston, the road was known at the
Chickasaw Trail, but soon in 1803 it would become know as Flynn's
Ferry Road for George Flynn who opened a ferry and established a
better road to Big Spring in Princeton.
***
Armstrong and
Centerville
The land that is now
Crittenden County is a rolling plateau cut by three main north-south
running valleys which are clearly divided by high ridges between them
in its southeastern quarter which were the first sections to be
settled by the pioneers after the Centerville neighborhood had been
taken up.
The Armstrong's were
among the first settlers of (what was to become) Crittenden County.
James took up 200 acres on Livingston Creek, the site of Centerville,
where he had already built a residence a few years earlier. Logan
Armstrong and Samuel Armstrong took up 200 acres on the same creek.
The three tracts were all surveyed in 1799. (There is a Kentucky
Historical Marker to mark the site of Centerville on the
Crittenden-Caldwell line on Highway 641.)
The Piney Fork Valley
was next preferred by the homesteaders. It begins as a narrow valley
in the south, near where the original Piney Creek Baptist Church was
located and is separated from the Tradewater River Valley by the Haw,
Blackburn and Piney Bluffs ridge on the east, but soon broadens to
the Twin Knobs-Wilson Hill ridge on the west. (Who would have ever
dreamed that the once historically known Twin Knobs would be no more,
and a modern highway would now be where they once stood. These knobs
were landmarks known for miles around by pilots in the air and from
travelers on the highways.)
This valley was very
fertile to the basic pioneer crops and was well drained by both forks
of Piney Creek and watered by numerous ever flowing springs. The land
was also blanketed by a fine virgin growth of hardwood timber. These
factors made it the ideal location for successful pioneer settlement
and it became the "cradle" of Crittenden County.
***
As each generation dies
out, much of our past history is lost. It's nice to have these
written facts to still read and recall the very early days of our
county and it's pioneer people.
.jpg)
.jpg)
