Wilderness Road

The Wilderness Road was the principal route used by American and immigrant settlers into and across Kentucky for more than fifty years. In 1775, Daniel Boone blazed a trail for the Transylvania Company from Fort Chiswell through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. It was later lengthened following prehistoric trails to reach the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville. The trail was steep and rough, and could only be traversed by foot or on horseback. Still thousands passed over it to new homes. In 1792, the new Kentucky legislature provided money to upgrade the road. In 1796, an improved all-weather road was opened for wagon and carriage travel. Kentucky abandoned the road in 1840 although modern highways follow much of its route.

Early Exploration

Before Daniel Boone opened a trail, the Appalachian Mountains formed a natural barrier from Pennsylvania to Georgia that blocked travel westward by the early pioneers on the Eastern Seaboard in the original Thirteen Colonies. Boone belonged to the “long hunters” so-called because of their long rifles and the long time they spent away on hunts in the wilderness before returning home. Boone would sometimes be gone for months and even years before returning home from hunts. (Newby, 172-173)

At that time, the hide of a doe (female deer) was bringing fifty cents per skin while the skin of a buck (male deer) never sold for less than a dollar, hence the slang name ‘buck” for a dollar bill. He once was asked if he was ever lost. He quipped, “No, I can’t say as ever I was lost, but I was bewildered once for three days.” (Bodett, 91-92)

Boone recommended three essentials for a pioneer: “A good gun, a good horse, and a good wife.” He also would need a strong body, a sharp ax and good luck. Another essential was salt. Before 1776, it had to be shipped into the Thirteen Colonies from the West Indies at great expense. It was the only preservative for meat available for men on the move and Kentucky had an extra lure with its large salt brine lakes near Boonsborough. (Cooke 158-160) A white man had never penetrated the Appalachian Mountains before 1674 when Gabriel Arthur found Cumberland Gap. This break in the rugged mountains was the most important gap of the many passes. The Cumberland Mountains stood over 3,000 feet high with 400-foot sheer walls along Cumberland Gap. The Native Americans captured Gabriel and his friend. His companion was killed but Gabriel was released when the Native Americans realized that they could trade their furs for guns. (Kincaid, 27-32) In 1750, Dr. Thomas Walker, an Irishman, explored and documented the existence and features of Cumberland Gap, which had been worn down by buffalos (American bison) and Indian hunting parties. (Kincaid, 47)

Boone - The Trailblazer

Starting on March 10, 1775 Boone along with 35 axmen, hired by the Transylvania Company and Judge Richard Henderson of North Carolina, cut a trail through the wilderness and mountains to Kentucky. This was a rough mud trail hardly more than a path. (Kincaid, 100)

On March 24, 1775 Boone and his party were only 15 miles from their final destination of the Kentucky River when they camped for the night. Just before daybreak a group of Shawnee Indians slinging tomahawks (light ax with a stone (in the 18th century it is highly unlikely that a tomahawk had a stone head) or iron head) attacked the sleeping men. Some of the men were killed and some were wounded but most were able to escape into the woods. Boone got his men together and drove off the Indians who had stolen some of their horses. Here Boone built a temporary open barricade with 6 to 7 foot high logs. (Kincaid, 103)

Location of Road

The entire road made a long loop from Virginia down to Tennessee and then up to Kentucky, a distance of almost 1000 miles. (Bodett, 83).

The southern part of the Road passed over the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee via the Cumberland River to Nashville. The northern arc split into two parts with the eastern spur went into the Bluegrass Region of Kentucky at Boonesborough on the Kentucky River (near Lexington); the western spur running to the Falls of the Ohio (Louisville). (Kincaid, 77) (Williams, 62). As settlements grew southward, the road stretched all the way to Knoxville, Tennessee by 1792 (Calloway, 26).

To see a detailed map click here: http://www.danielboonetrail.com/html/trailmap.html

For a map of the Kentucky part of the Road http://www.rootsweb.com/~vanrhs/wrrm/map.html

Dangers of Road

Because of the threat of Indian attacks, the road was so dangerous that most pioneers traveled well armed. Robbers and criminals also could be found on the road ready to pounce on weaker pioneers. (Kincaid, 351) Often entire communities and church congregations would sometime move together over the road to new settlements. Hundreds of pioneers were killed by Indian attacks. (Kincaid, 175)

Defensive log blockhouses built alongside the road had portholes in the walls for firing at Indian attacks. No one knew exactly when the next Indian attack would happen. The Shawnee Indians came from the north while the Cherokees were from the south. The Indians were resentful of the settlers taking their ancestral hunting lands while the French and Indian War had further stirred up their passions against the white man. (Kincaid, 116)

The Scotch-Irish were great Indian fighters. They had lived in Ulster, an English colony in Northern Ireland, for a hundred years before coming to America. They had taken over land previously owned by the Irish and had much experience as fighters in defending their homeland. (Leyburn, 120-132).

There was a great variety of animal life in the wilderness. At night the pioneers could hear the scary sounds of screech owls and hoot owls and the howls of wolves and the cries of panthers and wild cats. Sometimes the Indians imitated these sounds. Poisonous snakes such as copperheads and rattlesnakes blended into the leaves and undergrowth which were a danger to the pioneers, their horses and cattle. (Rouse,6)

Settlement of Road

Judge Henderson had made a treaty with the Cherokees (1775) and purchased 20,000,000 acres of land between the Cumberland River and Kentucky River. On March 28, 1775 he left Long Island (Kingsport, Tennessee) with about 30 horsemen on grueling trip on the Wilderness Road to Kentucky. At Martin’s Station an 40 to 50 additional pioneers joined the venture. On their way, they met nearly a hundred refugees fleeing Indian attacks further down the road. Despite the danger, the party kept going toward Kentucky. Since some of the streams were flooded, the pioneers had to swim with their horses. On April 20, they arrived at Boonesborough, a fortified town, named by Judge Henderson in honor of Boone. (Kincaid, 98-110) After 1770, a surge of Scotch-Irish immigrants (over 400,000) came to this country to escape the poor harvest, high rents and religious intolerance of Ulster in Northern Ireland. Since the better lands had already been taken, they constantly pressed onward to the western frontier of the foothills of the Carolinas. (Axelrod, 52)

Yet the flood of immigrants of Scotch-Irish, Germans and others kept on coming. Over 200,000 pioneers came over the Road and endured severe hardships. For instance, in the winter of 1778-79 the weather was so cold that the Kentucky River froze to a depth of two-foot. The frontier settlements alongside the road struggled to survive. Many of the cattle and hogs froze to death. The settlers had to eat frozen cattle and horses to survive. (Kincaid, 151)

Often the bloody Chickamauga tribe of the Cherokee Indians would hide in ambush for weeks between Cumberland Gap and Crab Orchard, a distance of 100 miles. They would not attack large groups but wait for weaker ones who were not able to defend themselves. More than 100 men, women and children were murdered in the fall of 1784 along the Wilderness Road. Many families, even in ice and snow, crossed the creeks and rivers without shoes or stockings; they often had no money and few clothes. They lived off the land by hunting in the woods and by fishing in the streams. (Kincaid, 175)

Since they had hardly any money, entire families sometimes walked hundreds of miles after landing in America. They even used cows as pack animals to carry their heavy loads. Cabins were built and land was cleared of trees and undergrowth so crops could be planted. (Webb, 149)

Chestnut was the most popular wood since its logs could be used to build cabins and rail fences to protect crops from wild animals. It could easily be split into shingles for roofs to cover cabins and barns. Its bark was used to make medicine and tannic acid for tanning and dyeing. In the fall, its rich nuts were used to fatten razorback hogs for the market and the home. Hemlock was also highly valued for its many uses. {Rouse, 6)

Commerce and Mail

The Wilderness Road served as a great path of commerce for the early settlers in Kentucky. Horses, cattle, sheep and hogs found a waiting market in the Carolinas, Maryland and Virginia. Hogs in groups of 500 or more were driven down the Road to market. Beef in Eastern markets had become a main source of income for farmers in central Kentucky. (Kincaid, 205)

Later, a postal road was opened in 1792 from Bean Station, Tennessee through Cumberland Gap to Danville on a regular basis. This was due largely to the efforts of Governor Shelby of Kentucky. This connection of Kentucky to the East was a great advantage. Frontier settlers considered the postal riders heroes and waited eagerly for their arrival for news from settlements along the trails as well as getting their mail and newspapers. (Kincaid, 187)

The Wilderness Road runs through the Appalachian Region. To learn more about this historic area, a good place to start is the Museum of Appalachia, just off I-75. "The most authentic and complete replica of pioneer Appalachian life in the world". http://www.museumofappalachia.com/ (Riley,book cover).

The Civil War and Its Decline

Use of the Wilderness Road fell when the National Road was opened in 1818, allowing travel to the Ohio River on level ground from the East. At the same time, the steamboat first appeared on the Ohio River and Mississippi River, allowing travel both up and down the rivers. (Hitchcock, 85)

During the American Civil War, both the Union Army and the Confederate States Army used the Road. An early battle (Camp Wildcat), stymied the first attempt by the Confederates to seize control of neutral Kentucky. The Cumberland Gap changed hands four times throughout the war. The southern armies used the road for marches into Virginia. General Ulysses S. Grant came down the road for the Union campaign in Tennessee in 1864. Grant was so taken by the Road that he said, "With two brigades of the Army of the Cumberland I could hold that pass against the army which Napoleon led to Moscow." (Bodett, 100)

The Road Today

A segment of the Wilderness Road was among the first roads in the United States to be paved. The old road from the town of Cumberland Gap, Tennessee to Middlesboro, Kentucky through the mountain pass was paved and completed on October 3, 1908. This was an “object-lesson” road (a new kind of paved macadam construction funded by local communities but with federal governmental supervision)initiated by the U.S. Office of Public Roads. At that time, only about 680 miles of paved roads existed in the United States. Later, it was linked to the famous “Dixie Highway” that connected Detroit to Miami by a paved road. Its name was later changed to U.S. Highway 25. This new road brought a new industry, tourism, to the rural areas filling hotels and restaurants with travelers. (Kincaid, 352) Today Cumberland Gap is a National Park (http://www.nps.gov/cuga/) and portions of the Wilderness Road can be visited at the Wilderness Road State Park in Virginia (http://www.dcr.state.va.us/parks/wildroad.htm). Additionally a reconstructed fort at Martin’s Station in Virginia on the Wilderness Road can be visited which is about 5 miles east of the Cumberland Gap (http://www.dcr.state.va.us/parks/wildroad.htm).

Sources

Axelrod, Alan: What Every American Should Know About American History (1992) Holbrook, MA. Adams Media Corp. ISBN 1-55850-309-9 .

Bodett, Tom: America’s Historic Trails (1992) San Francisco James Connoly (Small World Productions). ISBN 0-912333-00-6

Calloway, Brenda: America's First Western Frontier: East Tennessee (1989) Kingsport, Tenn. The Overmountain Press . ISBN 0-932807-34-8

Cooke, Alistair: Alistair Cooke’s America (1973) New York Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

Kincaid, Robert: The Wilderness Road (1992) Kingsport, Tenn. Arcata Graphics. ISB Unknown ASIN: B0006BNK0U

Leyburn, James G: The Scotch Irish A Social History (1962) Chapel Hill .University of North Carolina Press . ISB 0-8078-4259-1.

Newby, Eric: The Rand McNally World Atlas of Exploration (1975) London: Mitchell Beazley. ISBN 528-83015-5 .

Riley, Darnell: The Tennessee Blue Book (2004) Nashville: State of Tennessee. ASIN B000B9LQIK .

Rouse, Parke, Jr: 'The Great Wagon Road'' (2004) Richmond: The Diaz Press . ISBN 0-87517-065-X .

Webb, James: Born Fighting How the Scots-Irish Shaped America (2004) New York : Broadway Books . ISBN 0-7679-1688-3 .

Willaims, John Alexander: Appalachia: A History (2002) Chapel Hill, N.C. : University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 0-8078-5368-2 .

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