By most reports he was an aggressive land speculator who often went heavily into debt to acquire property.īoone was also a slave owner, who at one point in his life owned as many as seven slaves.Īfter returning to Kentucky in 1795 - in plenty of time to see the opening of the Wilderness Road in October 1796 - Boone refused to testify in a lawsuit against him. Land Speculator and Slave OwnerĪlthough he was famous as a militia leader, hunter and surveyor, Boone was not adept in business. Over the next several years, he relocated to present-day West Virginia and served in the Virginia legislature. Boone, however, escaped four months later and helped Boonsborough defeat the Shawnee at the Siege of Boonsborough.īoone established the settlement of Boone Station in December 1779. In February 1778, Shawnee Chief Blackfish captured Boone and adopted him as his own son. Boone quickly staged an ambush and rescued the girls, inspiring the historical novel, The Last of the Mohicansby James Fenimore Cooper. On July 5, 1776, Indians captured Boone’s daughter Jemima and two of her companions. Indian attacks were common in Boonsborough and many settlers eventually left Kentucky. Once in Kentucky, Boone founded the colony of Boonsborough and sent for his family to join him. Lord Dunmore's WarĪfter the Indian attack, Boone was sent to notify surveyors in Kentucky that war with the Indians was imminent, and armed conflict did indeed break out the following year in Lord Dunmore's War of 1774.Īfter the settlers' victory in Lord Dunmore's War, the Indians ceded their Kentucky lands, and Richard Henderson’s Transylvania Company hired Boone to blaze the Wilderness Road through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. The Indians brutally tortured and killed them, forcing the shaken immigrants back to North Carolina. In October, disgruntled Indians attacked members of the party, including Boone's son James. Boone returned home but had no intention of heeding the warning.īoone returned to Kentucky with his family and a group of immigrants in July 1773. Shawnee Indians captured him and one of his companions on December 22, stole their pelts and warned them never to return. On May 1, 1769, he headed back to Kentucky on a longer trip, helping to open a trail for future pioneers. In the fall of 1767, Boone took a short excursion through the Cumberland Gap to Kentucky. One of Boone's six sons, Israel, was killed at the Battle of Blue Licks in 1782, one of the last skirmishes of the Revolutionary War (Boone was also at the battle and saw his son die). One story holds that during one of his extended journeys, Rebecca thought Boone was dead and had a relationship with his brother, which produced a daughter whom Boone claimed as his own. As part of the North Carolina militia, Boone took many long trips through Cherokee land in the Blue Ridge Mountains. In 1759, Cherokee Indians raided the Yadkin Valley and forced many of its inhabitants, including the Boone family, to flee to Culpeper County, Virginia. He often disappeared for months at a time during the fall and winter and returned in the spring to sell his pelts to traders. Boone supported his large family by hunting and trapping. On August 14, 1756, Boone married Rebecca Bryan and they settled in the Yadkin Valley and had ten children. Findley later accompanied Boone on his first trip to Kentucky. He survived another Indian attack during the Battle of Fort Duquesne by snatching a horse and dashing away on horseback.ĭuring the war, Boone worked with John Findley, a trader who told him about the wilderness west of the Appalachian Mountains called “Kentucke,” a place rich with wild game and opportunity. After the French and Indian War broke out 1754, Daniel Boone joined the North Carolina militia and served as a wagoner - and narrowly escaped being killed by Indians during the Battle of Monongahela (one of several American Indian wars in which Boone would fight against Native Americans). In 1748, Squire Boone sold his land and moved the family to the North Carolina frontier in the Yadkin Valley. According to legend, he once shot a panther through the heart as it charged. He received his first rifle at age 12, learned to hunt and became a skilled marksman, often providing his family with fresh game. He spent much of his childhood tending his family’s cattle and wandering the woods near his home.īoone had no proper education but could read and write and often took reading material with him on his backwoods trips. Boone was born on November 2, 1734, in Berks County, Pennsylvania, the sixth child of eleven born to immigrant Quaker parents, Squire and Sarah.
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