John Donelson's Last Five Years
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JOHN DONELSON’S LAST FIVE YEARS January 27, 2012, by Richard Paddock The activities of Col John Donelson in KY after 1780 when he arrived at the French Lick, future site of Nashville, have confused me for a long time. His death in 1786 has been a matter of curiosity as well, since some historians have explained his demise differently. His business travel, as well as how his family developed a relationship to the Robards family has also intrigued my curiosity. As I have been writing up my family history, I have put together some information to help me better understand this period in his life. I have formed some conclusions as well. Others might likely disagree and offer additional clarifications. In this essay, I share my view on the last five years of Col Donelson's life. This narrative begins with some background regarding the circumstances for his entry into KY and the environment he left in Nashville to help explain why Col Donelson chose to relocate his family. I'll discuss the settlements in KY where he lived. Some of the politics and shenanigans which affected his speculation activities in the mid 1780s will be addressed. I'll end with some treatment of his daughter Rachel’s marriage and finally provide my take on his death. I should make a clarification here. Anyone reading this would be well served to look at a map of "early" Lincoln CO, “Present-day” Lincoln, Mercer, Boyle and Warren Counties in KY. For some time I was confused about the terms, "Crab Orchard" and "Cane Run". On today's maps there is a Crab Orchard town and Cane Run is a creek with a few branches. I use the two names to reflect their appropriateness in the 1780s. Back then, both were communities or neighborhoods as we might refer to them today; groups of interacting people, living in close proximity, often sharing common values and needs. So, when I refer to Cane Run or to Crab Orchard, I refer to an area of land and not to a specific water course or town name. From this point, I will use Nashville to refer to what at times was called French Lick, Cumberland settlements, Nashboro, etc. In discussing the settlements in KY, some were called forts and some stations. I use the term "Station" here for brevity. I don't intend to write much about the political intrigue which resulted from the many treaties, state land claims and cessions nor the rise and fall of the state of Franklin. Anyone interested them has access to volumes about those subjects in print and on the internet. I will only touch on these subjects as I see them affecting to some degree the lives of the Donelsons. Col Donelson was a wealthy surveyor, businessman, member of the House of Burgesses and land speculator from Pittsylvania CO, VA. He was an Indian agent and pioneer leader who A lieutenant colonel of militia and Indian agent, he had traveled widely on the frontier, serving as a treaty negotiator and surveyor. Admired for his resourcefulness and stability, he had been appointed to survey the line between VA and NC in 1771. My line goes back to him through his daughter Catherine. She was my GGGGGrandmother. After VA had declared Judge Richard Henderson's Transylvania Company's KY land claims illegal in 1778, He turned to the rest of his land purchase in TN. By the time Henderson contracted with Col Donelson and James Robertson to settle his TN lands, Col Donelson had already made his mind up to move west in order to protect his land holdings. He had met with Robertson in talks with Henderson at different times, probably as early as the Transylvania beginnings, when Henderson formed the company in 1775, with the completion of an Indian treaty. Prior to that, he had hired Daniel Boone to blaze a trail (Wilderness Road) into KY from VA. Without Henderson's promises of land, status and wealth, offering both large inducements for their services, Robertson would hardly have relinquished leadership of the Watauga settlements and Col Donelson, although he was having financial problems with his iron works in VA, might likely have refused to abandon speculation in the extensive lands originally purchased by Henderson. Some settlers who stuck it out at Nashville would resent Col Donelson's abandonment of them, leaving them to fight on, later to return his family to the area when Indian troubles had subsided. As it is, today he has been overshadowed by James Robertson, who stuck it out at Nashville and lived on to be a key mover and shaker in Nashville and TN history. Col Donelson is principally remembered as the leader of his famous water voyage from Fort Patrick Henry (Kingsport, TN) to what would become Nashville and as the Father of Rachel Donelson who married future president Andrew Jackson. By the late 1770s, white encroachment led to confrontations between Cherokees and the eastern Watauga settlements, and after 1780, between the Chickasaws and the new group of settlers led by Robertson and Col Donelson in the Nashville area. Long hunters, men who had hunted and explored the western lands, were coming and going in the country and telling about the richness of the land and the bountiful resources. Boone, Harrod and Logan had established settlements in KY; the land was filling up. The Indians viewed these settlers as a threat. Their response to land take-over was to attack the settlements. If millions of tribal acres were grabbed and surveyed from Nashville, then would go after the source of the problem. They did so -- and with such violence that many settlers considered permanently leaving the region. At Clover Bottom on Stone's River, about seven miles from Nashville, Col Donelson's family camped in dugouts along the river with his large family, cleared several acres and planted com and cotton. Two months later, rising water forced the Donelsons to abandon Clover Bottom and take refuge in Casper Mansker's station ten miles away where they remained until at the end of the summer. At the same time, Indian raids were threatening the inhabitants at Clover Bottom. The attacks had begun in April when a group of Chickasaw massacred Jonathan Jennings and one of James Robertson's sons, killed pigs and cows and drove off some horses. Thereafter, the Indians murdered on farms, by stockades, at licks and in the forests, wherever they could lure their victims. By summer's end, the receding river permitted the Clover Bottom folks return to their crops. Indians attacked a party led by Col Donelson's Son, John Donelson, Jr., to harvest corn. Two of his slaves were killed. In the winter of 1780-81, the settlers at Mansker's decided to break up. Among several who went to KY were Col Donelson's immediate and extended families. The move to KY ended a journey that had begun a year earlier when Col Donelson sold his plantation and iron foundry in backcountry VA, carried his family into upper East TN, led the voyage down the Tennessee and up the Cumberland Rivers, set up a camp near Nashville. I think he also saw trouble ahead besides the Indians; the difficulty of obtaining clear titles to his lands. He may have felt "Ahead of the curve", in that Col Donelson was on scene before a land office was opened and no legal structure had been set up to govern land disputes. Thus he sought greener pastures in KY as well as safety for his family. Col Donelson had many financial interests in Kentucky, all centering about land and another reason for the selection of the destination was the proximity of the Lincoln County Court at nearby Harrodsburg and later in Danville. While Col Donelson was getting his flotilla at Fort Patrick Henry ready, James Robertson led his group overland to Nashville. He followed the Wilderness Road (The trail blazed by Daniel Boone and traveled by the pioneers who came through the Cumberland Gap to settle the then new lands of KY and TN) and then headed southwest from Crab Orchard via the Cumberland Trace to the Cumberland River. The Cumberland Trace was an important artery in the settlement of Western KY and Middle TN for several years. Use of this route by many who settled the area began in the 1770s but it was most heavily used after Nashville was established in 1780. This route was believed to be safer for travel than the more direct route across Northern TN, even if it was longer. Col Donelson would travel the Cumberland Trace route to meet his death in 1786. Late eighteenth century frontier roads were referred to as "traces." They were little more than beaten paths or trails formed by the repeated passage of travelers. They were originally only wide enough to be traveled on foot or on horseback (no wheeled wagons or carts were known to have gone over the Wilderness Road until 1792). The first wagon on the Cumberland Trace was reported to have reached Pittman's Station in 1793. The Cumberland Trace began off the Wilderness Road from various branches near Benjamin Logan’s Fort (Stanford), Harrodsburg, Danville and Crab Orchard in Lincoln CO. The Trace went Southwest, past the present cities of Greensburg (The trace actually crossed the Green River near Pittman's Station, a few miles West of Greensburg.) and Glasgow, crossed the Barren River near McFadin's Station, at present day Bowling Green in Warren CO and continued on to the Cumberland settlements (Nashville).