The Annals of Fort Lee

By Roy Bird Cook

Fort Lee was built in 1788 on the site of what is now Charleston, West Virginia, at the junction of the Kanawha River and the Elk River. It is named for Virginia Governor Henry (Light Horse Harry) Lee, and played a great part in the Indian wars of that area until they came to an end in 1794. The fort was established by a group of men led by the Clendenin brothers George and William, for whose father Charles the city of Charleston was later named. The fort's early history was fraught with difficulties getting lead, powder and pay (with the capital at Richmond being far away over the mountains), but it contributed to an organized system of defense to stop the Indian raids from driving the settlers from their homes. The book discusses George Washington, who owned property nearby, and Daniel Boone, who was appointed Lieutenant Colonel of the Kanawha and took up residence quite near the fort. Readers will learn of "Mad Ann Bailey," who carried powder unmolested by Indians because they thought her insane, and others whose determination aided frontier defense. Following Mad Anthony Wayne's success against the Indians on the western border, Fort Lee ceased to have any connection with the Virginia military system by the end of 1795, and became simply a residence in Charleston. The fort building was subsequently moved a couple of times and was finally consumed by fire in 1891, except for a couple of logs from which souvenirs were made.-Print ed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Barakaldo Books
• Release date: Apr 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9781839743306

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THE ANNALS OF FORT LEE

BY

ROY BIRD COOK

Table of Contents

Contents

Table of Contents 4

ILLUSTRATIONS 5

PREFACE 7

PROLOGUE—1787-1669 8

FORT LEE—1788 13

FORT LEE—1789 21

FORT LEE—1790 23

FORT LEE—1791 25

FORT LEE—1792 28

FORT LEE—1793 34

FORT LEE—1794 39

FORT LEE—1795 42

I 42

II 44

III 48

IV 50

V 59

Epilogue—1796-1935 64

HENRY LIGHT HORSE HARRY LEE 68

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 70

ILLUSTRATIONS

Fort Lee, erected in April, 1788

Marker in memory of Charles Clendenin for whom Charleston was named

Major William Clendenin—Copy from miniature

Plat of town of Charleston, about time of close of Indian wars

Marker on site of Fort Lee

Report of survey made by Daniel Boone. From original in State Department of Archives and History

General Henry (Light Horse Harry) Lee—Portrait

PREFACE

The Annals of Fort Lee represent the first serious attempt to bring together from original sources such material as time has made available bearing on the history of this frontier post, which wielded a profound influence on the western border of Virginia during the Indian wars. Upon the foundation of old Fort Lee was built the city of Charleston, the capital of the State of West Virginia. Fort Lee as a military post was a part of the recognized system of Virginia frontier defense, and as such, in turn, was a part of the plan of protection of the central government which endeavored to afford a degree of safety to the pioneers surging forward in the great western movement.

The name Fort Lee is historically correct, predicated upon original documentary evidence. The fort is sometimes incorrectly called Clendenin’s Fort. In some local contemporary records the names Clendenin’s Station, and Clendenin’s Mansion House appear, but never the title Clendenin’s Fort. Reports by military officials as early as January, 1792, carried the official name Fort Lee and for the purpose of uniformity, as well as for accuracy, this title is used throughout this study except where variations are noted by actual quotations from contemporary documents. This treatise represents a cross section of the administrations of four Colonial and Virginia state governors. Edmund Randolph served under the Confederation and under the first Constitution, 1786 to 1788. Beverly Randolph served from 1788 to 1791. Governor Henry Lee, for whom the fort on the Great Kanawha at the mouth of Elk was named, served three terms, from December 1, 1791 to December 1, 1794. He was succeeded by Robert Brooke, who held the office from 1794 to 1796, or until after the close of the Indian wars.

It would hardly seem necessary in the scope of this small volume to carry out any extensive system of notes as to authorities or basic records. The same reason applies to any bibliography. It represents a rather extensive examination of the material in the splendid Draper Collection, which is in charge of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, at Madison; the Virginia State Papers which carry most of the Clendenin material; the Washington papers in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress; and the records of Kanawha County, at Charleston, and of Greenbrier County, at Lewisburg. A few records are to be found in the files of the War Department, at Washington, and the Virginia State Library, at Richmond.

That a study of this nature should be free from errors is hardly to be expected, but much care has been taken to secure accuracy. If it in some manner assists in the preservation of this chapter of the history of the beginning of settlement in western Virginia, and the valley of the Great Kanawha in particular, the author will feel well repaid.

ROY BIRD COOK.

Charleston-on-Kanawha.

PROLOGUE—1787-1669

IN 1669—the year that John Lederer climbed the Blue Ridge, marking the farthest advance of the English race on American soil—La Salle, one of the most eminent French explorers, descended the Ohio River, passing within sixty miles of the future capital of West Virginia. With the coming of two great divisions of the white race, the English and the French, it was but natural that this region should become embroiled in the subsequent contention between them for ownership. They found the land already occupied, in part, by the Indians, and clear evidence that before the Indians another, or related race, had inhabited the Great Kanawha Valley. On the site of Kanawha City the first settlers found several mounds; below, on the site of South Charleston, they discovered a vast array of mounds and earthworks, of which only one mound now remains. Even the site of Charleston bore evidence; a burial mound of some size existed at the junction of what is now Goshorn Street and the Kanawha River.

The first white man who viewed the site of Fort Lee and present Charleston will never be known. Thomas Batts and Robert Fallam from the East first penetrated the wilderness to within thirty-seven miles of the mouth of the Elk. There is substantial evidence to show that in about 1673 one Gabriel Arthur, clever English lad, passed the site of Charleston on his way to visit the Indian village of Moneton, located some distance down the Great Kanawha. Then came John Ewing, later a victim of the Clendenin massacre, in Greenbrier County; Mary Ingles; and other Indian captives.

By 1764 a French trading post was established at Point Pleasant, and Mathew Arbuckle made a trip from the Greenbrier regions to that point. A French post was soon thereafter located at the mouth of Elk, and there came Simon Kenton, George Yeager, and Adam Strader, who made their hunting camp up Elk. By 1773 Walter Kelly had settled at the mouth of the stream that now bears his name at the present site of Cedar Grove; and a year later was followed by William Morris, Sr., with his large family.

The acquisition and actual settlement of the site of Fort Lee was deep rooted in the story of the French and Indian War. Virginians did not respond to the support of the mother country in this conflict, as the leaders felt they should. In order to encourage enlistments, the ever resourceful Governor Dinwiddie offered bonuses of land to those who would take up arms. In the years that followed the close of the war, the soldiers attempted the acquisition of the western land to which they were entitled.

In the spring of 1773, Colonel Thomas Bullitt and a party of surveyors on their way to Kentucky appeared on the site of Charleston. Bullitt was born in 1730, a native of Prince William County. He served with Washington in military operations on the frontier, and, in 1760, being commissioned a surveyor by William and Mary College, was assigned to work on the Ohio. With him on this first trip were James Douglas, James Harrod, John Fitzpatrick, James Sandusky, Isaac Hite, Abraham Haponstack, Abram Senous, and John Cowan. This party later surveyed the site of Frankfurt and Louisville, and their activities were in part claimed to be an underlying cause of Dunmore’s War.

In July (1773), Colonel William Crawford, surveyor under direction of Washington, was on the present site of Nitro, at the mouth of Poca River. It is possible that he may have traveled sixteen miles east as far up the Kanawha River as the mouth of Elk. Another party under Major John Field, of Culpeper, was also in the valley, and camped at the confluence of the Kanawha and the Elk.

On April 16, 1774, a surveying party under John Floyd appeared on their way to the Ohio River region. In the party were A. S. Dandridge, Hancock Taylor, and Thomas Hanson. Hanson kept a daily journal in which he recorded that a stop was made at the mouth of the Elk, and that Floyd and a stranger went hunting. This entry proves that someone was then on the location. The surveyors cut down a large tree out of which they fashioned a canoe, which they named the Good Hope. On the eighteenth the party surveyed 2,000 acres, embracing the present site of St, Albans, between the Coal and Canawa Rivers, for Colonel Washington.

In the opening days of Dunmore’s War, in 1774, General Andrew Lewis and his army moved out of Lewisburg on September eighth, with Mathew Arbuckle as a guide. They proceeded along the old trail from Fort Union to the Kanawha at Kelly’s Creek. On the twenty-first the army of 1,100 men reached the site of Fort Lee. It is strange that the parole for the day should be Charlestown. Here they halted and built dugout canoes for baggage transportation down the river. A portion of the force moved down