The time was 150 years ago. The place was the home
of Joseph Brooks in Bullitt county. The occasion was a strange
reunion of hard-faced old men with cold, piercing eyes.
They had been woodsmen and hunters, scouts, settlers and traders.
They had been the pioneers, the first to push into the wild, dangerous
land of Kentucky. More than a quarter of a century had passed
since those troubled times. They had exchanged their fur caps
for wool hats, their fringed buckshins for linen and broadcloth.
Now they were being recalled to show exactly where the old Wilderness
Road once had run.
For even as early as 1811 that famous trace- the most important
in the history of Kentucky- had fallen into disuse. The very route
it had taken through the woods has been forgotten. anf the title
to thousands of acres of disputed land depended on rediscovering
its location.
Summonses went out all over the state from Bullitt Circuit Court
for the few remaining settlers who had been familiar with the
trace in early days:
To Squire Boone in Indiana Territory, to Jacob Vanmeter and John
Tuel and James Patton, who had come to Corn Island with George
Rogers Clark in 1778.
They were ordered to appear at the house of Joseph Brooks, which
had been an important way-station on the last leg of the Wilderness
Road. Altogether, more than twenty of these veteran pioneers responded
to the call.
Some had prospered; some were embittered; but for the moment they
seemed to have put their troubles and concerns behind them.
From the 22nd to the 26th of August, 1811, they foregathered at
Brooks Springs, drinking, reminiscing. They walked the old road
from the Blue Lick Gap in Bullitt County to the Fern Creek Crossing
in Jefferson, pointing out its route to the county surveyor, relating
the incidents that had occurred along it.
Here Walker Daniel, first attorney General of Kentucky, had been
killed by savages. There Col. John Floyd, one of the most colorful
characters in Kentucky's history, had been ambushed. Squire Boone
showed a tree on the bank of Fern Creek, which still bore the
marks where William Moore had hacked it with his big butcher knife
in 1779.
Their depositions were duly taken down by the justices of the
peace, and finally, on August 26, the session ended. Never again
were so many famous Kentucky pioneers ever to be assembled at
one time and place. Nor was it likely that it could have been
done later. Their ranks were thinning too rapidly.
The Wilderness Road officially started at Wadkins Ferry in West
Virginia. It wound through the Great Valley of the Shenandoah
in Virginia and entered Kentucky at Cumberland Gap. At the Hazel
Patch (eight miles north of present day London, Ky.) it forked.
One fork went to Boonesborough. the other, which was the main
road, went to Harrodsburg, then to Brashear's Station at the mouth
of Floyd's fork on Salt River, then to the saltworks at Bullitt's
Lick, three miles from Shepherdsville, and finally to The Falls
of the Ohio, or Louisville, where it stopped.
A great deal of research has been done on the eastern end of the
road. It had been studied, mapped, marked. But for some reason,
the last link from Harrodsburg to Louisville has been completely
ignored. After 1811, its path was forgotten again, and no one
knew where it ran except in a general sort of way.
If it hadn't been for the aging, brittle papers- depositions and
surveys- filed in the Bullitt County Courthouse, its route might
have been lost for good.
Yet it was the lifeline of Clark's army at the Falls, the main
route of travellers and settlers going to Harrodsburg and on to
Richmond in Virginia. Salt was transported over it by pack train
from the works at Bullitt's Lick to Clark's forces, as well as
to the interior settlements.
Originally most of this end of the road had been a great buffalo
path. Buffalo, according to the woodsmen, could lay put a road
as well as any man. These buffalo traces came from all directions,
from the Bluegrass, from the Barrens, from severns Valley, converging
on Bullitt's Lick like spokes.
The path that was later to become the Wilderness Road, after leaving
Harrodsburg, meandered along the ridge between the waters of Chaplin
fork and the Town Fork of the Salt River through Anderson County
to the headwaters of the East Fork of Cox's Creek in Nelson County.
U. S. 62 probably follows its route closely as far as Bloomfield
through Fairfield along the East Fork of Cox's Creek through Bullitt
County to Solitude, where it forded the main stream of Cox's Creek.
There were several crossings of Salt River between Cox's Creek
and the saltworks at Bullit's Lick. the traveller could ford the
river just below the mouth of McCullough's Run and follow the
buffalo trail on the north bank to Brashear's Station on floyd's
Fork near its mouth , and thence into Bullitt's Lick.
State road 44 follows this trace closely; and the ruins of an
old stone spring house, which can be seen from the highway on
the south side just past Floyd'a Fork bridge. marks the site of
Brashear's or Salt River Garrison. It was known by both names
in pioneer days.
If the Salt River was in flood, the traveller could keep to the
buffalo path on the south side and take the ferry at dowdall's
Garrison about a mile above Shepherdsville. Or he could ford the
river at Shepherdsville, which was the best crossing of all.
Once across the river, these routes all fell into the buffalo
road on the north bank. Driving along State Route 44 today, you
are more often on the old Wilderness Road than off it.
1759
French map showing the Kentucky country with the Illinois Indians
chasing Buffalo
At Bullitt's Lick, the saltworks was established in 1779. It was
Kentucky's first industry and supplied salt for all the wilderness
west of the Allegheny Mountains. Salt fromm Bullitt's Lick was
even shipped back up the Ohio by pigogue and keelboat as far as
Pittsburg.
Cahaz Knob, a high peak like a Mexican sombrero, loomed over the
lick- a landmark then as now.
From the saltworks, this great game trail led northward across
the Blue Lick Gap. The Blue Lick Road in Bullitt County, follows
the same rout; and the old John Dunn house, a beautiful example
of early Kentucky architecture, ehich is built of brick baked
on the site arounf 1805, can still be seen on the north side of
the gap.
Blure Lick Road crosses Blue Lick Run on a dilapidated iron bridge,
side by side with the original buffalo ford. A mile or two farther,
it crosses Clear's Run near where Clear's Cabins stood- a pioneer
fortification built by George Clear before 1783.
About a mile beyond Clear's Cabins, the road dips down to cross
a small branch of Brooks Run. Here Col. John Floyd, of Jefferson
County was ambushed by indians in 1783. With his brother, Charless,
and several others, Floyd had ridden off from his station on Beargrass
Creek for the Saltworks. He was wearing a bright scarlet cloak.
It made him an excellent target, and he was mortally wounded at
the first fire.
Charles, seing him reel in the saddle, sprang up behind him, and
rode back the way they had come, holding his brother in his arms.
They reached the Fishpools, about five miles distant. There the
wounded Colonel was given shelter in the cabin of Col. James Francis
Moore, an old companion at arms. Floyd died two days later.
Still following the Blue Lick Road from the scene of Floyd's ambush,
the next stop on the Wilderness Trail was Brook's Spring. This
was a well known camping ground. Squire Boone was familiar with
it as early as 1776.
In the spring of 1779, he and James Lee and William Moore spent
the night there. Boone had killed a buffalo at Bullitt's Lick
and they were returning to the Falls with their meat. They camped
about 300 yards west of the trace because of the danger of Indians.
And in 1811,Squire led all the old men who had came to give their
testimony to the place where he had camped that long-ago night,
and showed them where John Lee had hacked a bawdy joke on a beech
tree with his tomahawk along with the date, 1779. the clerk faithfully
copied the inscription in Boone's deposition.
Brooks Spring is still plainly visible beside the road, but the
fortified cabin which Joseph Brooks built in 1784 is gone.
Brooks was a Pennsylvanian, who had emigrated to Kentucky, arriving
at the Falls in 1780. He went to live first at the Spring station,
then in December, he moved to Bullitts lick. In 1784, he moved
on the last leg of the Wilderness Road- a dangerously exposed
location- and his house soon became a refuge for travellers.
He was a trader and planter, who acquired immense holdings of
land. He founded the mann's Lick Saltworks in 1787, and thus became
one of 'Kentucky's first industrialists.
About half a mile north of Brooks Springs, the road crosses a
second little branch of Brooks Run, where another bloody episode
took place.
On the morning of August 12, 1784, Walker Daniel, first attorney
general of Kentucky, left Sullivan's Old Station for the Saltworks
at Bullitt's Lick in company with George Keightley, a merchant
from Ireland, and William Johnston, clerk of the Jefferson County
court.
The party stopped for a while at Col. James Francis Moore's cabin
near the Fishpools. While there they met several people coming
from the Saltworks, who reported that they had seen no Indian
sign along the way. So Walker Daniel and his companions continued.
As they reached the branch of Brooks Run they were suddenly fired
upon from ambush. Walker Daniel and George Keightley were killed
instantly. Johnston was wounded, however he managed to reach Joseph
Brooks house nearly half a mile farther alonfg the trace. Nearby
settlers sallied forth and recovered the bodies, which were taken
to the Saltworks and buried the following day.
The unmarked grave of Kentucky's fiirst attorney general lies
somewhere within the confines of the old lick.
After passing the site of Walker Daniel's slaying, the bufalo
trace followed a remarkably straight course to the Fishpools.
These were a number of perhaps a dozen rising and sinking springs,
just north of the Jefferson County line between Blue Lick Road
and Preston Highway.
Several of them are still running, but the deepest and most dangerous
of these holes was filled up with logs from a cabin nearby after
a cow had fallen in it and drowned.
About a quarter of a mile down the branch from the Fishpools,
Col. James Franis Moore raised his cabin sometime before 1783,
and a little pioneer community, which was known as the Fishpools,
rapidly grew up.
The buffalo trace forked a short distance north of Moores Spring,
and the eastern path skirted the ponds and swamps and led to the
feeding grounds on Beargrass. the pioneers used this route in
times of high water. It went from Colonel Moore's house to Kuykendals
Old Mill near Buechel, then to Sullivan's Old Station at goldsmith
Lane and Bardstown Road, and finally on to the Falls. The Old
Shepherdsville Road follows the same route today.
The other fork, the main buffalo trace, continued straight on
along what is now the Preston Street Road. Okolona straddles the
now famous Wilderness Trail, which forded Fern Creek where Preston
Highway crosses the northern ditch.
Beyond the Fern Creek crossing, the path dived into the Wetwoods,
an area of deep swamp and dark forests, to emerge at the Flat
Lick.
At the Flat Lick, only a short distance north of Fern Valley Road,
used to be a sulphur well and a log tavern. This tavern had a
reputation as a hangout for outlaws, who preyed on travellers
going through the Wetwoods. As late as the Civil War, local inhabitants
who had to use the Preston Street Road were afraid to pass the
Old Sulphur Well after dark.
From the Flat Lick, The buffalo trace continued along
the route of the Preston Street Road to the Poplar Level in the
neighborhood of Mulberry Hill, the home of George Rogers Clark's
parents.
The residential section of Audubon Park probably was the site
of the Poplar Level, itself, although this is not certain.
From there on to the Falls , urbanization makes it difficult to
pick out the path of the old Wilderness Road. Moreover, as the
original buffalo trail had neared the Ohio River, it had fanned
out into feeding grounds. Much fainter through downtown Louisville,
it seemed to have veered toward present day Third Street and along
it to the bank of the river, avoiding the ponds in its route.
The road became plain again only as it neared the ford across
the Ohio River where the Kentucky & Indiana Terminal Railroad
Bridge is located.
These buffalo roads were there when the first long hunters entered
Kentucky. Woodsman after woodsman deposed that the buffalo had
made no new roads within his experience. Apparently these game
trails had endured for centuries, perhaps for thousands of years.
Col. Lucien Beckner of the Louisville Free Public Library Museum
is of the opinion that they were first beaten out by mastodons
and mammoths of the last great Ice Age.
Whatever creatures originally made them, the buffalo used them
by the thousands and tens of thousands in their annual migrations.
Even in day, the trees and wild grapevines formed a roof overhead
so that the road was in perpetual shadow. Where it led through
cane, it was narrow like a cowpath, and the mosquitoes swarmed
in clouds about the traveller face.
Gradually, the Bullitts Lick Saltworks declined in importance,
and a new, shorter route was cut between Louisville, Bardstown,
and Harrodsburg. The old trace was abandoned entirely in places
and lost its identity in others.
Today we no longer can call up the ghosts of those hard old men
to out the way the road ran. We have only a handful of sketchy
plats, faded and yellowed with age, and an occasional landmark,
scarcely recognizable for what it is after all these years.