Tag: NoDestination

No Destination: Daniel Trabue

Daniel Trabue was an early founder of Columbia and constructed the above house in 1823 (it has since been expanded). He served as a trustee for the town, the county sheriff, and justice of the peace. He operated a grist mill and a retail store. To be sure, the story of Columbia is not complete without reference to Trabue. But greater still, the story of Kentucky is incomplete without Trabue.

He was a fourth-generation North American Huguenot born in 1760 in Virginia’s Piedmont region. Trabue was a teenager when he encountered Indians along the Wilderness Road, was present at Daniel Boone’s court-martial following a loss to the Indians at Boonesborough. After serving three years in Kentucky, Trabue returned to Virginia to try his lot at business. It was during this time that he experienced, as a non-soldier, the events leading up to the colonist’s victory at Yorktown. By 1785, he yearned to return his young family to Kentucky and they settled in Fayette County.

In 1788, Trabue signed a petition to divide Fayette County, arguing that he was too far from the county seat of Lexington to be able to readily conduct business, caused an overburdened judicial docket and did not provide adequate representation in the Virginia legislature. The Virginia General Assembly agreed and Woodford County was born. In 1796, Trabue sold his Woodford County home and took his family from the Kentucky River basin to that of the Green River some 45-miles to the southwest in Green County.

In December 1801, the General Assembly created Adair County. Trabue’s home was one-quarter mile within Adair County and thus his “fortunes were to be tied to those of Adair County.” [cite] It was from here that he went on as an intregal part of the development and growth  of Columbia.
At the age of 67, he wrote a narrative of his life. This narrative later became the origin of “Westward into Kentucky: The Narrative of Daniel Trabue.” (I am putting this book on my Kentucky ‘wish list’). Although narratives are often fraught with historical innacurracy, his accounts still make history all the richer. As was said in the introduction of Westward (the source of much of the above history):

Daniel Trabue had indeed been a pioneer in the land beyond the mountains. As a settler there, he had helped to wrest Kentucky from nature and from the Indian’s tenuous hold and to plant the white man’s culture in Trans-Appalachia. He had done all of this, and of equal importance he had left a rich and meaningful narrative about much of what he observed and did.

No Destination: Columbia

The county seat of Adair County is full of history, and it is clear that the community is dedicated to the preservation of the same. On the courthouse “lawn” (watch out Nate; when you get to Columbia, the Courthouse is situated in the middle of the town square with nary a place to walk on) there lie several historical markers. The old courthouse remains the focal point of downtown with a preservation effort underway to deconstruct the additions erected in 1976 (presumably, this will recreate a courthouse lawn). As in so many Kentucky counties, a new judicial center has been erected taking some business out of downtown Columbia.

Even so, the downtown public square bustles with shops. The Columbia Bank has operated since 1866; cafes and shops remain active. The only sign of decay is the old Columbian Theater, whose empty marquis reminds us of the loss of small theaters at the expense of the multi-plex.

Columbia is the home of Lindsey Wilson College, a liberal arts college. The town hosts its annual festival, Downtown Days, each summer with nearly all of the town’s 4,000 inhabitants (2000 Census) coming to celebrate.

The town, first settled in 1800, was laid out as the county seat in 1802. It was the childhood home of Jane Lampton, the wife of John Marshall Clemens and the mother of “Mark Twain.” The Courthouse has many interesting features, but I will (as usual) leave those for future posts as part of the Kentucky120 Project.

No Destination: Perryville Mass Grave

In western Boyle County lies the community of Perryville, the site of Kentucky’s largest Civil War battle. On October 8, 1862, Union and Condederate forces each suffered heavy casualties as the Union army repelled Confederate forces out of Kentucky.

CSA Gen. Bragg, on a mission to secure supplies from Bardstown, was forced into battle near Perryville by a larger force of Union troops under the direction of USA Gen. Buell sent to stop the advancing Rebels. The first casualties, however, were not caused by musketfire – but by heat and sunstroke. The high temperatures and drought conditions left insufficient water for both soldier and steed.

Once the daylong battle was over, the dying – both CSA and USA – were transported to neighboring communities for treatment.  The dying lingered for months. As was the case following the Battle of Mill Springs, locals knew not what to do with the Confederate dead and a mass grave was dug. From the Perryville Enhancement Project:

As Union troops hastily buried their own dead in regimental plots, local residents were left to inter the dead Confederates. Local farmer, cabinetmaker and justice of the peace Henry P. Bottom, whose property was strewn with corpses, buried a majority of the Southern soldiers. With several field hands and neighbors, Bottom buried several hundred Confederates in two large pits. This mass grave is located in what is now the Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site.

This is a full post for one of the locales visited on my June 5, 2009 No Destination journey.

No Destination: Glens Fork

This was one of my…wait a minute, turn around, stop look again, and take a picture moments. Occasionally, you see something seemingly out of place and different. This is the Glens Fork, Kentucky Post Office.

First, it is a old post office. I wasn’t sure if it was still an active post office (according to USPS.gov it is not), but I found it intriguing. After all, Glens Fork has its own Zip Code, “42741..” It turns out that the building dates to 1932 and that the post office was reactivated in 1986 before its service was later discontinued again.

There is a lot of history to this unincorporated community in Adair County. A three-part history of Glens Fork (aka Glensfork, Glenville and Hardscratch) is interesting and informative. [Welcome Hamon, History of Glensfork, Kentucky, (Michael Watson, ed., Adair County Review, 1992-1993), available via Columbia Magazine]. The town was established by an act of the General Assembly in 1872 and it attempted to lure a Baptist College to town in 1874: “Glenville offers a thousand dollars to the proposed Baptist College, if it is located there.” (Farmer’s Journal, Nov. 11, 1874). The Baptists decided not to locate in Glens Fork, instead choosing Campbellsville for the site of its Russell Creek Academy (nka Campbellsville College).


At some point, the town’s government dissolved and this community turned into a mere crossroads at the junction of KY-55 and KY-768.

No Destination: Diamonds!

One diamond was found in Kentucky (Russell County; though some poor quality diamonds were later discovered in the 1960s in Elliott County); it is thought to have been brought here during one of the glacial periods. The 0.776 carat diamond was purchased from the discoverer for $20 by a Louisville jeweler and the gem now is on display at the Smithsonian.

The events of the discovery were described in The American Journal of Science (vol. 28, no. 223-228 dated 1889):

To be sure, it is an interesting antecdote in Kentucky’s history. And, as my wife would say, “diamonds are a girl’s best friend.”

No Destination: Evangelist Dewey Cooper

If you have spent any time driving on Kentucky’s back roads, you have most likely seen a sign erected by Evangelist Dewey Cooper.

The signs are all the same: “Warning: Jesus Is Coming, Are You Ready?” and “Be Prepared: Jesus is Coming” they read with their red, white and blue colors.

According to a 2007 article, Cooper began erecting these signs throughout Kentucky in 1997. Although my first introduction to a Dewey Cooper sign was in Garrard County (US 27, just south of the Kentucky River), I couldn’t resist photographing this Russell County sign.

The community has its own religious/patriotic name: Freedom, Kentucky. It is the junction of US-127 and KY-55. According to the article, this is one of 31 of these signs erected by Cooper.

Dewey Cooper is an evangelist to 40 churches in the West Union United Baptist Association. The United Baptists have a long history in the United States and are the forerunners to today’s better-known Southern Baptists. Interestingly, it was originally those of faith – and particularly the United Baptists – who encouraged and promoted a strong separation between church and state.

No Destination: Jamestown

Although Russell Springs is the largest city in Russell County, Jamestown is the county seat. Originally named Jacksonville (after President Andrew Jackson), the area was renamed to honor James Wooldridge who had given the land for the town. The renaming of the community was actually prompted for political reasons; those opposed to Jackson came into power in the area around 1826.

Two Civil War skirmishes occurred near this sleepy community, a community that grew in popularity (particularly in the summer months) after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed Lake Cumberland in 1952. [Simultaneously, the population of Russell County dropped 19.3% between the 1950 and 1960 census.]

Jamestown’s city center is well-designed. A large town square finds the old (1978) courthouse in one corner, which is complemented on its opposite corner by the new judicial center (under construction). The other two corners have a number of businesses, including cafes, antique stores and other small-town essentials. The northwest corner is pictured above. In the center of the square is a large American flag under which a Doughboy stands as a memorial to the soldiers who served our nation. All of which begs the question: How many Doughboys stand on the “lawns” of Kentucky courthouses? (Casey and Carter Counties, among others, come to mind…)

No Destination: Russell Springs


This community – Russell County’s largest – was known as Big Boiling Springs when it was founded, though the local post office (est. 1855) postmarked letters as being from Kimble, Ky. It was not until 1901 that the town was named Russell Springs.

I drove through quickly; the only site I was able to see was a historic marker in a small park – Chalybeate Springs:

A health resort long known as Big Boiling Springs, operated before 1850 by family of Sam Patterson, among the earliest settlers. Log cabins (12) called Long Row were built for guests who came here for amusement, pleasure, and the medicinal iron and sulphur water. In 1898, large hotel built which burned in 1942. The spring has been capped for use as a well. [Marker 1233]

Unfamiliar with the term ‘Chalybeate’ I inquired further. The term simply refers to mineral spring waters with heavy iron deposits. Derived from the latin word for steel, “chalybs,” the most famous chalybeate spring is Turnbridge Wells in Kent, England. Lord Dudley North discovered Turnbridge in 1606 and later wrote: “These waters youth in age renew //Strength to the weak and sickly add //Give the pale cheek a rosy hue //And cheerful spirits to the sad.” [cite].

No Destination: Zollicoffer Park Cemetery

Union troops who fell are buried in the Mill Springs National Cemetery, but the Confederate fallen were hastily buried in shallow graves. Locals reburied these dead in a mass grave, but first removing and returning to Tennessee the remains of General Felix K. Zollicoffer.

During the Battle of Mill Springs, Zollicoffer accidentally rode on horseback into the Union line (it was raining and smoky from battle) believing it was own. He was killed on the spot and a white oak (the Zollie Tree) was soon thereafter planted to mark the site.

In 1902, ten-year old Dorothea Burton believed it unfair that annual memorials occurred only at the National Cemetery. She believed that the Confederate fallen should be acknowledged, and she took the initiative (with her father’s help) to clear the area around the Zollie Tree and to place a wreath at the site. It soon became an annual tradition, drawing the attention of the United Confederate Veterans Association. By 1910, an obelisk (pictured above, upon which a close examination will reveal bullet marks showing that the obelisk was once used by locals for target practice) was erected to mark the site where Zolliffer died. At the same time, a monument was also erected to mark the mass grave (pictured right). Today, representative markers for the fallen stand nearby though all of the remains continue to lie in the original mass grave site.

The area, later designated the Zollicoffer Park Cemetery eventually fell under the control of the Kentucky Department of Parks until 1992 when the Mill Springs Battlefield Association was formed to protect this and other sites associated with the 1862 battle.

No Destination: Mill Springs National Cemetery

Kentucky has seven national cemeteries and has the highest concentration of national cemeteries of any state in the Union. Mill Springs National Cemetery is the smallest cemetery in the national system, though its has existed since the system was first established in late 1862 with only twelve cemeteries. Because of complications associated with the war, it was impractical to create a proper resting place for our nation’s heroes until after the war. Congress in 1867 provided more specifics for the national cemetery system and Mill Springs National Cemetery was formally dedicated on June 15, 1881. Mill Springs Nat’l Cemetery sits atop a high, sloping hill next to the Mill Springs Battlefield Visitor Center (opened in 2006) in the Pulaski County community of Nancy.

The Battle of Mill Springs occurred in January of 1862. During the course of the battle, 39 Union soldiers fell while Confederate losses numbered 125. (Visit the Kaintuckeean on Wednesday for a post about Zollicoffer Park and the Confederate mass grave/cemetery). Prior to the battle, CSA troops had established themselves in the immediate area, though the Union had control of neighboring communities. Confederate attempts to keep the two groups of Union troops from joining were defeated during this battle, and the surviving Confederates fled their position and supplies.

The Battle of Mill Springs occurred nine days after the Battle of Middle Creek; these two Confederate losses shifted the field of battle from southeeastern Kentucky into Tennessee until the Battle of Perryville brought the war back to Kentucky.