Deed, Swift Mine

[boomer]

Does anyone have the equipment to read this photo of a deed, that swift sold his mine

Appalachian History: Swift's Silver Mine - lost or merely invented?
Jun 17, 2008 ... Swift's Silver Mine deed Photo caption: Swift's silver mine - Jonathan Swift's
deed to Peter Hope, England, for the "mine." ...

appalachianhistory.blogspot.com/2008/06/swifts-silver-mine-lost-or-merely.html

 

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[cstraiton]

I tried a few different programs to enlarge the pic enough to make out the writing, but everything I tried came out too blurry. Maybe someone else has something that will work. Here is the best I could do.

 

[-Ki-]

out of that photo i can only see "march 1798" and strait over to the right is Swifts name......

 

[cstraiton]

At the request of boomer, I contacted Dave Tabler who is the original author of the blog where the picture was obtained from. He responded and gave me the link to the source which was the Kentuckiana Digital Library where he got the photo. I was successful in enlarging it enough to read it, however when I uploaded the enlarged pic to my host site it was automatically downsized according to their maximum file size limit. So I'll let you guy's give it a try yourselves. Here is the link provided by Dave Tabler from Appalachian History.net. I just used Microsoft Paint to resize it. Just save it to your computer and open it up in Microsoft Paint and click Image, then Resize/Skew and increase the size by 200% or whatever percentage you wish to increase it.

http://kdl.kyvl.org/images/knu/1987ph2/0944.jpg

 

[-Ki-]

thanks for the link........ -Ki-

 

[boomer]

Remember that old saying ( there is something wrong with this picture ). in swifts journal he states that he went to England to get backing to work the mines on a large scale and was put in prison. Why he should have been rich and would not need to have people from England coming here to work the mines. he could get all the backing right here. if he was rich and they put him in prison, under there laws, he would be able to buy his way out. all of his crew should have been rich. but most died on the frontier broke. all learned the trails coming and going into Kentucky and became experienced frontiersmen. they would have been able to go to any location and get the loot or work the mines. i always felt the journals exaggerated the amount that was carried out. Why sell the mine? it does not say mines, but mine. unless it was willam swift that worked the mines and john the brother got in to trouble in england. AHHH, this is so much fun.
DEED:
Well, it gives us the date and name. lucky there was a better photo of it. we need to find the rest of the deed, showing where this mine is. the first page is cut off but swifts name is on it and I'm guessing that there are more pages to this deed. i looked at the link and under news papers it had a few things on swift. Well i guess its time to start snooping for old deed records in England, anything that has to do with the colonies or maybe state deed records between 1790 and 1800, that shows a transfer of the mine, was swift acting on his own? because there were partners in the mining. i wonder if there are other deed records showing members of the crew, in one of the state records on deeds or transfers. time for another aspirin.

 

[vamelungeon]

There is one deed here in Virginia that mentions Swift.
In Russell Co., VA Land Entry Book, for November 23, 1816 is listed an entry for Cader Powell in the amount of 50 acres on a small branch of the Pound Fork of Sandy River, beginning below a deer lick on the line of an old lick on the north side of the branch "to include a place of silver ore where it was supposed that Swift and company worked." I've actually seen that entry in person. Cader Powell is a direct ancestor of mine and I was doing genealogical research at the time. The trick would be figuring out which branch of the Pound River the entry is talking about.

 

[cstraiton]

Here's another deed I found while looking on the Kentuckiana Digital Library. This deed is from George James to Jonathan Swift for 10,000 acres in the Big Sandy region where the siver mine was supposed to be located.

http://kdl.kyvl.org/images/knu/1987ph2/0943.jpg

 

[-Ki-]

A land grant id found states : Made on January 5, 1791 "Eli Cleveland and John Morton enters 1483 acres of land on two treasury warrants No. 15232 and 12128 on a branch of Red River to include an Old camp in the center where there is some troughs at said camp on the branch side. The said camp is a place difficult to access supposed to be John Swift's old camp and others including a Mine said to be occupied formerly by said John Swift and others".

It clearly states MINE, not mines.......

 

[Curtis]

Maybe he just sold the "lesser" mine or mines. I did read somewhere that there was land scam perpetrated using the Swift legend to sell it at high prices...several times.

 

[-Ki-]

Found the Filson land grant........the first time Swift's mines are mentioned.

The Filson entry reads as follows:
1788, Robert Breckenridge and john filson as tenants in common enters 1000 acres of land upon the balance of a treasury warrent No. 10,117 about 60 or 70 miles northeastwardly from martins cabbin in powell's valley to include a silver mine which was improved about 17 years ago by a certain man named Swift at said mine, wherein the said Swift reports he has extracted from the ore a considerable quality of silver some of which he made into dollars and left at or near the mine, together with the apparatus for making the same, the land to be in a square and the lines to run at the cardinal points of the compass including the mine in the center as near as may be.....

 

[swiftsearcher]

Remember that old saying ( there is something wrong with this picture ). in swifts journal he states that he went to England to get backing to work the mines on a large scale and was put in prison. Why he should have been rich and would not need to have people from England coming here to work the mines. he could get all the backing right here. if he was rich and they put him in prison, under there laws, he would be able to buy his way out. all of his crew should have been rich. but most died on the frontier broke. all learned the trails coming and going into Kentucky and became experienced frontiersmen. they would have been able to go to any location and get the loot or work the mines. i always felt the journals exaggerated the amount that was carried out. Why sell the mine? it does not say mines, but mine. unless it was willam swift that worked the mines and john the brother got in to trouble in england. AHHH, this is so much fun.
DEED:


Well, it gives us the date and name. lucky there was a better photo of it. we need to find the rest of the deed, showing where this mine is. the first page is cut off but swifts name is on it and I'm guessing that there are more pages to this deed. i looked at the link and under news papers it had a few things on swift. Well i guess its time to start snooping for old deed records in England, anything that has to do with the colonies or maybe state deed records between 1790 and 1800, that shows a transfer of the mine, was swift acting on his own? because there were partners in the mining. i wonder if there are other deed records showing members of the crew, in one of the state records on deeds or transfers. time for another aspirin.

Boomer, I have found evidence that there were two Swifts - George William and John (George had the place on the Yadkin near Mundy and John lived in Alexandria). I was lucky enough to stumble across some census records to help support this from this time period.

You make a GREAT point - Why on earth, if they prospered so much that they paid the workers seven fold their wages, had heaped up riches in the Great Cave and a fleet of ships, would Swift have to go to England to get "backers" for a larger scale operation? Maybe he went to get permission to do the mining legally? Maybe the purpose of the trip was something else entirely?

From Ralph's and my research, we have concluded that the reason the Scottish Co. was able to extort extra money from Swift was due to the "secret cargo" they were bringing Swift and Co. Ralph believes this to be mining equipment and I did at first. However, with the "Scottish Co.", there seems to be a Templar/Masonic reference here. I am 33.33/33.33/33.33 in my opinion of this "secret cargo" that the Scots were bringing Swift and crew. It could have been mining equipment. It also could have been something else - Templar "items" to hide. And, it could have been BOTH! Whatever it was, we know from the Swift journals that Swift paid the extra amount to the Scots and never dealt with them afterwards. Could this be why he went to England (the British Isles)? Could he have went to obtain in person the item(s) the company needed? Of course, either way (with mining equipment or Templar items), Swift would not and did not mention any details in his journal.

 

[Rebel - KGC]

Yeah, NOW I remember Swift WAS thrown in prison, where he went "blind" or something. Reckon, they caught that "old" pirate; going "blind" sounds like a "code"; just the same...
he came back, and could not find the mine(s), again. Hmmmmmmmmmmm... Does ANYONE have copies of Swift's "prison records"? Sure would like to know...

 

[boomer]

This has taken a lot of time and i should have gone to the source. i have friends in england that i e-mailed to get help with finding the complete sale document. there are 4 pages to this document, not just 2. some of the sale i can make out, like the name at the top. (Hugh Logan) that name is vary familiar. at the bottom it says (in the district of kentucky on the salt-sait next word could be ?rait, ?raik, ?rock. but there is a space a word is missing i think? on the next page the bits and pieces say sandy, white oak, dist??nts from. sad, the 2nd and 3rd page are cut off and they are the ones that tell where to find the mines. on purpose of course.
this was found in Kentuckiana Digital Library under (collection guide: C. Frank Dunn Photographs collection, 1900-1954the way its set up you can enlarge and read it, has all kinds of stuff on kentucky.

 

[cstraiton]

Awesome find there Boomer. I love searching the archives of the Kentuckiana Digital Library. Lots of good info on there.

 

[UpTheCreek]

Could this entry be another Jonathan Swift all-together?
Jonathan was a very popular name of that time, Dont know about the name Swift.

 

[KY Hiker]

Found the Filson land grant........the first time Swift's mines are mentioned.

The Filson entry reads as follows:
1788, Robert Breckenridge and john filson as tenants in common enters 1000 acres of land upon the balance of a treasury warrent No. 10,117 about 60 or 70 miles northeastwardly from martins cabbin in powell's valley to include a silver mine which was improved about 17 years ago by a certain man named Swift at said mine, wherein the said Swift reports he has extracted from the ore a considerable quality of silver some of which he made into dollars and left at or near the mine, together with the apparatus for making the same, the land to be in a square and the lines to run at the cardinal points of the compass including the mine in the center as near as may be.....

If you look at that on a map and draw a maximum radius line (an arc as the crow flies) of 75 miles it looks to me that Hazard, KY would be the furthest point NorthEast from Martins Station in the Powell Valley. Certainly Elkhorn City would fall out of that radius. Castlewood, VA would be just outside that distance. Certainly Pound Gap would be 5-10 miles further out. This may help narrow the search field by use of the this old title. One could use the journals travel time as a indicator as well. Generally 3-4weeks time from departure to arrival if my memory serves me.
The only possible problem with the title being that in KY, history of title distputes and fraud through 1900 is well known and quite common unfortunately.