Old Swift story and pics (linK)

swiftfan said:
What do you guys think of the whole "silver mine" story to sell land? We know Daniel Boone was hired by the Transylvania company to survey the land for expansion, and his favorite author was Jonathan Swift, could it be only a story to get people to move west?
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I don't believe Boone would have done such a thing. It does not fit any account of his character that I have read. He was known for his honesty and integrity. Boone was raised a Quaker and loved to hunt, especially long hunting. His auto autobiography was written down by John Filson who Boone had dictated it to. Filson later disappears after claiming a title to land with Swifts mine in the center of. Another friend of Boone's, Harrod (who Ft. Harrod or Harrod's station was named after) went missing when he and another man went looking for Swift's mine. Either of these men could have found a mine and 'disappeared'. Remember at and around this time 1770-1790 you had the Revolutionary war going on back East and then a country being founded. Kentucky was our nations first wild west/frontier. Kentucky was just beginning to be populated, mostly from rafts floated down the Ohio River from Pittsburg. Many came through Cumberland Gap as well, almost all looking for land to settle and farm...meaning bottom land or flat land. Not the land you typically see in Eastern KY. The motivation of the first settlers that Boone brought though and settled Boone's Station (Ft. Boonesborough) was to escape a over bearing taxation by a British governor in Carolina. The spirit of freedom and independence, and an escape of taxation, motivated them all to face the dangers of the frontier. If you watch the video I linked in a previous post about a presentation given in Prestonburg you will see the author of the book did some property title research. Its interesting where the land ownership overlaps areas known to be sacred to the Indians. Namely Paintsville. I think as with all legends, there is some truth in the root of it. The actual events, people and places are facts. Over time as a tale is told over and over, the story grows and gets less attached to the original facts. I think there was a least a mine if not multiple mines. I doubt there were actual veins of silver to be found in those mines. It was more likely a concentration of silver mixed with other minerals in rock that they smelted out. At that time in history on the frontier, some of the most valuable things to source were Salt, Lead, and Salt Peter for black powder. You needed the lead and Salt Peter to hunt food and the salt to preserve it.
 

Not far from where I live there is a place where Daniel Boone spent the winter of 1767. There was a salt lick there. Has was quoted as saying if it wasn't for that lick he would have starved to death. About that time, Swift was saying that people were aware of his comings and goings to the wilderness and had become suspicious. Was Boone trying to follow Swift? They weren't far apart if one of Swift's possible locations is right... but I agree that Boone was looking for land to settle. The lush, level farm land of central Ky was more suited for settlement, while the eastern mountains were avoided when the settlers came. Only the loggers, miners, and moonshiners were successful here.
 

swiftfan said:
Not far from where I live there is a place where Daniel Boone spent the winter of 1767. There was a salt lick there. Has was quoted as saying if it wasn't for that lick he would have starved to death. About that time, Swift was saying that people were aware of his comings and goings to the wilderness and had become suspicious. Was Boone trying to follow Swift? They weren't far apart if one of Swift's possible locations is right... but I agree that Boone was looking for land to settle. The lush, level farm land of central Ky was more suited for settlement, while the eastern mountains were avoided when the settlers came. Only the loggers, miners, and moonshiners were successful here.
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Only thing about looking for lands to settle especially in Kentucky it was illegal to settle land west of the Allegheny Mountains. D. Boone knew that but he was working under orders of the Transylvania Company. The TC was trying to get settlers west of the Allegheny's because they wanted to acquire all the land of Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana and western Virginia. Governor Henderson of North Carolina financed Daniel Boone to settle Kentucky. He dropped the money on the floor and told Daniel now if anyone ask you where you got the money ----- you found it. That is why the US Government took all of Daniel Boone's land and DB left and moved to Missouri where the Spanish gave him a land grant. Then after Thomas Jefferson purchased the Louisiana Territory, DB lost his land claim again to the US Government. Then the US Government tried to make heroes out of DB and dug him and his wife and reburied them in Kentucky. Dirty politics.
 

You might find this of interest, it includes the autobiography of Daniel Boone transcribed by John Filson in Boone's own words. Filson later disappeared after filing a title for land surrounding a silver mine worked by John Swift. The Kentucky historical society called the Filson Club was named after him.

http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=etas
 

KY Hiker said:
You might find this of interest, it includes the autobiography of Daniel Boone transcribed by John Filson in Boone's own words. Filson later disappeared after filing a title for land surrounding a silver mine worked by John Swift. The Kentucky historical society called the Filson Club was named after him.

http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=etas
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Yes, I have a copy and I have read it many times. John Filson did not write it in Daniel Boone's own words he added a ton of flurry with words D. Boone did not know. Did you know John Filson also wrote the auto-biography of Jonathan Swift also. Now you may know why he was killed and it was over land in Lowlantsville or Cincinnnati, Ohio property that Filson was a partner in with.
 

franklin said:
Yes, I have a copy and I have read it many times. John Filson did not write it in Daniel Boone's own words he added a ton of flurry with words D. Boone did not know. Did you know John Filson also wrote the auto-biography of Jonathan Swift also. Now you may know why he was killed and it was over land in Lowlantsville or Cincinnnati, Ohio property that Filson was a partner in with.
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If I remember correctly, a couple of men came to him wanting to go look for Swifts treasure. His wife begged him not to. He never returned. Cuff links with "JF" were later found.
 

swiftfan said:
If I remember correctly, a couple of men came to him wanting to go look for Swifts treasure. His wife begged him not to. He never returned. Cuff links with "JF" were later found.
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No I believe JF was returning from Lowlantsville or Cincinnnati, I forgot the names of the others that were investing in Cincinnati, Patterson could have been one. You can google Lowlantsville or Cincinnati. He was coming back up the Little Sandy River after getting off the Ohio River. The JF society may have a lot of information on this also.
 

swiftfan said:
If I remember correctly, a couple of men came to him wanting to go look for Swifts treasure. His wife begged him not to. He never returned. Cuff links with "JF" were later found.
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I think your thinking of Harrod. As I recall a man whom he had a previous land dispute with came to him to come look for the Swift mine. He never returned. His wife thought the man had lead him off to kill him.
 

franklin said:
No I believe JF was returning from Lowlantsville or Cincinnnati, I forgot the names of the others that were investing in Cincinnati, Patterson could have been one. You can google Lowlantsville or Cincinnati. He was coming back up the Little Sandy River after getting off the Ohio River. The JF society may have a lot of information on this also.
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I never heard anything about Filson investing in Cincinnatti, or any connection to that and his disappearance. I seem to remember a reference to the location of the land he claimed title to with Swift's mine in the center being 60 or 70 miles North East of Martin's cabin. (or was it Powell's cabin? )
 

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It was Martin's Cabin. I need to google and read that again. It has been about ten years since I read that but it was over a land deal plus they thought John Filson knew where the silver mines of Swift was located because he did an auto-biography of Jonathan Swift and Daniel Boone. I have not been able to find a copy of the Swift auto-biography other than the pamphlet about the Swift Silver Mines?

http://sandmancincinnati.com/founding/father. Well for some reason it don't work? Just google founding fathers of Cincinnati.
 

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KY Hiker said:
I never heard anything about Filson investing in Cincinnatti, or any connection to that and his disappearance. I seem to remember a reference to the location of the land he claimed title to with Swift's mine in the center being 60 or 70 miles North East of Martin's cabin. (or was it Powell's cabin? )
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Powell's cabin may be in reference to Powell Valley. Gist was supposed to have a cabin way up in there somewhere close to Pine Mountain. That's something I read somewhere years ago.
 

KY Hiker said:
Have never heard of any biography of Swift much less by John Filson.
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Maybe there is a copy at the Library of Congress. I have checked with John Filson Society. They never heard of it either. I have an old copy from computer about thirty years ago that said, "John Filson auto-biographer of Daniel Boone and Jonathan Swift. I looked for it then and I could never find it but now computers are better maybe someone can find it and solve the mystery whether the Jonathan Swift Silver Mines are real or fiction.
 

Well what you probably came across was just mis-information. Thirty years ago (1987) there was no public internet. I was just finishing college around then. Universities had mainframes with terminal access only. There were however BBSs and 300 baud modems. Some of the first BBSs were set up in larger city public librarys. Most of what you could access was public use programs, I am unaware of any literature 'published' to a BBS back then. File sizes were in Kilobytes and sometimes it would take 45min to download a 32K program! My bet is your source was incorrect, its also probable your time-frame was off by 8-10years.
 

franklin said:
Maybe there is a copy at the Library of Congress. I have checked with John Filson Society. They never heard of it either. I have an old copy from computer about thirty years ago that said, "John Filson auto-biographer of Daniel Boone and Jonathan Swift. I looked for it then and I could never find it but now computers are better maybe someone can find it and solve the mystery whether the Jonathan Swift Silver Mines are real or fiction.
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If the Filson Society in Louisville has no record of it then it most likely does not exist. They are very much THE authority on the historical records in and around the time of Kentucky's settlement and founding.
 

franklin said:
It was Martin's Cabin. I need to google and read that again. It has been about ten years since I read that but it was over a land deal plus they thought John Filson knew where the silver mines of Swift was located because he did an auto-biography of Jonathan Swift and Daniel Boone. I have not been able to find a copy of the Swift auto-biography other than the pamphlet about the Swift Silver Mines?

http://sandmancincinnati.com/founding/father. Well for some reason it don't work? Just google founding fathers of Cincinnati.
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So from another thread here Ki posted :
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.....
 

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Just need to draw an arc in the NE quadrant 70 miles from Martin's Station VA (wilderness road state park). That puts Pikeville, Prestonsburg and Salyersville in that range.

That quote above is a land title entry and probably the best lead on one of the mines location.
 

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