[Other Early Settlers]

Among the oth­er ear­ly set­tlers in the vicin­i­ty of Low­ell, was a man by the name of See, who lived on the land after­wards occu­pied by David Keller, Sr. Like most of his con­tem­po­raries, the exact date of his set­tling there can­not now be know, but tra­di­tion points out that he was there at a very ear­ly day and should be classed with the very ear­ly set­tlers of that local­i­ty. See, like Van­bib­ber, sold his claim to Con­rad Keller and sought a new home far­ther west. Of his mean­der­ings through the untrod­den for­est or how often he relo­cat­ed and then again moved for­ward, noth­ing def­i­nite­ly is known save that lat­er in life, about 1818, he found a per­ma­nent home on the Big Sandy Riv­er in the State of Ken­tucky, where his descen­dants are to be found to this day.

To this primeval set­tle­ment might also be added the name of Notliff Tay­lor, who, while [54] he did not live in the imme­di­ate bounds of those already men­tioned, he was near enough to be called a neigh­bor, espe­cial­ly in those days when neigh­bors were few and far between and sought each oth­er for assis­tance for miles around. He set­tled at the Mil­burn place on Green­bri­er riv­er. The names of his chil­dren were Anne, who mar­ried William John­son, of Cross Roads; Nan­cy, who mar­ried Isaac Mil­burn; Eliz­a­beth, who mar­ried Samuel Guinn, son of Samuel, Sr.; Mary, who mar­ried Joseph Guinn, son of James Guinn, Sr., before men­tioned, and William who mar­ried Flo­rence Gra­ham, daugh­ter of James Gra­ham, Sr.

Ear­ly in the set­tle­ment of this local­i­ty also came William Kin­caid who owned and occu­pied the Jessie Beard farm now owned by A. P. Pence, which prop­er­ty has recent­ly become famous as a sum­mer resort by rea­son of the med­ical qual­i­ties of the Buf­fa­lo Sul­phur Springs. Lit­tle did Kin­caid dream of the med­ical prop­er­ties boil­ing up out of this lick to which he then saw the wild [55] buf­fa­lo rush­ing with mad­ness to slake his thirst. It may be inci­den­tal­ly remarked here that traces of the old Buf­fa­lo path lead­ing across Keeney’s Knob, from the Buf­fa­lo Springs to Green Sul­phur Springs are still to be found. Kin­caid moved west about the begin­ning of the present cen­tu­ry, and so far as we know, left no imme­di­ate descen­dants in this coun­ty. It is sup­posed on rea­son­able author­i­ty that William Kin­caid belonged to the Kin­caid fam­i­ly of Augus­ta and came here about the same time that the Gra­hams set­tled at Low­ell.

A few miles east of Low­ell lived a Mr. (William?) Hinch­man, an Eng­lish­man, who set­tled there pos­si­bly dur­ing the Rev­o­lu­tion­ary war, and of whom the present Hinch­man fam­i­ly are descen­dants. The first tem­po­rary home of Hinch­man was on the riv­er below the mouth of Guinn’s branch about one half mile below Low­ell where he set­tled as a leas­er under Samuel Guinn, Sr. His stay there, how­ev­er, was short, when he moved to a per­ma­nent home in what is known [56] as the Hinch­man neigh­bor­hood east of Low­ell. He had a son, John, who served as jus­tice of the Peace for a long term of years. He also had a son, William, who a great many years ago moved to Logan coun­ty. It was the plea­sure of the writer to vis­it hi. in the year 1844 and remem­bers that he told him the year of his birth, which was 1770 and fur­ther recalls that he told him on that occa­sion that he was the father of twen­ty-four chil­dren by two wives. John Hinch­man, as before named, had a son. William, who was the father of the late John Hinch­man, whose death occurred in 1896. William Hinch­man was a Jus­tice of the Peace and was known as “Squire” Hinch­man and was a rul­ing elder in the Pres­by­ter­ian church.

The read­er will par­don the digres­sion in the fore­go­ing pages from the fam­i­ly geneal­o­gy for the rea­son that in so doing, it is hoped that it may be the means of hand­ing down to the present as well as future pos­ter­i­ty some account, how­ev­er mea­ger, of the first set­tlers of the local­i­ty of which we write; fur­ther­more, those whose names [57] we have men­tioned as com­pos­ing the ear­ly set­tle­ment stood shoul­der to shoul­der in brav­ing the dan­gers fight­ing the bat­tles of and sub­du­ing the hard­ships of pio­neer life, side by side with the prog­en­i­tors of our own fam­i­ly.

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