OCR Text |
Show 48 Early Western Travels [ VoL * 6 which the city stands, give to it a monotonous, perhaps a lifeless aspect to the stranger. It was in the year 1778 that a settlement was first commenced upon the spot on which the fair city of Louisville now stands. 4 In the early spring of that year, General George Rodgers Clarke, under authority of the State of Virginia, descended the Ohio with several hundred men, with the design of reducing the military posts of Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Fort Vincent, then held by British troops. Disembarking upon Corn Island at the Falls of the Ohio, opposite the present city, land sufficient for the support of six families, which were left, was cleared and planted with corn. From this circumstance the island received a name which it yet retains. General Clarke proceeded upon his expedition, and, in the autumn returning successful, the emigrants were removed to the main land, and a settlement was commenced where Louisville now stands. During the few succeeding years, other families from Virginia settled upon the spot, and in the spring of 1780 seven stations were formed upon Bear-grass Creek, 1 which here empties into the Mississippi, and Louisville commenced its march to its present importance. The view of the city from the Falls, as I have remarked, is not at all imposing; the view of the [ 20] Falls from the city, on the contrary, is one of beauty and romance. They are occasioned by a parapet of limestone extending quite across the stream, which is here about one mile in width; and when the water is low the whole chain sparkles with bubbling foam- bells. When the stream is full the descent 4 For a brief sketch of the history of Louisville, see Croghan's Journals, in our volume i, p. 136, note 106.- ED. ' The seven stations formed on Beargrass Creek in the fall of 1779 and spring of 1780 were: Falls of the Ohio, Linnis, Sullivan's Old, Hoagland's, Fiord's, Spring, and Middle stations. Beargrass Creek, a small stream less than ten mOes in length, flows in a north western trend and uniting with two smaller creeks, South and Muddy forks, enters the Ohio ( not the Mississippi) immediately above the Falls of the Ohio ( Louisville).- ED. |