A Poe presence remains in Bracken County, KY; April, 2022 on Route 10.
Edward Poe was born in 1732, the same year as our first president George Washington, in Plumstead Township, Bucks County, PA. His father Patrick Poe emigrated from the Ulster Province in the northern Ireland @ the 1720’s. A tailor by trade, Patrick married Edward’s mother, Abigail Day (daughter of Christopher Day who was one of the earliest settlers and large landowner in Buck’s County), in 1728 at Christ Church in Philadelphia. Abigail and Patrick would purchase an inn, The Sign of the Plough, which they ran at least until Patrick’s death in 1759.
• From a Bucks County History
Upon Patrick’s death Edward’s name appears as an executor of his father’s will along with his mother, Abigail. Patrick bequeathed 100
Estate sale of property published in The Pennsylvania Gazette, Philadelphia, PA, 15 March, 1759, page 3
pounds to Abigail, to Edward and son Patrick he left 2 shares of his remaining estate and his other 5 children each received one share of the estate. (Information from Will signed in 1758 was read from the original).
It’s unknown when Edward left Bucks County - never to return as far as we know except when he was hospitalized during the Revolutionary War in Plumstead Hospital - but it probably took place between 1760 and 1770. His mother Abigail’s death is not documented, nor a burial plot identified, but other family historians assume Edward waited to strike out for the lower Shenandoah after his mother passed away. The Mercer Museum in Doylestown, PA has a page from a deed book showing that Edward Poe still owned land in 1762 in Bucks County. (Below)
We can document that Edward and his wife Martha (Brittain), married in 1753, and had a family of four children: Joseph, John, Patrick, and Abigail - all of whom were born in Plumstead Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
Their first born, Joseph Poe Sr. (1754-1838) married Barbara Roe and eventually settled in Clermont County, Ohio, and had eleven children - six boys and five girls.
John Poe was next and most family historians show his birth in 1756. Most family trees list John married to Mary Polly Newman. Based on the Federal Census of 1801, 1810, 1820, and 1830 John and Mary had at least 8 children, lived in Bracken County, Kentucky, Brown County, Ohio, and finally, Franklin County, Indiana where Mary died in 1828 and John died in 1834.
Despite a lack of written documentation, it is probable that Patrick, a third child who was born in @1759 and married Margaret (last name unknown) after 1783 in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. They moved to Mason (later Bracken) County, Kentucky in 1806 and purchased farmland near the Licking River. Patrick and Martha had 9 children - seven boys and two girls. Martha’s death is unknown, but Patrick did not remarry until 1841 to Hannah Swain.
Edward and Martha’s final child was Abigail (1760-1845) and from whom our Kendle clan descended. Abigail married John Day (1755-1816), first cousin of Abigail’s father, who was a grandson of
Christopher Day of Plumstead Township, Bucks County, in Baltimore, MD in 1776. Abigail and John had 11 children, nine boys and 2 girls. They were some of the first of our family to move to Kentucky in the 1790’s and moved to Clermont County, Ohio in 1802 where both remained until their death.
Below is the Day and Poe family tree which started in Bucks
County, PA with Christopher Day in late 1600’s. Abigail Day, mother of Edward Poe, was a sister of Matthew Day, the father of John Day.
As mentioned previously we do not know the exact time when Edward and Martha left Bucks County. We presume it was some time after the death of Patrick Poe in 1759 and the disposition of his estate. We do know the following: Edward and Martha left Bucks County taking the Great Wagon Trail for some 200+ miles to Berkeley County near Martinsburg, WV (Virginia in the 1760’s); this
route to the backcountry became a favorite of the Scot-Irish who came from Ulster in Northern Ireland and populated the Appalachians; we can safely assume Poe farmed land that he acquired in Berkeley County west of the Blue Ridge Mountains, but the exact location is not known.
There are no known records (land, birth, or death) to fill in the picture of the Edward Poe family in the lower Shenandoah from the 1760’s until the outbreak of the Revolutionary War.
We can make some assumptions based on what we do know. Sometime after March, 1770 (when she was named in her father’s will) Martha died. Had she joined her Poe family in the move to Berkeley County? Did she die during the 200 mile trip to the Shenandoah? Or did Edward Poe and children leave Bucks County, Pennsylvania only after Martha died? There is no documentation to answer those questions and her gravesite remains unknown.
We can assume that Edward Poe and his family moved to the Martinsburg area in the later half of the 1760’s or early 1770’s. So a reasonable question to ask is “what did the Poe’s find when they established their new homestead and farm in the mountains of Virginia?’. The following gives a very good overview of what they faced.
Farming for the Poes during the mid-1700’s is described well in the book: The Allegheny Frontier: West Virginia Beginnings. The authors wrote “The pioneer farmer lived principally by hunting and by grazing livestock on the natural vegetation of the country and limited his cultivation of corn and garden vegetables only to what he needed to supplement the bounties of forest and pasture. He seldom devoted much effort to improving his cabin or clearing additional acres. Nor did he become greatly agitated about land titles…
“…In frontier agriculture corn was king. Settlers planted it in fields not entirely clear of stumps and used only the hoe in its cultivation…The reasons for the universality and popularity of corn are not difficult to fathom. Not only could it be planted before the land had been completely cleared, but it could be ground into meal with the simplest of devices…the most popular forms being mush, grits, hominy, roasting ears, and journeycakes. Equally important, corn fitted perfectly into a system of agriculture which placed emphasis upon the raising of cattle and hogs. Next to corn, wheat [which required stumps removed and three years after clearing before planting] was the most important grain crop. Because of their greater value, isolated mountain farmers often grew wheat, rye, oats, and buckwheat for cash crops and reserved their corn for their own use…
“The Germans constituted the vanguard of the new immigrant wave and usually took up lands in the northern part of the Valley of Virginia in the counties of Frederick, Shenandoah, and Rockingham. The Scotch-Irish, who followed close behind them, settled in Berkeley County or moved farther south to Augusta, Rockbridge, and Botetourt counties. Many of these settlers, as well as those from eastern Virginia, had formerly been indentured servants and had moved into the Valley as their contracts expired…
“The cosmopolitan character of the Valley of Virginia was reflected in the population of Jefferson and Berkeley counties, in West Virginia…Berkeley County, on the other hand, attracted a greater proportion of the Scotch-Irish. Both counties absorbed a substantial part of the German migration, with Martinsburg and Mecklenburg, later known as Shepherdstown, becoming centers of German settlement. In the two counties, as a whole, the Germans and Scotch-Irish were about equal in numbers, each nationality accounting for about 30 percent of the population.
But life in the lower Shenandoah involved more than clearing the land, building a log cabin, planting crops, and raising your farm animals. Western Virginia and Pennsylvania, including the Ohio and Monongahela River valleys, were still disputed lands between the pioneers and Ohio Indian tribes such as the Shawnee and Mingo.
After the French and Indian War concluded in the 1760’s, the two major eastern Indian powers, the Iroquois and Cherokee, reached several treaties whereby the lands south of the Ohio River from western Virginia through Kentucky would be open to settlement by pioneers without hostilities. The Shawnee, Mingo, and elements of the Delaware tribes in Ohio chaffed at the hegemony of the Iroquois over this territory. These tribes considered Kentucky in particular to be an important hunting ground and feared that pioneer encroachment would eventually affect their territory. This dispute amongst the tribes resulted in the treaties being ignored and a low level ‘war’ existed against the pioneers who pushed into far western Virginia and Kentucky through 1774 . The threat from these tribes reached a crisis in 1774 and embroiled the entire frontier south of the Ohio River from northwestern North Carolina, western Virginia, the Ft. Dunmore (Pittsburg) area in Pennsylvania, to Kentucky in conflict.
Dunmore’s War
John Murray, the fourth Earl of Dunmore and Britain’s last Royal Governor of Virginia, realized by mid 1774 the pacification of the Ohio tribes and cessation of hostilities would not be successfully negotiated. With British troops unavailable to protect the Virginia frontier Lord Dunmore mobilized the Virginia county militias to confront the threat. ‘Dunmore’s War’ was the last of the Colonial wars.
In a nutshell, Governor Dunmore had to consider an effective strategy to protect the settlers and the frontier from marauding bands of Shawnee and Mingo warriors. He considered two possibilities. First, build a network of blockhouses and forts with scouting parties and ranger detachments to thwart the attacks. Even with this plan the frontier would remain porous and exposed. The second plan called for mobilization of the militias to create two large armies - one from the western and southern Virginia counties and a second comprised of the northern counties - to confront the Shawnee and their allies in the heart of their main villages in Ohio (Chillicothe) - and after a hoped for decisive victory reach an agreement to cease hostilities.
Lord Dunmore headed for Winchester, Virginia to lead the northern half (Hampshire, Frederick, Dunmore and Berkeley counties) of his militia army to Ft. Fincastle (Wheeling) and appointed Colonels Preston and Andrew Lewis to bring the southern militia (Fincastle, Botetourt, and Augusta counties with volunteer companies from 3 additional counties) to the confluence of the Kanawha and Ohio Rivers.
Included In Dunmore’s “Right Wing” were members of the Berkeley County militia. In Captain Joseph Mitchell’s company was Edward Poe, our ancestor, who answered the call to battle the Shawnee and their allies who threatened the lives of Virginia’s frontier settlers. Of the 87 members of Mitchell’s company some 21 members deserted - nearly 25% of the total. Poe did not desert. We do not have documentation of Poe’s role or contribution to the effort, but he was in Dunmore’s “Right Wing” as they marched from Winchester, Virginia in late August until their return home in late fall.
In early October Lord Dunmore’s “Right Wing” militia army set out from Wheeling to float to the mouth of the Hockhocking Creek on the Ohio. When Dunmore arrived he was surprised Colonel Lewis’ “Left Wing” militia army had not yet arrived. Lewis, several days later than expected, reached the mouth of the Kanawha River with the Ohio, and set up a temporary camp at a place called Point Pleasant. His orders were to proceed north as soon as possible and merge forces with Dunmore on the Hockhocking where a last attempt to settle the conflict with the Shawnee was scheduled to take place with Cornstalk. Unknown to Lewis his march had been shadowed by Cornstalk’s spies. Unknown to Dunmore, his hoped for negotiations with Cornstalk had been a ruse. Instead, Cornstalk
Map Legend: Blue Oval - Poe lived in this area of Berkeley County; Red line/arrow - represents Lord Dunmore’s “Right Wing” march; Green line/arrow - Col. Andrew Lewis “Left Wing” march;
Purple rectangle - Shawnee Main Villages; Yellow Star - Pt. Pleasant Battle, 1774.
planned a surprise attack on Lewis’ “Left Wing” militia before it merged with Dunmore which would have resulted in a 3 to 1 advantage of fighters for the Virginians. Cornstalk hoped he could score a decisive victory before the end of fighting season.
On October 9th, 1774, scouts, which included Simon Kenton and Simon Girty, arrived at the “Left Wing” encampment with new orders for Colonel Lewis from Lord Dunmore: ‘Do not hike 70 miles north to the Hockhocking; instead travel across the Ohio River and march cross country to the Shawnee villages where both the “Right and Left Wings” of the Virginia militias would meet to confront Cornstalk.” However, Cornstalk and his warriors had built 80 rafts and transited the Ohio River on October 9th just 6 to 8
miles north of Lewis’ encampment. They marched stealthily to an abandoned Indian village just a mile or two away and awaited until morning to launch their attack. In the early morning of October 10th Cornstalk ordered his warriors to move out. In Glenn Williams’ book, Dunmore’s War (p. 279), he describes Cornstalk’s strategy in this way:
“After a short night’s rest, the Indian warriors were up for the fight. Their leaders told them they would advance in a large body toward the Virginia camp, staying on high ground as much as possible, initially marching in a single file expanding as the terrain visibility dictated. Just short of the (camp), they would silently eliminate the pickets and form into a line. If (undetected), they would attack at first light, advance quickly in a rush to catch the enemy troops by surprise….(and) if all went well, the fury of the warrior’s assault would create such terror and confusion that the (soldiers) would have two….equally undesirable options. Warriors would pursue and hound those remnants of the broken army (giving them no escape). (Those) who survived the onslaught and retreated to the Kanawha river would either have to fight to the death on the bank or enter the water in a vain attempt to swim across ….only to find lines of Indians (on the opposite shore) to complete their destruction. Once the threat (by the “Left Wing” of the) Virginians was complete…Cornstalk planned to return to the Scioto River in order to intercept Dunmore’s troops (he had und under surveillance) as they advanced along the Hockhocking Creek toward the Upper Shawnee Towns near Chillicothe.”
To paraphrase a military proverb, ‘no battle plan survives the first shot’.
Four soldiers (two sergeants and two privates) from the Fincastle County militia awoke early with plans to hunt and headed towards Old Town Creek - in the direction of the unknown Indian encampment. The two privates stumbled onto the approaching Indians first. One was shot and killed while the other, upon seeing “above five acres of land covered with Indians as one could stand one beside another” raced back to camp pursued by a group of Indians and raised the alarm. Shortly after Mooney’s hunting partner had been shot, the two sergeants had also seen a sizable party of Indians closing in and confirmed the private’s report to Colonel Lewis. With the militia bivouac alerted the planned surprise attack by Cornstalk was disrupted.
From “sunrise to sunset” both sides battled. Even though Lewis’ militia troops were outnumbered, with surprise eliminated, the Virginians gained the upper hand and by the end of the day Cornstalk pulled his warriors out of the fight. It is estimated that both sides suffered comparable casualties.
Cornstalk and his allies retreated across the Ohio River during the night and on the following day began their retreat to the Upper Shawnee Town of Chillicothe and surrounding villages. Aware from his spies that Dunmore’s army had struck out that same day for Chillicothe, helped quicken the step of Cornstalk’s warriors.
The Shawnee had previously prepared for the possibility that their upper towns could be a target of attack from the Virginians. With the Scioto River as a natural defensive barrier for Chillicothe, the Shawnee cleared the west and east side of the river of trees and brush allowing for excellent fields of fire. Ambush sites were constructed all along the high west bank of the Scioto to frustrate attempts to use the only ford of the river near the towns.
As Dunmore approached Chillicothe at Pickaway Plains on October 15th with some 1150 militia, his spies informed him that Cornstalk had gathered five to seven hundred warriors and their families to make a ‘last stand’ against the Virginians. Dunmore decided to forgo an immediate confrontation, to await the arrival of Lewis’ troops from Point Pleasant, and began construction of Camp Charlotte on the east side of the Scioto.
The message was clear to Cornstalk and his allies - the Virginians would remain until this war was settled.
The Shawnee, Mingoes, and their allies met to discuss the next step. Cornstalk, with the ‘Left Wing’ on the move north to join Dunmore, presented his allies with his best case: we must end the bloodshed of our warriors, protect Indian territory north of the Ohio River, and seek a peaceful solution. An emissary was dispatched to Dunmore seeking a meeting.
Dunmore immediately agreed and offered generous terms at their ensuing conference. Perhaps the most moving testimony regarding the cause and senselessness of the conflict came from Chief Logan. Transcribed after the peace agreement was settled, Logan’s sorrowful words* about the murder of his entire family and the growing enmity between the Shawnee and the pioneers were memorialized in the Virginia Gazette and by Thomas Jefferson, who entered them in his Notes on Virginia.
The militia from Berkeley County left Ohio and returned home in November of 1774. We assume that Edward Poe’s 400+ mile hike back brought him to his homestead and four children. When Poe left in late August we would expect that his three sons, age 20, 18, and 15, could care for their 14 year old sister, bring in the harvest, prepare for winter, and tend to the farm animals.
The American Revolution Is Coming
Even if this undocumented scenario of returning to his children above is reasonable, big changes beyond the Poe family’s control were about to turn their lives upside down and disrupt life in the Shenandoah. Citizens throughout Virginia protested the violence in Massachusetts and what was considered parliamentary overreach by King George in the affairs of the colonists. Lord Dunmore, who was heralded for his leadership against and diplomacy with the Ohio Indians, would be escaping from those same Virginia citizens within the year. The American colonies were moving towards rebellion.
About sixty miles from Poe’s farm, a preacher of German descent, Peter Muhlenberg, led a large German-speaking congregation in the town of Woodstock, VA in Dunmore County (name changed to Shenandoah in 1777). Muhlenberg also traveled widely in the area to minister to the large numbers of English and Scot-Irish colonists who were without a minister.
Muhlenberg, who worked hard ministering to his diverse flock, was also known for his inspired preaching, which resulted in members of his congregation being loyal and appreciative. In addition, between “1772 and 1774 Muhlenberg performed 463 baptisms and 158 marriages”, all while managing a small farm. Nor surprisingly, Muhlenberg enjoyed
a popularity that resulted in his election to the Second Virginia Convention for Dunmore County in the spring of 1775 and would have witnessed the famous “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech. In the summer and also December 1775, Muhlenberg was elected to the 3rd and 4th Virginia Conventions.
By the end of the Fourth Convention in January, 1776 at Williamsburg, Muhlenberg’s life took “a dramatic turn toward military affairs when the convention selected him to command…the Virginia 8th Regiment.
The 8th Regiment came to be known as the ‘German’ Regiment, even though many volunteers descended from English, Irish, and Scottish stock. Michael Cercere, writing in his book General Peter Muhlenberg, makes clear ethnicity was not a key factor. Instead he suggests the “…unifying factor of the 8th Regiment was “their frontier backgrounds…(and being) accustomed to using long rifles, a weapon very different from the smoothbore muskets that most Virginia soldiers carried.”
Muhlenberg’s first assignment was to raise enough volunteers to fill 10 companies of 68 soldiers in each from eight counties including Berkeley. Edward Poe, Grandma Smith’s 6th great grandfather, heard the call for liberty at the age of 42 and was one of hundreds to assemble in Woodstock, VA in late March, 1776 and marched off to war.
Poe’s ‘Payroll Card’ above documents his early 1776 enlistment into Virginia’s 8th Regiment. A cursory look would suggest a date of April, 1777. But thanks to VA 8th Regiment historian, Gabe Neville, who I reached out to in July, 2020 explained how to best understand the card with the following:
“This is not the correct enlistment date. If you look at his April, 1777 pay slip it shows pay for 11 months and six days, which means he was in the regiment when it was taken into Continental pay May 25, 1776 (actually retroactively at a later date). Prior to this, it was a provincial/state regiment, so his actual enlistment date would be some time before that. If he was in Darke’s Company, then probably before February 9 (1776). If in Croghan’s Company, then before April 19 (1776). 1776 enlistments were for one year. On December 2, he reenlisted - probably taking a bonus payment - under 1777 rules, for three years or the length of the war (whichever was shorter, I believe).”
Whither the Poe Children?
Once again documentation is scant. What happened to John, Joseph, Patrick, and Abigail? Without much of a paper trail, with the help of previous Poe family historians, we can make reasonable conclusions from Ruth Deserter’s Poe history.
First, one can conclude that the Poe Virginia homestead was abandoned or sold and the children dispersed. Consider what we do know about each.
Joseph Poe, (1754-1838), born in Plumstead Two. he died in Clermont County, Ohio. Joseph married Barbara Roe around 1778. Barbara was also born in Plumstead Township, which suggests Joseph may have returned to his place of birth after leaving Virginia. Joseph and Barbara had 11 children and there are documents he owned property in Maryland from 1783 to 1791. In 1794 he moved to Kentucky and bought land on Little Bracken Creek in Mason County. In 1815 Joseph bought 47 acres on Bullskin Creek, Clermont Co., Ohio. His home was close to his brother John.
John Poe, (1756-1834) married Mary Polly Newman in early 1780’s and they had 8 known children. There is evidence that John was living in Baltimore County, MD when he enlisted in Col. Ewing’s Battalion of a “Flying Camp” in 1776 (MD. Archives, Book 8, p. 54). The ‘Flying Camp’ idea of Washington came to an end by early 1777 and many of those veterans transitioned to the Continental Line. Many Poe historians suggest John enlisted in Winchester, VA in 1777 with Bland’s Virginia Regiment. Unfortunately, the record cited by all these historians belonged to another John Poe who died in 1838 in Ross County, Ohio. Our John Poe lived in Clermont/Brown Co., Ohio and Mason County, KY before moving to Indiana where he died. There is a Revolutionary War headstone marking John’s burial place, but if correct, it would be for his service in the MD Flying Camp in 1776, not in North Carolina.
Patrick Poe, (1758-1844) was born in Plumstead Twp., PA where he married Margaret Mason in 1784. They had 9 known children. It is conceivable that Patrick left Virginia and returned immediately to Plumstead, Bucks County where he was born. It is believed that Patrick served as a private in the Revolutionary War with the Bucks County Associators (Flying Camp) under Captain Wm. McCalla. Patrick and his family moved to Maysville, Kentucky (last of the Poe children) by flatboat in 1806 and bought property on the North Fork of the Licking River. Patrick’s first wife died @1827. He married his second wife, Hannah Swain, in 1841.
Abigail Poe, (1760-1845) born in Plumstead Twp., Bucks Co., married John Day (1755-1816), son of Matthew Day who was her father’s uncle. Abigail and John were first cousins, once removed. After Edward enlisted in the 8th Regiment one can imagine him sending Abigail to live with his uncle; perhaps she was sent in 1774 when he participated in Dunmore’s War. Abigail and John married on August 1, 1776 in Baltimore, MD, less than a month after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. More to be written on these two in the future.
* Logan’s Lament: “I appeal to any white man to say, if he entered Logan’s cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat; if ever he came cold and naked, and he clothed him not. During the course of that long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love for the whites, that my countrymen pointed as they passed, and said, ‘Logan is the friend of white men.’ I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injuries of one man. Col. Cresap, the last spring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not sparing even my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it: I have killed many: I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace. But do not harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? - Not one.”
Bibliography
The Allegheny Frontier: West Virginia Beginnings, 1730 - 1830, by Otis K Rice, University of Kentucky Press, 1970.
Dunmore’s War: The Last Conflict of America’s Colonial Era by Glenn F. Williams, Westholme Publishing, 2017.
Our Pioneer Ancestors: The Day and Hendrix Families: Including The Poes and Allied Lines, by Ruth Hendricks DeVerter, 1964, @ Genealogical Society of the Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints - Self-Published.
General Peter Muhlenberg: A Virginia Officer of the Continental Line, by Michael Cercere, Westholme Publishing, 2020.
Two more parts to the Poe Patriot Legacy will be included in the future: Part 2: Poe’s Revolutionary War service; Part 3: Poe moves west to Kentucky in the 1790’s.
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