Lewis Albert Tackett, III

Lewis Tackett, built Fort Tackett at present St. Albans, WV in 1787. The fort was destroyed by Shawnee Indians in 1790. Christopher was killed as were many of their family.

Ref: The Tackett Family Assn.

Publication: Lewis Tackett c1730, along with his brother Christopher Tackett, built Fort Tackett at present St. Albans, WV in 1787. The fort was destroyed by Shawnee Indians in 1790. Christopher was killed as were many of their family.

Ref: The Tackett Family Assn./ James Wm. Tackitt, Pres./ Editor.

"There were in the fort John McElhany, his mother and his wife, Hannah Tackett (wife of Christopher), Betsy Tackett, Samuel Tackett and Samuel McElhaney (little boys)." All were taken captive. Ref: The Tackett-Fletcher Pioneers" by Mae Elizabeth Lang

1973.

Betsy is my GGGG Grandmother

Tackett Family Journal Publication: Information from Jim Tackitt, President/Editon of The Tackett Family Journal

"While Lewis Tackett was out in a field near Tackett's Fort some Indians came up from the Kanawha River Bank. They captured him and on their way to Ohio, Lewis Tackett was tied to a pine tree on the bank of the Kanawha River about Knob Shoals while his captors went hunting. A storm came up which wet the buckskin thongs with which he had been tied, and allowed him to escape. He came back to Fort Tackett in their canoe. Tackett's Pine was on the south bank of the Kanawha River about 16 miles west of Fort Tackett near where Lewis Tackett was captured. Tackett's Pine stood for many y ears as a Land Mark to people going up and down the Kanawha River." Rev: The Tacketts in Kanawha Co., Va, by Erna Young Johnson.

The following information was sent to me by Jerry McCormack a researcher in Kanawha Co., Va. on 12/13/1997.

1810 Kanawha Co., Va. census has the following

Lewis Tacket, Sr 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 0

John Tackett 3 0 0 1 0 2 2 0 0 0 0 1

Samuel Tackett 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0

Lewis Tackett 1 0 1 2 0 2 2 0 1 0 0 1

Lewis Tackett, Sr, own 468 acres on Left Hand Fork of Mud River (Lincoln County) and 700 acres on Big Hurrican Creek (Putnam County). He built a fort at the mouth of the Coal River on the Kanawha River which was attacked by Indians, where John and Lewis Tackett with their mother were taken prisoners along with a man named McElhany and his wife, Betsy Tackett. Another Tackett, Chris, was killed in the fort. Lewis's daughter, Keziah, wife of John Young, had just borne a son the day before the attack and under cover of darkness John Young managed to get his wife and son into a canoe and leave for Fort Clendenin which was upstream. Supposedly, Hannah and Polly Tackett (sisters of Keziah?) hid in a vegetable patch, then made their way south to Mud River and safety. (deGruyter's The Kanawha Spectator)

In the 1820 annotated census is the following:

Jacob Young b 26 Aug 1790 Kanawha County d. 1875 Putnam County mar 1810 Kanawha County to Nancy Stephenson, b 1785, d before 1870 Putnam County. Jacob was the son of John Young b Aug 1760 Lancaster Pa d Jun 1850 Kanawha County and Keziah (Tackett) Townsend) Young, b 1767. John was the son of Conrad Young and Keziah the daughter of Lewis Tackett.

Jacob and Nancy had a son, John Valley Young b 5 June 1813 Kan Co. d 13 Nov 1867

who married on 23 Jan 1840 in Kan Co. to Paulina Marshall Franklin b 25 Oct 1820 Nelson Co Va d 19 Dec 1883 Kan Co. (Nina Wills Combes of Newland, NC)

From Gracie Stover home page (www.geocities.com/heartland/Ranch/1322/)

her email

"Peaceful Park Scene of Indian Outbreak. Beuty Spot Was Once Bloody a Blackshoe Tribe Swooped Down on Men, Women, and Children and Killed Them", by Cal. F. Young.

Copied from Microfilm in the Cabell County, WV Library:

The Herald-Advertiser,

Huntington, WV,

Sunday morning, January 12, 1930

More than a score of men, women and children massacred on Four Pole Creek, Ritter Park, by a band of Black Shoe Indians, an off-spring of The Shawnee or Mingo Tribe.

Such a story would circle the globe within a few hours and be printed in newspapers within a day in more than a score of languages--as if it had "broken" yesterday, instead of 140 years ago. There are evidences of the truth of the slaughter. What is stated above is reported to have taken place about 1790, or early in the 1790's. Betty Tackett, a young woman living with her parents at the junction of the Ohio and Guyan rivers, now Guyandotte, witnessed the scene of the slaughter before the bodies were disposed of and frequently related the incident to members of her family and relatives. Betty Tackett, as Mrs. Reuben Cremeans, died in Mason County in 1884 at the age of 118.

Shopman Relates Story

A son, Henderson Cremeans, through whom much of the data relative to the early inhabitants of Huntington, was brought down to existing relatives, was well known in the Ohio Valley. His death occurred in 1913 at the age of 115. Our information comes through these two persons to Henry R Bryan, 2344 Ninth Avenue, a night foreman at the Chesapeake and Ohio shops. Some of the data Mr. Bryan remembers having

heard Mrs. Reuben Cremeans (Betty Tackett) relate on visits to the home of his parents in Mason County, to himself and Henderson Cremeans, and as retold by Henderson Cremeans, to Henry A Bryan. Of some of the incidents Mr. Bryan is not certain of the exact date but he is certain as to the incidents and the approximate dates.

According to the information thus obtained the first white settlers in the Huntington section were the Tacketts-Mr. and Mrs. Ambrose Tackett, one daughter, Betty and four sons. They came from the waters of the Rappahannock in Virginia via the New River to the Creek just east of St. Albans, now known as Tackett's Creek.

Talks With Cornstalk

Here the caravan of ox teams and many hogs encountered Indians, who showed no deposition to be friendly and the Tacketts headed down the Kanawha River to Point Pleasant, reaching there before the Battle of Point Pleasant on October 10, 1774, in which Tackett participated against the Shawnees under Cornstalk. At this time, Betty Tackett was about eight years old, having been born in 1766. Betty was also present at the killing of Cornstalk in 1777, and was reported to have frequently talked with the great Indian chieftain, who she greatly admired and whom she always had been mistreated by the white men. Following the battle between Lord Dunmore's forces and the Shawnees in 1774, and the killing of Cornstalk, the Tacketts came down the Ohio to the junction of the Guyandotte and Ohio, and built a home where now Guyandotte is situated. Trips back and forth between here and Point Pleasant were numerous. On one of these trips to Point Pleasant Betty frequently related, she saw General George Washington.

Friendly With Indians

As handed down, the early trials of the Tackett family in what is now Guyandotte, were varied. Tackett counted upon this section as his future home. In most instances he and the scattered Indian bands had few difficulties. About 1790, it is related, a band of Red Hawks, with which Cornstalk's son, Elinipsico, at one time affiliated, were located at what is now known as Indian - Guyan, opposite the Ohio from Guyandotte. With this band the elder Tackett and his sons had numerous and friendly dealings, frequently trading hogs to the Indians. This tribe is claimed to have been a branch of the Shawnees. At the same time there was also a settlement of Indians on the hill east of Guyandotte. Some of the old mounds are still visible. The exact date of the massacre on Four Pole is not definitely fixed by the data available, but was either in 1790 or within the next year of two. Just when this white band settled on Four Pole and erected their block houses, is also lacking, except they were not there when the Tacketts reached the junction of the Guyan and Ohio and the immediate year thereafter. It is known that the white band had erected a number of block houses and had taken precautions against an Indian attack.

White Colony Attacked

These precautions were neglected on a hot summer day and the double barricades to the houses were left open. Apparently watching for an opportunity the Indian band of Black Shoes swooped down and completely annihilated the white colony. Children were picked up and swung about, their brains being smeared about the trees. Every one of the colony was either killed or later died from injuries received in the conflict. It was from the injured that the Tacketts got their story. The Tackett family witnessed the scene immediately after the attack and saw the bodies scattered about the stockade. Betty and her son, Henderson Cremeans, are reported to have frequently related. Henderson's story coming fro m his father, mother and uncles.

In 1797 Betty Tackett married Reuben Cremeans from what is now Mason County. She is said to have been the first white woman married west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The ceremony was performed by an army chaplain at Point Pleasant. Almost immediately the Cremeans took up their abode near the junction of Mud River and Lower Creek, about one mile from the present town of Milton in this county.

Felled Indian with turnip

In 1820 the family moved to Mason County, locating on Knife Branch of Guyan Creek. Henderson Cremeans, a son of Reuben and Betty, was born in 1798. He died in 1913, aged 115 years. Until a few years before his death he was very active and frequently visited the scenes of his parents' early life. Like most frontiersmen, Henderson was of a rugged type and able to give a good accounts of him self in any kind of an encounter. While a resident of Mud River Henderson was attacked by three Indians while gathering turnips. With a turnip he felled one of the Indians and sprang on him and soon finished the Indian off. The others escaped. These were the last Indians seen in that community. This experience was related with a certain degree of satisfaction by Henderson. Mr Bryan stated that both Betty and her son Henderson, who was Mr. Bryan's uncle, enjoyed relating their early experiences. Especially would the latter enjoy relating the experiences of his mother as she had related them to him.

Saw Buffalo in River Among some of the experiences were the activities of the Buffalo when the family resided at what is now Guyandotte, She told of having seen droves containing as many as 75 buffalo and swimming the Ohio river at that point. The only land routes in those days were the Buffalo Trails. That is all they had to follow over the Blue Ridge Mountains into the New and Kanawha River Valleys, and on to the Ohio they would declare. What is now known as Reservoir Hill, was named Panther Knob by the Tacketts A disturbance among the hogs one night was found to have been caused by a panther, but that fact was not definitely known until the next morning when the animal was found in a tree top where it had been chased by a number of dogs. The Tackett boys secured one of their flintlocks and killed the panther. The animal measured eleven feet from tip to tip. There after the hill was known as Panther Knob...

1764

 Kanawha Co., (W) Virginia