William Joseph Poage

From the Poage family genealogical forum:

http://genforum.genealogy.com/poage/messages/330.html

The Ironton Register for Thursday, Feb. 3, 1853 has the following regarding my great-grandfather, George Poage’s, younger brother, William, which is of considerable interest. William was born about 1735 and died on September 03, 1778 in Fort Harrodsburg, KY. He was married to Anne Kennedy. The following excerpt is from the reminiscences of William’s son-in law and great-nephew, General John Poage:

Among the first settlers of Harrodsburg was William Poage, an uncle of George Poage (John is referring to his own father, George Poage, without making reference to that fact) . William Poage was with a party of men going to attend a court, and when near were the town of Danville now stands, they were fired upon by Indians, and Mr. Poage fell from his horse, shot in the abdomen. The rest of the party escaped, but returning they found him in the bushes, his horse and rifle gone; they carried him some 3 or 4 miles to a deserted cabin, where part of the men returned to Harrodsburg for pillows with which to support the wounded man, and the remainder watched over him through the night in the cabin; they heard Indians about the cabin and supposed that an attack would be made about daylight, hence all slipped out, leaving Mr. Poage in the cabin, protected with their saddles.

The Indians made the attack on the cabin, supposing that the whites were still within, but they found out their mistake when they received deadly shots from the unerring rifles in their rear, they took to flight in great consternation; one of them having in his possession Poage’s rife was killed. That same rifle is now in possession of William L. Poage, of Hannibal, Mo., familiarly known here as Lindsey Pogue, who is a grandson of William Poage of whom we are speaking. The men returning with the pillows, Mr. Poage was taken to Harrodsburg, but died in about 2 days afterwards.

A daughter of this William Poage named Ann, was then an infant, and afterwards became the wife of General John Poage, whose name is at the head of the above article. She was the 4th white child born in Kentucky; the first was Harrod Berry (or Barry) born in Harrodsburg, of an obscure family, and grew up to be a worthless man; the second was Lovoisa Whitley, daughter of Col. Whitley, who was killed at the battle of the Blue Licks; and the third was Judge Logan, a son of General Benjamin Logan.

After the death of William. Poage, the attorneys who settled the estate &c. in their papers spelled the name Pogue, according to the sound, as they were ignorant of the true spelling, hence the spelling of the name of that branch of the family to which William. L. Pogue belongs.

The widow of William Poage soon married Col. Lindsey, and he together with five others of her family was killed at the Battle of the Blue Licks; she married the third time a man by the name of McGinty. William Lindsey Pogue derives his name from his grandfather and his step-grandfather Col. Lindsey.

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As we have just stated the name of the family of William Poage was changed by the lawyers to Pogue. Ann, as before related, married Gen. John Poage and died some six or seven years since. An elder sister, Elizabeth, who was about 13 years of age when her father was killed, afterwards in the family of her stepfather, Col. Lindsey, became acquainted with a young man by the name of Overton; they were engaged to be married, but he was one of the six of her mother’s family who was killed at the Battle of the Blue Licks.

Overton willed her 50 acres of land near Harrodsburg and on this same track of land she is still living. (Having married a man by the name of Thomas, ) at the advanced age of about ninety years. Robert, a brother, became Col. Robert Pogue, of Mason County, and was the father of William L. Pogue. He commanded a regiment of Kentucky volunteers in the campaign of 1812; and together with his sons, among whom was William L. Pogue, built Amanda Furnace, on the Kentucky shore, about a mile above Ironton.

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I also have the following additional information for William, which I believe comes from Chalkeys Chronicles of the Scots-Irish:

William Poage, born about 1735 in Ireland it is supposed, was a sergeant in 1758 in Captain Peter Hogg’s company of Augusta Rangers, was appointed county sergeant of militia in 1771 for old Botetourt County and in 1774 was the sergeant in command at Fort Russell on the Clinch River some sixteen miles from Lebanon, VA, in present Russell County on US Route 19 and about five miles from Fort Moore on the Clinch then under the command of Lieutenant Daniel Boone.

His home at the time (1771 to 1774) however seems to have been on the North Fork of Holston River some five miles from present Abingdon. His original settlement was in Rockbridge County near the Natural Bridge where his first child was born on Sept. 4, 1764.

In September 1775 he and his family (wife and five children) followed Lieutenant Daniel Boone to Boonesboro, Ky, the fifth or sixth family of Kentucky pioneers; whence in February 1776 he established his home at Cave (or Cove) Spring, later called Gore’s Spring, two miles northeast of Fort Harrodsburg. On Sept. 1, 1778 he and a company of sixteen men were attacked by Indians at Danford, some ten miles from present Danville. Wounded with three bullets he was carried horseback to his home at Fort Harrodsburg and died Sep. 3, 1778. He is buried in the old Fort Harrodsburg graveyard.

He was a woodenware maker in the new settlement and made buckets, milk pails, the wooden framework of ploughs etc. He made also the first loom in Kentucky for his wife who had brought a spinning wheel along and made linen from the lint of nettles; she made linsey woolens from the nettle lint and buffalo wool.

• Reference: MyHeritage Family Trees - SmartCopy: Mar 9 2016, 2:38:37 UTC