Bluegrass Renaissance: The History and Culture of Central Kentucky, 1792-1852

Chapter 7: Three Central Kentuckians, the "Bone" of Political Office, and the Kentucky Exodus, 1792–1852

7 Three Central Kentuckians, the “Bone” of Political Office, and the Kentucky Exodus, 1792–1852 Mark V. Wetherington In many respects—arts, architecture, and education—the early republic was the time and central Kentucky the place to ponder the idea of the commonwealth as a likeness of classical Athens. But ancient Athenians did not stay at home. They expanded their influence and power, particularly through the use of their navy, over much of the Mediterranean world. Kentucky’s political leadership between 1792 and 1852 accomplished the same. The state’s exodus sent explorers, politicians, soldiers, settlers, and enslaved African Americans from central Kentucky throughout the First West and, later, the trans-Mississippi West. This was a remarkable achievement. Consider that, in 1792, the cutting edge of the western Euro-American settlement line touched the Falls of the Ohio, that settlement had slowed during the American Revolution , and that land-hungry people were ready to move again. In 1803, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark gathered the core of the Corps of Discovery from the commonwealth before heading up the Missouri to the Pacific Ocean. Moreover, Kentuckians played important roles in the conquest and settlement of the Old Northwest during the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812 as well as of the Southwest during the Texas Republic and the Mexican War. Long before Kentucky was thought of in terms of being a part of the South, it was a part of the West. For, just as Virginia was in many respects the “mother” of Kentucky, then Kentucky fulfilled the same role for western settlements far beyond its present-day boundaries. Kentucky was the middle ground, not only between North and South, but also between the trans-Appalachian and the trans-Mississippi Wests. And, as middle grounders, the common-  158 Three Central Kentuckians 159 wealth’s people imported the political customs and laws of Virginia and other eastern colonies. They then applied them to the enormous transfer of sovereignty represented by the defeat and removal of the French, English , and Indians and the establishment of the new republic’s first postcolonial state. The surveying and remapping of this Ohio valley region fell to men such as Daniel Boone and William Clark who led a migratory wave beyond the Mississippi, carrying with them the political traditions of Kentuckians.1 Political life in this western country was not something that happened during congressional, gubernatorial, or presidential elections, only to lapse into dormancy until the next balloting. It took place daily on all levels—neighborhood, county, state, and nation. Most often, political life unfolded within the county context, for counties formed the organizational blocks of the political system. At every step of the way west, a workable system of government was established locally. And land—hundreds of small and mostly privately owned tracts—formed the counties. Each tract of land was, over time, surveyed, bought, traded, and inherited. Public acts of the legislature regulated the toll roads, ferries, and tobacco-inspection stations that appeared on early maps. Local political officeholders guided and recorded the process. More counties meant more “petty offices” for the would-be politicians who designed to make them their bailiwicks. Such politicos seemed constantly in search of the “bone of office,” as one reform-minded journalist described the object of all their “growling and fighting” almost a century after statehood. He wistfully hoped that “the Legislature wipes out” the offending counties.2 One way in which to explore this idea of a central Kentucky exodus is by briefly examining the lives of three political leaders who lived in central Kentucky and its outer fringes. One of them—Isaac Shelby—remains well-known today. The other two—Peter W. Grayson and George A. Caldwell—although recognized as political leaders in their own time, seem virtually unknown today. Collectively, the public lives of these three men spanned the length of time between the birth of the commonwealth of Kentucky and the Mexican War. Isaac Shelby (1750–1826) and the Northwest In 1792, Kentucky became the fifteenth state, one of the first to work through the new political process of admitting states to the nation. By then, white Euro-Americans and their enslaved African Americans had 160 Mark V. Wetherington settled “Caintuck” permanently for less than twenty years. Most of its newcomers were born east of the Appalachian Mountains and poured into the commonwealth, dispossessing...