s own account of this expedition--His
letter to Henderson--Account of Colonel Henderson and the
Transylvania Company--Failure of the scheme--Probability of Boone
having been several years in the service of Henderson.

On the conclusion of Dunmore's war, the militia were discharged from
service, the garrisons which had been under Captain Daniel Boone's
command were broken up, and he once more returned to his family, who
were still residing on Clinch River. But he was not long permitted to
remain comparatively idle. Captain Boone's character as an able officer
and a bold pioneer, was now well known and appreciated by the public.
The marks of confidence bestowed on him by Governor Dunmore rendered
him one of the most conspicuous men in the Southern colonies, and his
services were soon to be put in requisition by the most considerable and
remarkable of all the parties of adventurers who ever sought a home in
the West. This was Henderson's company, called the Transylvania Company,
to whose proceedings we shall presently refer.

Between 1769 and 1773, various associations of men were formed, in
Virginia and North Carolina, for visiting the newly-discovered regions
and locating lands; and several daring adventurers, at different times
during this period, penetrated to the head-waters of the Licking River,
and did some surveying; but it was not till the year 1774 that the
whites obtained any permanent foothold in Kentucky. From this year,
therefore, properly dates the commencement of the early settlements of
the State.[22]

The first great impetus given to adventure in Kentucky was by the bounty
in Western land given by Virginia to the officers and soldiers of her
own troops who had served in the British army in the old war in Canada
between the English and French. These lands were to be surveyed on the
Ohio River, and its tributaries, by the claimants thus created, who
had the privilege of selecting them wherever they pleased within the
prescribed regions. The first locations were made upon the Great Kenawha
in the year 1772, and the next on the south side of the Ohio itself the
following year. During this year, likewise, extensive tracts of land
were located on the north fork of the Licking, and surveys made of
several salt-licks, and other choice spots. But 1774 was more signalized
than had been any preceding year by the arrival, in the new "land of
promise," of the claimants to portions of its territory,