“Let me tell you, the land is full and fruitful. It’s also a howlin’ wilderness full of savages and beast of all kinds,” John explained, waving his arms here and there. “I’ve seen buffalo herds at salt licks that could not be counted, for the good Lord didn’t create numbers to count that high. There be bobcats and panthers, wolves, coyotes, streams filled with beavers, polecats, deer and majestic elk herds, and turkeys. A man might feast most every day on a turkey should he so choose. Course, why would a man choose to eat only turkey when there is so much variety to fill yer stomach? I found nuts and berries and persimmon trees; oh, and fox grapes as big as apples, hanging alongside creeks just after the first frost. I almost forgot the fish in the streams. Trout jumpin’ high in mountain streams and lesser fish in the rivers. See, I prefer trout when I eat fish. There’s bottom land with rich soil, yet covered in thick, waist-high grass. I discovered rivers and small streams. Springs and salt licks abound where animals of all sizes and sorts come to lick the ground. Why, a man could camp alongside those salt licks and never go any farther to keep himself fed. He’d gather enough pelts and hides to enrich his pockets to overflowin’.” *
Indian trader, soldier, and peddler John Finley entertained the Boone children with this tale of Caintuck in 1768. Talking from personal experience, Finley was one of only a few white men to travel in the lands beyond the Appalachian Mountains who lived to tell of that land. There were others in the years that followed, and by 1775, a Virginia clergyman wrote “What a buzzel is this amongst people about Kentuck?” Across the colonies’ western frontier men and women talked about three things – taxes, war, and Caintuck.
In all the talk, Caintuck had become a rich land where taxes could be avoided – where men could start again with cheap or even free land – good land where crops would grow with little effort. Yet the talk also told of the danger for while Caintuck was basically uninhabited, its riches in game and other subsistence items brought American Indians to its land to hunt, fish, and gather nuts and berries. Yet, white men, women, and even children yearned to hear more of this Eden – especially the Boone children.
*Excerpts from Caintuck Lies Within My Soul. Read more about early westward expansion in my new book which tells, in novel form, the story of Jemima Boone.