IGHR (Samford) — Day 2

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In the “Records of Oth­er Researchers” por­tion of the Vir­ginia class at Sam­ford today, we took a look at a vol­ume enti­tled The Pre­ston and Vir­ginia Papers of the Drap­er Col­lec­tion of Man­u­scripts. (Madi­son: State His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety of Wis­con­sin, 1915). This vol­ume cat­a­logs a sub­set of col­lec­tions of the Drap­er Man­u­scripts, papers gath­ered by Lyman Drap­er for the Wis­con­sin His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety. These papers doc­u­ment the “his­to­ry of the trans-Alleghe­ny West from the fron­tier con­flicts of the 1740s to the War of 1812.”

As you may have guessed, the Pre­ston and Vir­ginia Papers relate to Vir­ginia. The book out­lines the col­lec­tion, with names of per­sons and sum­maries of the mate­ri­als con­tained and the events described in them.

Google Books includes the book in ques­tion, and a quick search found a few ref­er­ences to the Indi­an attack on the house my 5th great grand­fa­ther James Gra­ham built on the Green­bri­er Riv­er. On page 211, there’s this:

1777 Sept. 11, 3ZZ10
Van Bib­ber, Capt. John. Capt. John Van Bib­ber’s Fort, Green­bri­er. Let­ter to [William Flem­ing]. Indi­an trou­bles on Green­bri­er; James Gra­ham’s house attacked; requests that a small body of men be placed under his com­mand, and that he may send out spies. A. L. S. 1 p. Endorsed: Capt Van Bib­ber. Print­ed: Thwait­es and Kel­logg, Fron­tier Defense, pp. 78, 79.

1777 Sept. 12, 3ZZ11
Hen­der­son, James. Fort Hen­ry. Let­ter to Col. William Flem­ing, Bote­tourt Coun­ty, [Va.] Account giv­en by Andrew Kinkead of attack on James Gra­ham’s house on Green­bri­er Riv­er; Wal­ter Cald­well shot; Steel Lof­tus killed at mouth of Indi­an Creek. A. L. S. 1 p. Print­ed: Thwait­es and Kel­logg, Fron­tier Defense, pp. 79, 80.

1777 Sept. 12, 3ZZ12
Stu­art, John. Let­ter to Col. William Flem­ing, Bote­tourt [Coun­ty, Va.] Enclos­es let­ter from Cap­tain Arbuck­le; attack on James Gra­ham’s house; Wal­ter Cald­well killed; the peo­ple fly­ing to fort at Camp Union; Capt. Hendry Smith request­ed to send assis­tance to peo­ple on Mud­dy Creek; report of an expe­di­tion against Ohio Indi­ans. A. L. S. 2 pp. Print­ed: Thwait­es and Kel­logg, Fron­tier Defense, pp. 80–82.

Each of these entries men­tioned the let­ters being pub­lished in Thwait­es and Kel­logg, that is in, Fron­tier Defense on the Upper Ohio, 1777–1778: Com­piled from the Drap­er Man­u­scripts in the Library of the Wis­con­sin His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety, Reuben Gold Thwait­es, LL. D and Louise Phelps Kel­logg, Ph. D., edi­tors (Madi­son: Wis­con­sin State His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety, 1912). Luck­i­ly, this title is also on Google Books. I have pro­vid­ed a embed­ded copy of the book, open to the rel­e­vant page .…