Boonesborough Connection

Do you ever attempt to connect a genealogy line to a major historical event? I'm sure most genealogists with families in the United States have tried to connect ancestors to military records related to any of our major wars. 

With my early Kentucky research, one of my goals is to figure out when they arrived in Kentucky. Thus, I checked the list of "Early Settlers of Boonesborough" for my Crawford families and did not find them listed. 

As I've dug into these Crawford families, I've started looking at other family ties. One of those ties is to the John Anderson family. John's daughter, Rebecca, was married to James Crawford. Since I couldn't find documentation of James' arrival, I started looking for information for the arrival of Rebecca's siblings. 

Thanks to a 1798 Madison County Kentucky deed, Rebecca's father was identified as John Anderson and her siblings as the following:

• Samuel Campbell and Mary his wife
• Bez'l Maxwell and Margret his wife
• James Crawford and Rebecca his wife
• James Anderson and Hannah his wife
• John Gass and Anne his wife
• William M. Morris and Betsey his wife
• Isaac Anderson
• Samuel Anderson

Since Bazeleel Maxwell appears in many of the same records as James Crawford, I decided to try and learn more about this Anderson family. 

This took me back to Boonesborough -- where I found several Anderson family members on The Fort Boonesbourough Monument:

• Anderson, James - 1775
• Anderson, Jemima
• Anderson, John - 1780
• Anderson, Mary - married Captain John Kennedy
• Anderson, Nicholas

Besides the Anderson children, I found several of the spouses:

• Gass. John - 1775 -- s/o Capt. David Gass
• Morris, William
• Campbell, Samuel

Based on the names in the deed and the names at Boonesborough, it looks like John Anderson and several of his daughters were in Boonesborough. Missing from Boonesborough are sons Isaac and Samuel and daughters, Margret and Rebecca.

Since Rebecca Anderson was married to a sibling of Bazaleel Maxwell prior to her marriage to James Crawford, there is a strong family connection between Bazaleel Maxwell and James Crawford. Thus, I've been looking for Maxwell families when looking for my Crawford families. 

Thus, I found Bazaleel Maxwell listed on the tax list for Montgomery County, Virginia in 1782. (Kegley, Mary B., compiler and editor. Tax List of Montgomery County, Virginia, 1782. Roanoke, VA: Copy Cat, 1974.) 

Several Crawford families are also listed on this 1782 tax list, including Edward, James, a reference to the estate of John Crawford and Robert Crawford. 

So far, I don't have anything to prove that the James Crawford in the 1782 tax list is the James Crawford who married Rebecca Anderson. However, the fact that a James Crawford and a Bazaleel Maxwell are both listed on the 1782 tax lists is incentive to continue researching the Crawford family in Montgomery County, Virginia prior to 1786 when James Crawford purchased land in Kentucky.