May 30, 1901… The name “Kentucky,” both the country and the river that
now bear the beautiful name “Kentucky,” were so called by the Indians
ages before the coming of their white destroyers. The Indians also
called the river “Chenoca,” a word which still distinguishes a mountain
spur in Bell County, but the name they used by far the most was
Kentucky. In coming into use among the whites early in the 18th
century, the word varied as to form and pronunciation according to the
user’s knowledge of the Indian tongue. John Salling, who was a prisoner
among the Cherokees for some years before 1736, and who must have been
somewhat familiar with their language, gives the name as we now have it
when he say that they took him “to the salt licks of Kentucky.”
Alexander McGinty, who had also been held by the Indians, deposed in
1753 that they captured him “on the south bank of the Cantucky,” and
Col. George Croghan who was for so many years British agent among the
Six Nations and an authority on savage affairs, speaks in his journal of
1765 of “The Kentucky River.” Dr. Thomas Walker (1750) ignores the
Indian name, if he knew it. Christopher Gist (1751) gives it in a
corrupted form as “Cuttaway,” and Lewis Evans (1752) who only caught the
name from traders, put it down on his map as “Cuttawa.” Kentucky seems
never to have been known by any but Indian names until a short time
before 1775 when “Louisa” came into limited use among the whites. The
generally accurate Bradford helped to perpetrate the error that the
Kentucky River was given the English name “Louisa” by Dr. Walker, but
not only does Marshall declare that Walker did not reach the interior of
the county, but later writers assert that it was a tributary of the Big
Sandy, as given on Jefferson’s map, that the explorer of 1750 so named.
It was sometime after Walker’s tour before the name of this tributary
was applied to the country itself and then, fortunately, it quickly
subsided before the original and Indian name, which after many
vicissitudes among the whites as to spelling and pronunciation, came
into prominent use as the Indians themselves pronounced it “Kentucky.”
Authors differ as to the meaning of the name. According to Darlington,
Archives Americana, it is a Mohawk word signifying “among the meadows”
and others give it still different definitions. Probably the earliest
writer to give its meaning as “The Dark and Bloody Ground” was Filson
(1784) who says the country was so denominated by the Indians when
Finley traveled through it in 1757. This statement was adopted by
succeeding historians and came into use, though Filson gave no authority
for it, and there is nothing extant that this writer knows of to sustain
it, certainly nothing from the Indians themselves. There is a popular
impression that this phrase “The Dark and Bloody Ground” was used as the
meaning of the word Kentucky by the Cherokees at the Treaty of Watauga
in 1775, but that is a mistake. On that occasion Dragging Canoe, who was
strongly opposed to the treaty, said in that metaphorical style which
distinguished his race, that there was a “dark cloud” over Kentucky,
meaning by that expression, as he himself explained, the hostility of
the northern tribes to its occupancy by the whites. On the same
occasion, an Indian opposer of the treaty, hoping to arouse the
superstitious fears of the whites, said that the land desired by
Henderson & Co. was a “bloody country,” but in neither case was a
reference made to the meaning of the word Kentucky. Certain writers
assume that it referred to the supposed bloody extermination of the
Mound Builders, but on that theory the phrase would apply with even more
force to Ohio and other states of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys. One
has as much authority, apparently, for calling Kentucky “The Meadow
Land” as “The Dark and Bloody Ground.”
Dunvegan, the famous seat of the MacLeods, is said to be the oldest
inhabited private house in Scotland.
Dr. S.H. Halley’s new house at Payne’s Depot is nearing completion and
is making a fine appearance.
Starks & Co., John Wise, and the Citizens Bank are laying concrete
pavements in front of their buildings on Railroad Street.
Capt. James W. Blackburn and Sen. J.C.S. Blackburn are attending the
Confederate reunion in Memphis this week.
June 1, 1922… Versailles High defeated the UK AllStars 5-4 at Childers
Field Wednesday.
Mr. and Mrs. R. Keene Arnold have their first grandchild, born May 20 in
Tokyo to Rev. and Mrs. B.E. Watson, a girl.
Prof. Mark Godman and wife, nee Angela Morancy, are parents of a
daughter, Marie Morancy Godman, born at their home in Shelbyville.
Louis Marshall of Woodford Bank and Ulysses Turner of Amsden Bank
attended the Bankers Convention in Louisville last week.
Judge Alfred Nuckols, brother of Charles Nuckols of Winter Street, is
seriously ill at his home in Versailles.
A party of young people left today for “Bonnie Doon,”Cogar’s camp on the
Kentucky River. Among them were Misses Kathryn Withrow, Lilly Parrish,
Marjorie Kemm, Dorothy Davis, Mary Lewis Marvin, Annie Slack Nelson,
Jeanette Lehman, Jim Parrish, Colvin Rouse, James Cogar and John
Withrow. They will spend a week.
The historic Lexington Opera House, where for more than a half century
some of America’s most famous stage figures have appeared, was sold at
auction to R.S. Webb Jr., who will use it for business purposes. The
last stage performance was given Thanksgiving Day 1921, the closing
following an order from adjoining property owners.