Richard Henderson (April 20, 1735 – January 30, 1785) was an American jurist, land speculator and politician who was best known for attempting to create the
Transylvania Colony in frontier Kentucky.
Henderson County and its seat
Henderson, Kentucky
Henderson is a home rule-class city along the Ohio River and is the county seat of Henderson County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 28,757 at the 2010 U.S. census. It is part of the Evansville Metropolitan Area, locally known as the ...
are named for him. He also sold land to an early settlement that went on to become
Nashville, Tennessee.
Henderson was born in Virginia Colony, but his family moved to Granville County, North Carolina when he was a child. There he studied law and became a member of the bar. He married in Elizabeth Keeling, an Englishwoman, in 1763 and had 6 children.
Henderson was appointed judge in 1768, but retired in 1773 to pursue land deals. In 1774, he formed the Transylvania Company for that purpose. Between 1775 and 1783, he pursued various land deals in Kentucky, Tennessee and southwestern Virginia, including the Transylvania Purchase and Colony in western Kentucky and north central Tennessee. The extra-legal deals collapsed by 1783 when voided by the Virginia and North Carolina colonial governments.
Henderson's Transylvania settlement was one of the early triggers of the
Cherokee-American wars.
After the land deals, he returned to North Carolina and held various legislative and executive positions in the North Carolina government. He died at age 49 at his home in North Carolina.
Early life and law career
Henderson was born in
Hanover County,
Virginia Colony
The Colony of Virginia, chartered in 1606 and settled in 1607, was the first enduring English colony in North America, following failed attempts at settlement on Newfoundland by Sir Humphrey GilbertGilbert (Saunders Family), Sir Humphrey" (hist ...
on April 20, 1735. His parents were Samuel Henderson and Elizabeth Williams Henderson. He had a brother, Thomas Henderson. In 1745, his family moved to
Granville County,
North Carolina
North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and ...
. There he
studied law, was admitted to
the bar,
practiced law, and in 1768 was appointed judge of the Superior Court.
In 1763, he married Elizabeth Keeling, the daughter of an Englishman. Their children were Fanny (b. 1764), Richard (b. 1766), Archibald (b. 1768), Elizabeth (b. 1770),
Leonard
Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname.
The given name and surname originate from the Old High German ''Leonhard'' containing the prefix ''levon'' ("lion") from the Greek Λέων ("lion") through the Latin '' ...
(b. 1778), and John (b. 1780).
Viewed as a member of the gentry, he had been a target of
Regulator violence.
He was a member of a
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church record ...
parish in Williamsboro during this time.
In 1773, Henderson retired from the bench to pursue his real estate interests.
The Transylvania Company and Colony
After a brief career in law, on 27 August 1774, Henderson organized a land speculation company with a number of other prominent North Carolinians. Originally called Richard Henderson and Company, the company name was first changed to the Louisa Company, and finally to the Transylvania Company on January 6, 1775.
The Transylvania Purchase
![Wilderness road en](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Wilderness_road_en.png)
In March 1775, Henderson gathered chiefs of the
Cherokee Indians
The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, th ...
and negotiated the Treaty of Watauga at
Sycamore Shoals
The Sycamore Shoals of the Watauga River, usually shortened to Sycamore Shoals, is a rocky stretch of river rapids along the Watauga River in Elizabethton, Tennessee. Archeological excavations have found Native Americans lived near the shoals s ...
at present day
Elizabethton, Tennessee
Elizabethton is a city in, and the county seat of Carter County, Tennessee, United States. Elizabethton is the historical site of the first independent American government (known as the Watauga Association, created in 1772) located west of both t ...
, during which time he purchased all the land lying between the
Cumberland River
The Cumberland River is a major waterway of the Southern United States. The U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed June 8, 2011 river drains almost of southern Kentucky and ...
, the
Cumberland Mountains
The Cumberland Mountains are a mountain range in the southeastern section of the Appalachian Mountains. They are located in western Virginia, southwestern West Virginia, the eastern edges of Kentucky, and eastern middle Tennessee, including ...
, and the
Kentucky River
The Kentucky River is a tributary of the Ohio River, long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed June 13, 2011 in the U.S. Commonwealth of Kentucky. The river and its trib ...
, and situated south of the
Ohio River
The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illi ...
.
The land thus delineated encompassed an area half as large as the present
state of Kentucky. In order to facilitate settlement, Henderson hired
Daniel Boone
Daniel Boone (September 26, 1820) was an American pioneer and frontiersman whose exploits made him one of the first folk heroes of the United States. He became famous for his exploration and settlement of Kentucky, which was then beyond the we ...
, who had hunted extensively in Kentucky, to blaze the
Wilderness Road through the
Cumberland Gap
The Cumberland Gap is a pass through the long ridge of the Cumberland Mountains, within the Appalachian Mountains, near the junction of the U.S. states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. It is famous in American colonial history for its rol ...
and into the Transylvania land purchase. Henderson also purchased the land known as the Path Grant that allowed access to the Transylvania lands. That purchase is described on the
Path Grant Deed.
To appease other prominent early explorers, Henderson held out other rewards. He offered
Joseph Martin, founder of Martin's Station on Martin's Creek in present-day
Rose Hill, Lee County, Virginia
Rose Hill is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Lee County, Virginia, United States. The population was 799 at the 2010 census, up from 714 at the 2000 census.
Geography
Rose Hill is located in western Lee County ...
, a spot as an agent and entry taker for the company, in charge of keeping tabs on settlers moving westward; Henderson offered Martin's brother Bryce a tract of adjacent to the
Cumberland Gap
The Cumberland Gap is a pass through the long ridge of the Cumberland Mountains, within the Appalachian Mountains, near the junction of the U.S. states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee. It is famous in American colonial history for its rol ...
.
The Transylvania Compact
![Boonesborough, Kentucky 30 grey](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Boonesborough%2C_Kentucky_30_grey.jpg)
Henderson followed Boone to a site that came to be called Boonesborough, located on the southern bank of the Kentucky River, Henderson encouraged the few settlers there to hold a constitutional convention.
In May 1775, under the shade of a huge elm tree, a compact organizing a frame of government was drafted. The intended government entailed executive, legislative, and judicial branches. After concluding the Transylvania Compact, Henderson returned to North Carolina and on behalf of his fellow investors in the land scheme petitioned Congress seeking to make Transylvania America’s fourteenth colony. Despite those efforts, Congress was unwilling to act without the consent of Virginia and North Carolina, both of whom claimed jurisdiction over the region in question.
In June 1776 the Virginia General Assembly prohibited the Transylvania Land Company from making demands on settlers in the region and in December 1778 declared the Transylvania claim void. North Carolina invalidated the remaining Tennessee portion of the purchase in 1783. Henderson and his partners instead received a grant of 200,000 acres on the Ohio River below the mouth of
Green River.
Later life
In 1778, Henderson briefly returned to the bench but resigned a short time later to pursue more land deals. In 1779–80 he headed another group of settlers into the Cumberland Valley in Tennessee and founded a settlement
Fort Nashborough
Fort Nashborough, also known as Fort Bluff, Bluff Station, French Lick Fort, Cumberland River Fort and other names, was the stockade established in early 1779 in the French Lick area of the Cumberland River valley, as a forerunner to the settl ...
(present-day
Nashville
Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and t ...
) in the French Lick area.
In 1779, Judge Henderson was appointed one of six commissioners to run the line between Virginia and North Carolina into Powell's valley. He served as a captain (1779-1781) in the
Granville County Regiment of the
Hillsborough District Brigade in the
North Carolina militia
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.
Etymology
The word ''north'' is ...
in the Revolutionary War.
He represented
Granville County, North Carolina
Granville County is a county located on the northern border of the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 60,992. Its county seat is Oxford.
Granville County encompasses Oxford, NC Micropolitan Statistical ...
he made the transivenia colony
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
of the
North Carolina General Assembly
The North Carolina General Assembly is the bicameral legislature of the State government of North Carolina. The legislature consists of two chambers: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The General Assembly meets in the North Caro ...
in 1781. He was elected by the legislators to be one of the
Councilors of State in 1782-83.
Death and legacy
He died at the age of 49 on January 30, 1785. He was buried on his farm near
Williamsboro, North Carolina on Nutbush Creek.
One of his sons,
Leonard Henderson, was a Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court (18291833).
Henderson, North Carolina was named for him. The other son,
Archibald Henderson
Archibald Henderson (January 21, 1783 – January 6, 1859) was the longest-serving Commandant of the Marine Corps, serving from 1820 to 1859. His name is learned by all recruits at Marine recruit training (Boot Camp) as the "Grand old man of th ...
, was a legislator representing
Rowan County, North Carolina
Rowan County is a county in the U.S. state of North Carolina that was formed in 1753, as part of the British Province of North Carolina. It was originally a vast territory with unlimited western boundaries, but its size was reduced to 524 sq mi ...
.
In Henderson's western Kentucky land grant on the Ohio, in an area named Red Banks, an early settlement became the town of
Henderson, his namesake, in 1797. Later,
Henderson County, Kentucky
Henderson County is a county in the U.S. state of Kentucky. The county is located in western Kentucky on the Ohio River across from Evansville, Indiana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 44,793. Its county seat is Henderson.
The co ...
(seat Henderson) also named for him, subsumed the land grant.
[Henderson County, IL as well as Henderson County, TN are often erroneously ascribed to Richard Henderson, but are actually named for other Richard Hendersons]
During the
Treaty of Sycamore Shoals,
Dragging Canoe
Dragging Canoe (ᏥᏳ ᎦᏅᏏᏂ, pronounced ''Tsiyu Gansini'', "he is dragging his canoe") (c. 1738 – February 29, 1792) was a Cherokee war chief who led a band of Cherokee warriors who resisted colonists and United States settlers in the ...
, son of the Cherokee chief
Attacullaculla
Attakullakulla ( Cherokee”Tsalagi”, (ᎠᏔᎫᎧᎷ) ''Atagukalu''; also spelled Attacullaculla and often called Little Carpenter by the English) (c. 1715 – c. 1777) was an influential Cherokee leader and the tribe's First Belo ...
, made a speech condemning the sale of Cherokee land and broke from the general Cherokee tribal government to form the sub-tribe known as the
Chickamauga Chickamauga may refer to:
Entertainment
* "Chickamauga", an 1889 short story by American author Ambrose Bierce
* "Chickamauga", a 1937 short story by Thomas Wolfe
* "Chickamauga", a song by Uncle Tupelo from their 1993 album ''Anodyne''
* ''Chick ...
. This group went on to become the chief protagonists in the later
Cherokee-American wars resulting from the settlement attempts.
Ashland plantation house, Henderson's childhood home in North Carolina, was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...
in 1973.
References
*
External links
North Carolina Historical Marker
{{DEFAULTSORT:Henderson, Richard
1735 births
1785 deaths
Kentucky pioneers
North Carolina militiamen in the American Revolution
People of Kentucky in the American Revolution
People of pre-statehood Tennessee
People from Hanover County, Virginia
People from Granville County, North Carolina
North Carolina Council of State
Members of the North Carolina House of Representatives
18th-century American politicians