Where Did Squire and Sarah Morgan Boone Live in North Carolina?
Detail of Map of Davie County Land Grants by Andrew Lagle-1976 showing Squire Boone’s two 1753 Granville Land Grants. More images shown below.
Robert Alvin Crum copyright 28 February 2025
Daniel Boone’s parents moved their family to North Carolina in 1750 and purchased two 640 parcels of land in the Granville Tract. The county’s name was Anson, when they settled there in 1750. It became Rowan County in 1753, when Squire was deeded his two land grants. Today, these two locations or tracts are in Davie County. One 640-acre tract is east of the town of Mocksville, and the other is west of Mocksville. After the land was deeded in 1753, Squire and his family settled on the eastern tract, and this article is about this acquisition and their settlement there.
Many write that Squire and Daniel both settled on the western tract, which is known as the “Boone Tract” or “Bear Creek Tract.” This is a myth, and I’ll focus on the origin of this myth in another article. Please note that this article has the same information provided in a previous article I wrote called, “Squire and Sarah Morgan Boone and Family Settle in North Carolina,” but I needed to repeat it here to provide the evidence for my conclusion that they settled and lived on the eastern 640-acre tract.
In the spring of 1749, Squire Boone traveled from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to explore the area before a possible move. He took with him his son and daughter, Daniel and Elizabeth, and Daniel’s lifelong friend, Henry Miller. They traveled along trails that would later be known as the Great Wagon Road and continued south on a part of the trail known as Morgan Bryan’s Wagon Road that’s between today’s Roanoke, Virginia, and the Shallow Ford on the Yadkin River.
Once they reached the east side of the Shallow Ford, they probably stopped at Edward Hughes’ ordinary (tavern) to talk about this new land before crossing the Yadkin River. Squire knew Edward in Pennsylvania, and their families were connected by siblings’ marriages. Once they crossed the Yadkin, they passed through lands owned by the Bryans (who they also knew in Pennsylvania) and probably also discussed prospective land purchases.
While searching for land, it appears that they camped at a site along the Yadkin River that became known as Boone’s Ford (previously known as Alleman’s Ford). It’s located about six miles north of a place now called “The Point” where the South Yadkin River flows into the North Yadkin River. Just above this location on the east side of the river is a fertile bottom land that became known as Boone’s Bottom, and there was a log structure built on the west side of Boone’s Ford, either at this time or in 1750, that became known as Boone’s Fort.
Squire, Daniel, Elizabeth, and Henry Miller returned to Pennsylvania. On April 11, 1750, Squire and Sarah Morgan Boone sold their 158-acre Exeter Township farm, and on May 1, 1950, they left Pennsylvania for North Carolina. They and their large family followed the same route that they used the previous year during their exploratory trip. Some sources say that the Boones stopped in Winchester, Virginia and may have stayed there for two years. However, Lyman Draper documented that it was a brief stay, and there’s additional evidence to the contrary.
Additional documentation showing Squire Boone’s earlier arrival in North Carolina is a land entry in 1750 showing a warrant to measure and lay out 640 acres for Squire Boone lying on Grant’s Creek (alias Lichon Creek) and now known as Elisha Creek. When this land was surveyed, Squire Boone is named as a “chainer” indicating that he was walking the land long before the grant was issued on April 13, 1753.
Additional evidence shows the Boones first settled on the east side of the Yadkin where they are shown as living on land adjacent to a survey completed by James Carter dated February 27, 1752. Carter knew the Boones, since he married a Boone, and his daughter Mary married Jonathan Boone. There’s also documentation in the Draper Manuscripts showing that Squire and Sarah Morgan Boone and their family first lived on the east side of the Yadkin River and near today’s Boone Cave Park. In 1753, they completed the purchase of two separate 640-acre tracts from Lord Granville on the west side of the river in 1753.
When the large area of Rowan County, North Carolina was formed from Anson County in 1753, Squire Boone became a reasonably prominent colonial official. He served on the Vestry of the Anglican Parish of St. Luke, was a civil administrator of a large area of Rowan County and was appointed as one of the first Justices of the Court of Common Pleas. In the Minutes of the Court of Common Pleas, Squire Boone is listed as one of the Justices, and after his name, it’s recorded that, “Squire Boone’s residence is on the Yadkin at Boone’s Ford.”
Squire Boone’s purchases of two 640-acre tracts from Lord Granville were finalized in 1753. One is referred to the Bear Creek tract (west of present-day Mocksville) and the other is referred to as the Dutchman’s Creek tract (east of present-day Mocksville). The two following paragraphs show the initial purchase of the Dutchman’s Creek tract by Squire Boone and then the transfer to his son Squire in 1759.
Rowan County Deed Book 3, page 137 shows on April 30, 1753, the “Land granted from Granville to Squire Boone, Esq., of Rowan County, Province of North Carolina, 640 acres land in Parish of (not given) Rowan County, N. C. lying on the South side of Grant’s Creek otherwise Licking Creek. (3 shillings to every 100 acres).” Signed Granville, by James Innes and Francis Corbin. Witnesses: James Carter and William Haywood. Proved at Court House in Salisbury for Rowan County, January 20, 1756, on oath of James Carter, Esq. Ordered to be registered. Test. Thomas Parker.”
Rowan Deed Book 4, page 196 shows on April 12, 1759, the land gift from “Squire Boone of Rowan County, N. C., and Sarah, his wife, let Squire Boone, Jr., son of said Squire Boone, Sen’r., have for love and affection and for (?) pounds, 640 acres land in Rowan County, lying on South side of Grant’s Creek, otherwise Licking Creek. (This land was granted to Squire Boone, Sen’r., by Granville on April 30th, 1753). Signed Squire Boone and Sarah Boone, Witnesses: Thomas Banfield, Richard Neely and Charles Hunter. Proven, Rowan County Court, October 1759. Let it be registered. Tho’s. Parker, Clerk.”
Squire Boone, Sr. and his family lived on the Dutchman’s Creek tract as verified by a letter dated February 17, 1843, from Daniel Bryan to Lyman Draper. Daniel Bryan writes, “When Dan’l [Boone] was sixteen years old his father Squire Boone Moved to North Carolina and settled on Dutchman’s Creek at the Buffalow Lick, where he died in 1763.”
Daniel Bryan was born in 1758 as the second son of William and Mary Boone Bryan. Mary Boone was Daniel Boone’s younger sister, and William Bryan was the uncle of Rebecca Bryan Boone. Daniel Bryan was born at and lived on his parents’ land at what was known as “The Bend” along the Yadkin River in the Bryan Settlement in North Carolina. Daniel Bryan was also the grandson of Squire Boone, Sr. and Morgan Bryan, Sr. and was also the nephew of Daniel Boone and a first cousin of Rebecca Bryan.
This close relationship with the Boones, as a grandson of Squire Boone, and living nearby as family would make his statements an accurate source about Squire Boone and his family and where they lived. When Draper’s biography about Daniel Boone was published by Ted Fraklin Belue, it also confirms that Squire and family ultimately settled on what many now refer to as the Dutchman Creek property and that Daniel and family settled at Sugartree Creek. Neither lived at the 640-acre “Bear Creek Tract,” and the perpetuation of this myth will be addressed in a subsequent article.
Sources:
Anson County, North Carolina Deed Records.
Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, Acts of the North Carolina General Assembly, 1753, Chapter VII, p. 383.
Draper, Lyman Copeland, Draper Manuscripts, State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin.
Draper, Lyman Copeland, Belue, Ted Franklin, Editor, The Life of Daniel Boone, Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, 1998.
Edith M. Clark History Room, Rowan County Public Library, Salisbury, North Carolina.
Hammond, Neil O., My Father Daniel Boone: The Draper Interviews with Nathan Boone, The University of Kentucky Press, Lexington, Kentucky, 1999.
Kamper, Ken, An Accurate Summary of the Life of Daniel Boone, Daniel Boone History Research – Newsletter No. 6, December 2021.
Kamper, Ken, A Researcher’s Understanding on the Boone Family Move to North Carolina, No. PK17.0211, February 2017.
Linn, Jo White, Abstracts of the Deeds of Rowan County, North Carolina, 1753 – 1785, Books 1 through 10, Salisbury, North Carolina, Privately published, 1983.
Linn, Jo White, Abstracts of the Minutes of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions, Rowan County, North Carolina, Volume I – 1753-1762, Volume II – 1763-1774, Volume III – 1775-1789, Salisbury, North Carolina, Privately published, 1977, 1979,1982.
Martin-Wall History Room, Davie County Public Library, Mocksville, North Carolina.
Rowan County Deeds, Salisbury, North Carolina.
Spraker, Hazel Atterbury, The Boone Family, The Tuttle Company, Rutland, Vermont, 1922.
Weiss, Kathryn H., Daniel Bryan, Nephew of Daniel Boone: His Narrative and Other Stories, Self-published by Kathryn H. Weiss, 2008.
