Boone's Station

Boone's Station (1779-1783) - A Revolutionary War era Fayette County Station established by Daniel Boone in 1779. Daniel Boone and his wife Rebecca came with family and friends from Fort Boonesborough and built a stockaded Station near present-day Athens, Kentucky. Abandoned as a fortification and refuge in 1783.

History
Boone's Station was the home of Daniel Boone and his extended family from 1779 until 1783. Daniel Boone established the station apart from Boonesborough on 25 Dec 1779 after crossing the frozen Kentucky River to arrive at the site of his recently approved land claim. Boone sited his station on a level area about 150 feet north of a spring that eventually flowed into Boone’s Creek.

The first winter of 1779-1780 was spent in temporary quarters described as a "half-faced camp made of boards and forked sticks". This first winter was known as the "Hard Winter", Livestock froze to death, wild animals starved, and hunting was difficult. Boone had brought sufficient supplies to get the group through the winter and by March 1780 more permanent quarters were under construction.

The new settlement was constructed with a number of cabins which shared a common outside wall to defend against British inspired Indian raids. Excavations of the site indicated that the station was a rectangular stockaded enclosure composed of log cabins on stacked stone foundations that all faced inward. The stockading was not continuous but was placed to fill the gaps between cabins. The number of cabins constructed or the number of people at the site can't be documented but estimates indicate that 15 to 20 families and an unknown number of single men were there in the 1782-1783 time frame. Family units usually occupied the log cabins while single men lived in the corner blockhouses.

Unlike Boonesborough, Boone's Station saw little action during the War but members of the community including Boone's immediate family were killed in clashes elsewhere. Daniel's brother Edward was killed by the Shawnee in 1780 while hunting with Daniel. Boone's son Israel and his nephew Thomas were killed in the ambush at Blue Licks in 1782 from which Daniel himself narrowly escaped.

Daniel Boone was notified in March 1783 that he had lost his claim to the station land to a James Hickman. In the fall of 1783, he resettled his family at nearby Marble Creek and later relocated to Limestone (now part of Maysville), near the Ohio River where he ran a tavern (1783-1789). By 1791 the Boone's Station community no longer existed. In 1795, Robert Frank purchased the property, moved his family there and built a large stone house on the site.

Current Status
Now the Boone Station State Historic Site. Archaeological investigation of the station site began in 1993 after the site was willed to the Kentucky Department of Parks by a Boone descendant. Artifacts identified at the site include remains of the log cabins and stockade as well as the remains of the 1795 Frank house. The Station site has an Archaeological site designation of 15FA218.

See Also:
 * Fort Boonesborough

Sources:
 * O’Malley, Nancy, Field Investigations at Daniel Boone’s Frontier Station, Fayette County, Kentucky, Paper presented at the SHA 2002 Conference, 8-12 January 2002, Mobile, Alabama. Pdf
 * Kentucky State Parks - Boone Station State Historic Site Park Brochure
 * Kentucky State Parks - Boone Station State Historic Site Park Brochure

Links:
 * North American Forts - Boone's Station
 * Frontier Folk - Boone's Station
 * Tim Talbott, “Boone's Station,” ExploreKYHistory, accessed September 16, 2018