On December thirteenth of the year 1800 the State Legislature of Kentucky passed an act creating a new county, said county to be named Wayne in honor of General Anthony Wayne, the Revolutionary hero. The act specifies the following bounds:

"All that part of Pulaski and Cumberland included within following bounds: Beginning at mouth of Indian Creek on Cumberland River and running by James Sanduskie's cabin to the road that leads from Captain Thomas Johnston's to Major Alexander McFarland's on Indian Creek; thence to top of Poplar Mountain; thence with same until it intersects State line; thence east with said line so far that a north line will strike Rock Creek on main South Fork of Cumberland River; thence down the same to the beginning shall be one district and called and known by the name of Wayne."

The territory of Wayne had been, variously, a part of Lincoln County when Kentucky was divided into only three counties; then a part of Green when that county was carved from Lincoln; then a part of Cumberland, and was finally, in 1800, created from parts of Cumberland and Pulaski.

In 1803, a small part of Adair County, "from mouth of Wolf Creek to Cumberland River," was added to Wayne "for convenience of citizens." In 1817, an act was passed "to alter division line between Wayne and Pulaski," throwing a small part of Wayne into Pulaski and a small part of Pulaski into Wayne. In 1836 Clinton County was created from parts of Wayne and Cumberland, and in 1912 a part of Wayne was taken to form McCreary County, leaving Wayne with its present area of 478 square miles.

Between the close of the Revolution and 1792, when Kentucky was admitted to statehood, Virginia had made a number of military grants of land in this section, and Kentucky continued the practice. All grants up to 1797 were military. A grant by Virginia to General George Rogers Clark in 1784 included several thousand acres in the northern part of what later became Wayne County, and the first deed recorded in the county was made by General Clark to Jacob Vanhoozer. Major Alexander McFarland was also located in the upper part of the county as well as Captain Thomas Johnston. After 1797 the unappropriated lands were opened by grants under "headrights" by which any man twenty-one years of age could acquire from 100 to 200 acres of land by making survey and entry and living upon it one year. These surveys were made by surveyors with varying degrees of ability, giving cause for many land suits later to settle boundary lines and establish title. There was much inaccuracy and over-lapping. Confusion was inevitable under these conditions, but in the main, differences were adjusted amicably enough in Wayne, due to the intelligence and fair-mindedness of the settlers and the superior ability of the man who was appointed first surveyor of the county, Joshua Jones

Joshua Jones had been a surveyor for thirty-five years in Virginia. He had been engaged in surveying as early as 1763 and made the first surveys in southwest Virginia on the Holston and Clinch rivers, where he settled after his marriage in 1767. Appointed to survey "the public lands" by the governor of the new state, he sold his ironworks in Augusta County, Virginia, in 1794 and came to Kentucky.

He surveyed and entered two tracts on Elk Spring Creek in the then county of Cumberland and began at once the operation of an ironworks. On the same day in which the county was created, there was passed an act granting "to Joshua Jones certain lands." The preamble states:

"Whereas it is represented to the present assembly that Joshua Jones has a bloomery in great forwardness in the county of Cumberland and it is deemed expedient to grant unto said Joshua Jones a certain quantity of unappropriated lands contiguous to the said bloomery for the better carrying the same into complete effect: Therefore be it enacted by the General Assembly that one thousand acres of land be granted to Joshua Jones in the said county of Cumberland, to be laid off in not more than five surveys anywhere within the compass of six miles of the said bloomery

Provided however, that the said Jones shall not be at liberty to include in his surveys any salt lick or spring, or any person now actually settled thereon.

"With two hundred acres to be laid off around the same by lines running to the cardinal points, including said improvement in the center.

"Sec. 2. And be it further enacted that the said Joshua Jones shall pay into the public treasury of this state thirty dollars per hundred acres for all the land he may have secured to him under this act on or before the 1st. day of December, 1805: Provided however, that no grant shall issue for the same until the money hereby required to be paid for the same, together with the interest at the rate of six per cent annum thereon from the passage of this act, shall be paid into the public treasury as aforesaid; and provided also that the said Joshua Jones shall have the term of twelve months from and after the passage of this act to pay into the public treasury as aforesaid; and provided also that the said Joshua Jones shall have the term of twelve months from and after the passage of this act to locate and survey the said lands: and upon his, the said Joshua Jones, fully complying with the requisitions of this act, the land hereby granted, with all and singular its appurtenances, shall be the complete bona fide property of said Joshua Jones and his heirs forever, any law, custom, or usage to the contrary notwithstanding. Provided always that if the said Joshua Jones, his heirs, or assigns, shall not on or before the first day of December, 1805, produce to the register of the land office a certificate from the county court of Cumberland, attested by their clerk, that bar-iron hath been made at his said works, that then the lands herein granted shall revert to the Commonwealth, anything in this act to the contrary notwithstanding. This act shall commence and be in force from and after the passage thereof."

December 2, 1801, an act for benefit of Joshua Jones provided that he "be allowed two years longer to locate the land granted to him last session and that he be permitted to locate eight surveys." December 18, 1804, an act giving Joshua Jones "five years longer to pay the state price for his lands in five installments."

There had come into this region, under the early Kentucky grants, the following: Jonathan and James Ingram in 1796, Cornelius Phillips in 1798, Isaac West in 1799, James Simpson in 1799, Nicholas Lloyd in 1799, Henry Garner in 1799. By 1800, there were the first justices mentioned below; the three who composed the court of quarter sessions; the first tavern keeper, Roger Oatts; the first merchant, Joseph Beard; another merchant, McNutt, "the Irishman"; Lieutenant William Jones; James Jones; Bartholomew Hayden; John Buster; Lewis Coffey.

Some of these had received grants for Revolutionary service, and this was additional land taken up in this way. There were doubtless others, as records can never be assumed to be complete. In the decade following many more came while many passed on to the rich valleys of middle Tennessee. This was the great Indian route to the South. Cornelius Phillips brother Richard went on to Tennessee as did some of the Cullom, Shores, Jones, Ewing, Berry, Miller, and McGee families as well as others.

In 1801 a tract of public land was set aside for the town site and on February 13, 1802, "William Beard and Joseph Beard with Hugh McDermott and Henry Beason (bound by distance) make title to thirteen acres of land adjoining the public ground on which the court has established the town."

In 1805 the Cherokee Indians ceded to the United States a tract embracing part of Tennessee and including a strip along the eastern border of Wayne. These were known as the Tellico lands. The name of the town Jellico was so corrupted from Tellico.

W. R. Jillson in his Kentucky Land Grants says: "The small and unique group of grants from 1803 to 1853 were given upon warrants from the Register of the Land Office. These grants in Wayne lie mainly on the Little South Fork, a few on Rock Creek, Otter Creek, and Wolf Creek, and two in Elk Spring Valley.

The act creating the county provided that the first meeting of the county court should be held at the home of Henry Garner, and accordingly, on the 16th day of March, 1801, the first county court assembled there. The first justices were Charles Dibrell, Martin Sims, Edward Cullom, James Montgomery, Raleigh Clark, James Jones, James Evans, and Samuel Hinds. The three men who composed the court of quarter sessions were Samuel Newell, Hugh McDermott, and Isaac Chrisman.

Steps were taken at once to provide a courthouse, and a log structure was erected in the center of the square that was laid out by Joshua Jones. Micah Taul was appointed first clerk of both courts. He was then less than sixteen years of age.

At the April term of the county court held at Henry Garner's it was ordered that a courthouse be located on William Beard's land "provided he build a house of hewn logs 30 by 20 feet, two stories high, two floors, two doors, in workmanlike manner." It was also ordered that "Joshua Jones, gent., survey 13 acres of William Beard's land for the town, lay off the public square and determine the location of the court house." This courthouse was located in the center of the public square. There were four families living in the town at this time. They were those of William Beard, Joseph Beard, Roger Oatts, and Henry Garner. In 1810 there were twenty-seven people living on the "thirteen acres" that constituted the town. Micah Taul's Memoirs tell how the name of Monticello came to be chosen.

The first trustees appointed for the town were Anthony Gholson, George Singleton, Roger Oatts, John Hammond, and Isaac Crabtree. The first constable was Joseph Wheeler. It was some time, apparently, before a jail was needed and then "Roger Oatts, tavern keeper," was designated as first jailer. He used a log house adjacent to his tavern for a jail. The jail was the last house at the top of the hill above the town spring, near the tavern.

Tavern prices were fixed by court order at "1 and 6 for dinner and 1 for breakfast or supper," using the phraseology to indicate English money, that was one shilling for breakfast or supper, and one shilling and sixpence for dinner.

John Francis, Gent., was the first high sheriff of the county, which office he held until 1813, when Abel Shrewsbury was appointed by the court. Solomon Brents was the first attorney who qualified in Wayne County. Francis Emerson, a qualified attorney, appeared before the court as early as 1807. On the occasion of this April term of court, Joshua McDowell was fined "10s for profanely swearing twice."

The minutes of the courts for the few years after the county was formed are much concerned with the opening and improvement of roads, and these early roads were first, mainly, the means of reaching mills that were located on the water courses. The first mill mentioned is Van Winkle's Mill, on Elk Creek. It was two miles south of Monticelio, built by the VanWinkles on land later owned by Micajah Phillips.

Jones' Mill, later known as Marshall's Mill, was built by Joshua Jones. Denney's Mill, near Gregory, was an early mill, as was Eads' Mill in the western section of the county. The mill at Mill Springs was owned and operated at a very early date by the Metcalfe and Tuttle families

Ferrills Mill was probably the first in that part of the state. The mill was necessary to the existence of the pioneer as his grain had to be taken to the mill and ground before his family could be supplied with bread.

Young's Mill, on Little South Fork, later owned by John San-dusky, was built at a very early date. It was a marker on the boundary of Public School District Number 29 in 1838 when it was referred to as "Young's Old Mill" by the surveyor. It is thus recorded in the Minute Book of the Commissioners

Of this period Micah Taul's Memoirs give us a graphic account. They were published in 1887 by J. A. Phillips in the Monticello Signal and later in various other papers. They cover the years from 1800 to 1850, largely in Wayne County. We get a vivid picture of the life of that early day in his descriptions of "Court Day" when candidates met often for debate. He tells an amusing story of Colonel Lyon, who was candidate for Congress in 1803.

"Colonel Lyon arrived at Monticello on Saturday evening, before the May court in 1803, and put up at the tavern of Roger Oatts, the only one in the town. I called upon him on Sunday morning and invited him to dine with me. My young wife pre-pared the best dinner she could upon such short notice. Straw-berries then grew spontaneously in the barrens about Monticello and were getting ripe. She went herself and gathered perhaps a quart, which constituted the chief article of dessert at dinner. We had at the table with us Col. Lyon and Mr. and Mrs. Haden (my wife's sister) and her little daughter, two or three years old. Col. Lyon dined heartily and when his plate was changed he was furnished with a saucer and spoon and asked if he would take some cream and strawberries. He answered in the affirmative and said he would help himself-the strawberries had been put in a deep plate on the table near him. He seized the plate, placed it before him and ate up all the strawberries to the amusement of myself and Mr. Haden and to the infinite distress of the child, who screamed out lustily when she saw the last of the fruit disappear, to the great annoyance of her mother but without disturbing the equanimity of our ill-mannered guest.

"Haden and myself told this next day to the plain, honest people of the county who were delighted. They swore by their Maker that 'Matthew Lyon was their man' and they were as good as their word and his majority in the county was large. He was elected to Congress in opposition to Mr. Walker."

In 1804-5 the Judicial system of Kentucky was changed. The District and Quarter Sessions Courts were abolished and Circuit Courts established, with a judge and two assistants in each county. In 1807 the Academy or Seminary lands were ordered to be set aside by the State Legislature, the revenue from these to be used for building and carrying on academies of higher learning. The court therefore ordered these lands to be surveyed by Joshua Jones. James Jones, Roger Oatts, and Cornelius Phillips were named justices in 1809, and a road was ordered improved to Rogers Grove Meeting House.

The Legislature that convened in December, 1809, included Edward Cullom in the Senate and Isaac West in the House from Wayne County. It occurred to these gentlemen that the town of Monticello was in a unique position-it had never been formally incorporated. While the Legislature of 1800 that created the county had ordered a town to be laid out, that was all that had been done. Consequently we find on January 18, 1810, "an act for the better regulating of the town of Monticello in the County of Wayne":

"Whereas it is represented to the present General Assembly that there has been no special law passed heretofore for the regulation of the town of Monticello in the County of Wayne and that it is necessary that some special law be passed for that purpose: Be it enacted that the free male inhabitants of the town aforesaid meet at the Court House on the second Saturday of March, 1810, and elect five trustees."

And there follow four pages of specific instructions as to the management of the municipality.

Court notes of 1831 show that John Dick was appointed Sheriff by the governor. William Hardin, attorney, was Justice of the Peace as was Archibald Woods, who served in this capacity for many years. James Jones was Justice of the Peace. Leo Haden, "a young man of honesty, probity, and good sense produced license from two circuit judges and took the several oaths as attorney of the court."

Sherrod Williams was appointed attorney for the county court. He was born in Pulaski County and moved to Wayne where he married a sister of Lucy and Frank Stone. He was a brilliant but erratic lawyer. He represented Wayne in the Legislature several terms. He later removed to Mississippi. His son, Tom Williams, was also a brilliant lawyer.

In 1813 Abel Shrewsbery was appointed jailer to succeed Roger Oatts, and in 1815 Stone and Berry were licensed to run "an ordinary." On petition of Joshua Jones in 1816, his son James Jones was appointed deputy surveyor of the county and in 1817 Joshua Jones resigned and said James Jones was commissioned surveyor. In 1819 Joshua Oatts and Cannon Worsham were licensed to keep a tavern. By 1810 the county had a population of 5,430 and there were 37 people living in the town. The population of the county increased by about 2,500 in the next ten years as there were 7,951 in 1820. By 1830 there were 8,685.

A cause celebre in Kentucky was the case of Moore's Heirs against the State. This trial ran through the courts for several years until it was finally disposed of by Justice George H. Robert-son in favor of the plaintiffs. The case had all the elements of a first-class mystery story.

"On a summer afternoon in 1835, a boy of eighteen took his last whipping from his mother. Parental chastisement was more common then than now. William Perry Moore's father, John S. Moore, had died and his mother had married Isaac Shepherd. The boy may have found it easier to submit to his mother's whip-ping than to a step-father's discipline, or he may have been slow to assert his budding manhood against the maternal hand. The Moores and Shepherds were people of standing in the community and this discipline was not the unthinking brawling of coarse people. At any rate, vowing his mother should never see or hear from him again, he left home secretly in the night, riding away on his step-father's horse. He returned the horse by the mail carrier from a point where he found other conveyance. This fact testifies to a certain uprightness of character and points to the injustice of the punishment at which he rebelled.

"When he rode away that was the last of him so far as his mother or his family and his home town of Monticello ever knew. His mother's efforts to find him were futile. Here is a description taken from the court records: about 5 feet 9 1-2 inches, weight 160 to 170 pounds, shoulders broad and rather stooped, hair light brown, eyes bluish gray, skin fair, small scar on edge of left jaw, dimple in chin.

"The scar is important because it, with other evidence, served to identify both a soldier of the Texan Army of Independence who had been killed and buried, as well as in later years a peaceful citizen who had married and reared two daughters in Columbus, Georgia. It served to eliminate a third and maybe a fourth. All claimed to have been William P. Moore, son of John S. Moore, of Monticello.

"In 1841, the mother heard of a William Perry Moore in Columbus, Georgia. She asked some men driving stock to this point to find out if it was her son. They reported on their return that this man was not her son. The mother wrote to him anyway, but when an answer came in the wife's handwriting, Mrs. Shepherd felt sure it was not her son. William P. Moore went from Columbus to Baltimore and died there. Soon his widow and daughters appeared in Monticello to claim the estate held by his mother, but she would have nothing to do with them, although the girls were named Mary Evaline and Sarah Adelaide, the names of William Perry Moore's two sisters.

"In 1854, the daughters filed suit at Baltimore to recover the estate. There had appeared the Texas soldier, William Perry Moore, making a case difficult to decide. Judge George Robertson, of the Court of Appeals, after eleven years of litigation rendered a decision in favor of the plaintiffs."-Courier-Journal. Of this first half century of life in Wayne an article by James A. Phillips, based on Micah Taul's Memoirs, already referred to, gives a striking picture.

We trust that it will not be deemed a species of maudlin sentimentalism or weakness, which gives pleasure to the mind, as in imagination it beholds in "fancy's misty light" the spectral forms of the revered dead, who, one hundred years ago were liv-ing, active factors in forging deeds which make the annals of the first chapter of our country's history. Oftentimes these airy shapes pass before our mental vision; we can see the venerable form of the old surveyor, Joshua Jones, Jacob Staff in hand, on his way to survey a plot where the sound of "stick-stuck" was never heard before, nor the compass brought into requisition to establish artificial lines of dominion where once savage beasts and the more savage Indian exercised an undisputed title.

We can behold the seven first justices: Charles Dibrell, Martin Sims, Edward Cullom, James Montgomery, Raleigh Clark, James Jones, and James Evans, assembling at the house of Henry Garner for the purpose of holding the first county court. And those three dignified old gentlemen are Samuel Newell, Hugh McDermott, and Isaac Chrisman. These men compose the court of "quarter sessions." They are trying to find a rude temple of justice in which to hold court..

That man is Roger Oatts and those other two are Joseph and William Beard. They are the only citizens who live in the town: the first mentioned, Roger Oatts, keeps a hotel; Joseph Beard is a merchant, Ben Gholson is his clerk; McNutt, the Irishman, is another merchant who came from Winchester, Virginia. It is county court day: then as now, the good citizens have assembled-a clerk is to be elected-the town is to be named. Some are gathered at the town spring, others are drinking, fighting, and pillaging "for fun." A squad of militia, commanded by Lieutenant Bill Jones, is drifting near the spot where the old jail stood. We can see in the crowd, Joseph Chrisman, William Cullom, Anthony Gholson, Isaac West, Bartholomew Hayden, John Buster, Louis Coffey, Squire Baker, Thomas Eades, Solomon Dunagan, Leonard Dodson. These first settlers came mainly from West Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

But look! They have all vanished like the gigantic shapes and shadows of the beleaguered city. The actors on this stage have disappeared, having in life illustrated the full gamut of human virtues. They fell asleep on the lap of Mother Earth, there to rest until the resurrection morning.

These are the men with whom Micah Taul came in contact, more than one hundred years ago, after the organization of the county. They were nature's own product, tall, stalwart sons of the mountains and the forests, brothers of the pine and massy oaks, beside which they grew. They had led an outdoor life, where strong lungs inhaled the pure air of heaven, had from childhood been familiar with nature in all her majesty, and unconsciously absorbed her rugged strength, apart from the influences of vice and luxury, which contaminate; having neither fear, hypocrisy, nor avarice they learned the lessons of courage and self-confidence by grappling with the hardships and privations incident to primitive conditions. Thus equipped with but little book knowledge but with much "mother wit" our ancestors had emigrated farther west, to find new homes and to plant Anglo-Saxon civilization, where erstwhile rude savages dwelled.

On the 16th day of March, 1801, the first session of the county court was held at the house of Henry Garner. Before this court appeared Micah Taul, Hugh McDermott, Samuel McKee (long afterward a distinguished member of Congress and father of Colonel McKee who was killed at the battle of Buena Vista), and quite a number of other candidates. Taul was chosen clerk of the court and soon thereafter he was appointed clerk of the court of "quarter sessions." He was two months less than sixteen years of age when he was entrusted with the records of both courts.

Since we now have installed our clerk in both offices, them "to hold during good behavior," permit us to go back for a time and find out something about his antecedents.

Micah Taul was born in Montgomery County, Maryland, about twelve miles north of the city of Washington, on the 14th day of May, 1785; his father's name was Arthur Thomas Taul; his mother's maiden name was Mary Anne Johnson. He was the youngest of six sons born unto them. In the year 1787 the family moved to Kentucky, and settled in Fayette County. Micah was two years old, but old enough to remember that in coming down the Ohio in a boat he fell into the river and was rescued by his father, and that two of their Negroes were drowned by the over turning of a canoe. His parents were Baptists.

He was taken, upon one occasion, to hear the pastor, Rev. John Price; after the sermon quite a number of persons were baptized, and the next day, said he: "I joined some little girls at play. Whether I voluntarily offered, or the little girls out of mere wantonness got me preaching, I do not remember; so it happened, however, I preached them a sermon and baptized them one and all. I did not hear the last of it for years; I must have been very young, probably not more than 5 years old."

His education was limited, as at that day little opportunity was offered, even in Fayette County, for education. "At the county school" said he, "nothing but reading, writing, and cyphering was taught in those days. The Bible, testament, and Dills-worth's spelling book were the only school books. I was fond of going to school, fond of learning, and I can say it without vanity that I went ahead of all the boys. Although I was industrious, I did not want to be a farmer-wanted to be something else-though I hardly knew what."

At thirteen years of age Micah entered the office of Captain David Bullock, then clerk of the Clark County Court-he had been a captain in the Revolutionary War and was a most excellent clerk "one of the best and altogether the laziest man I ever saw." In a few months after writing in Captain Bullock's office he was considered by everybody as good a clerk as the "old man." In less than a year Bullock hardly ever had an occasion to come to the office.

The truth is Micah Taul never knew what it was to be a boy as he said himself, he ranked with men when he was sixteen years of age. At eleven years of age the decision was made that he was not to be a farmer, then it was that William Leary, a Scotch merchant, of Lexington, refused to employ him, not on account of his abilities, but his diminutive size; and at thirteen, when the average "outlaw" as Judge Owsley used to call them, was "link-ing it over the lily white lea" robbing bird's nests and water-melon patches, this staid young fellow was acting the part of a man in the clerk's office at Winchester.

So we need not be astonished that one so young took charge of the offices at Wayne County with so much self-confidence. At the age of fifteen he was offered the clerkship of Floyd County upon its organization, which he refused. After his appointment to the offices here he kept the office at his residence half a mile from the courthouse and did all the writing himself until the fall of 1807, when Daniel Mays, a very handsome and sprightly boy from Fayette County, entered the office and remained less than a year. Mays subsequently became a distinguished lawyer and Circuit Judge. Anthony Dibrell, who was afterward Treasurer of the State of Tennessee, wrote in the office for a time during the years 1803-4. Dibrell was an excellent and agreeable boy and made a valuable and useful man. John Chrisman, known more familiarly as "Jack" Chrisman, wrote in the office after this, and upon the resignation of Taul he became the chief clerk.

To an antiquarian it produces a delightful sensation to observe the free and flowing handwriting of our first clerk traced in regular lines with a goose quill upon the unruled pages of the first deed book. The very first deed recorded therein is a historical document itself and of peculiar interest; a deed from the celebrated George Rogers Clark to Jacob Vanhoozer, of 100 acres of land at Price's Meadows now "Meadow Creek," consideration paid 105 pounds.

Had we never come across the Memoirs so kindly loaned us by Judge M. C. Saufley we should have been able to deduce with some degree of certainty, from internal evidences connected with his handwriting, one characteristic of the man. The free and uncramped chirography unmistakably indicates a frank, unselfish disposition- How easily we can trace the influences of Micah Taul's style to some of those who came after, perceptibly in Jack Chrisman, some of the elder Phillips's, and William Simpson. Wayne County has much cause to be proud of the day this young scrivener took charge of her public records.

Having some regard to unity, we dealt with Micah Taul as a clerk-the Custos Rotulorum of the courts then existing-and concluded this feature of the history of a man, who has more sides than one. So far as this part of the country is concerned he was simply a name, a shadowy figure, becoming more dim as newborn generations came upon the scene. The fancy picture painted in youth has been almost totally wrecked, and instead of the venerable form of "Old Colonel Taul" bent with age, moving amid the Druid oaks which surrounded the two-story log house a half-mile from the courthouse on the place where the late Micajah Phillips long resided, we behold quite a young man, full of life, vigor, and ambition at the age of twenty-nine retiring from the offices to which he had been chosen to assume the graver responsibilities of legislator in the Congress of the United States.

In recalling these early impressions of the subject of our sketch, we find that imagination is a fraud and that tradition is unable to tell more than half a truth. Under recent lights it develops on us that Micah Taul was a positive torce, an entity, acting, felt along many lines, that he was a military leader, a lawyer and a good one, a statesman; and while by accident we have rescued from oblivion some of the characteristics of the man, yet it is to be bewailed that neither art nor tradition have left a trace of the human face divine-the voice, the eyes' magnetic beam, these have perished, lost in the fleeting memory of contemporaries. The old house, too, long used as a barn, like "Palmyra Central in the desert" has disappeared. Many times we have gazed at the well-hewed logs and the wooden pegs in the roof and dreamed of its occupants. Here it was that Dorothy Gholson reigned the queen of this chalet and blessed Micah Taul with her radiant smiles, and here it was that Thomas Paine Taul (the brilliant young lawyer who was associated with John Rowan and W. T. Barry in the prosecution of I. B. Desha) was born, as also his brother Algernon Sidney Taul-and Louisiana, who became Mrs. Buford-but we are getting along rather too fast.

In the fall of the year 1801 Anthony Gholson moved from Botetourt County, Virginia, to Wayne County and settled five miles northeast of Monticello. The next spring his son John and his youngest daughter Dorothy passed Isaac West's house where Micah Taul was boarding. It was a damp, cool evening and Dorothy was "wrapped up in a large blue cloth cloak, her face veiled and an umbrella over her." Micah Taul had never seen her before, but he remarked to his brother Jonathan that "that young lady" was to be his wife. A few days afterwards he saw her at the marriage of Abel Shrewsbury to Tebitha Van Hoagan, fell in love with her and in six days thereafter led her to the hymeneal altar. He was only seventeen and Dorothy younger. Said he "of course we were a very young couple, too young. I am in favor of early marriages, but it is possible to marry at too early an age. I thought seriously on the subject at the time, young as I was, but I ranked amongst men, was the clerk of two courts, had a license to practice law which I had obtained in the preceding month of March from Samuel McDowell and John Allen, two of the judges of the District Court of Kentucky."

Isaac Chrisman, Joseph Chrisman, and Bartholomew Hayden, each married daughters of Anthony Gholson, hence we learn that "Jack" Chrisman, who succeeded Taul in the office of clerk was his nephew by marriage. In 1827 Mrs. Taul died at Winchester, Tennessee. Her husband thus speaks of her: "I feel myself wholly incapable of doing justice to the memory of this admirable woman, the wife of my youth-in person she was small and very delicate, her weight at no time in life ever exceeded 100 pounds. She was however generally very healthy. In mind she was a giantess. Her early education like my own was limited, but she was fond of reading, and I made it a rule when at home to read everything I did read, in her hearing-as a daughter, wife, mother, mistress, friend, sister, and neighbor, she was blameless; as a housekeeper she had no equal, order and neatness everywhere prevailed. To cap the climax of her character she was a devout christian. A member of the Baptist church, she was baptized in the Cumberland River by the Rev. Thos. Chilton about the year 1810. Her sister, Nancy Gholson, attended her for several months in her last illness."

Thos. Payne Taul, the oldest son, became quite a distinguished attorney. Beside the celebrated Desha case he prosecuted James W. McClung at Huntsville, Alabama, when no one else would dare to do it. After this he unfortunately became engaged in a difficulty in which he shot a man by the name of Dwyer at Winchester, Tennessee. He was killed himself by his brother-in-law, Rufus K. Anderson, in 1828 in the same town.

Micah Taul was now left with an only daughter, Algernon Sidney having died before. "I have passed" says he "through many painful and tragical scenes the remembrance of which is poignant almost beyond endurance." He was married the second time but we cannot ascertain from the Memoirs who his second wife was, or how many children blessed this union. Nor are we able to give a further account of himself as the Memoirs come to a sudden stop about the year 1850. Written in Talladega County, state of Alabama, we conclude that he died about this time in that county.

"How the subject theme may gang" in endeavoring to compress such a variety of incidents in a short sketch along so many different lines taxes the art of the writer. We shall retrace our steps and pick up a thread or two dropped from our woof. But few, if hardly any, persons know that the name of dear old Monticello with its wonderful history, much of which gathers around the old courthouse that once stood in the center of its plaza-"public square"-around the old jail and the never changing "town Spring," was suggested by Micah Taul. The vanity of the Joneses, a strong-minded and bumptious family of people, wanted the town called "Jonesboro" in their honor. There being some controversy about a suitable name, Taul was appealed to for a name. He mentioned Monticello, the name of Jefferson's villa, which was adopted by the court. Said Taul, "the family threw the blame on me and were sore about it for a while but ultimately became friendly."

In this connection we give another incident of a clash with a member of the Jones family. This was with William Jones, the oldest son of Joshua Jones. We quote from the Memoirs: "I was elected Military Captain in opposition to Wm. Jones-a new company had been formed by dividing an old one. Jones had been Lieutenant in the old company and expected to be elected Captain of the new one without any opposition. When the election came on to his great surprise I was put up as a candidate in opposition to him and was elected by a large majority. Jones was so much disappointed that he became quite enraged. Swore I should not command the company and that he would whip me on the spot. He considered himself a very stout man and advanced upon me in a menacing attitude. His rage unmanned him and as luck would have it I whipped him, according to the fighting phrase of the day. After a hard fight, fist and skull, biting, gouging &c, I came off victorious. It was a long time before Mr. Jones got over his defeat. He was unfriendly to me for several years, but ultimately became a warm friend. He was a member of a numerous and respectable family, who did not sympathize with him in his hostility to me although, before this occurrence, a portion of the family became displeased with me on account of the naming of the town at the seat of justice."

The William Jones mentioned above was the father of "Tanner," Jimmie Jones, a highly respected citizen, who died at Steubenville several years ago.

We have heretofore considered Micah Taul as a clerk and also somewhat as to his domestic relations. It now behooves us to speak of him in the more active or strenuous scenes of life in which he participated while a citizen of Wayne County.

There was fight in the blood of the Tauls. Most any kind of fight, whether provoked by pride or patriotism. When the bugle called to arms Micah was always ready. There being some apprehension that the government of the United States would have trouble in taking possession of the Louisiana Territory upon the ratification of the treaty of purchase, President Jefferson was authorized by Congress to call into service a number of volunteers. Kentucky's quota was 5,000. Taul raised a company (1804) but they were never called for. We have heretofore alluded to the company which he led out in 1812-13. The competitors for the command of this company were Taul, Lewis Coffey, John Dick, and James Jones. Taul was chosen to command the company.

This company returned to Wayne County in the spring of 1813. Again about the month of June in the same year General Harrison made a requisition on Governor Shelby for 5,000 mounted volunteers. Says Taul: The call was responded to as might have been expected from the chivalrous character of the Kentuckians and of their noble old chief (Shelby). I raised a large company in Wayne County without any difficulty. Stephens was elected First Lieutenant, Bartholomew Hayden, Second Lieutenant, Andrew Evans, Ensign. In August we were called upon to rendezvous at Cincinnati. I immediately issued an order for my company to assemble on the day appointed at Monticello, well-mounted and prepared in all respects to take up the line of march. I don't think there was an indifferent horse in the company. I am very sure there was not an indifferent man. I well remember, when we marched through the city of Lexington several of my acquaintances said to me, 'yours is the best looking and the best mounted company that ever marched into this place'-they were in a truth, a noble looking set of fellows, stout, able-bodied, well-dressed, and in fine health." The detachment having marched to Urbana, Ohio, was organized. "I was appointed to the command of the 7th Regiment which was considered at the time by myself and friends as a very high compliment. I was then only 28 years of age and was the youngest Colonel in commission in the State."

This regiment was composed of six companies commanded respectively by Captains Wilson, James Gholson, Sam C Tate, Thomas Miller, and Craig. The Battle of the Thames was fought on the 5th of October, 1813, but Colonel Taul was in such bad health he could not participate in the engagement. After the defeat of the British the troops were discharged at Maysville and those who volunteered from Wayne came home as best they could.

In the year 1811 Judge Montgomery, of Lincoln County, was a candidate for Congress in the district of which Wayne made a portion. It was understood that the congressional district was formed for the benefit of Montgomery and Tunstall Quarles as his residuary legatee. Quarles boasted that no man in the district could beat Montgomery. This was said in the presence of Colonel Samuel Newell, who remarked that "Micah Taul, of Wayne, could beat him." Whereupon Quarles remarked that, "Montgomery could beat Taul in his own county." Said Micah, "my pride was offended and my ambition somewhat excited and I determined to be a candidate." In this first race for Congress Judge Montgomery beat Taul only 62 votes in the district. In Wayne, Montgomery received only 18 votes out of 1,200. In the year 1814 Montgomery and Taul were candidates again for Congress, the latter was elected by 1,262 votes.

In the course of the summer after returning from Washing-ton, Micah Taul became dissatisfied with his residence in Wayne County, and determined to make a change. In the fall he removed to Winchester, Kentucky. Said he, "the worst selection I could have made, in the state or elsewhere." In summing up the mistakes he had made, he mentioned three: 1st, voting for the "Compensation Bill"; 2nd, moving from Wayne County; 3rd, selecting Winchester as a place of residence. While living in Wayne he made money at the practice of law, but spent it or rather as he frankly confessed "lost it at the card table." "It was then fashionable," said he, "among the profession to play cards for money. The card table was set out every night or every day. There were gentlemen attending court who studied Hoyle more than they did Blackstone and generally won all the money made by others. If I had never played cards I might have been a very wealthy man long, long ago. It is a ruinous vice.

After removing to Winchester he made money fast and might have retained his practice which was good but he indulged in the fashionable habits of the day and neglected his business. For two or three years he was the most popular attorney at the Paris bar, being associated with such men as John Rowan, Beverly Clark, and Thos. F. Marshall. In speaking of Rowan he said that he was "a man of decided talents and commanding eloquence, but I always thought he had as much character as he deserved."

In the spring of 1819 or '20 Colonel Taul was back in Wayne we suppose for the last time. Upon his arrival he found the people excited beyond measure on account of the arrest of three men, who were charged with committing a rape on a woman of the county. The influential citizens prevailed upon him not to undertake their defense. He, however, conferred with the defendants and came to the conclusion they were not guilty of the charge. Said he, "many of my good Wayne County friends were sorely vexed with me for defending them. I never saw a community so inflamed." The men were considered desperate and strong guards were employed by the sheriff to guard the woman. She was marched between double files with the sheriff at the head to the grand jury room that an indictment might be found. "Judge Montgomery," said Taul, "was a very impulsive man; he was not only the personal enemy of the men charged, but he was my personal enemy. I had beaten him for Congress in 1814 and he seemed determined never to forgive me for it."

Amid much opera bouffe demonstration the trial came on. As soon as Taul began his speech, the judge left the bench and did not resume his seat until he concluded his argument. Says Taul, "I never managed a case better, never made a better speech. I convinced the jury that all three of the men were innocent. I dwelt with severity upon the conduct of the judge in having the witness guarded to and from the court house. I told them that the conduct of the judge was a libel upon the county, that his object was to add to the too great excitement for the purpose of producing the conviction of the persons charged. Possibly, gentlemen, said I, his Honor may consider you all savages as you voted against him for Congress in 1812-14." At each of these elections Montgomery had only received eighteen votes in the county. Years afterwards Judge Montgomery told Colonel Taul that the reason why he did not remain on the bench was that he saw the "devil was in him." He said that he was satisfied that Taul intended to arraign him for his conduct before the jury and he could not stand it. "I should," said he, "have ordered you to jail, the consequence of which would have been the acquittal of the prisoners by acclamation. The people of Wayne County would not have seen you carried to jail by my order. No sheriff could have laid hands on you there in safety. Instead of you being taken to jail, I should in all likelihood have been mobbed and thus the whole matter would have ended."

One of these men moved to Texas and another, Charles Cox, the youngest son of a highly respectable man, who had been a member of the Virginia and Kentucky legislature was hung in Arkansas for murder. He was the father of Rebecca Cox who now lives in Monticello. They had got themselves into this great difficulty by dissipation. They had been the preceding day at a "deer hunt" and "fish fry," where they had indulged freely in drinking, stopped at a doggery, where they became involved with the woman in the case.

We cannot forego giving in this connection an anecdote, which took place during the canvass for Congress in 1812 between Colonel Taul and Judge Montgomery. It occurred in Lincoln County, the home of Montgomery. The judge was disposed to treat Taul with disrespect, did not accord him the usual courtesies that should exist between candidates, in fact would not recognize him or speak to him. The candidates, Montgomery, Taul, and Captain Henry James, of Pulaski, met at Stanford. Montgomery made his speech without any arrangement with the others. Said Taul, "I was young-of an ardent temperament, gay, buoyant, and happy, laughed at his impudence and presumption. He undertook to injure my private character by raking up a lawsuit I had with a man in Clark County, grow-ing out of a transaction between us before I was sixteen years of age, in which he attempted to swindle me out of one hundred dollars."

Two different messengers were sent to Clark County tor the purpose of obtaining copies of the records-one was a cousin of Montgomery's, the other a peddler, both lame. The transcript was read and several certificates to prove falsehoods. After he was through, Taul addressed the people and recognized in the crowd "the noble and majestic form of Isaac Shelby then a candidate for Governor." "I was confident," said he, "I had the advantage of my opponent upon this occasion. I was in the county and town of Montgomery's residence and instead of treating me, a young man who had never injured him, with courtesy and respect, he made a wanton attack upon my character, surrounded with personal and political friends. Having been arraigned at the bar of Old Lincoln as a criminal everybody seemed willing to hear me.

"I told them I was a candidate-that my name was Micah Taul-that I was the same Micah Taul named in the transcript; that I was a young man, having no relatives, and but few acquaintances in the county. I proceeded and said I was not so silly as to flatter myself that I would escape the arrows of calumny and detraction. No candidate that I knew of had been so fortunate in the country, no not even the venerable hero of King's Mountain (Shelby) then present, who had consented to become a candidate for the office of Governor on the sole condition that war was declared against England. He had not escaped; foul charges had been made against him, but he cared as little for them as the stag did for the gadfly that lit upon his horn; and young and humble and friendless as I might be supposed to be I could say to my accusers-my opponents-that their attacks upon me had created in me not one moment's uneasiness; on the contrary I ought to be thankful to them for affording me a good excuse for proving to the people who I was and what I was-to prove to them, in fact, that I had a character of which I had the right to be proud, and of which I was proud, but in relation to which, under ordinary circum-stances, it would be indelicate for me to speak [here the speaker read various letters, certificates, etc., to prove his character from boyhood]. I then remarked that I had never thought about the charge against me and of the instruments used in collecting evidence and propagating it-the one being a lame peddler and the other a hopping deputy clerk-without having my risibility excited; it always brought to my recollection Homer's description of the Prince of Slanders:

"My friends shouted and roared at the top of their voices, the crowd was taken by surprise and laughed heartily. Montgomery and friends were completely crestfallen. One of the lame men spoke up (they were both lame) and said his eyes were not blinky, to which I replied that Thersites was a much handsomer man than he. The cheering was resumed and lasted for some time." Montgomery had fled and Micah concluded by sayint that "the battle was over and won."

We have given the above circumstance connected with Taul's first race for Congress to show his calmness and equanimity under a brutal assault upon his character; his skill in the employment of the ad captandum art that catches the crowd; and above all his literary culture and readiness in its application when needed. Had he remained in Wayne County he would have been returned to Congress in a few years. The little disturbance to his popularity would have been transient. We doubt if there was any one in the congressional district who was his peer in all that goes to make the ideal Congressman.

That Micah was not a teetotaler, we have the direct testimony of John Stephenson, who informed us several years ago that he had seen him "full" many times on his way home from town. Says Taul, "It was no objection to a man in those days that he drank. I will not assert that it would have been an insuperable objection to a candidate to drink for I do not remember that there were any such characters then, but this I can say with perfect truth, a temperance man would not have been likely to succeed at the regular election." ---Monticello Signal.

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