John McLean: Childhood

John McLean  entered the world 11 Mar 1785, on a small farm in Morris Co., New Jersey.^{1 2 3}  A tumultuous revolution, whose battles had raged nearby, had been won but two years earlier. He was the first born son of a 32 yr. old mom named Sophia (Blackford) and her 39 yr. old, war vet husband, Fergus McLean.¹   They proudly named him after his paternal grandfather, John. He had been preceded by his sister Desire, then about three. Three events that were to greatly influence his life took place when he was two. His brother Nathaniel was born, George Washington was named the first to hold a brand new office, that of President of the United States, and the delegates to Constitutional Congress established their new country on a legal foundation, called the U.S. Constitution.

In 1789, when John was four, the family packed up and headed westward in search of a better home. The first place they tried was at Morgantown, Monongalia Co., in what is now West Virginia.^{2 5} 

 

There were tales however of better opportunities further west.

"For some time the attractions of the Blue Grass region of Kentucky had beckoned to the inhabitants of western Virginia. Hence a year later the McLean's again began a trek toward the newer frontier."³

And so it was that, in 1790 in he found himself in Kentucky's Jessamine County ², near present day Nicholasville.³   Nicholasville is about 5 miles south of Lexington.

"John McLean, Associate Justice... lived for quite a while in his youth on the Duncan farm.  ...Within the memory of persons living, there was an old well dug by Judge McLean's father on the Duncan place. It was east of the house about 200 yards."^{3 4}

The house belonged to William and Nancy Duncan. Nancy, a cousin, was the daughter of John's Uncle Benjamin Blackford.  Not only does the house still stand, it is still boarding guests. Note the names now given the bedrooms.

When John was six, his sister Mary Belle was born.¹

In 1793, the family again moved, this time northward, to the Mayslick region in what would soon be called Mason County. Nearby stood the tiny community of Maysville, on the banks of the Ohio river.^{1 2} Here, when John was nine, his brother William was born.

On the other side of the Ohio River lay the vast forests of the Northwest Territories. In 1794 a grant by the federal government gave John Cleves Symmes a quarter of a million acres of the rich Miami valleys which lie east of Cincinnati along and between the Little and Big Miami Rivers.¹

"Convinced of it's desirability as a place of residence, they at once concluded a contract with Symmes and his associates. In the spring of the next year Fergus McLean with his son John and a neighbor, Mr. Welch, and his eldest son, about John's age, were among those who set out for a preliminary trip to their new home."¹

It was the year 1797, John was 12:

The boys, wearing hunting shirts and moccasins, carried rifles with considerable ammunition and knapsacks containing a blanket and necessary provisions. Large butcher knives in their belts supposedly gave them a further sense of security.      From the Kentucky shore they floated in flat boats down the river to Cincinnati. Although this was the official residence of Arthur Sinclair, governor of all the Old Northwest - from the Ohio to the Great Lakes and from Pennsylvania to the Mississippi - it was then a very unprepossessing village. The few homes were made in part from the timbers of flat boats that had been utilized on the journey from the upper waters of the Ohio. The streets were unimproved save for logs of planks that were thrown across them in muddy weather to make them passable. It would be interesting to know the impressions of this farm boy upon first entering the town which later, as the "Queen City of the West" was to claim him as one of its most distinguished citizens.      ...Soon they were again in the country, this time to the northeast of the town, traversing soil that was rich and deep - through dense undergrowth as well as open groves - and crossing streams of natural purity.  Forty miles from Cincinnati they reached their destination, in the present Warren Co., at the home of a Mr. Richardson, where they were kindly received.  The primitiveness of the region is indicated by the bear meat which they were served and which John relished with all the voracity of a growing youth.

-Francis P. Weisenburger, The Life of John McLean

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