Exceptionally rare ADS, signed “Daniel Boone, D.S.,” one page, 8 x 5.5, June 10, 1787. Land survey penned by Boone as deputy surveyor of Kentucky, which reads (spelling and grammar retained): "Survaid for James Dickey 3125 acres of land by virtue of a treasury Warrant No. 19236, Duly Entered, Situate Lying and Being in the County of Madison on Sturgon Crick adjoining William Critenton on the North and Bounded as follows vizt Beginning at his NE Corner at A 2 hickorys thence North 418 pos to B 3 White okes thene W 1200 pos to C a hickury and Rad oke thene S 418 pos to D a Walnutt and linn thence Es to Critentons Line to A the Begining." Signed neatly at the conclusion by Boone, who adds the name of three others involved with the survey, and, in the upper left, a diagram of the land in question, which notes: "area 3125 acres plated by a scale of 400 poles to the Inch." Mounted, matted, and framed with a descriptive caption to an overall size of 15.75 x 18; a caption to reverse states: "This Daniel Boone land survey has descended in the family of Richard Calloway, a founder of Boonesboro, who came to Kentucky in 1776 with Daniel Boone. Calloway was killed by Indians at Boonesboro in 1780." In fine condition. Provenance: Robert F. Batchelder, December 1987.
As a pioneer and frontiersman, Daniel Boone was influential in extending the nation beyond the peaks of the Allegheny Mountains. With the company of his brother Squire, he explored the Kentucky wilderness from 1767 to 1769, and eventually settled his family in the territory in 1773. Two years later he extended the Wilderness Road over the Cumberland Gap through the Allegheny Mountains and erected three settlements, one of which was named ‘Boonesborough.’ In the wake of the Revolutionary War, Boone resettled in Maysville, Kentucky, and was elected to the Virginia state assembly in 1787. His military pursuits over, Boone became a local celebrity and for a period earned a profitable living as a tavern keep, a surveyor, a horse trader, and a land speculator. The legalities of the latter soon caught up with Boone’s sense of honor and weak investment strategies, and in 1788 he moved upriver to Point Pleasant, Virginia, operating at a trading post and then occasionally as a surveyor's assistant. An interesting land document dating to the most prosperous period of Boone’s life.
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