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=== Historical Background === | === Historical Background === | ||
In 1774 Judge Richard Henderson, a land speculator of North Carolina, hired Daniel Boone to blaze a trail through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky. The '''Wilderness Road''' started at Bristol, Virginia (splitting off the [[Great Valley Road]]) and headed west along the Virginia-Tennessee border to the Cumberland Gap, across the nearby Cumberland River, and then went northwest to Boonesborough, Kentucky. Eventually, a western spur of the road would reach Harrodsburg, and then Louisville, Kentucky on the Falls of the Ohio River. | In 1774 Judge Richard Henderson, a land speculator of North Carolina, hired Daniel Boone to blaze a trail through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky. The '''Wilderness Road''' started at Bristol, Virginia (splitting off the [[Great Valley Road]]) and headed west along the Virginia-Tennessee border to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumberland_Gap Cumberland Gap], across the nearby Cumberland River, and then went northwest to Boonesborough, Kentucky. Eventually, a western spur of the road would reach Harrodsburg, and then Louisville, Kentucky on the Falls of the Ohio River. | ||
The road crossed difficult mountains, rushing rivers, and ran through Indian lands. | The road crossed difficult mountains, rushing rivers, and ran through Indian lands. Indian raids and white robbers both were significant problems, so many people chose to travel the road in large groups. But the risks were worth taking for the rewards of bountiful hunting grounds, rich farmland, and good salt licks.<ref name="WildpediaRd" /> Until the 1794 [[Shawnee_Indians|Shawnee Indian]] defeat at [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallen_Timbers Fallen Timbers], for hostile Indian reasons, the Wilderness Road was the preferred route to Kentucky and used by 75 percent of settlers. It also served as an important passage for cattle, pigs, and sheep drives into and out of Kentucky to market.<ref>William W. Luckett, "Cumberland Gap National Historic Park," ''Tennessee Historical Quaterly'' 23 (December 1964). Digitized online at http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/cuga/luckett/index.htm (accessed 3 August 2010).</ref> | ||
The Kentucky legislature paid for the footpath to be upgraded to a wagon road starting in 1792. The wagon road was finished in 1796.<ref name="WildpediaRd" /> | The Kentucky legislature paid for the footpath to be upgraded to a wagon road starting in 1792. The wagon road was finished in 1796.<ref name="WildpediaRd" /> | ||
Earlier peace with Indians along the Ohio River, and the opening of the [[National Road]] in 1818 provided an easier, safer, more level route to the Ohio Valley and Kentucky. With the introduction of steamboats at about the same time, traffic on the Wilderness Road declined until it was nearly abandoned in the 1840s. However, it was used by both Union and Confederate armies during the [[United States Civil War, 1861 to 1865|American Civil War]].<ref name="WildpediaRd" /> | |||
=== Route === | === Route === | ||