July 1-4th Weekend in
Asheville, NC, July 2000
Cade's Cove at
the Smoky Moutain National
Park
Blue Ridge Parkway,
Boone and the Folk Art Center
Kinnick land in the Yadkin River
Valley in Davie Co, NC
This year for my (Bill) birthday on July 1 and the July 4th
holiday, we went to Asheville, NC, where Annette
and Larry have
Harvey
the RV parked for a couple of
months. Besides the beautiful Blue Ridge and Smokey Mountains, I
wanted to visit the Yadkin River Valley of Rowan/Davie County in NC,
the home of a major Kinnick family branch from 1792 to about 1850.
They moved into the same area where Daniel Boone had lived before he
moved his family to Kentucky in about 1780. Bill
The Yadkin River Valley was in Rowan County when the John and Ann
Kinnick family moved to North Carolina in about 1792. Family
tradition says they moved to "the forks of the Yadkin." This southern
part of the triangular area created by the fork where the South
Branch joins the Yadkin main channel later became Davie County with
county seat at Mocksville.
We began our visit at Mocksville with
pictures of the courthouse and center "square."
The placque at the corner of the
building, right in the center of the picture, is a tribute to the
Boone family, who lived nearby from the 1740s until the
1780s.
A sculpture of Daniel Boone is on the
left. The placque reads: This Memorial Legend to (on the left side)
Daniel Boone, hunter, explorer, backwoodsman, soldier, surveyor,
roadbuilder, legislator, magistrate, he lived and learned woodcraft
in Davie County 1743-1785 (on the right side) Squire and Sarah Boone,
Parents of Daniel Boone, Pioneers of the Yadkin, whose remains are
interred in Joppa Graveyard. Coming from PA 1743.
Four large trees form the center of
Mocksville, in what we saw as a beautiful, rather unique,
arrangement. Here, Larry and Annette are walking across the street
toward the courthouse:
From historical maps and county land
records, we have determined that the Kinnicks first settled along the
Yadkin, just east over the ridge from the Daniel and Rebecca Boone
cabin on Sugar Creek. John Kinnick bought his land, which had been
part of the Edmon Hays estate, from John Mock, near Jacob Sheek's
Mill on Big Creek. This land was just north of Riddle Road, which
crossed the Yadkin on the Riddle Ferry. Current highway 801 appears
to follow the Riddle Road, perhaps a little to the south, running to
the west to Farmington.
This Davie county land, north of highway
801, along the Yadkin, is basically inaccessible to the public
because private homes on acreages are built on the bluff on the west
shoreline. Yadkin Valley Road is the access:
Yadkin Valley Road (on the sign), goes to
the right, turns north along the river and loops back to this same
northbound (straight ahead in the picture, and to the left) road
(with no river access, except across private property)
....
According to a map I have, the
Daniel
and Rebecca Boone cabin on Sugar
Creek would have been
straight ahead, on the road above, and little to the left, down
slope, maybe a couple of miles.
Below is the closest this road gets to
the Yadkin River. There are these two houses, which we believe may
very well overlook the (old) Riddle ferry site on the
river:
It appears that the trees in the
background may well be on the far side of the Yadkin.
Along the road north of Mocksville, but
short of Farmington, we did cross over Dutchman's Creek. It was along
this creek that George Kinnick, a son of John, bought land from the
Whittaker family. The Whittaker's were known to have had a Methodist
meeting house in a area in the 1780s.
This is the Dutchman Creek sign, by the
creek, but, the property in question would have been a couple miles
up the creek to the north (right in the picture).
We recorded one other sight along the
way, not related to anything except history. This old house along the
road, with a tin porch roof in front:
background
credit
Page created 4 July 2000, last updated 16
Aug 2001.
Direct questions and comments to Bill
or Nancy.