"I never knew a Hardin that was a thief, I never knew a Hardin that was a coward, and your father was the noblest of them all.' The tears then ran down his cheeks as they had done for the fifty previous years whenever he spoke of his brother John after he was killed by the Indians in 1792. "An entire family there holding their possessions and rearing families will, of necessity, make an impression in the surrounding community.

"Of the younger brood I can say, whether of the name of Hardin or of any other name, I know that they are men-feel that they are men amongst the wisest and amongst the best.

"It will suit here to state that a few years since my granddaughter, Mrs. Bernoudy, in St. Louis, met with Bishop Spaulding, who was raised near Lebanon, Ky., and hearing that she was of this family, remarked that the Hardins were a strong-minded family, but obstinate.'

"Just here let me ask the question, if, in the providence of God, I have been given a strong mind to discern the truth, and integrity of purpose to maintain the right, may I not proudly wear the epithet of obstinacy? Bunyan would call it valiant for the truth.' Thus viewed, we accept the soft impeachment as bringing with it no reproach. And, before I leave this branch of the subject, let me say to all of our lineage, whether a Hardin, a Wickliffe, a Helm, a McHenry, a Harwood, a Cofer, or any other name, remember what your old uncle, Martin Hardin, has said of them; and remember, also, that had it not been for the massacre of St. Bartholomew, we, the Hardin family, might now have been Frenchmen instead of Americans.

"In the year 1786, then a boy of four years of age, I was landed in the woods near a spring, some three miles east of where Springfield was afterward built. It was then the District of Kentucky, part of Virginia. Since then the Constitution of the United States was adopted, and has since been accounted of no binding force. Since then the constitution of the Presbyterian church has been adopted and violated. I had in early manhood sworn to support the one, and in mature middle age vowed allegiance to the other. I have, in good faith, endeavored to fulfill my obligations to each of them as God has given judgment and strength to do so. And now, in my eightyeighth year, to each one of you separately, and to all of us collectively, remember that each of us owes it to ourselves and to each other to maintain the character that has been transmitted to us. When there is a question of right, let us be obstinate in maintaining that right, and let us always be very obstinate in upholding the truth and prove our lineage true."

CHAPTER II.

Τ

BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE.

HE parents of Mr. Hardin were Benjamin, Sr., and Sarah Hardin. They were cousins and both natives of Virginia. The father of this Benjamin bore the same Christian name, and was of Huguenot descent. Mr. Hardin's father was a plain, quiet, sensible, honest man, not a little deferential to his wife. He was a typical backwoodsman, brave and hardy, with a strong inclination for Indian fighting— one of the ordinary employments of his day. After his marriage to Sarah Hardin (which occurred in Virginia), they removed northward and located, as it proved, within the limits of Pennsylvania, which was perhaps inadvertent. Here his children were born. In March, 1788, he removed with all his family (save a daughter who had married) to Kentucky, stopping in what was then Nelson, but in that part of which Washington county was subsequently created. His farm, where he settled on his arrival, where he lived (the cultivation of which was his lifelong pursuit), where he died, and where his ashes rest, was two miles from Springfield, adjacent to the public road from that place to Lebanon.

Sarah Hardin, the wife of Benjamin Hardin, Sr., was born in Fauquier county, Va., and there dwelt until she attained young womanhood. The following reference to her early life is from the pen of another:

"In childhood she listened with thrilling heart to the stories of the Huguenots as recounted by her aged grandfather, Martin Hardin, who, a mere youth at the time, fled from France within a few days allowed for escape by the revocation of the edict of Nantes. In old age, on the borders of ninety, with head erect and clear blue eyes brightening and glowing, she told the story to her grandchildren, who asked no greater privilege than to stand by her knee and listen to the reminiscences of her youth—to stories of those revolutionary times that developed strong-hearted women as well as brave men; stories she had to tell of the war with the Indians; of Braddock's defeat; of how she stood with her father on the lawn in front of his house in Virginia watching the messenger of evil tidings go by reeling with fatigue and haste as he urged on his nearly-exhausted horse, to her father's call drearily responding, without slacking his pace, 'The army is defeated

and Braddock is killed,' and of the dread that settled upon the community as the news went through. Proudly she would tell of the War of Independence; that all of her family were true; there was not one Tory among them all.'

"After removal to Kentucky one of the first objects to which Mrs. Hardin devoted herself was to supply, as far as possible, the comforts of life left behind. To this end she planted seeds and raised fruit trees-a matter generally neglected by the adventurous but improvident population of the new State. For awhile she shared her orchard products with her neighbors, exhorting them, however, to plant seeds and raise orchards of their own. But these admonitions were long unheeded. 'Plant for yourselves this year,' she would say, 'for at the end of three years if you have not fruit trees you must do without, for we will not give to you after that.' The third year came and the improvident ones came as usual asking their portion of the fruit, although they had planted no orchards. Mr. Hardin would have yielded, but his wife said 'no; what we have said we will abide by.'

"Too conscious of many neglected warnings to remonstrate against this just decision they departed; but young Ben, with the ready sympathy a boy feels in the matter of getting fruit, hied away unnoticed to help them get the forbidden fruit. When he reached it, what was his surprise to find his ever kind father ahead of him, and he chuckled to himself as, hiding, he heard his father say: 'Now, you must plant the seed this year, for Sarah is a woman of her word, and will do what she says.' Well they knew that Sarah would do what she said. They reverenced and depended on her strong nature. In sickness and sorrow she was their best friend; but when she stood before them, tall, erect, proud of her courage, with purity and truth written on every line of her fair face, her clear blue eye flashing so brightly with indignation at wrong-doing, they feared to do evil, for she would look with no degree of allowance upon aught that was not honest and true.

"They resorted to her for advice in sickness until there came to the neighborhood a young physician, who, on acquaintance, she found was qualified to administer the healing art. Then when the neighbors came to her for the unremunerated advice they were in the habit of receiving she told them no; they had a doctor now-they must go to him, and pay him, too, or he would not be able to remain among them.”*

Mr. Hardin, though more yielding, was equally kind with his wife. He erected a school-house upon his place and himself taught a charity. school during those portions of the year when the children of the poor were released from labor.

The Hardin emigrants were clannish after coming to Kentucky, and much together. Sarah Hardin all her life was regarded by them as the strongest-minded of the family, and was deferred to as such.

* Miss Lucinda B. Helm, in Lebanon Times.

She was of great personal beauty and superior intellect. Her complexion was very fair; her hair bright auburn; eyes clear and blue; in person, tall and commanding. She had the nerve and courage of a Cæsar. Moving to Kentucky when it was molested by Indians and abounding in game, she learned to use the rifle, and became a superior marksman; she killed squirrels from the tops of the tallest trees. In old age she taught her grandchildren gunning. She was a great reader, reading daily until within a few days of her death. She became an excellent historical scholar. Her conversational powers were unusually fine. She had enjoyed the best of Virginia society in young womanhood, and at that period associations more refined and intelligent were not found this side the Atlantic. "I have heard her say," writes a granddaughter, "that she was well acquainted with General Washington had frequently met him in the social circle, and was often his partner at the whist table."*

On the death of her husband (about 1820) she took up her residence with her son Ben, with whom she lived until her death in 1832, in her eighty-eighth year.

The theory asserted by Napoleon and others that it is the mother, rather than the father, that imparts greatness to the child has here another corroboration. It is fancied that between Mrs. Hardin and the imperious spirit of Lady Macbeth a resemblance may be traced. Of the one as well as the other it seems appropriate to say:

"Bring forth men children only!

For thy undaunted metal should compose naught but males."

Mr. Hardin had four sisters, of whom two married husbands named Tobin, another married Andrew Barnett, and the fourth (Rosa) married James McElroy. His brother Martin lived to middle age in Kentucky, in pursuit of agriculture. At the period when Texas was engaged in her unequal struggle with Mexico for independence, many chivalrous souls rushed to the aid of the republic of the Lone Star. Among these were Houston, Milam, Bowie, Crocket, etc. Martin Hardin also went thither, and did important service at the battle of San Jacinto. Afterward, when Texas was free and at peace, he procured title to the land where the battle was fought, and there spent his last days. Warren, the youngest of the family, was a farmer of Meade county, and survived the late civil war. He was noted for integrity and courage. He had fine natural endowments, and if he had had requisite culture, and chosen intellectual pursuits, he would have made his mark.

Mrs. Kate Riley.

Benjamin Hardin (or Ben Hardin, as he was always called), so christened for his father, and third in descent of the same Christian name, was born at George's creek settlement, on the Monongahela river, Westmoreland county, Pa., February 29, 1784. He was the sixth of the seven children of his parents. He early gave indication of decided vigor of body and mind.

Not unnaturally, he was a favorite in his immediate family, and his most commonplace performances were deemed worthy of note. When the emigrant boat that bore the Hardin family down the Monongahela, in March, 1788, started on its voyage to Kentucky, a married sister, who remained behind, remarked afterward that the last sight she caught of little Ben, then four years of age, he was sitting on a barrel beating lustily on the head of it, unconscious and uncaring whither he went or what the future had in store for him.

On one occasion a young gentleman of a heroic turn of mind proposed to write Mr. Hardin's biography, and asked for the incidents of his early life. Mr. Hardin thereupon related an adventure of his childhood for the benefit of his would be biographer. The latter, however, expressing the opinion that he could not make use of such a trivial circumstance, further communication was declined. The rejected adventure was this: When about seven years of age (after removal to Kentucky), he was sent by his mother from his home in