THE
HISTORY OF LOUISVILLE,
FROM ITS
EARLIEST SETTLEMENT
TILL THE YEAR 1852.
BY BEN CASSEDAY
LOUISVILLE, KY.
HULL AND BROTHER.
1852.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852,
By BEN. CASSEDAY,
In the Clerk’s office of the District Court of the United States for the District
of Kentucky.
HULL & BROTHER,
PRINTERS AND BINDERS.
83 & 85 Fourth St., Louisville, Ky.
To My Father,
At whose Instance it was Undertaken.
AND
By whose Assistance it was Completed,
This Book Is
AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.
Very little need be said by way of Preface to the present volume. Cities,like individuals, have ever found the utility of giving publicity to theadvantages they possess. The respective claims to public consideration ofalmost all the larger American cities have already been set forth, and noinconsiderable sagacity has been displayed in the preparation and issue ofthese advertisements. It cannot be denied that Louisville has equal claimupon the community for a fair hearing with many of these cities, and thismay serve as the apology which custom seems to render necessary for thepublication of this volume.
Louisville has attained her present rank and position without havingresorted to any of the factitious means so generally employed to promotethe progress of cities. A singular apathy in this regard has alwayspervaded this community, and the present prosperity of the city is theresult only of fortuitous circumstances, of individual and unorganizedeffort, or of local causes. The following extract from one of a series ofvery able articles, published several years ago in the Louisville Journal,conveys a very caustic and severe, but, at the same time, a very just andmerited rebuke of this apathetic indifference to political progress whichhas been characteristic of this city. The author says: “In the recent bookof Judge[Pg 6] Hall entitled “The West—its commerce and navigation,” it isstated that “Louisville keeps no account of its business.” Such is reallythe fact; we have no business organization—no chamber of commerce, nomercantile clubs—no Exchange, no place “where merchants most docongregate.” Our city Fathers keep no record of our increase or doings,and it is doubted whether the Mayor or Council, with the Assessors andCollectors to advise with, can either guess or reckon our presentpopulation within 4,000, or the number of respectable tenements erectedlast year within 200 of the truth. There is not a series of our newspapersor price currents to which a stranger has the right of access; if, indeed,there be an entire series of either to be found in our city. Occasionallya Directory is got up and contains a few statistics gathered withoutsystem or concert, and necessarily imperfect, and these even are rarelyset before the public eye. Other cities have had for years the mostskillful trumpeters and gazetteers; their men of influence and wealth havecontributed largely of money and time (more important than money) not onlyto make their city attractive but to show off those attractions. Doesanything agitate the public mind, whether religious, political, orfinancial—whether it relates to