THE HART FAMILY Letter by Nathaniel Hart to Draper 1842. 2CC27-2 Thomas, John, Benjamin, David, Nathaniel and Susannah Hart were raised in Hanover county, Virginia, and about the middle of the last century removed to North Carolina (then a now country). Thomas settled near Hillsborough. David and my father, Nathaniel, settled in what is now Caswell county. My father built the Red House and lived there until 1779 when he removed to Kentucky. David Hart lived and died there, his family are living on lands in Tennessee and Kentucky. John Hart died in early life, leaving one child, Susannah, who married John Luttrell, who was killed in an engagement with the Tories and his widow married Doctor John Umstead. Benjamin Hart removed to Georgia and died there. Susannah married James Gooch and died leaving two children, James and Nancy who married Jesse Benton, the father of Thomas Hart Benton and Jesse Benton, Colonel Thomas Hart came to Kentucky in the fall 1775 and David Hart in the spring 1776. My father was here more than half his time from the spring of 1775 to the fall of 1779, he had travelled the Wilderness road 14 times, he was killed on the 22nd of July 1782 at Boonsborough. LETTER BY NATHANIEL HART TO DRAAPER. 1853. 2CC29 Col Thomas Hart was born and raised in Hanover county, Virginia, being the eldest of five sons and one daughter of Thomas Hart of Hanover. The daughter being the grandmother of Col Thomas Benton of Missouri. He removed to Orange county North Carolina about the year 1760 where he married a lady of fortune and where he continued to reside until the invasion of that State by Cornwallis in 1780 or 81, when he made a hurried sale of his lands and removed through Virginia to Hagerstown in Maryland, where he made a temporary residence with the view of removing the next spring to Kentucky. But the death of my grandfather by the Indians just before the fatal battle ofthe Blue Licks, deterred him from his favorite purpose until the spring of 1794. As the older members of his family were daughters, my father (then 24 years of age) escorted his uncles family from Maryland to Kentucky and upon their arrival at Lexington, immediately started on Waynes Campaign, where he acted as Aid de Camp to Gen Todd of the Kentucky Volunteers in the battle of the Fallen Timbers. Col Thomas Harts son, Capt Nathaniel Gray Hart, was afterwards killed near Waynes Battlefield, at the battle of the Raisin in 1813. Col Thomas Hart died in 1807. -- Bob Francis, 1920A Butner St., Ft. Eustis, VA 23604 My Homepage is: http://www.shawhan.com Ruddell's Fort Page: http://www.shawhan.com/ruddlesfort.html Early Bourbon Co. Fam. Pg.: http://www.shawhan.com/bourbonfamilies.html Bourbon Co., Ky., Bios: http://www.shawhan.com/biographies.html Shawhan Genealogy: http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~shawhan/Homepage.html