Tennessee (Davidson County), Nashville — Founding of Nashville On Monday, April 24, 1780, two pioneers, James Robertson and John Donelson, shook hands upon the completion of a reunion at the site on which you now stand. Each man, one by land, the other by water, played out in a two-fold plan for a new settlement that grew into present-day Nashville. Robertson, at the head of his mounted band of 226 frontiersmen, traversed the long, circuitous overland route through Kentucky and Tennessee down to the Great Salt Lick. His group arrived on Christmas Day, . . . — Map (db m24379) http://www.hmdb.org/results.asp?County=Davidson%20County&State=Tennessee Tennessee (Davidson County), Nashville — 3A-36 — Cockrill Spring The house of John Cockrill, an early settler, stood about 60 yards north, near a large spring, whose waters ran northeast into Lick Branch, which emptied Great Salt Lick, around which Nashville was founded. A blacksmith shop stood under the great oak tree nearby. The spring was a stopping place for travelers along Natchez Trace. — Map (db m12765 http://www.hmdb.org/results.asp?County=Davidson%20County&State=Tennessee General James Randolph Robertson removed to the settlements into what becomes Tennessee, his sister is married to a Johnson who died at French Lick 1779 Dec. 6 Michael Rogers, "... a Witness thereto...," proved a bond before the Wake County Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions, in the amount of £1000, "...from James Robertson, John Robertson Charles Robertson & David Johnston to Dempsey Powell ..."for the remaining interests in the Neuse River land http://www.robertson-ancestry.com/1221-vg-02.htm A Kinsman of one of my McElyea fore fathers one Great Grand Uncle James McElyea first settled lands in what becomes the State of will be found on the boats of Col. Donnellson’s flotilla which began December 22, 1778, James McElyea was killed by Indians in 1785 near French Lick. (per the book written by Clara Bell Hunter McElye’a in Transient) On 1801 Feb 26: A deed was renewed for the lands of my Forefather Hudson Johnson, which shows he bought lands on fifth day of September 1784 from Stockley Donelson the son of Col John Donelson who with my Kinsman General James Randolph Robertson will found the Watauga Settlement of what becomes the Sate of Tennessee. Abner Johnson ( Brother of Gideon Johnson) and his family likely came to Nashville in November 1788, with his sister Mary Ursula Pillow and her family. Abner is mentioned in Rockingham land records in 1786 and 1787, but no later; his son Abner Jr. told census takers he was born in TN in 1792; and Davidson Co. court records of the early 1790s refer to Abner Sr. In that era, little of the state was settled except for the eastern mountain counties and the Red River communities around Nashville, also known as Nashboro or French Lick. March 17. 1792 Issued Certificates Viz. James Glasgow esquire Secretary of the State