(I have checked out a book on the history of Tenn. and thought I'd share the info on Memphis and/or Shelby Co. with the list. Also, the Shelby Co. TNGenWeb county coordinator may use this info on the site. I haven't looked through all of the book so I'm not ready to do lookups if I'm going to do any at all. It doesn't have personal histories other than major historical figures. I'll send Memphis, Shelby Co. info as I come to it. -Laurel Crook, lcrook@fhu.edu) ----------------------------------------------------- >From History of Tennessee by William Robertson Garrett and Albert Virgil Goodpasture; pub. 1900 by Brandon Printing Co., Nashville, Tenn. p. 171-172 MEMPHIS - Shelby County, erected in 1819, was the first county that lay wholly in West Tennessee. The commanding position of the Chickasaw Bluffs, where Memphis now stands, marked it as one of the most important points on the Mississippi River. It was recognized by the French and Spanish, who erected forts there before the earliest settlements in this State. They viewed it from a military standpoint. Afterwards far-seeing men recognized its equally important commercial advantages. In the troublous winter of 1791-92, when General Robertson called for volunteers to act as spies and rangers, John Rice and some other young men left Sevier's Station, on the north side of Red River, near Clarksville, intending to proceed up the Cumberland by boat, and join him at Nashville. Discovering their purpose, a party of Indians under Doublehead, crossing a peninsula made by the river just above Clarksville, lay in wait for them at a place now called Seven Mile Ferry, and as their boat came round a bend, fired a volley into it, which killed John Rice, three sons of Colonel Valentine Sevier, and John Curtis. Rice appears to have been a young man, not only of energy and enterprise, but of sound judgment and foresight. When North Carolina established the land office known as John Armstrong's office, in 1783, which opened all the land in this State to entry, he obtained a grant for 5,000 acres of the best lands on the Chickasaw Bluffs. By his will, this grant was bequeathed to his brother, Elisha Rice, who, in 1794, sold it to John Overton for $55. Overton then conveyed a half interest in the same to his friend, Andrew Jackson. The devoted and uninterrupted friendship through life of these two men is as beautiful as that of Jonathan and David. For politic reasons, Jackson sold his entire interest in the property before it was developed. On this tract the city of Memphis was laid out in 1819.