Posted on: Jackson County, WV Bios Reply Here: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/genbbs.cgi/USA/WV/JacksonBios/156 Surname: HUGHES, HANSHAW, SAYRE, COZART, PROCTOR, GANDEE, TANNER ------------------------- This sketch taken from "Pioneers of Jackson County", by John House, it appears in the section "Lower Sandy Valley". Jesse Hughes Jesse Hughes, the renowned scout and Indian fighter, spent the last years of his life on the Ohio River, near the mouth of Big Sandy. He first bought land at Sandyville, but lost it through a former patent. It would appear that Hughes came to this section a few years before the closing of Indian hostilities. He had three daughters, Nancy, Agnes, Massie and Luraine. Nancy and Massie were hunting cows on Turkey Run, which enters the river a mile above Ravenswood, when they were discovered by a party of Indians, who made a capture of the latter, and carried her off and kept her in captivity for two years. After the Treaty of Greenville brought peace to the border settlements, Jesse went in search of his daughter, but did not at first recognize her, as she was dressed in Indian fashion, with rings in her ears, mouth, and on all her fingers, her face and body smeared with paint, and she carried a bow and arrows. Nancy Hughes married George W. Hanshaw, who lived in a cabin on the site of the house occupied a few years since by W.S. Proctor, on the old Proctor farm, above Ravenswood. Jesse Hanshaw, who lived near the mouth of Mill Creek, was born there about 1830. G.W. Hanshaw at one time owned the Blake, or Varner farm on Sandy. Jesse Hughes' other daughter, Luraine, was married to Uriah Sayre, and lived at the mouth of Ground Hog, on the Ohio side of the river. Her daughter, Lura Sayre, married Lafayette Cozart, of Jackson County, who relates that his wife's grandfather, Jesse Hughes, after he became old, wandered off into the woods. He was found on either Turkey or Lick Run, and though not dead when found, died very soon after. He was buried on the Proctor farm, some say, at the "old graveyard" but it is uncertain whether the exact site of the grave can now be located. Massie Hughes, daughter of Jesse and heroine of the Indian capture married Uriah Gandee, Jr, and lived near Gandeeville. It is said that the wife of the famous Indian fighter, Grace Tanner Hughes, spent the last years of her life with them, and at her death in 1839, was buried there. There are numerous persons in Jackson and adjoining counties who claim descent from Jesse Hughes, or his near relatives.