YOUTH

When Daniel Boone was a youth his family moved to North Carolina.  The exact date of this move is not known, but it is thought to be around 1752, when Daniel was about eighteen.  Squire Boone invested in land close to the Yadkin River, about eight miles from Wilkesboro, North Carolina. 

ADULTHOOD

 The first land purchase by the Boones was in 1753 on the banks of the Yadkin River. Daniel Boone’s first home site is a cause for much debate.  On the east bank of the Yadkin, now in Davidson County is a high eminence above Boone’s Ford on which there had been a cabin as long as could be remembered, however there are no county records for the property.

 In 1756 Daniel Boone and Rebecca Bryan were wed and for the first five years Boone led a quiet farmer’s life along the Yadkin River.  The political unrest and social conditions in western North Carolina caused Boone to search for a home in the Western wilderness.  He traveled to Kentucky in May of 1769 and returned for his wife and family two years later. The Boone’s did not return to North Carolina.

BOONE NC and DANIEL BOONE

The community that is now the county seat of Watauga County, previously known simply as Councill’s store, was named Boone in 1894 in honor of Daniel Boone who spent many overnight hunting trips there.

When Watauga County, from an Indian word for “beautiful waters”, was formed, the legislature called the county seat Boone because of the location of Boone’s cabin which was within a few hundred feet of its courthouse.

NC DESCENDANTS

While Daniel Boone moved his immediate family to Kentucky, several of his brothers and sisters remained in North Carolina. Numerous residents of Watauga County claim descent from Boone’s sister, Sarah Boone Wilcockson. There are no known direct descendants of Daniel Boone living in North Carolina.  From tradition, we know of several relatives who resided in Watauga County.  One niece of Daniel Boone, Anna, was married in a log cabin about one mile east of Boone. 

Jesse Boone, Daniel’s nephew, lived at the top of the Blue Ridge.  His cabin was located approximately four miles above Shull’s Mills, just to the right of the old Morganton Road.  It sat in a five acre field and the foundation stones on the old chimney and the spring can still be pointed out.  The grant for the one hundred acre tract of land was made on November 29, 1817.

LANDMARKS

• A monument of stone and concrete was erected at the identical spot where the log cabin stood in which Daniel Boone and his companions slept when they were on hunting trips through this region. Now disappeared, the chimney stones remained until 1911.  The monument has since been moved to River Street at Water Street in downtown Boone NC.
• A Daniel Boone statue can also be found at the AppState Duck Pond on the corner of River Street and Stadium Drive in downtown Boone NC.
• A Daniel Boone trail marker is located at the Watauga County Courthouse

In October of 1913, the Daughters of the American Revolution erected six markers in Watauga County.  Their locations are listed below:

• Cooks Gap, six miles east of Boone
• Three Forks Baptist Church, 3 miles from Boone, Daniel Boone’s relatives attended the church. This was the  first church in Boone and was established in 1790
• Hodges Gap, two miles west of Boone
• Graveyard on Straddle Gap, four miles west of Boone
• Zionville, near the Tennessee line

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