Hamilton Lyon (1804-abt. 1890) is my great-great grandfather. He was one of the early (1860) petroleum producers in the Paintsville, Johnson Co. KY area. These are excerpts from documents published at the time. You can read the letter that his daughter Missouri wrote after she came to live with him in 1860.
From the journal of Peter Lesley, Paintsville area, Kentucky, 1865
March 26, Sunday
Five of the party started on foot up Paint Creek, and Ogden Lewell and I, on horses, into the most tremendous land of crags, ravines, cascades, oil springs, forests and guerillas, and reached Wash Webb's, to sleep in a cabin, while an old woman with a pipe studied curiously our mode of undressing. Before retiring we had a guerilla fright; not a pleasant episode. We rode cavalry horses, by the by.
Monday, 27th
Having opened communication with the foot party (who got lost among the precipices), we continued up three miles to Lyon's Well, got specimens of oil rock, waded the creek forty times, found the XI iron ore, and joined them five miles up Little (Oil) Fork of Paint, where we ate a chicken, filled our bottles with tar, smoked the pipe of peace, discussed plans for the future, and the best mode of cutting up the 100,000 acres. Back three miles across the bend to Williams' (where the footmen had spent the night) and left them there unable to proceed. I got Carlisle to ride with me back to Paintsville, where we arrived nearly dead with fatigue. I had been very sick in the night with a sort of inflammation of the lungs, and asthma in the morning, which has stuck to me ever since.
Life and Letters of Peter and Susan Lesley
By Mary Lesley Ames
Published by G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1909
Pp 496 ff
From the journal of Peter Lesley, Paintsville area, Kentucky, 1865
March 26, Sunday
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| Hamilton Lyon's Tar Spring Petroleum Co. |
Monday, 27th
Having opened communication with the foot party (who got lost among the precipices), we continued up three miles to Lyon's Well, got specimens of oil rock, waded the creek forty times, found the XI iron ore, and joined them five miles up Little (Oil) Fork of Paint, where we ate a chicken, filled our bottles with tar, smoked the pipe of peace, discussed plans for the future, and the best mode of cutting up the 100,000 acres. Back three miles across the bend to Williams' (where the footmen had spent the night) and left them there unable to proceed. I got Carlisle to ride with me back to Paintsville, where we arrived nearly dead with fatigue. I had been very sick in the night with a sort of inflammation of the lungs, and asthma in the morning, which has stuck to me ever since.
Life and Letters of Peter and Susan Lesley
By Mary Lesley Ames
Published by G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1909
Pp 496 ff
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