Individual Details

The first settlement made in the area that was to become Bourbon Co, KY was that of Isaac Ruddell. The settlement was known as Ruddell's Station. They were attacked by the English and Indians under the command of Capt Henry Bird, 22 Jun 1780 - an attack which soon became a massacre. Isaac's infant son was torn from his mother's arms and killed.. Those in the fort that were not killed in the attack were taken prisoner. Isaac's sons Stephen and Abram were both adopted into Indian families and lived many years with the Shawnee. His nephews John & James, and niece Sarah - all children of Archibald Ruddell - were also taken prisoner. John was killed.

"Be Safe and Keep Your Powder Dry" by Daryl Skaggs, Cynthiana, KY
Captain Isaac Ruddell founder of Ruddell's (Ruddle's) Station in Bourbon County Kentucky. During the Revolution, he as captured by Shawnee under a British Commander in a joint British-Shawnee attack, his sons were adopted by the Shawnee. After the war, he returned to Bourbon County and established a grist mill on the Licking River, and donated the land for Stoner Mouth Church and Cemeteray where he and wife are buried. The location of Isaac Ruddell’s grist mill, the “mill seat,” required legal authorization and a proper location for the operation. Isaac Ruddell chose a good site for his home and mill at the confluence of Hinkston and Stoner Creeks, which formed the South Fork of the Licking River. John Hinkston had previously built a fort at this location, but abandoned it by 1776. The Ruddells and other families later occupied the place that became known as Ruddell’s Station.
Although the highway marker tells the story of the mill, Ruddell’s Station was involved in an earlier historic event. In 1780, the old Hinkston fort and Ruddell’s home was captured by British Captain Henry Byrd in command of about 1000 British and Native American troops as part of the frontier action during the Revolutionary War. During the capture about 20 people were killed, including Isaac Ruddell’s three year old child. A number of other pioneers were made prisoner and taken to Detroit. Among the prisoners were Ruddell’s sons, Stephen and Abram.
Stephen and Abram Ruddell spent several years among their Native American captors. Stephen Ruddell later married a native woman, but returned to a home his father built for him to entice the young man back to Bourbon County. However, Stephen retained many of his Indian ways, including wearing his hair long and wearing earrings. Stephen later became a minister and eventually moved to Missouri in 1820. Abram Ruddell ran a saw mill upon his return to Bourbon County and served as a volunteer in the War of 1812.
Abram Spears bought the mill in 1836 when it was a factory for cotton and wool. Later the mill was turned it into the Ford and Bowen Distillery. Distilling was a logical side product for mills, as they were often the place where grains were processed that were needed to produce whiskey. In addition, the river provided the mill's power source as well as the transportation system to get the finished product to market. The local rich Bourbon County soil produced surpluses of the necessary corn and rye, and the area's limestone water springs were also an important ingredient in whiskey. Captain John Haggin (1753 – 1 March 1825) was one of the earliest settlers of Kentucky, arriving in the spring of 1775 with his wife's uncle, Col. John Hinkston. A famous "Indian fighter", he was on numerous occasions the hero of attacks against pioneer settlements, was dispatched on many expeditions, and was involved in many other aspects of the New West.Hinkston’s Station, in Harrison County, on South Licking, 1 miles above Higgins' Blockhouse, and a short distance below Hinkston creek; Higgins' Blockhouse was located on bank of Licking, 1 miles above Cynthiana, Harrison County, opposite mouth of Sellers' Run before 1786. In 1769, Daniel Boone wintered in a cave on the land occupied first as Trigg's Station, later called Viney Grove. Settlers were attracted by the deep soils, excellent for crops such as tobacco, corn, grains, strawberries and hay; the fertile grasslands were excellent for raising livestock.Trigg’s Station, was located four miles northeast of Harrodsburg in Mercer County on Cane Run about four miles from its mouth at the Dick’s River. The station was settled in 1780 by Colonel Stephen Trigg and called Viney Grove because of the number of large grape vines. John Haggin lived there and it was sometimes called Haggin’s Station.This site was usually referred to as "Haggin's Blockhouse" rather than a station although it served the same purposes. John Haggin had come to Kentucky in April of 1775 and and raised a corn crop about eight miles above Cynthiana on Hinkston or Stoner Creek (Draper mss. 11CC257263). Hinkston’s Station was first settled by Isaac Ruddle and others, and called Ruddle's Station until "taken by the Indians" in 1780; when resettled, afterwards, it was oftenest called Hinkston's, after John Hinkson, the most prominent of the re-settlers. Ruddell's Station was a pioneer settlement on the South Fork of the Licking River south of what is now Cynthiana in Harrison county on the trail from McClelland's Station to Lower Blue Licks. Captain Isaac Ruddell (1737-January 1812) was an 18th-century American Virginia State Line officer during the American Revolutionary War and a Kentucky frontiersman. He was an officer commanding a company under BGEN George Rogers Clark (1777–1782). He was the founder of Ruddell's Station, one of the earliest settlements in Bourbon County, Kentucky. He founded another settlement also known as Ruddell's Station, or fort, on the site of an abandoned fort on the Licking River in present-day Harrison County, Kentucky. During the Revolutionary War, the settlement was destroyed by a joint Canadian and Shawnee party under British officer Captain Henry Bird in 1780. He and his family were held prisoner in Detroit for over two years before their release.
Captain Isaac Ruddell was also a brother-in-law to Kentucky pioneers Isaac, Joseph and John Jacob Bowman. His grandson, John M. Ruddell, was a prominent Kentucky statesman and landowner. Captain Isaac Ruddell born in Nottingham, Pennsylvania his family moved to Virginia in the early 1740s. Ruddell became a captain in the Washington County militia; 6 March 1797 in Shenandoah Co, Virginia. Captain Isaac Ruddell married Elizabeth Bowman. In 1774 or 1775, he accompanied the Bowmans to Kentucky and while living in Boonesborough, Ruddell joined his brother-in-law John Bowman who was en route to Harrodsburg with two Virginia militia companies. Ruddell would later replace John Dunkin as one of Bowman's officers. He also served under General George Rogers Clark during the Illinois campaign, in charge of the Corn Island party and of the military stores left there. For his service, he was awarded 3,234 acres (13.09 km2) of Clark's Grant in the Indiana Territory.
In the Spring of 1779, he established a fortified settlement on the South fork of the Licking River known as Ruddell's Station (or Fort Liberty) in Harrison County one mile from present-day Lair Station. The fort was built on the site of Hinkson's Station which was previously abandoned several years before. Along with Martin's Station, located on Stoner Creek near present-day Paris, the settlement became home to a large number of Pennsylvania German families over the next year. During the American Revolutionary War however, an Indian (including Shawnee) raiding party of 600 - 900 led by British officer Captain Henry Bird and 150 British soldiers left twenty+ settlers dead. The approx. 470 survivors, along with he and his wife (and captives from Martin's Station), were force marched to Detroit where they remained prisoners until the end of the war.
During the march to Detroit, Ruddell was separated from is wife and children. Shortly after arriving in Detroit, Ruddell protested to the commandant of Bird disregarding his agreement of safe passage in exchange for their surrender. He was reunited with his wife and two daughters, however his two sons were turned over to the Shawnee who were eventually adopted by the tribe. Stephen Ruddell, 12 years old at the time of the attack, was accepted into the family of Chief Blackfish and eventually became the adopted brother of Tecumseh. The younger son, Abraham Ruddell, when repatriated from the Indians, by the War Department in 1794 could barely speak English and later settled in Arkansas.
Shortly after their arrival in Detroit, Ruddell and his family were allowed to live on a nearby island where they grew corn and supplied food for their fellow prisoners. He also reportedly helped several men to escape from the camp. He and several other prisoners were allowed to return to Virginia in 1782. Soon after arriving, however, Ruddell was accused by several of his fellow prisoners of collaborating with the British and was charged with treason in Frederick County but was acquitted. His friendship with the commandant is thought to have been based on Byrd's poor treatment of Ruddle's party as well as both men belonging to the Masonic fraternity.
Ruddell gave a written account of the attack which began appearing in newspapers in late 1783. Returning to Bourbon County in 1784, they built a home at the head of the Licking River four years later. He also built a grist mill on the northside of Hinkston Bridge and, in 1795, a sawmill which was operated by his son Abram. The town is still in existence, known today as Ruddell's Mills. He also donated land to the Stoner Mouth Church and cemetery. He died in January 1812.
In 2008, the Ruddle's and Martin's Stations Historic Association dedicated a new monument for Captain Ruddell.The site was included in Hinkston's 1,400-acre settlement and preemptive grant, filed in 1784, and is marked by a stone monument. It was settled in 1775 by John Hinkston and several families and further fortified by Simon Kenton and others in 1776. Hinkston's Station was briefly abandoned and then occupied and enlarged by Issac Ruddell and his family in 1779 seeking protection from Indian raids. British troops and Indians attacked Ruddell's Station in 1780, killing about twenty and marching the rest to Detroit as prisoners. The Ruddells were released a few years later and returned to their original home, which became the town of Ruddells Mills in Bourbon county, a few miles south of Ruddell's Station. John Hinkson is one of the most fascinating sons of the 18th century American frontier, and like this frontier, he has mostly vanished from our collective memory. Today, all that remains of this enigmatic figure are two waterways that bear his name: Hinckston's Run, a small stream that "comes down through the classic region of 'Frog Hollow,' in Millville (Johnstown, Pennsylvania) and flows into the Conemaugh"1 and "Hinkston Creek," a tributary which joins with Stoner Creek at Ruddles Mills, Kentucky, to form the south fork of the Licking river.n 1775 John Hinkston and other settlers built fifteen crude cabins on a broad flat ridge above the South Fork of the Licking River, along an old game trail from McClelland's Station (Scott County) to Lower Blue Licks. This site is now in Harrison County. Simon Kenton and Thomas Williams helped build a blockhouse at the station in the winter of 1776-77. Indian threats then caused its abandonment. Isaac Ruddell enlarged and fortified the station in 1779; after that, the site was interchangeably referred to as Ruddell's or Hinkston's. A large number of Pennsylvania German families lived there and at Martin's Station, only a few miles away. Ruddell's Station was attacked by Capt. Henry Byrd and his British and Indian troops in 1780. About twenty inhabitants were killed at the site. The survivors were subjected to a forced march to Detroit, where they remained prisoners for the remainder of the Revolutionary War. The bones of the victims were later gathered and buried in a mass grave covered with stones.

Birth	Ca 1729	Chester County, Pennsylvania
Death	Ca 1812	Bourbon County, Kentucky
Marriage		Elizabeth Bowman

Spouse	Elizabeth Bowman (1737 - 1815)
Child	Cornelius Ruddell ( - 1787)
Child	Living
Child	Abraham Ruddell ( - )
Child	Stephen Ruddell ( - )

Father	John Ruddell (1695 - 1781)
Mother	Mary Cook (1695 - 1781)
Sibling	John Ruddell Jr (1716 - 1749)
Sibling	Cornelius Ruddell (1717 - 1798)
Sibling	Ann Ruddell (1720 - )
Sibling	Stephen Ruddell (1725 - 1800)
Sibling	Archibald Ruddell (1727 - 1787)
Sibling	Clara Ruddell (1735 - 1822)
Sibling	Living
Sibling	George Ruddell (1740 - 1805)