Squire Boone: My God My Life Hath Much Befriended

It is not easy to be the little brother of a famous man. Many worthy and honorable siblings of noteworthy men have faded into the mists of history. So it is with the little brother of Daniel Boone. Squire Boone was born on October 5, 1744, about ten years after his famous older brother. Squire was the tenth of the eleven children of his parents, Squire and Sarah Boone. The family was originally part of the Quaker community in Pennsylvania. When Squire was still a young boy, the Boone family moved down the great wagon road through the Shenandoah Valley into the valley of the Yadkin River in what is now North Carolina.

At the age of 15, Squire was apprenticed to a relative back in Pennsylvania named Samuel Boone, a riflemaker, and thus it was that he learned the important craft of gunsmithing. He became a skilled gunsmith over time, and even made the famous rifle for his older brother, Daniel, a rifle that Daniel Boone named “tick-licker” claiming that he could “lick” a tick off the back of a deer with it! Like most of the Boone boys, he yearned for the wilderness, and before his apprenticeship was up, he was off again for the frontier settlements of the Yadkin valley.

Squire married his sweetheart, Miss Jane Van Cleave, when he was twenty-one and she was only fifteen. Jane was young, but she was strong, smart, pretty, and brave! Above all, she feared God and loved her husband. She was willing to move into a cave with her new husband while he completed the construction of the log cabin that would be their home.

Soon after his marriage to Jane, Squire accompanied his brother, Daniel, into the wilderness of Kentucky for the first time. Over the course of the next several years, Squire and Daniel made several “long hunts” over the mountains in the rich lands filled with elk, buffalo, deer, and fat bears. But Kentucky was not only rich with game, it was also jealously guarded by various native tribes that also hunted there. Of the eight men who first entered Kentucky to explore and to hunt, only two survived to return to the settlements. Those two were Daniel and Squire Boone.

One of the most remarkable events in these early longhunts was the reunion of Daniel and Squire in 1770. In the spring, Squire left Daniel alone in the wilderness, and the two brothers agreed to meet in a specific clearing on July 27, 1770. Squire took the furs they had prepared back to the settlements to trade for new horses, gunpowder, and lead. On the way home, he was robbed by the Indians, but he escaped with his life. He enjoyed a few days with his wife, Jane, and his growing children. He assured his sister-in-law that all was well with Daniel. Then he set off again into the wilderness. At high noon on July 27, 1770, Daniel stepped into a clearing from one side. Squire stepped into the clearing from the other side. The two brothers had a joyous reunion and exchanged news and supplies. Many historians over the years have marveled at this reunion. With no maps or modern navigational equipment, Daniel and Squire met on the exact day and at the exact place they had agreed upon months earlier.

In 1775, the Boone brothers, along with others like Simon Kenton, opened the wilderness road through the Cumberland Gap, blazing a trail into Kentucky that would be followed by thousands of feet. They came as families. As soon as possible, Daniel and Squire brought their wives and children into Kentucky, facing bravely all the dangers of the frontier. Life on the frontier was not without its hardships. Daniel lost his son James near the Cumberland Gap, tortured to death by the Shawnee. Squire himself was wounded eleven times in dozens of fights with Indians. He had his head bashed by a tomahawk outside the gates of Harrodsburg in 1775. Squire’s brother, Daniel, took two boards and wrapped them with cloth to bind the skull back together so it could heal. Squire would carry a scar on his forehead for the rest of his life.

At Boonesboro, in 1778, Blackfish and over 400 of his warriors surrounded the wooden stockade where the frontiersmen lived with their families. Squire was severely wounded by a bullet in the shoulder during a parley that turned treacherous. Daniel dug the bullet out of his shoulder with his hunting knife. During his convalescence, Squire organized a little group of children to shoot “squirt guns” made out of broken rifle barrels onto the burning shingles on top of the blockhouses after the Shawnee shot burning arrows with the purpose of burning down the fort. Squire went on to settle near present day Shelbyville, Kentucky and became widely respected as an expert hunter, skilled surveyor, and honored minister of the Gospel. Always deeply reverent, Squire became a Baptist minister, performed the first wedding in Kentucky, and organized churches wherever he settled.

For a few years, Squire went west to Missouri where his brother, Daniel, had settled with his family. Squire and his family also lived for a time near present day Vicksburg, Mississippi. Like Daniel, Squire loved to rove far and wide, always looking for a better situation for his wife and children. Squire finally settled down in Indiana near a cave where he had once taken refuge from pursuing Indians. He always felt that this cave was a token of God’s protection, and it was his desire to live the final days of his life near this cave.

Squire wrote this poem and inscribed it in the walls of the cave, expressing his gratitude for God’s mercy extended to him over the course of life:

I set and sing my soul’s salvation
And bless the God of my Creation!
My God my life hath much befriended
I’ll praise Him till my days are ended!

Squire Boone and his sons built a gristmill together. He was contented to have his family all around him. He and Jane had raised one daughter, Sarah, and four sons: Jonathan, Moses, Isaiah, and Enoch. In addition to the mill and their home, Squire and his boys built the first Baptist church in Indiana. It was called “Old Goshen Church.” Squire preached there regularly to an attentive congregation.

Squire Boone died of heart failure in August of 1815 at the age of 70. His sons buried him, according to his request, in the very cave where the Lord had once spared his life. Squire’s cave in southern Indiana is now called “Squire Boone Cabins” and is open to visitors. His body was found in the cave and was positively identified by the marks of the tomahawk on the skull. Squire’s bones were placed in a new walnut coffin, and he lies today in the cave awaiting the dawn of Resurrection Day.

Bibliography

The Incredible Adventures of Daniel Boone’s Kid Brother, Squire by W, Fred Conway