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Daniel McAninch and William McAninch, 1796-1797, Greene County, Tennessee

During the 1770s and 1780s, Daniel McAninch (born 1748-1752) was moving west across

Pennsylvania, and married Mary Smith in 1776, in Cumberland County, colonial Pennsylvania,

and they lived there for many years before moving farther west [Article Notes 1] [2]

During 1790, Daniel and his family were living on the western frontier on the Allegheny River,

‘Indian Country’ in Washington Township, Westmoreland County, Penn. [Notes 3] [4] [5].

Braddocks Road (1755) and Forbes Road (1758) had opened the route to western Pennsylvania,

although, after the end of the Revolutionary War, both roads had degraded to ‘pack mule’ tracks,

which was the condition of these roads in 1790 and subsequent years.

Sometime after the 1790 census, Daniel McAninch, William McAninch, and their families were

on the move again, going south through the Great Valley of the Shenandoah and west into eastern

Tennessee, where they stopped for a year or two in Greene County, eastern Tennessee, 1796-1797.

"The Old Wagon Road" "When the crops were in, they started. Early in the morning - even early

for farm people, they'd set out. During the first years, they walked, leading five or six pack animals

laden with supplies: tools, seed, fabric. In places, the famous path they trod was only three or four

feet wide. The wilderness literally crept right up to their feet and brushed their faces . . ." [Note 7]

Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, to eastern Tennessee, between 1790 and 1796

Daniel McAninch and his family left Westmoreland County sometime after the 1790 census, and

Daniel and William McAninch are next found six years later, in Greene County, eastern Tennessee.

The Great Philadelphia Wagon Road was the route through Cumberland County, Pennsylvania,

across Maryland and the Potomac River, through Winchester, Virginia, and continuing south up

through the Great Valley of the Shenandoah River to Big Lick (now Roanoke), Virginia [Note 8].

South of Big Lick (now Roanoke), the route divided, with the Carolina Road going south to the

Carolinas and Georgia. Alternatively, from Big Lick (now Roanoke), the Frontier Trail went west,

connecting to Daniel Boone’s Wilderness Trail west of Bristol, Virginia, near Jonesborough and

Johnson City, Tennessee, and crossed the Nolichucky River, which flows through Greene County.

The land south of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, is very mountainous, almost impassable

(the formidable Allegheny Mountains, present-day West Virginia), and, in the early 1790s,

Daniel McAninch would have been forced to travel east first, to get to the Great Wagon Road.

Since Daniel and Mary (Smith) McAninch had lived in Cumberland County before, and knew

people there, Daniel and his family probably went back to Cumberland County for a while

(maybe some of his wife Mary Smith’s family was still there?). In any case, that was the only

practical way to go south, and it was 160-170 miles to go back east to Cumberland County,

probably walking all the way, and, hopefully, with some pack animals to help carry the load.

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Daniel McAninch and William McAninch, 1796-1797, Greene County, Tennessee

McA. Family Hist. NL v.XXXII (32) n.2 / Nov. 2024 / Copyright Frank McAninch / p.2024-15