Buncombe County NcArchives History - Books .....Erected, 1782
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Fran Chancellor http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00016.html#0003841 February 25, 2018, 9:01 pm

Book Title: Western North Carolina; A History(1730-1913)

COUNTY HISTORY Buncombe County. In 1781 or 1782 settlers from the blockhouse at 
Old Fort, McDowell county as it is now, crossed the mountains to the head of 
the Swannanoa river, and became trespassers on the Cherokee territory, the Blue 
Ridge at that time being the boundary line. Samuel Davidson, his wife and child 
were among the first. They brought a female negro slave with them, and settled 
a short distance east of Gudger's ford of Swannanoa river, and near what is now 
Azalia. He was soon afterwards killed by Indians, and his wife and child and
slave hurried through the mountains back to Old Fort. 

An expedition to avenge his death set out, with the late Major Ben. Burgin, who 
died at Old Fort in November, 1874, at the age of ninety-five, among the number 
and conquered the Indians at the mouth of Rock House creek. By this time, 
however, several other settlements had been effected on the Swannanoa from its 
head to its mouth by the Alexanders, Davidsons, Smiths and others, the earliest 
being about the mouth of Bee Tree creek, a little above this being the 
Edmundson field, the first cleared in Buncombe. 

Soon another company passed through Bull gap and settled on upper Reems creek, 
while still others came in by way of what is now Yancey county and settled on 
lower Reems and Flat creeks. Some of the people who had been with Sevier at 
Watauga settlement settled on the French Broad above the mouth of Swannanoa, 
and on Hominy creek. Some from South Carolina settled still higher on the 
French Broad. 

The Cheery Name of Buncombe. The Swannanoa was now recognized as the dividing 
line between Burke and Rutherford counties, from portions of which counties 
Buncombe was subsequently formed, and named for Edward Buncombe, who had been a 
colonel in the Revolutionary War. 

In 1791 David Vance and William Davidson, the former representing Burke and the 
latter Rutherford, agreed upon the formation of a new county from portions of 
both these counties west of the Blue Ridge, its western boundary to be the 
Tennessee line. 

First Court at the Gum Spring. In April, 1792, at the residence of Col. William 
Davidson on the south bank of the Swannanoa, half a mile above its mouth, 
subsequently called the Gum Spring place, Buncombe county was organized, 
pursuant to the act which had been ratified January 14, 1792. On December 31, 
1792, another act recited that the commissioners provided for in the first act 
had failed to fix "the center and agree where public buildings" should be 
erected....

Arthur, John Preston. Western North Carolina; a history (1730-1913) (Kindle 
Locations 2732-2752).  . Kindle Edition. 

 

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