WAR JOURNAL
JOHN HAZARD (1740-1822)
Clark's Illinois Regiment - Virginia State Troops
John was born 13 January 1740 on the family farm in North Furnam Parish of Richmond County, Virginia. His father, Henry, had been born in Richmond County in 1713, and his grandfather, John, had been born there in 1693.On 6 June 1762, when he was 22 years old, John married a Richmond County girl, Judith Hanks. Her aunt, Nancy, was the mother of Abraham Lincoln. John and Judith had eight children. Three of them, all boys, were born in Virginia. Before 1777 the Hazards and their sons moved to what is now Taylor County, Kentucky, where the first of their five daughters was born in 1777, the year Kentucky was recognized as a county in Virginia. In 1780, when he was 40 years old, John enlisted in Colonel George Rogers Clark's Illinois Regiment of Virginia State Troops.
In 1777-1779 Clark, a Virginia surveyor, who was a lieutenant colonel in the Virginia militia, had commanded an expeditionary force in the Northwest Territory. For the first two years of the Revolutionary War, American frontier settlements in the Ohio River Valley had suffered from Indian attacks. Clark and his men came down the Ohio River from Fort Pitt and established a base on Corn Island ,at the Falls of the Ohio (modern Louisville) .From there they fought the British and Indians in Indiana and Illinois and are credited with saving the Northwest Territory for the Americans.
John's military records indicate he enlisted 28 March 1880 and served in Captain Robert George's company of artillery from that date to 3 December 1781. For this period of 20 months and six days, John was paid $8.33 per month, a total of $168+
John's company transported guns, cannon and wagons. He was listed as a mattross--a gunner's mate who helped load, fire and sponge the guns--and rose to the rank of sergeant.
The last entry on John's military records was on 1 Sep ember 1782 when his name appears on a muster roll of Capt. George's company of artillery at Fort Nelson, Kentucky.
After his military service, John returned to Woodford County, Kentucky, where he lived until his death at the age of 82 on 18 August 1822.
(Note: Lincoln County was created from Kentucky County inVirginia in1780. Green County was created from Lincoln and Nelson counties in 1792. Taylor County was created from Green County in1848.)
John's second daughter, Nancy, who had been born in Woodford County about 1779, had married Thomas Miskell, a stonemason, on 7 August 1811inLincoln County.
The Miskells had 11 children. One of them was Amanda, who was born 18 March 1821in Green County, Kentucky. She married George Washington Shipp on 25 March 1841 and died in 1870 in Taylor County, Kentucky. She was the ancient grandmother of the compiler of this journal.