Rusk: The Adventures of Gilbert Imlay 
7 
III 
At the close of the Revolutionary War, Imlay, like many 
other land-hungry ex-officers of the American army, turned 
toward the Western country, where white settlers, who had 
first penetrated the region only a few years before, were now 
appearing in considerable numbers. It was the day of Daniel 
Boone, John Filson, and Simon Kenton, and of petty Indian 
wars ; ■ and, once the tide of immigration had set in, it was 
also the day of the speculator in lands. In March, 1783,^ 
Imlay purchased a tract of land in Fayette, one of the three 
counties into which the District of Kentucky was at that time 
divided; and in the autumn of that year he attempted thru 
the agency of Henry Green, deputy surveyor of that county, 
to obtain a clear title.® It does not seem likely, however, that 
ImJay himself appeared in Kentucky before the spring of the 
following year, 1784, According to his own account, in which 
he does not state the year, he left Pittsburgh on his Western 
journey sometime in March and arrived at Limestone less 
than five days later. That the year was 1784 and that his 
own statement as to the month is correct seems likely, because 
at that time, and not until then, begins the long court record 
of the business and legal entanglements that marked his resi- 
dence of not quite two years in Kentucky.^^ 
On the seventh of the following April, Imlay, who, as we 
Book of Forman’s Regiment (MS, 3777, p. 4) as omitted in July, 1778, seems to 
indicate that he was temporarily disabled about that time. This entry was made, 
it may be noted, shortly after the Battle of Monmouth had been fought near the 
Imlay home. Some minor details of Imlay’s service during 1777 are recorded in the 
files of the Adjutant-General of New Jersey: on May 19 of that year Imlay sent, from 
Haddonfield, a memorial to Governor Livingston and the Council of Safety of New 
Jersey, asking that certain prisoners confined in Philadelphia be released so that they 
might join his company, in which they had agreed to enlist ; three days later the 
Council of Safety responded to this request by ordering that the prisoners be sent for, 
and on May 24 seven of the latter were enrolled and delivered to Lieutenant Gilbert 
Imlay (MS. 4126 and Council of Safety, pp. 63 and 67-69). It is of interest to note 
that the Peter Imlay who was mentioned in the will of Alice Imlay in 1761 as the 
father of Gilbert is said to have served during the Revolutionary War as a minute 
man of the Monmouth County militia and to have been a prisoner in 1778-1779 (see 
Lee’s Genealogiaal and Personal Memorial of Mercer County, Neiv Jersey, II, 634). 
® See Imlay to Triplet, July 15, 1784, in Vol. 32, Innes MSS., Library of Congress. 
® Imlay’s memorandum to James Marshall, November 6, 1785, in Vol. 32, Innes MSS., 
Library of Congress. 
1'’ A Topographical Description, London, 1792, p. 40. 
Further negative proof in favor of 1784 as the date of Imlay’s arrival in Ken- 
tucky — proof which, however, is neither chronologically nor geographically complete — 
is offered by the poll lists of Jefferson County for 1781 and 1782, in which Imlay’s 
name does not appear. See Minute Book A (for 1780-1783), Jefferson County Court. 
Minute Book No. 1 (1784-1785), Jefferson County Court, pp. 3 and 5. 
