"Lessley-Lesley-Leslie Family Tree":Information about Robert Leslie
Robert Leslie (b. 25 Oct 1763, d. 1822)
Notes for Robert Leslie:Extract from The Big Sandy Valley, Catlettsburg, Ky., author unknown, 1887, p. 210-212.
THE LESLIE FAMILY
Belongs to the Celtic race. William Leslie came from Ireland to America before the American Revolution, and settled in the valley of Virginia. He was a patriot, and fought against the king. Robert, his son, came to Sandy with his family in 1798, settling at the mouth of Pond, where he made a crop. He, however, was driven off by the Indians before he had been there a year. He, with his family, returned again in 1800, this time settling on John's Creek, at a place now and from that time known as the Leslie Settlement.
Robert's son, Pharmer Leslie, was the first male child born on the waters of John's Creek. The event occured soon after the family came to the country. Pharmer became one of the prominent men of the Sandy Valley. He was a model farmer and grew rich at farming, stock-raising, and timbering. He was a man of high character. He was the father of seven sons, four of whom are still living. A granddaughter married Dr. Jackson, a noted physician of Pike County. The sons, like the father, were men of mark, noted for energy, honesty, and fair dealing. They married into leading families of the valley, and now the Leslie family is one of the largest as well as one of the most noted in the valley. Doctors and lawyers are representative of the house, as well as merchants and traders. One, a scion of the house, came to the front as a newspaper man several years since.
In early days, when the plank in the upper John's Creek country was sawed by hand, and used as fast as sawed, William Leslie died, at seventy-three, and no plank could be procured to make a coffin to bury him in. Nor could a whipsaw be procured to saw enough. His relatives and friends were determined to give him a decent burial; so they had a nice poplar-tree cut down, and chopped off a log of proper length, squared it up, and with ax and adze, shaped it into a coffin, digging out a trough. They took clapboards and shaved them, with which they made a nice lid for the trough-like casket, and in this unique case the remains of William Leslie, of John's Creek, were consigned to mother earth.
Pharmer Leslie died in 1883, at nearly eighty-four years of age. One feels sad that a man like Mr. Leslie could not have been spared to witness the coming of the railroad up the valley. In childhood he had many times heard the growl of the bear, the howl of the wolf, the scream of the panther, and the savage yell of the Indian. What a contrast would it have been to him to have listened to catch the piercing scream of the locomotive, and to see the smoke and fire issuing from the nostrils of the fiery steed, as he drags in his wake scores of iron chariots, laden with the wealth of all climes - all traveling faster than the winds of an old ocean! But God is good, and we must bow to the incidents of locality and circumstances.
The Leslies are Democrats in politics, but are not office-seekers. In religion they are mostly Southern Methodists.
Robert and Elizabeth are buried on Leslie Settlement.There is now a golf course on this site but the graves are preserved with fencing around them.
More About Robert Leslie:
Date born 2: 25 Oct 1763, Augusta Co., Virginia.
Burial: Unknown, William Robert Leslie Cemetery, Gulnare, Kentucky.
Died 2: 1822, Pike County, Kentucky.
More About Robert Leslie and Elizabeth Compton:
Marriage: 21 May 1787, Montgomery Co.,Virginia.
Children of Robert Leslie and Elizabeth Compton are:
- Hannah Leslie, b. 22 May 1789, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 1834.
- Elizabeth Leslie, b. 29 Jan 1791, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. date unknown.
- Adah Leslie, b. 20 May 1792, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 1887.
- +Allen Leslie, b. 09 Jul 1793, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 10 Jun 1879, Johns Creek, Pike Co.,Kentucky.
- Rachel Leslie, b. 31 Aug 1794, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. date unknown.
- Jemima Leslie, b. 04 Jul 1796, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 03 Jul 1875.
- Cynthia Leslie, b. 03 Mar 1798, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 1840.
- Esther Leslie, b. 17 Mar 1799, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. 11 Sep 1857.
- Milton Leslie, b. 29 Nov 1800, Bluestone, Tazewell, Va, d. 11 Sep 1857, Danville, Vermillion, Illinois.
- Harvey Leslie, b. 05 Feb 1802, Bluestone, Wythe, Virginia, d. date unknown.
- +Pharmer Leslie, b. 22 May 1803, Johns Creek, Floyd Kentucky, d. 22 Oct 1883, Kentucky.
- Amos Leslie, b. 25 May 1804, d. 1849.
- +Martin Leslie, b. 14 Nov 1807, Johns Creek, Pike Co.,Kentucky, d. 05 Mar 1859, Danville, Vermillion, Kentucky.
- Luna Leslie, b. 30 Jan 1809, Johns Creek, Floyd Kentucky, d. 02 Nov 1887.