Document. The Real Story of Cowan's Gap

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Return to Old Chester Tapestry|Explanation
Cowan Tapestry
Register
Data
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Analysis
Bibliography
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YDNA
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Index


……………………..The Tapestry
Families Old Chester OldAugusta Germanna
New River SWVP Cumberland Carolina Cradle
The Smokies Old Kentucky

Sources

SourcesDocumentsRelated
Source:Maurer, 1899
Source:Cowan, 1928
Source:Orr and Cowan, 1970
Source:Fleming, 1971:377









Data:Cowan Land Warrants Old Chester PA
Cowan Tax Records|Cowan Tax Records
Data. Cowan's in the 1790 PA, US Census
Document. Excerpt from Orr, January, 1970
Document. Burning of the Old Cowan House
Document. Romance of Cowan's Gap
Document. The Real Story of Cowan's Gap
James Cowan Land Transfer
Notes for Cowans of Cowans Gap
Letter Miller to Cowan 1865



YDNA. Cowan Surname
Mary Unknown
Person:Samuel Cowan (17)
person:Hugh Cowan (7)
Person:Robert Cowan (17)
person:Edward (1)
person:Archibald Cowan (2)
Cowan's Gap Cowans
Octoraro Creek Cowans
YDNA
Wife of Samuel Cowan
The Cowan Homestead
Lower Path Valley Prebyterian Cemetery


Source

Original Source:Source:Cowan, 1928
Intermediate Source:Files of Chris Cowan, February, 2011

Note this work is a family document generated in 1928 by Archibald Cowan, describing his family connection to Cowan's Gap. With a publication date of 1928 it falls in the grey area (1924-1963) where its initial copyright has expired, but could have been renewed. Whether it was renewed or not can be determined through the US Library of Congress. Currently the charge for such a search is $150. It is extremely unlikely that the copyright of an informal work such a this was infact renewed. It is believed that this work now lies in the public domain.

Text

THE REAL RECORD OF COWAN'S GAP

JAMES ROBERT COWAN was a Scotsman, who had come to London ostensibly to study medicine. Just as the British did in the War of 1812 when they took the colonists (Americans) off ships claiming they were British Subjects. Robert Cowan was compelled to board an English vessel and eventually landed in Boston, Massachusetts. There he fell in love with one Mary Miller, whose father was engaged in smuggling and was very wealthy. He was smuggling molasses from the West Indies Islands and turning it into rum. He forbade his daughter, Mary, to consort with Robert Cowan, chiefly because he, Miller, was wealthy and Cowan was a common seaman.

One dark night Cowan rolled his red coat in a ball sunk it in Boston Harbor, went to Mary Miller's home and together they went to a padre and were married, her father telling her never to come home again when she left. Robert Cowan had saved a few bucks, so they decided to head for Kentucky, crossing Connecticut, New York, and into Pennsylvania as far as Culbertson Row, where their wagon broke down and was not easy to replace. While there, a Tuscarora Indian Chief, who saw their broken wagon and who wished to acquire the metal tires and other iron, bolts, etc. to use in making spear heads and war axes. He offered them the land in the Gap, later called Cowan's Gap, for the metal and the deal was made. The Cowans built their log cabin directly in the middle or center of the little plateau and the barn 100 feet south of the house.

I remember as a boy my family always spent 4th of July, in the Gap and the four outside walls of the house were still standing. I remember one time when my father pried a bolt from a hinge to be kept as a memento.

My grandfather, John Snyder Cowan was born 100 yards from the original, Cowan house, in a log cabin of course. That was in the year 1830. There was a grand spring which boiled up from white sand and was cold as ice-water. When old man Roosevelt "FDR" had those CCCc camps there they filled the spring in as well as the spring by the Old Cowan House.

My father, Robert D. Cowan was born in Path Valley directly below the Gap on what was then known as the Bitner Farm on November 3, 1855 and when he was three weeks old, my grandparents took him up in the Gap to visit Mary Miller Cowan, or Molly as everyone called her. She promised them a pair of silver cuff links with the initials R-C, one letter to each link, provided they call their baby Robert after her husband, which they did and together with an Indian tomahawk and an old rifle were prized possessions.

Gijantwaia, or as he was known to thousands, "Cornplanter" was a Seneca

Indian Chief and for many years was the scourge of the white settlers. But he was called to Washington to hold a pow-wow and after meeting George Washington and made to know that fighting the white man was a losing cause he resigned his chieftanship and came down accompanied by about 50 of his warriors to the Conference of the East and West branches of the Conocheague Creek which is about 8 or 10 miles south of Cowan's Gap. Now at this time the entire state of Pennsylvania was covered with massive forests which were filled with every kind of game. The Shawnees who lived in Ohio used this as a hunting ground, In order to by pass all those [in what is]...is now called the "Cumberland Valley"... mountains in Pennsylvania they crossed the Ohio River at or near the present site of Wheeling WV, came through the Cumberland Gap, and then north. [1]Their easiest route was through Cowan's Gap and since Indians are Indians they could not forget to take a few scalps along the way.

At one time, soon after the Cowans and Cornplanter had settled, a runner Cornplanter (Indian scout) brought word of a bunch of Shawnees approaching. and his braves met them in the Gap and routed them with heavy loss. But several of Cornplanter's braves were badly wounded so Mary Cowan had the chief bring them to her cabin where she tied up their wounds and kept them until For this she was the everlasting friend of the great chief Cornplanter, who George Washington saw, was the greatest of the whole Iroquois tribe, who died at the age of 100 years mourned by both white and red men. Cornplanter in gratitude told Mary Cowan if any Indian ever showed up, to get word to him and he would be there in a few hours.

Many years ago Dr.J.C.Martin who was President of Wilson College and later President of Shippensburg Normal School started a club which was called the Kittatinny Historical Society. In the first copy, one of the topics was one called "The Romance of Cowan's Gap" and had been written by a Mr. Mowery of Chambersburg who had made a trip to Cowan's Gap and interviewed Mary Cowan who was then 102 years old. In his closing remarks Mowery said she, Mary Cowan, had died 2 years later. She died in 1856 the next spring after my Father as a baby had been taken to see her and presented him with the silver cuff links.

I can place everything in Cowan's Gap as it was when we went there as a family, where the Cowan House stood, also the barn and the spring near the house, the place where my grandfather was born a sulphur spring which was only 200 feet from the Cowan House, the road down to the valley floor which was always called the Braddock Road, as some say Braddock had cut out the road on his ill-fated trip to Ft. Duquesne, where he was killed and where he was buried on top of Laurel Hill Mountain and his troops marched over the grave to keep Indians from desecrating the spot.

Archibald Rutledge who was a professor of English at Mercersburg Academy in its hey day and from whom I have some much prized letters spent every Saturday up in Cowan's Gap and loved it, calling it the most delightful place he had ever seen. The stream through the Gap which runs north to Burnt Cabins was called Auwich, or as Rutledge told me the Indian name of "Irquic".

So you see great, great grandfather's name was Robert, he had a son, Robert, My grandfather had a son Robert, I have a son Robert, My son has a son Robert. My grandson, named Robert, also my great grandson is Robert so the name has come down through 6 generations.

(Arch Cowan)

References

  1. The georgraphy given here is confused. Cowan is probably describing the passage of Native Americans along portions of the Warrior's Path leading from the Ohio south into Tennessee. The sequence of georgraphic features should probably be: Ohio River, Cowan's Gap, Cumberland Gap.

Footnotes