03/05/2023
December 17, 1798 – After arriving six years earlier, Robert Goodwin recorded his claim to 200 acres on Horse Creek, and a few days later for acreage on Muddy Fork Creek. The area became known as Cerulean Spring after the 1811 earthquakes. Goodwin is thought to be the first permanent white settler in the area that is now Trigg County.
Robert Goodwin and his adult sons Samuel and Jesse were in a small group of people that left South Carolina in 1789 and traveled into the Tennessee territory. This group, led by Andrew Jackson, reached Fort Nashboro (later Nashville) after a long journey and possibly stayed there as long as two years. About 1792 the Goodwins left Nashville and traveled north into the Kentucky wilderness. Robert Goodwin and his sons chose to settle near the future site of Cerulean Spring. It is not clear when the Goodwins brought their wives and families to Kentucky. At the time they arrived the area was still part of Logan County.
Other settlers began moving into the area and staking claims to land. Finally in 1798, Robert Goodwin legally filed his claim to two tracts of land – each 200 acres. In 1807, Goodwin sold the Muddy Fork Creek property. It is believed Robert Goodwin died in 1809. History accounts state that he is buried in the Military Cemetery; a location long forgotten.
The same year that Goodwin settled in Cerulean – 1792 – Thomas Wadlington, Sr. and his son Thomas Jr. settled at Kent’s Bridge (near the present intersection of Hwy. 272 and Glenwood Mill Road). A few years later Thomas Wadlington Jr. became the first settler at Caledonia. Allen Grace settled near the Tennessee River in the mid-1790s also. These pioneers set out to establish a better life for their families and conquered a true wilderness to do so.
The Cerulean Spring is shown here, courtesy of the Cerulean Spring page
