The Tenmile Country and Its Pioneer Families: A Genealogical History of the Upper Monongahela Valley. Howard L. Leckey. (1950, 1993) reprinted 2021, New, Illus., Index, 746pp.

Back by popular demand, this reprint is loaded with genealogical information on early families in present day Greene, Fayette, Washington, Westmoreland and nearby counties of Southwestern Pennsylvania. It also extends to Northern Virginia, present day West Virginia and some from Western Maryland and Eastern Ohio. It's all about those who settled these areas in the mid to late 1700's. Much of the history includes family migrations from Eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, etc. plus French and Indian and American Revolutionary War participants. It is a great publication for any one researching this part of our early growing country when it was claimed by both Pennsylvania and Virginia.

After 1750 the Tenmile Country became a desired place of settlement or stopover point for the huge migration of Scotch-Irish, to a lesser extent British, colonists, who extended American settlement beyond the Alleghenies. Migration to the Monongahela took place over three main routes: along the National Pike via Winchester, Virginia; through the Shenandoah Valley to the head of the Cheat River and from there to the Monongahela; and along the Lincoln Highway to Ligonier, Pennsylvania and thence along Jacob's Creek to the Monongahela.

From the time of the French and Indian War to the end of the 18th century, the tributaries of the Tenmile Creek would be inundated by pioneers, many of them German or Scotch Irish, some of them the spillovers from the great migration into Kentucky, and still other travelers and immigrants who passed through Baltimore enroot to one of the great migration trails.

This book was originally published as a series of newspaper articles by Mr. Leckey before being consolidated as a book in 1950 and then reprinted with an every-name index under the auspices of the Greene County Historical Society in 1977. The work commences with a historical overview of settlement in the Tenmile Country, and it concludes with a new surname index to replace the very inaccurate every-name index.

There are well over 500 family histories of varying lengths, which delineate the lineages of the many families who migrated into this area. The genealogies, which are arranged according to place of settlement, are periodically embellished with rosters of one sort or another, maps, facsimiles, and illustrations. The genealogical sketches cover or touch on more than 2,000 main families who settled in the Upper Monongahela during the final third of the eighteenth or first quarter of the nineteenth century. This is definitely a great starting point for genealogical research in southwestern Pennsylvania.

This book is a reprint of Leckey's massive collection of genealogies pertaining to the 18th-century settlers of Pennsylvania's Monongahela Valley. Originally published in 1950, reprinted by Closson Press in 1993 with a surname index. 

Book #: J-L1461 (P) & J-L1462 (H)

ISBN: 9781596414617 (P) & 9781596414624 (H)