The Trail He Left Behind

Time marches along steadily whether we like it or not. In my case, before I knew it, ten years slipped by…ten long years in which I doggedly researched and wrote a biography about William Bratton, our local hero who was a member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. When I began the process, I discovered quite a bit of information online and at our local library and courthouse. I accessed an impressive Bratton archive at the Crawfordsville District Public Library (CDPL) built by previous researchers and family members. The library also contained the best Bratton treasure of all, William’s account book that listed details about his life in Kentucky and how he conducted his life here. I knew William was buried with his family in the Old Pioneer Cemetery in Waynetown and I knew he went on the Great Expedition, but I wanted to know more. I reached the point where I could only unearth his story by physically traveling the trail he left behind.

I found William in Frankfort, Kentucky where he was first taxed at the age of 21. He also filed papers to administrate his sister Anne’s estate, a sister that no one had listed before, a sister once lost to time but who is now lifted from obscurity. I found William at Traveler’s Rest in Montana and marveled at the many technological measures scientists used to nail down the location where expedition members camped twice, both on their way to the Pacific and on their way back east. I could almost visualize William sitting by a small fire to melt lead to pour into bullet molds to make more bullets, for you see, scientists uncovered small pieces of spilled lead in the ground there. I found William on a battlefield in Michigan where he fought the British and Native Americans during the War of 1812. This battlefield near Lake Erie was the site of a horrific massacre and the beginning of a harrowing experience for William as a prisoner of war. I traveled to Canada to unearth his parole record and stand at Fort Niagara where he stood relieved to finally be back on American soil amidst friendly faces and able to eat an ample, hot meal. I found William near Bowling Green, Kentucky where he ran a mill and distillery on the Big Barren River. It is there where he married and began a family.

I began this process as an objective scholar and avid history buff. However, this endeavor of discovering William’s story was pursued in tandem with my obsessive hobby as an amateur genealogist. About six months into my Bratton project, imagine my surprise of coming across the Bratton name when working the female lines of my maiden name Kunkle. There it was, the name Hetta Ann Bratton, my four-times great grandmother. Drum roll, please….she was William’s great-niece, the granddaughter of William’s brother Archibald Bratton. Incidentally, William and Archibald married sisters so their children were double cousins who shared the same two sets of grandparents. I recently viewed my DNA results and saw the centimorgan proof that I carried the Bratton bloodline. What a serendipitous pleasure!

My biography about William Bratton is titled A Compass Pointing Home: The Adventurous Life of William Bratton of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. If you would like to hear more about the book and my adventures in writing it, you are welcome to attend the book launch and signing at the Carnegie Museum on May 1st at 2 p.m. The event is free to the public and copies of the book will be available for sale. Be sure to put the event on your calendar because time is marching along and the date is steadily approaching.