On August 10, 1810, the Great Cherokee Children Massacre took place at Yahoo Falls in southeast Kentucky, nestled in the Big South Fork, right outside Whitley City. John Sevier’s Cherokee fighters, who operated under the U.S. War Department’s authority, massacred women and children gathered under the falls.
On August 10, 1827, Matthew Harris Jouett passed away in his home outside Lexington; he came home to pass. After studying with Judge George Bibb, he chose his passion for art over law and became one of the South’s most significant antebellum portraitists. He became world-known after displaying his portraits of General Charles Scott and John Grimes at the 1893 Chicago Exposition.
August 10, 1881, Cynthiana native Orville Hickman Browning died. A U.S. Senator from Illinois and the 9th U.S. Secretary of the Interior, Orville, attended Augusta College in Augusta.
August 10, 1886, John W. Stevenson, Kentucky’s 25th governor, our 18th Class II U.S. Senator and a U.S. Representative, died in Covington.
August 10, 1900, Night Policeman James T. Martin, Carrollton Police Department, died from a gunshot while enforcing a city livestock ordinance prohibiting livestock from going at large.
August 10, 1934, highway bandits hijacked over 1,650 cartons of cigarettes, worth $1,850, from a truck in Williamsburg on its way to Louisville from Knoxville. They stopped the driver on the Knoxville-Corbin Highway and then forced him to drive up Wolf Creek Road in Whitley County. Then they tied him up and unloaded the loot into two cars.
August 10, 1951, Marine Corps SSGT, Leonard H. Hughes from Benham in Harlan County died in the Korean War.
August 10, 1952, Marine Corps PFC Charles W. Parrish from Cynthiana died in the Korean War.
August 10, 1954, Sir Gordon Richards retired as a jockey with a record 4,870 wins.
Localtonians wish a Happy Birthday to Elizabethtown native Kenny Perry, born in 1960. Kenny won 14 PGA tour events.
August 10, 1962, Mrs. Mary Montgomery Beam, 86, widow of Col. James B. Beam, founder of the James B. Beam Distillery, died at her home in Bardstown.
August 10, 1968, Marine Corps PFC James E. Marshall from Lexington and Marine Corps PFC Franklin Renfro, Jr. from Richmond, died in the Vietnam War.
August 10, 1970, the curious turned out to watch the Army remove, by rail, deadly nerve gas rockets encased in 113 concrete and steel vaults in Madison County.
August 10, 1972, a newly devised system for ranking safety conditions claimed Kentucky had 49 of the 70 least safe coal mines in the U.S. The Bureau of Mines said almost all were small operations. Only 11 Kentucky coal mines earned a “Best” safety rating.
August 10, 1987, in 15 minutes, a Jefferson grand jury decided not to bring charges against a Crescent Hill man who fired an arrow into the neck of a man who was stealing a car stereo.
August 10, 1990, Southeast Coal Company, Kentucky’s largest family owned coal company told its 820 employees that they would be laid off in October.
August 10, 1996, it would take an entry and teamwork to bring about one of the most legendary upsets in racing history. Del Mar’s GI $1,000,000 Pacific Classic set up well for Cigar to equal Citation’s modern-day record of 16 straight victories.
August 10, 2000, V.P. hopeful Dick Cheney held babies in Anderson County High School. He would soon be responsible for thousands of dead babies in Iraq. Cynical autocrat, war profiteer, torture advocate, shredder of constitutional protections and destroyer of democratic processes, Cheney usurped the U.S. presidency and, in the process, solidified executive powers to their current level of perpetual tyranny.
On August 10, 2005, Transportation Cabinet officials regularly listed the political traits of job candidates ranging from party affiliation to campaign donations according to internal documents. Governor E. Fetcher pardoned his boys before the month was out.
August 10, 2007, the three lawyers charged with bilking clients out of $46 million in Kentucky’s fen-phen case went to court to argue for a delay in their trial. By afternoon, they were in jail.
August 10, 2011, Governor S. Beshear stepped up to the plate and questioned a major merger between Louisville and Lexington hospitals. Louisville’s University Hospital had a “public mission” to serve the poor and if that stopped under the merger, it would not be approved.
August 10, 2020, Governor A. Beshear announced two new deaths, ages 60 and 98, and gave the go-ahead for bars and restaurants to reopen at 50% capacity; however, they had to close at 11:00 p.m. In addition, the governor asked all schools to postpone in-person learning until September 28. Meanwhile, as uncertainty plagued the country, the government lockdowns changed the course of society.
On August 10, 2022, Kentucky released its overdose fatality report, which showed the Covid-19 restrictions led to more overdose deaths. In 2021, approximately 2,250 Kentuckians OD. In 2020, 1,964 Kentuckians died from drug overdoses, and in 2019, before the lockdowns, 1,316 died.
By August 10, 2023, Governor A. Beshear, running for a second term, faced questions about commuting the sentences of 1,870 medically vulnerable inmates who had no violent or sexual offenses. Within one year, 47% received at least one more charge, and 30% received another felony, of which 83 were violent. During the 15 months the state recorded such stats, eight state prison staff and 39 inmates died.
