Matthew Kuykendall had his arm permanently damaged by a British bullet at the Battle

of Cowpens in South Carolina.  He served under Captain Joseph Hardin and also fought

at Ramsours Mill and in raids on the Cherokee towns.  Between the war, inflation and ever

decreasing productivity of land, the Kuykendall's with related families left Anson and Burke

Counties in North Carolina for land further west.  Matthew's father, Peter Kuykendall, died 

in 1783 leaving his will in Washington County NC, (now Jonesboro TN area).  From there

Matthew, along with brothers, cousins and in-laws, made the great leap forward into middle

TN, settling in Sumner County.  John Harden and Joseph Kuykendall were already Justices of

the Peace there (see Records of Sumner Court, April Term 1787).  However, there were

continuing problems with hostile Indians, with horses and livestock being stolen and numerous

murders of settlers as they worked the farms.  The killing of settlers esculated and by 1791 in

J G M Ramsey's 1853 book, "Annals of Tennessee" it can be found that "they killed Benjamin

Kuykendall in his own house, within two miles of Colonel Winchester's, in Sumner county, and

plundered his house of anything the Indians could use."  Matthew left Tennessee with others

of his family for the safety of Logan county in Kentucky, and settled on land that was later cut

into Butler county, where he died in 1845.