Henry County History

Henry County was named for the Revolutionary patriot Patrick Henry, famous for his "Give me liberty or give me death" speech.

more about Patrick Henry

HISTORICAL PHOTO BOOK, DONE!
Click here for details!

Henry County Historical Society Membership Info/Form The CAPLINGER House	Henry County History Drennon Info Ye Olde History Shoppe
History & Genealogy Links

Henry County Historical Society
P.O. Box 570
New Castle, KY. 40050
(502) 845-0999

We are located in the Caplinger House
219 South Main (a.k.a. Hwy. 421) in New Castle.

A volunteer will greet you M-F 10: a.m. to Noon. Please call ahead for a group visit or alternate hours.

For more information email:

President, Elizabeth Howard

Vice President, Carla Gerding

Treasurer, Connie Snowdon

Historical Society Schedule of Events 2008
Look at the great line up for your education and entertainment in 2008!

June 16, 2008
General Meeting
Program: "Come to the Hanging"
(Learn about HC most notorious social event: the Shuck Hanging)
by Dr. David Rosenthal,
Professor at Northern Kentucky State University
Catered Dinner
6 p.m. 4H Building at the Fairgrounds

July 26th 2008
8th Annual Harvest Showcase
more details to be announced

August 2008
Six County Picnic
Date and Place TBA

September 1, 2008, 4 p.m.
General Meeting
Labor Day Picnic Potluck
Philip and Betsy Sewell's Farm, Bethlehem, KY
Touring Henry County - Bethlehem Day

October 20, 2008, Monday 6 PM
General Meeting Henry County History Center
Ghost Lantern Walk of New Castle
Chili Supper, Cost: Donation

Attention Researchers:

The Henry County Historical Society has custodial care of marriage records in Henry County starting in 1800. (The earliest birth records for the state are 1852 and then only sporadically until 1911 when it became mandatory to record all births.)

For a fee we can provide copies of all documents related to marriages (if available) such as: the bond, the consent, and the minister's return.

Your request for information regarding marriages may be submitted to .

Past Events and Exhibits

(Mr. Berry is the author of The Memory of Old Jack, Jabber Crow, and The Unsettling of America among numerous other books of fiction, poetry and social criticism.)

Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry visited the Henry County History Center & Museum & gave a reading of his choice and signed books for this FREE open-to-the-public event, in 2002.

Historical Society Vice President Carla Gerding and husband John
at the 2008 Henry County Historical Society Gala held at the Smith-Berry Winery.
More Photos submitted by Robert Winburn.

Flags of the Civil War Exhibit
Our April 2002 Exhibit was Flags of the Civil War

On loan to the History Center by Rhelda Moore is a Civil War era quilt made by Mary Ann Duvall Hackett Hardwick (1820-1890), the gr-grandmother of: Ruby Brown, Martha Johnson, and Rhelda Moore. Mary Ann Duvall, daughter of Lot Duvall, married first Cornelius K. Hackett in 1839. In 1862 she married Robert Hardwick. Mr. Hardwick served in the Civil War and was killed in 1864 and is buried in Tennessee.
Click here for 3 detail photos of the stitches and "ribbons" used in the construction of this quilt.

Civil War Era Crazy Quilt
Source: Henry County Historical Society Quarterly, June 2002

THE FORMATION OF HENRY COUNTY
Reprinted from Henry County Historical Society Quarterly Review, Apr. 1979

Henry County was carved out of a portion of Shelby County during the greatest burst of county-making in the history of the Kentucky General Assembly. The second session of the 1798 legislature voted to create 12 counties, including Henry, during an 11-day span between December 10 and December 21. Henry County was approved on December 14, followed later that same day by Green, Gallatin and Muhlenberg counties. Other counties formed during that period were Pendleton, Livingston, Boone, Ohio, Jessamine, Barren, Henderson and Pulaski.

A total of 26 counties were in existence prior to the late 1798 session, while eight of the counties created by that session became effective prior to Henry County. Pulaski County became a county on the same day as Henry--June 15 1799--but had been created earlier in the December session. Thus, conceding the earlier date to Pulaski, Henry County would be the 31st of Kentucky's 120 counties.

The original boundary of Henry County included several miles of frontage on the Ohio River. That frontage was gradually eroded as three neighboring counties were carved out of portions of Henry County during the early 1800's. Oldham County was formed in 1824 (along with parts of Jefferson and Shelby); Trimble County was created in 1837 (along with portions of Gallatin and Oldham) and finally, with the formation of Carroll County in 1838 (again with part of Gallatin and the newly created Trimble), Henry County lost its last bit of land on the Ohio River.

The first section of the act creating Henry County describes the boundaries of the new county:

Be it enacted by the General Assembly that from and after the first day of June next, all that part of the county of Shelby included in the following bounds, to wit: Beginning ten miles due north from the public square, on which the court-house of the said county of Shelby is now situated thence west to the Jefferson line thence with said line to the Ohio River, thence up the Ohio with the meanders thereof six miles above the mouth of Corn creek, on a straight line from the mouth thereof, thence a straight line till it strikes the road leading from Shelbyville to the mouth of Kentucky, two miles north of Henry Dougherty's thence a direct line to the Kentucky river two and a half miles above the mouth of Eagle Creek, thence up the Kentucky river and the Franklin line so far till a west course will strike the beginning, shall be one distinct county and called and known by the name of Henry.