My lineage directly follows a path to John Fife who was born in 1721 and died November 19, 1800 at the age of 79 years. Family tradition often refers to him as "John Fife, The Pioneer". County history records that John and Margaret Wright Fife and their family were in 1766 the earliest settlers in the area known today as Upper St. Clair Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

It's often recorded in family history that John Fife was born in Fifeshire, Scotland. He and two brothers, William and Matthew, emigrated from Scotland to settle on a farm in Archill, County Tyrone, 22 miles from Londonderry, in the Irish province of Ulster. The area lies on the northern coast of today's Northern Ireland.

It is not known when John immigrated to the Colonies. There is conjecture, but no proof whatsoever, that John as a young man, like thousands of other Ulster Scots of the time, contracted to serve an indentured service period to pay the costs of ocean passage. Refer to link: Scotch Irish.

William Fife Senior, Brother of John Fife, The Pioneer, eventually joined John on the frontier in about 1776. Their brother Matthew Fife remained in Ulster and lived to be 100 years old.

Written family tradition says that the family of John Fife, who had learned the trade of tailor, was living in Virginia in 1756. The family was farming land at a location quite likely in Berkley County, an area now within the state of West Virginia, about 20 miles north of Winchester. This is probable because John Fife's Will, probated in 1800, bequeathed to son John "my place in Berkley County, Virginia" - assumed to be the prior family homestead. (Spelled "Barkley" County in his Will).

It's well accepted among old family writings that John Fife led his family on the 200-mile journey to the "frontier" area near the Forks of the Ohio sometime between 1766 and 1772. The year most commonly written is 1766, the date also recorded in the booklet published at the time of the 1890 Fife Family Reunion, entitled "The Descendants Of John And William Fife".

It has been suggested in other family narratives (e.g., Mrs. Martha B. Gilfillan's published 1955 account) that John Fife could have made an initial journey to the frontier as early as 1762. It was a common practice for frontiersmen to make initial "hunting trips" to the interior before returning for their families. Should John Fife had done so, it's reasonable to assume he would not have returned with his family to the area around the Forks of the Ohio until after the Indian uprisings of the 1763-1765 period.

New settlers, many of whom were Scotch-Irish from the Valley of Virginia, were moving westward across the Allegheny Divide. Individuals, families, and groups of families would follow the old Nemacolin Path. It was the most direct route and, in the late 1760s, many were calling it Braddock's Road, the trail that Braddock's Army had carved through the mountains in 1755. In 1768, the Virginia colonial government authorized widening portions of the trail to facilitate the passage of wagons from the upper waters of the Potomac by way of Wills Creek on to the Monongahela and the small village at Fort Pitt.

Tradition says that John Fife inquired at Fort Pitt as to the location of land where white oak trees stood, believing that good farming soil would be found beneath the white oaks. He was advised to proceed south from the Ohio River "to a stream called Chartiers Creek, then to travel up the creek until he came to the biggest white oak timber stand in the country."

It is said that John Fife found the land, on the waters of the Chartiers Creek, occupied by Indians. Where Hidden Valley Country Club stands today, he climbed two miles to the crest of the hill to trade with the Indians. He made friends with them, and for a pair of leather moccasins, a flintlock rifle and a pair of leather breeches, he acquired the land. The Indians - likely Mingo, Delaware, or Shawnee - moved on toward the Ohio.

John Fife would have "made the location" by stepping off the boundaries of the claim and, at the corners, piling stones or using a tomahawk to mark large trees. The common practice on the frontier was to ensure that a certificate of settlement right was properly submitted to the land commissioner where it laid in trust for a period. If no one had already claimed the land and it could be shown that permanent settlement was intended, a patent would eventually be issued and the land was owned free and clear. John Fife would likely have paid a fee as Virginia had fixed the price said to be the equivalent of about two dollars per one hundred acres.

The first record of John Fife was a Virginia Certificate for 1,000 acres issued in 1772 when that part of our country was claimed by the Colony of Virginia. The area in which the John Fife family settled was then known as Yohogania County, District of Augusta, Virginia. The lands of western Pennsylvania were claimed by both the colonies of Virginia and Pennsylvania. In 1773, Pennsylvania organized Westmoreland county, comprising most of today's western Pennsylvania north to Lake Erie. As both colonies were issuing land grants, there were disputes and litigation relating to ownership. Preference was given to the oldest grants and to settlers who had actually raised a crop.

With the ratification of the Mason & Dixon Line in 1780, Virginia gave up its claim to the area. Washington county was carved out of Westmoreland county in 1781. The Fifes found themselves farming in Peters Township, Washington county - and John Fife received a Pennsylvania patent in 1786. It was called "Cremona". John also obtained two small tracts named "Lambeth" and "Fife's Utility" which adjoined McLaughlin Road. His brother William's patent was named "Fifer's Delight", a tract of 386 acres of adjoining property.

On March 13, 1779, John Fife sold 376 acres of his original tract to John Swearingen for 857 pounds, 4 shillings (local currency). The survey was made by Thomas Bond, and witnessed by Thomas Douglass and John's brother, William Fife.

In 1788, Allegheny county was formed from parts of Westmoreland and Washington counties and the Fifes were then living in St. Clair Township, Allegheny County. In 1839, the township was divided into Lower and Upper St. Clair townships.

At some point in time, John Fife also acquired substantial land in Kentucky. History tells us that the frontier farmers, after a few years, would be making a modest profit from cash crops and were moving beyond mere subsistence farming. They were investing in their own lands, and spending considerable time at investigating land speculation opportunities, many of which were available through outright grants of huge tracts of land still further west.

Daniel Boone and others had been as far west as the Kentucky country. One can expect that large numbers of Scotch-Irish were interested in the stories of great gains at the outer edge of the new frontier. In 1769-71, some of James Knox's Kentucky "long hunters" were returning to the small settlement around Fort Pitt at the head waters of the Ohio River. They were described by one observer as "men in caps of otter or beaver, with heavy buckskin leggings, hunting shirts of soft leather, hatchets in their belts, and big black rifles". We can imagine that their tales would excite other Ulstermen until their traditional wanderlust drove them to have a look for themselves.

Kentucky land was also deeded by Virginia's Lord Dunmore in 1772. Fort Pitt had been abandoned and dismantled in that year - and with it, the last physical vestige of imperial authority west of the mountains vanished. Dunmore went himself to Pittsburgh, proclaiming the area a part of Virginia to be designated the District of West Augusta, privately encouraging civil war if necessary to maintain Virginia's claim. Further, to encourage his supporters, he offered to grant them land anywhere, including Kentucky. Dunmore's extravagant offer of grants was done so with the cloudiest of authority. It did not trouble the men who rushed to accept. They were not men who held authority in high regard.

The country in which John Fife farmed, today's Upper St. Clair Township, was not thickly settled. According to a library document authored by Alexander Gilfillan, the original patentees were few, perhaps numbering 35 or so. The average farm size ranged from 175 to 450 acres. Usually there was but one log cabin on each tract, and they were constructed in the most sheltered part of the tract, close to spring water, with a downhill haul to the barn.

Throughout the 1770s, settlers continued to penetrate the frontier wilderness and to establish their families there in spite of sporadic Indian attacks. So strong was their drive to possess land that they considered the risks worthwhile. In the year 1780, Indian raids against the whites were frequent. It seemed to the settlers that the American authorities in the east were too occupied in opposition to the British in the Revolution to be concerned about the terrible attacks being launched against them. The frontiersmen formed volunteer militia forces comprised of men formed into units usually from a specific geographic area. Their officers were chosen at the rendezvous point often through popular election among the volunteers.

Like hundreds of other farming settlers, John Fife volunteered for such militia duty. The time away from home depended on the mission, varying from a few days to several weeks at a time. He served as a private in Robert Johnson's Company of Westmoreland County Rangers, a company that was engaged on the frontier from about 1780 to 1782. He also served as a 2nd class private in his son William Fife's Company (4th Company, 2nd Battalion, Washington County Militia) after February 4, 1782.

Refer also to the link: Fife Men In the Revolutionary War.

Neither John Fife nor his brother, William, could read or write. The Scotch Irish almost without exception left clearly defined Wills. Copies of all Wills have been closely examined, and the brothers signed theirs with their marks.

In the Will of John Fife, he bequeathed to his grandson, Thomas Thompson (son of his daughter Jean), 100 acres of land in Kentucky. To his grandson, John Fife (son of his daughter Elizabeth), 100 acres of land in Kentucky. To another grandson, also named John Fife (son of Margaret), 100 acres of land in Kentucky. And the remainder of his Kentucky lands were left for his sons William and John to divide equally.

In his Will, John Fife also bequeathed to each of his sons 150 acres of land on which they were living at the time of their father's death.

John Fife is buried in historic section one of the Bethel Cemetery, immediately adjacent to the Bethel Presbyterian Church, Upper St. Clair Township, an affluent Pittsburgh suburb today. A memorial replacement marker has been placed presumably on or close to the site of his original grave. His wife, Margaret Fife, is believed to be buried there; however, her grave site has not been identified.