A large percentage of the first settlers in this oounty came from Virginia and Kentucky. A certain harmony of ideals, a similarity of manners and customs, together with a code of honor to which both heariily subscribed, created a bond of union between them. They set up new altars in the wilderness bit retained the worship of the old gods. They poured out upon their altars the incense of hospitality and true friendship, and the fragrant perfumes reminded them of their old homes. Each state made comribution of the best of their sons and daughters, for there was need of a brave and virile race to multiply and replenish the wilderness and subdue it.
Among the arrivals from the Old Dominion in l844 was DAVID McCUE and his family, consisting at that time of his wife and twelve children. The advent of this family added much to the numerical strength of the new community. David McCue was born near Williamsburg, Greenbrier county. Va., February 18th, 1802. Was married to Martha McNeel, August 23rd, 1827. She was a native of Pocahontas county, Va., and was born Oct. 30th, 1810. The fruits of this union were eighteen children, twelve boys and six girls, fifteen of whom lived to reach their majority. Following are the names and brief records of this remarkable family of children, perhaps the largest ever reared in Daviess county.

Paul M., born Nov. I6th, 1828; wounded during the
seige of Vicksburg during the Civil war, from the effects of which he died Dec. 22nd, 1863. Isaac M., born April 6th, 1830; living now in Jamesport, Mo. Franklin, born April 30th, 1831; died Feb. 24th, 1864. Margaret E., born May 27th, 1832 ; died when four years old. Rachel A., born June 29th, 1833; married Alphonso L. Martin and is still living somewhere in Kansas. David, born Jan. 29th, 1835; died Jan. 28th, 1861. James W., born June 10th, 1836; lives in Lock Springs, Mo. John, born August 27th, 1837; lives in Shelby county, Mo. William P., born November 17th, 1838, died August 4th, 1862. Charles, born March 2nd, 1840; died several years ago. Hannah J., born July 15th, 1841; lives in Jackson county, Mo. George W., born October 8th, 1842; lives near Gilman City, Mo. Richard M., born February 19th, 1844; lives in Gallatin, Mo. Abram J., born March 22nd, 1846; died in infancy. Virginia M., born March 22nd, 1846; died in infancy. Matthew W., born Dec. 8th, 1847; lives in Shelby county, Mo. Mary E., born May 9th, 1849, Martha A., born August 11th, 1851.
The two last mentioned have been dead for several years.
Mr. McCue's first wife died May 13th, 1854, and after remaining a widower for 5 years, he married the widow of Andrew Leeper of Livingston county in 1859, and had five children by his last wife, four girls and a boy. The girls, Nettie, Ella, Willie and Cassieare still living, but the boy, Andrew, died several years ago.
In 1886 he removed with his last family to the Chickasaw Nation, but his health failing, he was brought back to this county and cared for by his children until his death, which occurred at the home of his son, Richard M., Sept.
12th, 1892, and his body was laid to rest in the Jordin graveyard by the side of his first wife and most of his children. It would mean much now for a woman to be the mother of such a brood of lusty youngsters, but it meant more in the early days. The pioneer mother was a helpmeet in the truest sense of, the word. In her was combined the essence of all the tutelary gods. She belonged to no lodge, was not a member of any society, never attended fashionable functions, never gave a card party and never worried because she could not vote. But lacking all these, she yet was not idle. The mother of eighteen children could usually find something to do. In order that her children might be clothed it was necessary to card wool by hand, spin it on a "big wheel," reel it on a count reel, the arn dyed and made ready for the loom and when woven into cloth, the garments must be cut and made at home. Janes, blue mixed, gray mixed and black for the boys, while for the girls there was linsey and flannels, woven in various designs and in brilliant colors. The mother was tailor and dressmaker. The boys, even the little fellows, wore long pantaloons, a roundabout for the smaller ones and a "wamuss," with occasionally a frock coat for Sunday was the unvarying style of dress. The girls never worried themselves into a fit of nervous prostration while trying to find some particular shade of dress goods, and no dressmaker ever thwarted nature by defacing the God-given symmetry of their bodies. Then there was the knitting and darning and patching, the cooking and washing and ironing, little faces to wash, little heads to comb and little shoes to tie. There is one with a cut finger to be bandaged, another with a grass cut under his toe aud still another with a stonebruisse on his heel, all crying for mother at once. Then on Sunday morning when they made their weekly change of undergarments to have ten or a dozen husky boys all shouting at once "where's my shirt," (that being the only article of underwaits known to the pioneer boy) was enough to run an ordinary woman distracted. And then each night the weary mother would tuck them away in "the trundle beds that each helt three" with a silent prayer to God to keep her little ones safely through the night. But while the mother of such a family had her worries she was not alone. The father also had a few things to look after. He was commander-in-chief of this little army as well as its ex-ofcio commissary general. David McCue was peculiarly fitted by nature to take charge of such a family. He had the lungs of Stentor, "The front of Jove An eye like Mars to threaten and command," and he enforced a not unkind, but rigid discipline, although there might be occasionally one who had to "learn obedience by the things that he suffered " He was a good provider, a loving husband and a kind father, and in return his children loved and honored him above all men. It is indeed a great thing for a man to so live that he will deserve and receive the respect of his children. While a family of this numerical distinction would be the despair of the woman, who, like the proverbial hen with one chicken, is worrying her life out over one little, spindle shanked, penwiper boy, it would upon the other hand provoke the unbounded "delight" of President Roosevelt, the strenuous champion of large families.

From: Memories by J F Jordin