Married Elizabeth Kellogg, daughter of Stephen Chester Kellogg of Weathersfield, Conn., January 27, 1774.

Revolutionary War DAR A072459

Service:

MASSACHUSETTS Rank(s): PRIVATE

Service Description:

1) CAPTS RATHBURN,ROWLEY,RAYMOND,BACON

2) COLS ROSSITER,JOHN BROWN

Marriage to Abigail Brownson (1749–1772) on 14 Apr 1768 in Farmington-Berlin Hartford Connecticut.

Marriage to Elizabeth Kellogg (1752–1836) on 27 Jan 1774 in Wethersfield Hartford Connecticut.

With his son Stephen, then fifteen years old, and Seely Peet, a hired man, John Lusk came to the Genesee region from Connecticut in the early summer of 1789. Arriving at Schenectady, he embarked with a small stock of provisions, in a batteau, the son and hired man coming by land, and driving some cattle. The son, Stephen Lusk, of Pittsford, said he remembered that upon the present site of Utica, there was only an opening of about half an acre in the forest — and that the pioneer there, John Post, was just finishing his log cabin. They came upon the Indian trail, via Skaneatelas, Onondaga Hollow, and from there to Cayuga Lake had little more than spotted trees as a guide. They crossed Cayuga Lake on a raft, swimming their cattle. The father, son and hired man, re-united at Canandaigua, and constructing an ox-sled, made their own road to their location in Brighton. Erecting a log cabin, they cleared twelve acres and sowed it to wheat, procuring their wheat of Ebenezer Allan, upon the Shaeffer farm, by cutting a woods road to the mouth of Red Creek, to which point they transported it in a canoe. While they were clearing the land and sowing their wheat, they saw none of their own race, but the surveyors of the township. Indians often came from Canada in canoes to the Bay, on their way to Canandaigua. The whole three had the ague and fever, which obliged them to suspend labor for a considerable period, and they returned to Massachusetts in the fall.

In the spring of 1790, Mr. Lusk brought out his family, coming all the way from Schenectady to the head of Irondequoit Bay by water, the sons Stephen and Erastus coming by land with stock in company with Enos Stone and others. Mr. Shaeffer and his brother, being bachelors, the family of John Lusk may be said to be the first family located upon all the territory now embraced in Monroe county, other than the temporary residents, refugees from the border wars, Allan and Walker. The first few years they had to contend v/ith all the usual privations of extreme backwoods life, and to which was added disease and harrassing Indian alarms. The refugee Walker of whom Mr. Hencher speaks, living in his solitary hut at the mouth of the River, was still in the British and Indian interests — made frequent visits to Niagara, and returning would alarm the few settlers in the backwoods by representing that they were to be attacked by the Indians. He was not pleased with his new neighbors, and when they crowded upon him, he sought more congenial associations, in Canada.

Mr. Lusk died in 1814, aged 66 years. Besides Stephen Lusk, his sons were Erastus, Norman, John and Aaron. 

Stephen Lusk, whose wife as will have been observed, is the daughter of William Hencher, was 76 years of age. Heman and Dennis Lusk of Pittsford, Henry Lusk of Laporte, Indiana, are his sons; Mrs. Thomas Wilcox of Mendon, is his daughter.

- History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase by Orsamus Turner