POWER OF ATTORNEY OF SAMPSON MATHEWS OF RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, SIGNED AND DATED JANUARY 19, 1786, APPOINTING SAMUEL MCDOWELL AND CALEB WALLACE OF LINCOLN COUNTY, KENTUCKY, HIS "TRUE AND LAWFUL ATTORNIES" CHARGED WITH THE SALE OF "ALL MY LANDS IN KENTUCKY, EACH... PARCEL OF LAND FOR THREE EQUAL YEARLY PAYMENTS... TO BEAR INTEREST IF NOT PUNCTUALLY PAID, BOND AND GOOD SECURITY TO BE TAKEN & THE TITLE TO BE MADE AT THE LAST PAYMENT OF EACH SALE, PROVIDED THAT THE SALES MADE BY MY FORMER INSTRUCTIONS ARE TO BE MADE GOOD AGREEABLE TO THE CONTRACT MADE BY MY SAID ATTORNIES...." SIGNED BY SAMPSON MATHEWS AND WITNESSED BY GEORGE WINTER, BENJAMIN LOGAN, JOHN CAMPBELL, AND CHRISTOPHER GREENUP, WITH THEIR SIGNATURES. [Docketed on verso: AT A COURT HELD FOR LINCOLN COUNTY THE 18TH DAY OF JULY 1786/ THIS POWER OF ATTORNEY WAS PROVED BY THE OATHS OF BENJAMIN LOGAN AND CHRISTOPHER GREENUP, WITNESSES THERETO AND ORDERED TO BE CERTIFIED.]

[Lincoln County, Kentucky, 1786. Single sheet, 8.75" x 10". Completely in manuscript, approximately 20 lines, signed and sealed on January 19, 1786, by Sampson Mathews, George Winter, Benjamin Logan, John Campbell and Christopher Greenup. Paper seal attached with wax near Mathews' signature. Old folds, two short fold splits with a few letters affected but not lost, minor toning and wear at folds. Good+.

Sampson Mathews [1737-1807] served as commissary of Col. Charles Lewis' regiment in the Point Pleasant campaign, as Colonel of the Augusta Militia in 1781 where he led the American defense against Benedict Arnold's January 1781 raid of Richmond, and fought at the Siege of Yorktown. He served in the first Virginia State Senate [1776-1781 and 1790-1792] and was a founder of what became Washington and Lee University. [Waddell: ANNALS OF AUGUSTA COUNTY, VIRGINIA, 1902, pp.185, 220, 310.]
Benjamin Logan [1743-1802] was an American Revolutionary War officer and brother of John Logan [1747-1807], a Kentucky pioneer and politician. Both Benjamin and John were Justices of the County Court of Lincoln County, which was organized in 1781; this was the first court in what would become the State of Kentucky. Benjamin Logan, Colonel of the Kentucky County, Virginia militia, was second in command of all Kentucky militia during the Revolutionary War. He also led in the effort to achieve Kentucky statehood. [Kleber: THE KENTUCKY ENCYCLOPEDIA, 1992, p.388.]
Christopher Greenup [1750-1818] was an officer during the Revolutionary War and
Governor of Kentucky from 1804-1808. He helped settle Lincoln County where he studied law and worked as a surveyor and land speculator. He served on a committee with Benjamin Logan which sought to achieve statehood for Kentucky. Active in three state conventions from 1784-1788, he was also accused in complicity in the Burr conspiracy while serving as Governor. [Kleber, p.388.]
Samuel McDowell [1735-1817] served under General Washington during the French and Indian War; in the American Revolution under the command of Nathanael Greene. He presided over the 1782 convention that framed a constitution for the independent territory of Kentucky, presided over the first district court in Kentucky and its first county court. McDowell, and presided over nine of the ten conventions that drafted the first Kentucky Constitution.
Caleb Wallace [1742-1814] was born in Virginia and moved to the Kentucky district in 1783. He was a cousin of Samuel McDowell, was a pioneer jurist in the Supreme Court for the District of Kentucky, was active in the movement for Kentucky Statehood, played a role in the struggle for religious freedom in Virginia, and was a founder of what became Washington and Lee University. [Kleber, p.925.]
John Campbell is likely Col. John Campbell [1735-1799], the Revolutionary War soldier and namesake of Campbell County, Kentucky. He was one of the drafters of the Kentucky Constitution, the Speaker Pro-Tem of the Kentucky Senate in 1798 where he signed the Kentucky Resolutions, and a founder of Louisville having staked his claim to a military grant of land on that site in 1774. [Kleber, p.154.].