Boone also brought news that the legislature had incorporated "the town of Boonesborough in the County of Kentuckey," of which he was named a trustee, which office he eventually declined. The town, although now laid out into building lots, and anticipating a prosperous growth, never rose to importance and at last passed away. Nothing now remains upon the deserted site, which Boone could have known, save a decrepit sycamore-tree and a tumble-down ferry established in the year of the incorporation. As indicated in Robinson's address, quoted above, the winter of 1779-80 was a season of unwonted severity. After an exceptionally mild autumn, cold weather set in by the middle of November and lasted without thaw for two months, with deep snow and zero temperature. The rivers were frozen as far south as Nashville; emigrant wagons were stalled in the drifts while crossing the mountains, and everywhere was reported unexampled hardship. It will be remembered that the Revolutionary Army in the East suffered intensely from the same cause. The Indians had, the preceding summer, destroyed most of the corn throughout Kentucky; the game was rapidly decreasing, deer and buffaloes having receded before the advance of settlement, and a temporary famine ensued. Hunters were employed to obtain meat for the newcomers; and in this occupation Boone and Harrod, in particular, were actively engaged throughout the winter, making long trips into the forest, both north and south of Kentucky River. The land titles granted by the Transylvania Company having been declared void, it became necessary for Boone and the other settlers under that grant to purchase from the State government of Virginia new warrants. For this purpose Boone set out for Richmond in the spring. Nathaniel and Thomas Hart and others of his friends commissioned him to act as their agent in this matter. With his own small means and that which was entrusted to him for the purpose, he carried $20,000 in depreciated paper money--probably worth but half that amount in silver. It appears that of this entire sum he was robbed upon his way--where, or under what circumstances, we are unable to discover. His petition to the Kentucky legislature, in his old age, simply states the fact of the robbery, adding that he "was left destitute." A large part of the money was the property of his old friends, the Harts, but many others also suffered greatly. There was some disposition on the part of a few to attribute dishonorable action to Boone; but the Harts, although the chief losers, came promptly to the rescue and sharply censured his critics, declaring him to be a "just and upright" man, beyond suspicion--a verdict which soon became unanimous. Sympathy for the honest but unbusinesslike pioneer was so general, that late in June, soon after the robbery, Virginia granted him a preemption of a thousand acres of land in what is now Bourbon County.