Kenney Family

"Fortune Assists the Daring"

The Kenneys are a Scotch-Irish family. They came to America in the early 1700s, settled first in Pennsylvania, then moved south to Virginia before moving west. Capt. James and Margaret (Frame) Kenney were early settlers at Daniel Boone’s settlement in Boonesborough, Kentucky. The Kenney farm, Stonerside Farm in Bourbon County, is still an operating horse farm of 1,500 acres. The Kenney Cemetery is on land that formerly belonged to the farm.

Barnett Cemetery

MacKinnon Clan

The Kenneys were members of Clan Fingon (MacKinnon), a branch of the Siol Alpine said to be descended from Fingon, grandson of that Gregor who was ancestor of the MacGregors. They possessed the district of Griban in Mull, but exchanged it for Mishnish. They also possessed the district of Strathbairdle in Skye. They were followers of the Lords of the Isles, and regularly feuded with the MacLeans. They supported the Stuarts in the Jacobite uprisings of 1715 and 1745. The present chief is Anne MacKinnon of MacKinnon.

Coat of Arms

MacKinnon of MacKinnon: Quarterly, 1st Vert a boar’s head erased Argent, holding in its mouth the shank bone of a deer Proper (for MacKinnon); 2nd Azure a castle triple-towered and embattled Argent, masoned Sable, windows and portcullis Gules (for MacLeod); 3rd Or a lymphad oars in saltire Sable (for MacDonald); 4th Argent a dexter hand couped fessways Proper holding a cross crosslet fitchée Sable (for Macdonald). Crest: A boar’s head erased, holding in its mouth the shank of a deer all Proper. Supporters: Dexter, a lion Proper; sinister, a leopard Proper. Motto: Audentes Fortuna Juvat (Fortune Assists the Daring).

MacKinnon Tartan

Lineal Genealogy

1. (Sgt.) James Barnett Kenney (c1726-1786), of Uniontown, Pennsylvania; married (?) Barnett. He served in the American Revolution.

2. (Capt.) James Kenney (1752-1814), of Stonerside Farm, North Middletown, Kentucky; married (1) Mary “Polly” Frame (1742-1796). He served as a Private in the American Revolution, and was taken prisoner at the Battle of Germantown in 1778. After the war, he obtained a land grant in Kentucky, and was one of the early settlers at Boonesborough. He was a Captain in the local militia.

3. Mary (Polly) Kenney (1779-after 1850); married William Hildreth (c1776-1816), of Bourbon Co., Kentucky. She told her children that she remembered riding in front of her father on horseback when the family moved from Virginia to Kentucky. After her husband’s death in 1816, she became one of the pioneers of Vermilion Co., Illinois.

4. Angeline Hildreth (1806-1860); married (2) John Mallory (c1793-before 1880), of Champaign, Illinois. She and her first husband George Howe were pioneers in Vermilion Co., Illinois. When her husband was killed in the Black Hawk War in 1835, she took her three small children back to her mother’s home in Kentucky. In 1838 she returned to Illinois, settling first in Vermilion Co., where she married John Mallory. She died in 1860 while the family was in the process of moving to Iowa.