Maynard’s Comfort was situated at the head of St. Clement’s Bay, where today highways #242 and #234 intersect.5

Fought in Battle of Long Island during the Revolutionary War, covering Washingtonretreat from Brooklyn across the East River to Manhttan.

About June of 1777, James was made first leutenant and his brother William was made second leutenant. On Nov. 18, 1777 James was promoted to Captain. Served in the militia for five years.

Afetr the war many Marylanders sought new lives in the Virginia wilderness. In the spring of 1786 Cpt. Richard James Rapier lead another large group of Catholics into the region who located principally on the Beech Fork much nearer Bardstown. At that time Bardstown was called Salem.

By the time KY was admitted to the Union as the 15th State, five large colonies of Catholics were settled in Nelson County. Richard James and his wife Mrgaret were among the group on Beechfork, which later became St. Thomas congregation.

Ben J. Webb remarked in his “The Centenary of Catholicity in Kentucky” that Cpt. Rapier did not bear any exalted reputation for practical religion. His wife, however was a woman of strong faith and fervent piety.To the present day her memory is venerated by her numerous descendants. Charles and William, whom I remember well, were good citizens and pious Catholic.

On May 10, 1787, James Rapier purchase land on the Beech Fork River for 250 pounds. This land is where he, his wife and 8 children settled. This first house was constructed with walls 5 bricks thick. Regina Rapier in “Rapier Family Record” wrote “the brick is of brownish hue, like that of Federal Hill. The doorway is arched with a fan like window. Inside were fine Adam mantels and built-in cupboards. The stairscase was small and winding, with a quaint banister of numerous thin spooled balusters set closely together with no intervening spaces. The ceiling on the second floor was low and the unfinished rafters gave a frontier appearance.” The kitchen, off the side of the brick house, was said the have been constructed of logs, with slave cabins nearby. Behind the slave quarter was a distillery. The roof of this house was destroyed during a tornado in 1908.

The land is located about 4 miles south of Bardstown on Highway 49. Crossing the Fogle bridge over the Beech Fork river, take the first left onto Roberts Road. The road winds and the earliest Rapier house was on the right, located on the top of a hill overlooking the farm. Before 2010 the house was leeled and the road that led up the hill to it was filled in to level out the field for crops. The road was said to have been tree lined and 10 or 15 feet below the grade of the fields.

Continuing down the road the next house on the left was the “Mansion”, which is the second house James Rapier built. It sat near a bluff overlooking the Beech Fork River. The Mansion was a much larger house than the first, boasting a pretentious hallway with a winding staircase ornamented with scrollwork od the same design as Federal Hill. The ddorway is square, without a fan, and not as handsome as the first house. The bricks for the house were baked nearby by family slaves. The walls were three bricks thick. The is an old burial ground in the rear of the garden. Sometime before 2010, the mansion was purchased by the Bruckheimer family of Bloomfield, and completely dismantled and taken away. Shortly afterwards a new house was built on the exact spot where the mansion stood by the Cassity family who owned the property.

James Rapier first appears on the Nelson County Tax Rolls in 1788. He was taxed for Himself and three slaves. In 1789 he had five taxable fo his eldest son had reached the age of 16. In 1791 he was taxed for himself, his son Richard, and 3 slaves.

His ancestry is Scottish, English and German.