KENTUCKY: A History of the State, Battle, Perrin, & Kniffin, 4th ed., 
1887, Boyle Co.

PROF. JAMES LANE ALLEN was born December 31, 1821, in Fayette County, 
Ky.; is a son of John and Elizabeth (Payne) Allen.  John Allen was of 
English descent, his ancestors having settled in Virginia, and afterward
moved to Kentucky in the first settlement of the State.  The mother of 
James Lane Allen was a daughter of Judge Henry and Anna (Lane) Payne, of
Fayette County, Ky.  Anna (Lane) Payne was a daughter of Gen. Lane of 
Virginia, a distinguished officer in the war for independence.  James 
Lane Allen was educated at Transylvania University, from which he 
graduated in 1841, while Dr. Lewis Marshall was president.  He then 
studied law under his half-brother, M.C. Johnson, at Lexington, and 
graduated in the law department at Transylvania University in the spring
of 1843.  He removed to St. Louis and practiced law nearly two years, 
and then went to Texas.  The Mexican war breaking out about this time, 
he joined the United States forces and became a lieutenant under Capt. 
Ben. McCulloch, later Gen. McCulloch, the famous Texas ranger.  He was 
engaged in the storming of Monterey, after the surrender of which he 
returned to Texas, and became one of the leading and prominent members 
of the first Legislature of the State, and was sent as a delegate to the
National Democratic Convention at Baltimore which nominated Gen. Cass 
for President.  After the death of his father, which occurred in Fayette
County, Ky., in 1848, he returned to Lexington and resumed the practice 
of law and there resided until 1854, when he went to Europe and spent a 
year with a view of general improvement, and upon his return in 1855 was
united in marriage to the eldest daughter of John and Cecily 
(DeGraffenreid) McCaw, of Lexington, and removed to Missouri, where he 
engaged in agricultural pursuits until 1863.  The war being in progress,
he was, owing to his Southern sympathies, imprisoned, and upon his 
release obliged to leave the State.  He returned to Lexington, Ky., and 
after a short residence there went with his father inland to Canada, 
where he remained until the close of the war.  In 1865 he taught in the 
female school at New Castle, Henry County, which was under the control
of Z.F. Smith, and afterward taught taught in the school of Prof.
Mullins, at Lexington.  He was appointed cashier of the bank at 
Eminence, Ky., which position he resigned in 1868, and removed to 
Danville, where he still lives.  While a resident of Eminence, he was 
brought out as a candidate for nomination for Congress, but was defeated
in the convention by Hon. Boyd Winchester, after a sharp contest.  He 
married his second wife, the eldest daughter of Hon. Joshua F. Bell, on 
November 7, 1867.  He filled a professorship in one of the Danville male
colleges, and being a member of the Christian Church he was, upon the 
urgent solicitation of many of the prominent members of the 
denomination, induced him to devote himself to the ministry, which he 
did.  In 1876, upon the burning of the Caldwell Female Institute, he was
induced by friends to organize the institute now known as the Ball 
Female Seminary.  His wife, who possesses a wealth of talent, aids as 
co-principal; she is the life and soul of the institution.  She was very
carefully educated by her father, who was a man of distinguished talent
and ability, which she has inherited in full.  Prof. Allen has two sons:
John McCaw, a physician in Chicago, and George J., commission merchant 
in Chicago.

Allen Payne Lane Marshall Johnson McCulloch Cass DeGraffenreid McCaw 
Smith Mullins Winchester Bell
=
Fayette-KY Henry-KY VA TX MO Canada

http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/boyle/allen.jl.txt