Surname Saturday ~ Gorin of Virginia and Kentucky

Virginia (courtesy Wikipedia)

The first Gorin ancestor I know about is the ancestor under whom I applied for membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), John Gorin. He was born on May 15, 1763, in Alexandria, Fairfax County, Virginia. I don't know his parents or where they were originally from. There are some online (unsourced) family trees at ancestry.com that indicate his father's name is John Gorin; that he was born in France; that his wife's name was Gladin; and that there were at least three children from this union. I have NOT added this to my family tree, as more research needed here, but it is an interesting trail to pursue.

Fold3.com, a subscription website which focuses on military records, has a wealth of information on John Gorin. His Revolutionary War Pension file includes letters written by descendants in the early 1900s looking for information about his service in the war, as well as correspondence from the 1850s regarding the application by his widow (his second wife) for a pension as well as for bounty lands.

In a later 1793 record, he appears in muster rolls as a Sergt. Major for Russell's Reg't Cav. of the Kentucky Volunteers.

In 1799, he moved his family from Virginia to Barren County, Kentucky, after receiving a land grant for 200 acres as of August 27, 1799. At this time, this was the frontier.

John Gorin later served in the War of 1812, as a Major in the "10 Regiment (Barbour's), Mounted, Kentucky Volunteers."

Kentucky (courtesy Wikipedia)

He first married Elizabeth Franklin (about 1765-1824) in about 1786, in Alexandria, Fairfax, Virginia. With her, he had at least eleven children, the youngest of whom was Thomas Jefferson Gorin. His wife predeceased him, dying in 1824. He remarried another Elizabeth: Elizabeth Duval, on May 26, 1825, in Kentucky. She died in 1855, and it looks like she continued to receive a pension as John Gorin's widow until her death.

He died August 5, 1837, in Glasgow, Barren County, Kentucky, and is buried in the Glasgow Municipal Cemetery.

See his Find A Grave memorial, which includes a photograph of what is likely his original gravestone, as well as a newer stone indicating his service in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812.

Generation 2: Thomas Jefferson Gorin (1808-1883) married Mary Ann Bowman in 1831.

Most of the information I have about Thomas is from the 1856 Family Bible that was handed down in the family.

Thomas was born on January 27, 1808, in Barren County, Kentucky. He married Mary Ann Bowman on December 27, 1831. According to the bible records, he fathered seven children: Mary Elizabeth, James Edward, Laura*, Emma, Ellen*, Thomas*, and Florence.
    * These three died young - the daughters as teenagers, the son as an infant.

Not only does the bible have the traditional center section with births, marriages and deaths recorded for the family, but pasted on the inside are newspaper clippings of obituaries for both Thomas and his wife, Mary Ann, who predeceased him, dying on September 5, 1870.

Thomas Jefferson Gorin

Thomas died at the Louisville, Kentucky, home of his son, James E. Gorin on January 11, 1883. In one obituary, Thomas J. Gorin is described as "one of Louisville's most esteemed citizens" and "a prominent tobacconist and banker of that place [Glasgow, Kentucky]." He was survived by four of his children: "Mrs. Henry Murrell, Mrs. John A. Lee and Mr. James E. Gorin of this city [Louisville], and Mrs. D. M. Ashby, of Glasgow." He is buried in Glasgow and has a Find A Grave memorial.

I previously shared the ambrotype at right, where I transcribed the handwritten note that is included in it.

I am descended from the eldest daughter, Mary Elizabeth Gorin, and I have also written about his youngest daughter, Florence, and her husband, who lived in Texas for quite awhile, then California, but are buried in Louisville, Kentucky.

Generation 3: Mary Elizabeth Gorin (1833-1891) married Daniel Morgan Ashby.
Generation 4: Mary Bowman Ashby (1866-1956) married Charles Chapin Adsit
Generation 5: Elizabeth Adsit (1897-1983) married Charles McAlpin Pyle
Generation 6: Charles McAlpin Pyle, Jr. (1924-1993)
Generation 7: Me