Since I have been working on writing about third and fourth great grandparents during much of this writing challenge, this fits into my plan!
Last week, I wrote about a paternal third great grandfather, Thomas Jefferson Gorin. His wife was Mary Ann Bowman. I know much less about her.
Mary Ann was born in Kentucky on March 2, 1814 to Granville Bowman and wife Polly Walthall. (Her parents were born in Virginia.) I have five younger siblings listed for her, but there could be more children who didn't survive childhood.
I know her birth date from the Gorin family bible and I believe her birth place was probably Burkesville, Cumberland County, Kentucky, considering her father was in Cumberland County in U.S. Censuses from 1810-1840. (Also see her obituary below.)
According to the family bible, she married Thomas Jefferson Gorin on December 27, 1831. As I noted last week, they had eight children:
Mary Elizabeth Gorin (1833-1891)
James Edward Gorin (1835-1896)
Laura Gorin (1837-1853)
Emma Gorin (1839-1901)
Unnamed daughter Gorin (July 1842)
Ellen Gorin (1844-1858)
Thomas Gorin (March 1847-November 1847)
Florence Gorin (1851-1925)
She named in the U.S. Census for 1850, 1860, and 1870, but the census records don't tell me much about her except for the make up of her household in each of those years.
I shared the family's 1850 U.S. Census record at the blog post for Thomas J. Gorin. In 1860 and 1870, the family was still in Glasgow, Kentucky.
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| 1860 U.S. Census; Place: Glasgow, Barren, Kentucky; Roll: M653_354; Page: 1065; Image: 506. (Ancestry.com). Record for Thomas J. Gorin. |
In 1860, the household was headed by Thomas J. Gorin, age 52, a banker with $7,000 in real estate and $13,900 in personal estate. Also listed are Mary A. Gorin, age 46 with occupation "H. K." (housekeeper), son James E. Gorin, a 25-year-old merchant, and daughter Florence, age 9. Not included here is the image of the associated slave schedule for the family in 1860 which shows that the Gorins owned 12 (unnamed) slaves.
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| 1870 U.S. Census; Place: Glasgow, Barren, Kentucky; Roll: M593_445; Page: 541; Image: 385. (Ancestry.com). Record For Thomas J. Gorin. |
The household in 1870 is headed by Thomas, a banker with $5,000 in real estate and $4,000 in personal estate. (Note the dramatic reduction from 1860: he no longer owns slaves, the value of whom were included in his personal estate in 1860.) Mary Ann, age 56, is Keeping House and daughter, Florence, is listed as 18 years old. The household also includes a couple of Domestic Servants, Amy Cockrill and Eliza Cockrill. (I wonder if they were freed slaves of the Gorins or of neighbors?) The household also includes a lodger, Clarance Wood, a 25-year-old "Druggist" with $2,500 in personal estate.
I wrote about their youngest daughter, Florence (Gorin) Lee and her husband, and their move to Texas.
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Mary Ann (Bowman) Gorin died on September 5, 1870, and there is an obituary pasted in the bible. Unfortunately, I don't know what newspaper it was from, though according to Chronicling America, there were several newspapers published in Glasgow, Kentucky during the late nineteenth century.
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| Inside right front cover. Mary Ann's obituary is center and right. |
The obituary starts by noting that:
"Mrs. Mary Ann Gorin was the daughter of Mr. Bowman, a reputable and influential citizen of Cumberland county, Ky., where she was born and brought up. In her eighteenth year she was united in marriage with T. J. Gorin, Esq., of Glasgow, Ky., with whom, in 1832, she joined the Methodist Church, of which she continued an exemplary member till her death, which occurred September 5, 1870."The obituary goes on to say that she had been suffering from a "pulmonary affection" from which she ultimately died. The language that describes her and her life is very nineteenth century:
- "In few instances has the ideal of a Christian woman been more fully realized than in Sister Gorin."
- "The domestic virtues shone in her character with peculiar brilliancy. She was a model housekeeper."
- "She indulged in no idle visiting, and was consequently no tattler or busybody in other people's matters."
- "When she and her husband set out together to encounter life's struggles, they had but little of this world's goods, but the blessing of the Lord, "which maketh rich," was upon them, and for many years before her death they were in possession of affluence."
Mary Ann Bowman Gorin
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Elizabeth Adsit
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Charles McAlpin Pyle, Jr.
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Me
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