This microfilm is a copy of the original records located at the Kentucky State Historical Society in Frankfort and microfilmed in 1975. It is an incomplete copy of the set of records for each county but can provide the information for the specific counties and years as denoted in the list.
This enterprising and representative citizen of Malheur County has the distinction of being one of the early pioneers of Oregon, while also he was among the very first in many mining regions where he endured the almost overwhelming hardships there encountered and wrought with a strong hand and courageous heart, doing well his part in the great development of the west. Robert W. was born in Hopkinsville, Christian County, Kentucky, on April 30, 1839, being- the son of Robert and Emeline (Elgin) Worsham. He was reared on a farm and in the winter months attended school. In 1852 he came … Read more
Interviewer: Mamie Hanberry Person Interviewed: Cora Torian Location: Hopkinsville, Kentucky Place of Birth: Christian County KY Age: 71 Place of Residence: 217 W. 2nd St., Hopkinsville, KY Story of Cora Torian: (217 W. 2nd St., Hopkinsville, Ky.-Age 71.) Bell Childress, Cora’s Mother, was a slave of Andrew Owen. He purchased Belle Childress in the Purchase and brought her to Christian County. Cora was born in Christian County on Mr. Owen’s farm and considered herself three years old at the end of the Civil War. She told me as follows: “I has dreamed of fish and dat is a sure sign … Read more
Guy Wilson, president of the Traffic Motor Truck Corporation of St. Louis, has in his business career demonstrated the fact that opportunity is ever open to ambition, diligence and determination, for these qualities have been the dominant factors in the attainment of his present position and the success which has rewarded his labors. He was born in Christian county, Kentucky, May 1, 1878, his parents being Richard Henry and Maggie (Smith) Wilson. The father was a planter, who was descended from a long line of ancestors engaged in the same pursuits in Virginia. He had removed to Kentucky immediately following … Read more
Interviewer: Mamie Hanberry Person Interviewed: Mary Wooldridge Location: Hopkinsville, Kentucky Place of Birth: Washington County, Kentucky, Age: (about) 103 Place of Residence: Clarksville, Pike R.R. #1, Hopkinsville, Kentucky “Mary and her twin sister were slaves born in Washington County, Kentucky, near Lexington, belonging to Bob Eaglin. When Mary was about fourteen years old she and her sister was brought to the Lexington slave market and sold and a Mr. Lewis Burns of the same County purchased her. Mary doesn’t know what became of her sister. Five or six years later she was again put on the block and sold to … Read more
Robert M. Bronaugh of Baileyville had been a factor in the life of Kansas for considerably more than half a century. His people were in fact territorial pioneers. He fought when the country needed his fighting ability as a young man during the Civil war, and after that took up farming and latterly business connections with Baileyville, where he is still a merchant and is vice president of the Baileyville State Bank. He comes of old French stock and of aristocratic ancestry in America. Mr. Bronaugh was born in Schuyler County, Illinois, May 6, 1844. His paternal ancestors some generations … Read more
Interviewer: Mamie Hanberry Person Interviewed: Kate Billingsby Location: Hopkinsville, Kentucky Date of Birth: 1828 Place of Residence: R.R. #2, Hopkinsville, Ky Kate Billingsby, Ex-slave, according to a record in a Bible the Buckners gave her when she married was born in 1828. She was owned by Frank and Sarah Buckner. Born in this County and has spent her life in and around Hopkinsville. She lives on what is known as the Gates Mill Road about one half mile east of US 41E and owns her own home. Aunt Kate as she is generally called is a small black negro and … Read more
Christian County Christian County, Kentucky Cemetery Records Hosted at Christian County USGenWeb Archives Project Burt Cemetery Chapel Hill Cemetery Gee Cemetery Greenmoore Cemetery Hayes Cemetery Hord Cemetery McReynolds Cemetery Messamore Cemetery Powell Cemetery Steele Cemetery Christian County, Kentucky Cemetery Records Hosted at Christian County, Kentucky KYGenWeb Boyd Cemetery Bobbitt Cemetery, Bobbitt-Boyd Cemetery Brick Church Cemetery, Sinking Fork Baptist Church Broadcastle Cemetery Burgess Cemetery Cornelius Cemetery Cocke Cemetery Crofton-Ridgetop Cemetery, Partial Faughender Cemetery Grant Family Cemetery aka Clark Cemetery Gresham Cemetery Grissom (Grissam) Cemetery Harmony Grove Cemetery Hill Cemetery Hord Cemetery Jackson (Thos.) Cemetery Lander Cemetery McCarroll Hill Baptist Church Cemetery … Read more
A remarkable character and an energetic business man was Joshua Cates. Few now living remember him personally, or that he was once an influential citizen of the county. He was no common man in anything, not even in his eccentricities and peculiarities, for these were his most charming characteristics. It is said that he bore a strong resemblance to Napoleon Bonaparte, and that he was as great a man in his way as the little Corsican Lieutenant. He was not learned in the books, but he was rich and original in intellect, and rough sometimes in his speech, but still … Read more
The name popularly applied to the region embraced within the limits of Barren, Warren, Simpson, Logan, and the lower part of Todd, Christian and Trigg Counties, is very misleading to the modern ear. To the pioneers of the early part of this century, impressed by the stern experiences of frontier life, it meant a land ” where every prospect pleases” the eye only to dupe the understanding. They had been brought up in a timbered country, and had been educated to believe that it was necessary not only to their comfort but to their very existence. They had an exaggerated … Read more
Last Wolf: [HW: KY4] On January 20, 1910, a famous gray wolf was seen in Christian County and killed by a man named Tyler. This wolf seemed to be the last wolf seen in this County. It had terrorized the farmers in the Sinking Fork neighborhood, and a party organized by Charles L. Dade formed to hunt and kill this wolf which was done on the above date. The wolf measured 48 inches from tip to tip and stood 24 inches high.
Interviewer: Mamie Hanbery Person Interviewed: Uncle Dick Location: Christian County, Kentucky Uncle Dick, a negro servant of one of the Hendersons, was the fiddler of the neighborhood at weddings, husking parties and dances. Dick’s presence was essential. Uncle Dick was fully aware of his own importance, and in consequence assumed a great deal of dignity in his bearing. Before setting out he always dressed himself with the greatest nicety. At the appointed time he was at the place with all the weight of his dignity upon him. Woe to the “darkies” who violated any of the laws of etiquette in … Read more
The following sketch was written by Hon. James F. Buckner, of Louisville, for the Kentucky New Era. Col. Buckner was a student of Mr. Crockett, and for several years his law partner, hence no one is better qualified to write an impartial sketch of the man, and he pays a noble tribute to his old friend, partner and preceptor. He says: Joseph B. Crockett, the son of Col. Robert Crockett, was born in 1808, at Union Mills, in Jessamine County, Kentucky, and settled on a farm near Russellville. It was while Col. Crockett was pursuing the vocation of a farmer … Read more
Abraham Stites was a son of Dr. John Stites, and was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, during the Revolutionary war, and with his mother was removed into a cellar to avoid danger resulting from a sharp engagement then going on between the British soldiers and the rebels of that day. A singular coincidence in the life of Mr. Stites is that he died in February, 1864, in Hopkinsville, during a skirmish here between the Confederate and Federal troops. He, with a large family connection of the Ganos and Stiteses, removed from New Jersey to the Ohio Valley in 1808, carrying … Read more
Interviewer: Anna Pritchett Person Interviewed: Joseph Mosley Location: Indianapolis, Indiana Place of Birth: March 15, 1853 Federal Writers’ Project of the W.P.A. District #6 Marion County Anna Pritchett 1200 Kentucky Avenue, Indianapolis, Indiana FOLKLORE JOSEPH MOSLEY, EX-SLAVE 2637 Boulevard Place [TR: Also reported as Moseley in text of interview.] Joseph Mosley, one of twelve children, was born March 15, 1853, fourteen miles from Hopkinsville, Kentucky. His master, Tim Mosley, was a slave trader. He was supposed to have bought and sold 10,000 slaves. He would go from one state to another buying slaves, bringing in as many as 75 or … Read more
John M. Palmer was born in Scott County, Kentucky, September 13, 1817, and soon after his birth his father, who had been a soldier in the war of 1812, removed to Christian County, where lands were then cheap. John M. is still remembered by many of the old citizens as a bright, intelligent boy, fond of reading, and who lost no opportunity to improve his mind. He received such education as the new and sparsely settled country afforded, and in 1831 his father removed to Illinois. Shortly after a college was opened at Alton on the “manual labor system,” and … Read more
Among the early practitioners at the bar of Christian County, none surpassed in profound legal attainments Rezin Davidge. He was a brilliant and forcible speaker, an excellent judge of law, and a faithful and conscientious attorney. Strength of mind and purity of purpose were his leading traits. In his profession of the law, these made him a great chancery lawyer, no doubt one of the ablest the county knew in the early period of its history. In that branch of the law practice, that sometimes requires scheming and cunning diplomacy, he was neither great nor very successful, a proof that … Read more
Trailing through broad and verdant valleys, they went, their progress often arrested by hundreds of acres of plum trees bending to the ground with tempting fruit; crossing oak ridges where the ground was covered with loaded grapevines, through suffocating creek-bottom thickets, undergrowth of vines and briars, laboring up rocky hillsides and laboring down again, the horses picking their way through impeding rocks and boulders, until on the twenty-ninth of the month, two hundred miles from Fort Gibson, General Leavenworth and his staff reached Captain Dean’s camp, a mile or two from the Washita, where there were quartered two companies of … Read more
The son of a Revolutionary soldier and the representative of a distinguished family was Robert P. Henry. He was born in 1788 in Scott County, Ky., where his father, Gen. William Henry, had settled among the first in that region. He graduated in Transylvania University at Lexington, and studied law with Henry Clay. In 1809 he was admitted to the bar, and the same year was appointed Commonwealth’s Attorney for the district. He served in the war of 1812 as aid to his father, with the rank of Major. In 1811 he married Miss Gabriella F. Pitts, of Georgetown, Ky., … Read more
CHRISTIAN CO. (Mamie Hanbery) HOO-DOOISM A snake head an’ er lizard tail, Hoo-doo; Not close den a mile o’ jail, Hoo-doo; De snake mus’ be er rattlin’ one, Mus’ be killed at set uv sun, But never while he’s on de run, Hoo-doo. Before you get de lizard cot, Hoo-doo; You mus’ kill it on de spot, Hoo-doo; Take de tail an’ hang it up, Ketch de blood in a copper cup, An’ be sure it’s uv a pup, Hoo-doo. Wait until sum stormy weather, Hoo-doo; Put de head an’ feet together, Hoo-doo; In a dry ol’ terrapin shell, Let … Read more