The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1886-11-27
The Boy Abe Lincoln.

an Abraham Lincoln, who emigra-
ted to the OZARK and bloody ground"
in 1850 from Rockingham county.
Virginia. He was the grandfather
of the President, and his location in
Virginia is thus accounted for by
Hay and Nicolay:
"All that was known of this emf
grant Abraham Lincoln by his i'm
mediate descendants was that his
progenitors. who were Quakers, came
from Berks county, Pennsylvania,
into Virginia, and there throve and
prospered. But the Investigations of
several eager genealogists have since
established a strong probability that
he was descended from the Massa-
chusetts family of the same name,
who settled about the year 1857 at
bingham, and who came originally
from the county of Norfolk in the
Old country. The first ancestor of
this line, of whom we have any
knowledge. was Samuel Lincoln, of
Norwich, England; he, dying in
bingham, Massachusetts, left son.
Mordecai, whose son, of the name,
removed to Monmouth, New Jersey,
and thence to Amity township, now
part of Berks county, Pennsylva-
via, where he died about 1875, fifty
years old. From copy of his will,
recorded in the Office of the Register
in Philadelphia, we gather that he
was a man of considerable property"
Abraham, the Kentucky pioneer,
was killed by the Indians in 1856.
Thomas one of his five children,
learned the trade of carpenter, and
to him were reserved the honors of
an illustrious parentage. On the 18th
of June, while learning his trade in
the carpenter shop of Joseph Hanks,
in EIizabethtown, Kentucky, he
married Nancy Hanks. a niece of his
employer.
There was no hint of future glory
in the wedding or the bringing home
of Nancy Lincoln. All accounts rep.
resent her as handsome young wo-
man of tWenty-three, of appearance
and intellect superior to her lowly
fortunes. She could read and write
a remarkable accomplishment 10 her
circle-and even taught her husband
to form the letters of his name. He
had no such valuable wedding gifts
to bestow upon her; he brought her
to little house in Elizabethtown,
where he and she and want dwelt TO-
gether in fourteen feet space. The
next year daughter was born to
them, and the next the young car
penter, not finding his work remu-
nerative enough for his growing
budget, removed to little farm
which he had bought on the easy
terms then prevalent in Kentucky,
on the Big South Fork of Nolin
Creek, in what was then Hardin and
is now La Rue county, three miles
from Hodgensville. The ground had
nothing attractive about it but its
cheapness. 1t was hardly more
grateful than the rocky hillslopes of
New England. 1t required full as
earnest and intelligent industry to
persuade living cut of these barren
hlllocks and weedy hollows covered
with stunted and scrubby under
brush, as it would amid the rocks
and sands of the northern coast.
Thomas Lincoln settled down in
this dismal solitude in deeper pov-
erty than any of his name had ever
known; and there, in the midst of
the most unpromising circumstance
that ever witnessed the advent of
hero in this world. Abraham Lin
coin was born on the 18th day of
February, 1909.
There is still living near Knob
Creek in Kentucky. at the age of
eighty, man who claims to have
known Abraham Lincoln in his
childhood-Austin Gollaher. He
says he used to play with Abe Lin
coin in the shavings of his fathers
carpenter shop. He tells story
which, if accurate, entities him to
the civic crown which the Romans
used to give to one who saved the
life of citizen. When GoIlaher
was eleven and Lincoln eight the
two boys were in the woods in per-
suit of patridges; in trying tn ''enan"
across knoh Creek on "A log, I.:tf,4dn
fell in, and Godfather ti,ned ni,D oar
with sycamore branch-a service. to
the Republic. the value of whirn il
fatigues he imagination to cOniuut,"
Thomas LlncDin soon removed to
Indiana, where he built "A TEMPORARY
shelter of the sort called in he from.
tier language "a half-faced camp;"
merely a shed of poles, which defend
nH tho I'M 20.