Milburn Gunn (1820 - 1888)

Husband of Elizabeth Ann (Shenk) Gunn — married 31 Dec 1844 (to about 1857) in Jefferson Co., KY

Descendants

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Biography

Lived most or all of his life in Jeffersontown, Jefferson Co., Kentucky. According to https://www.myheritage.com/names/elizabeth_shenk#, Sarah’s father’s name was Milburn Gunn, a wagon maker who later owned a sawmill. On 8 September 1855 he served as secretary for a meeting in Jeffersontown of the Democratic and Anti-Know-Nothing Party, at which a Kentucky state convention was scheduled and all voters of Jefferson County “who are opposed to religious intolerance and proscription of naturalized citizens” were invited to attend (Louisville Daily Courier, 13 September 1855). In 1869 he was awarded patent number 96,800 for a machine for tenoning spokes. On 31 December 1844 he married Elizabeth Ann Shenk when she was 17. She gave birth to five children, of whom Sarah Ellen and Molevia were the youngest. Apparently she was commonly known as Eliza, the name that appears in the census records and on her gravestone. In the 1850 census for Jefferson County, Kentucky, Milburn and Eliza are listed with two children. But the divorce evidently happened between the birth of Molevia in 1855 and the census of 1860. In the records for that year, the 40-year-old Milburn is listed as living with the family of his 38-year-old brother Thomas, and the only child listed under him is the 10-year-old John. Eliza with her two youngest daughters Sarah and Molevia moved in with her parents, as they are listed with her parents Jacob and Dorothy (spelled “Dorithy” in 1850 and “Dorotha” in 1860). Rather than being immigrants from Germany, Jacob is listed as born in Pennsylvania and Dorothy is listed as born in Maryland (1850 and 1860) or Kentucky (1870). By the 1870 census the 17-year-old Sarah Ellen must have left home because just Eliza and Molevia are still in the Shenk home in Jeffersontown with Jacob, Dorothy, and their youngest son Coleman. Eliza spent her later years as a patient or inmate in the Central Kentucky Lunatic Asylum, where she is listed in the censuses for 1900 and 1910. She finally died of apoplexy at age 88 in 1916. Did Eliza go insane because of the divorce or did her husband leave her because she was insane? Milburn remarried in 1864 and in the 1870 census is listed as a farmer with real estate worth $2000 and personal property worth $600. According to https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-1-458114251-1-17872/milburn-gunn-in-myheritage-family-trees, Milburn was part owner of a dairy farm but contracted glaucoma and was swindled into signing papers relinquishing his share.

Sources

• Census records for Jefferson County, KY, for 1850, 1860, and 1870; https://www.myheritage.com/names/elizabeth_shenk#; https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-1-458114251-1-17872/milburn-gunn-in-myheritage-family-trees