Horton and Bryan Family History

James Kash Cockerham was born on 25 June 1846 in Owsley County, Kentucky, the son of James Henry Cockerham (1822-1904) and Emily Stamper (1826-1900). In 1866, James married Zerilda Manervia Puckett (1831-1921) at Puckett’s Bend in Breathitt County, Kentucky. They had four children. Their eldest, Syrene Cockerham (1868-1962), married Robert Pepper McCoun (1860-1940). They were…

Joseph Eccles McCoun began with his birth on 24 August 1825, in Salvisa, Mercer County, Kentucky. He was the fifth of six children of Joseph McCoun (1784-1829) and Esther Eccles McCoun (1792-1881). In these biographies, Joseph Eccles McCoun is called “Joe” and his father “Joseph,” to distinguish the son from the father. Joseph died when…

On 2 May 1868, Syrene Cockerham was born in Wolfe County, Kentucky, the eldest child and only daughter of James Kash Cockerham and Zerilda Manervia Puckett. She had three younger brothers. At 22, Syrene married Robert Pepper McCoun (1860-1940). During the first 11 years of marriage, Syrene and Rob had seven children, six of whom…

Robert Pepper McCoun was born on 8 May1860 in Salvisa, Mercer County, Kentucky, the same year in which the only Kentucky-born president, Abraham Lincoln, was elected. Rob’s father was Joseph Eccles “Joe” McCoun (1825-1897). Joe was the son of Esther Eccles (1792-1881) and Joseph McCoun (1784-1829), who built the house in which Joe and Rob…

Lucy Ethel McCoun was born in Wolfe County, Kentucky, on 15 September 1896. The fourth child of Syrene Cockerham (1868-1962) and Robert Pepper McCoun (1860-1940), she always went by “Ethel.” On 1 January 1914, 17-year-old Ethel married Herbert Hilary Horton. They had seven children, including the author’s father, Raymond Thomas Horton, the eldest. Herbert tragically…

Raymond Thomas Horton was born on 15 November 1914, in Campton, Kentucky. His father, Herbert Hilary Horton, was 21 and his mother, Lucy Ethel McCoun Horton, who went by “Ethel,” was 18. Herbert died in 1931 when Raymond was 16. Raymond attended Berea Academy from 1931-1934, graduating in 1934, and Berea College for one year.…

Herbert Hilary Horton was born on 11 January 1893, in Campton, Wolfe County, Kentucky, when his father, Thomas Richmond Horton (1845-1907), was 47 and his mother, Anna Barron Tyler Horton (1855-1924), was 37. He was the tenth of 12 children, all but two of whom lived to adulthood, married, and had children. Herbert married Lucy…