Emily Brumfield
© January 2005
Compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber
22937 Long Branch Road, Rush, KY 41168
Emily Brumfield, was born, according to son Lorenzo, in Giles County, Virginia. She was the daughter of Micajah Brumfield and Eleanor Clay. She married Lorenzo Dow McCormack 02 March 1826 in Giles County, Virginia.
There are several family stories that have been handed down, generation by generation, about Emily. Some family members were told that she and sister Lucinda were Cherokee and either adopted or raised by the Brumfield family. Yet another story says that she was killed in a corn crib by Creek Indians in North Carolina and that her husband then brought the children to Kentucky after her death. It is still not clear from where or why the stories were started.
What we can document is that Lorenzo McCormack and Emily were married by the Reverend Landon Duncan in Giles County. The minister was born in Virginia but had moved to Stokes County, North Carolina for a time and then migrated back settling in Giles County in the Wolf Creek Section. Duncan was a Baptist minister and established several churches in the county.
Emily’s husband appears on tax rolls for Giles County, Virginia from 1827 through 1830. During that same time frame Emily gave birth to at least two children Ellen and Micajah. As indicated in September 1832, they may have had financial trouble when an indenture was drawn up between her husband and Daniel Hale selling 44 shocks of hemp, one cow and calf, a two year old heifer, hogs, two beds and furniture along with all household and kitchen furniture to secure a debt. Emily had given birth sometime in early 1832 to Madison and was once again pregnant.
The family appears in 1833 in Lawrence County, Kentucky where Lorenzo was born, followed by Malinda in 1835 and Julina, our ancestor, on Christmas day 1836. Julina told census takers she was born in Virginia. Researchers have not located the family on the 1840 census.
Lorenzo Dow McCormack died some time before February 1846 when daughter Ellen went before the Lawrence County, Kentucky court and chose Peres Randall as her guardian. No such papers have been located for the other children. Nothing more has been located for Emily. We know that her mother was living in Lawrence County with a brother William in 1850 and may have helped raise the children.