I don't know why David and Joanna Reece Cornett took their family from East Tennessee to Kentucky and then to Logan County, West Virginia. My grandmother, Phylow Frances Godfrey Roberts, daughter of Lewis Gerome Godfrey and Susannah Cornett who was the daughter of David and Joanna Reese Cornett, would tell of her grandfather David Cornett, who was killed by renegades during the Civil War. He was a feisty little old man. The renegades had stolen about all that they had. A band of them came by and were going to take the milk cow, which was about all they had to feed the family. He wouldn't let them take the cow, so they killed him and cut him up and hung the pieces from trees along the lane. I have the memory that she said he was red-headed, however, I'm not certain of that.
Lately, I have heard from his son Wilborn's descendents that he was actually killed after the war was over by Union soldiers who had deserted and were going home. I don't swear to the veracity of this story, but that was what was told to me.
-- submitted by Rodney D. Veitschegger, Bowling Green, KY
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