Mordecai Lincoln

Mordecai Lincoln (1771 – 1830) was an uncle of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln. He was the eldest son of Captain Abraham Lincoln, a brother of Thomas Lincoln and Mary Lincoln Crume, and the husband of Mary Mudd. Lincoln is buried at the Old Catholic or Lincoln Cemetery near Fountain Green, Illinois. Mordecai's Springfield, Kentucky home, is the only home built by a member of the Lincoln family that still stands in its original location. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Early life Mordecai was the first child born to Abraham Lincoln (1744–1786) and Bathsheba Herring (–1836), having been born in 1771 Augusta County, now Rockingham County, Virginia. Abraham had been given 210 acres of prime Virginian land from his father, John Lincoln, and later sold the land to move in 1782 to western Virginia, now Kentucky. He amassed an estate of 5,544 acres of prime Kentucky land, realizing the bounty as advised by Daniel Boone, a relative of the Lincoln family. The couple had five children: Mordecai, Josiah, Thomas, Ann (Nancy) and Mary. The family settled in Jefferson County, about twenty miles (32 km) east of the site of Louisville. The territory was still contested by Native Americans living across the Ohio River. For protection the settlers lived near frontier forts, called stations, to which they retreated when the alarm was given. Abraham Lincoln settled near Hughes' Station on Floyd's Fork and began clearing land, planting corn, and building a cabin.