Loren Mckager Lawhorn

     Loren Mckager Lawhorn, son of McKager Micajah Lawhorn and Martana Isabella Crabtree, was born 30 June 1922 in Fentress County, Tennessee.^1,2 Loren Mckager Lawhorn was the son of McKager Micajah Lawhorn and Martana Isabella Crabtree. Loren Mckager Lawhorn married Azilee Anna Pate on 20 November 1950..¹      The Oak Ridger
     Friday, November 24, 2000
     Lawhorns to celebrate 50 years
     Loren and Azilee Pate lawhorn will celebrate their golden wedding anniversary with a reception to be held from 2 to 4 P.M. Saturday, Nov. 25, at Central Baptist Church
     The two were married on Nov. 30, 1950 at First Baptist Church of Harriman. Loren Lawhorn is retired from Lockheed martin Energy Systems and Azilee Lawhorn is retired as a teacher with the Roane County schools.
     The Lawhorns have four children: Ed Lawhorn of Midlothian, Va., and Don Lawhorn, susan Lawhorn Willoughby and John Lawhorn, all of Knoxville. There are 12 grandchildren³      The Oak Ridger
     Friday, December 8, 2000
     
     A CIVIL WAR SON REMEMBERS
     by Cathy Ziegaus - Oak Ridger Staff
     Loren Lawhorn referred to the books, documents and pictures that surrounded him as he talked about his father, McKager Lawhorn, a veteran of the Civil War. An Associated Press story reported Nov. 23 that a woman living in the Chattanooga area was the only known living child of a Civil War veteran in Tennessee. Loren Lawhorn disputes that claim.
     "I believe there are quite a few," he said. "I know of several in Morgan County. Now there may not be many first-born children ... they'd be pretty old ... but I believe there are more than that article stated. ... My sister Dora (Gregory) lives in Soddy Daisy. So that already makes two of us."
     McKager Lawhorn enlisted in the Union Army in Clinton County, Ky., a few months before his 18th birthday, along with his older brother, Asa.
     "Most of East Tennessee was primarily Republican," Loren said. "The Confederates prevailed in Middle and West Tennessee. ... Kentucky was split down the middle."
     The Lawhorn brothers were assigned to Company C of the First Regiment in the Kentucky Cavalry, mustered in on Aug. 31, 1863. That was two years after the war began but it was right at the peak of conflict.
     The new Republican Party, formerly the Whigs, had their candidate, Abraham Lincoln, as president, elected in 1861. Ironically, that time in history coincides with the present. Neither Lincoln nor the other candidate received a majority of the popular vote, but Lincoln had a majority of electoral votes. After his election, seven Southern states withdrew from the Union.
     It was also about the time the war turned around in favor of the Union Army. A month before the Lawhorns enlisted, Gen. Grant and his troops had captured Vicksburg, Miss., giving the Union complete control of the Mississippi River. Later, the Army suffered a serious defeat at Chickamauga, but according to historical documents, the Army "received a spectacular victory in the Battle above the Clouds at Chattanooga."
     McKager was first stationed in the Nashville area and then his unit moved to Harriman.
     Loren said he and his wife had bought a farm on the same site where the camp had been but didn't know it at the time.
     "They were there (in Harriman) so they (the troops) could be moved easily," Loren said. "He fought in all the Knoxville battles: Fort Sanders, Campbell Station, all the battles around Knoxville up to Jefferson City. ... Then they went to Chattanooga and he fought in those battles, and also in battles at Nashville. ... He fought all in this area and made the final push to Atlanta."
     Loren doesn't remember his father. He was only 2 when his father died in 1924.
     Most of the stories he knows about McKager came from his mother and other family members or friends.
     "I'm the 19th child," Loren said, adding that he was born to his father's fourth wife. "My father was a lot older than my mother. ... My daddy had four wives, but he never did have two wives at the same time," he laughed. "In that day, a man almost had to have a wife ... especially if you had small children. When his wives would die, he'd be married again in three or four months, ... When his first wife died in July 1897, he got married again in December 1897."
     Loren remembers one of the stories told about his father during the war, concerning a Confederate guerilla named "Tinker" Dave Beatty.
     "He was pretty upset about him. While he was in the Army, he (Beatty) came to my father's house when he was gone. My dad's two sisters were there and Beatty's men threatened to rape them. ... They took all their food, but of course soldiers did that all through the war. But my dad said if he ever saw him, he'd kill him.
     "Well, he saw him at Jamestown, about 10 years after he was discharged. He went home to get his gun."
     That day, someone must have talked Lawhorn out of killing Beatty, but according to records, he didn't live that long anyway. Beatty died at the age of 40.
     Loren and his wife, Azilee, have been Oak Ridge residents for a long time, with all four of their children going through Oak Ridge schools.
     "I worked here briefly during World War II, before I went to the Navy," Loren said. "When I came back after the war, I didn't claim my job (at the Y-12 Plant) because people I talked to told me 'there's a big layoff and chances of you staying more than a month are very remote,' so I didn't want to get a job and be laid off."
     He went to college and after graduating, got a job as a high school principal at Sunbright and taught for five years.
     Then someone told him about a machine operator training program at the Oak Ridge plants.
     "I was hired to teach remedial math here safety."
     After the Lawhorns' youngest child graduated, around 1980, the couple moved to Rockwood (his father's) area of operation in the Civil War," Loren said. "I hadn't been too interested in it before. ... We were living in Rockwood at the time. ... My wife would come back here to the craft fairs. I wasn't too much interested so I'd go to the library."
     One day at the library he found a bibliography that listed "The Wild Riders of the First Kentucky Cavalry: A History of the Regiment, in the Great War of the Rebellion, 1861-1865." The copyright was 1894.
     "That was my father's unit," Loren said. "I knew I had to have it because it's got my father's name in it. ... A picture of his captain, Frank Wolford, is in the front of the book.
     "But there's a funny story about that book. I've got four june. They wanted a combination gift for Father's Day and my birthday." Loren said one of his sons, who lives in Richmond, Va., found the book at the Richmond library.
     "It hadn't been checked out in 37 years," he said. "My son went there and talked to that lady about buying the book. She told him none of the books were for years." She said "That's all right. And 37 years from now if someone wants to read it, it'll be here."
     His children finally found one for sale in an antique store in Louisville, Ky.
     "They still haven't told me how much they paid for it," Loren said. "It’s out it," he laughed.
     "I think it's the only book he's ever read from cover to cover," his wife said.
     A family member compiled a genealogy on the Lawhorns a few years ago, Loren Lawhorn was born toward Atlanta. They had been in the hospital at the same time.
     "We lived in Oak Ridge till 1980, moved to Rockwood, then came back to Oak Ridge in 1990 when we both retired," said his wife, retired as a math teacher with the Roane County schools.
     "We lived in Rockwood 10 years and it was a good 10 years but it wasn't Oak Ridge," he added.
     "Oak Ridge gets in your blood, once you live here," Loren said. ... "So we moved back."
     Home used to be Mona Lane. The Lawhorns were one of the families who had to move recently because of sinkholes in the area.
     Though it's been more than a century since the Civil War, Lawhorn still defends his father's side in the war.
     "I had a hard time a few years ago with a lady -- she was actually my niece. She was rich and she decided she wanted a relative in the Confederate Army. My daddy fought with the Union side. She wanted to have a relative that was prominent in the decided my father was a Confederate officer inscription and had it erected at the grave site, which is in Jamestown.
     "I gave her 24 hours to remove there after 24 hours and it was still there, so I busted it up with a 12-pound sledgehammer and threw it over the hill," he laughed.
     He said he received a letter from her threatening to sue but he never heard from her again.¹ His last residence was in Oak Ridge, Anderson County, Tennessee.⁴ Loren Mckager Lawhorn died on 7 March 2005 at at his home, 105 Wimberly Ln in Oak Ridge, Anderson County, Tennessee.⁵ He was buried on 10 March 2005 in the Oak Ridge Memorial Park, oak Ridge, Anderson County, Tennessee.