Jennie
(Minerd)
Herrington-Worrick
(1876-1930)
Jennie
(Minerd) Herrington-Worrick was born on March 29, 1876 at Mt. Braddock near
Uniontown, Fayette County, PA, the daughter of William
and Sara Elizabeth (Whoolery) Minerd. She was a survivor and must have
been a very strong woman.
On Sept. 21, 1897, at age 21, she married 18-year-old Albert H. Herrington (1879-1899), a lamp cleaner at the nearby Oliver coke plant. (His middle initial also has been given as "A.")
They lived on Middle Street in Uniontown and had one son, Charles L. Herrington.
A little over a year after their marriage, during the Philippine Insurrection, Albert and 13 other local men enlisted in the Army, and were shipped out to the South Pacific. He was assigned to Company M of the 20th U.S. Infantry.
On
the night of Feb. 5, 1899, while in port in Honolulu, Albert was critically
injured when struck by a
horse and buggy. He was taken aboard his ship, the
Scandia, where he died shortly afterward. His broken remains were
laid to rest at Nuuanu
Cemetery in Honolulu. About two years later, on New Year's Day 1901, he was
reburied at the San
Francisco National Cemetery, in Section ES, Site 1075, where his grave may
be found today. He is listed as "A.A. Herrington" on the cemetery
website.
Widowed at the tender age of 23, Jennie and son then went to live with her parents in the coal mining patch town of Brownfield, Fayette County.
After two years as a single woman, on Nov. 28, 1901, Jennie married her second husband, John B. Worrick (1872-1910), a coal miner. They had one son, James W. Worrick.
The Worricks lived at Brownfield and then moved to Grays Landing, Greene County, PA.
Tragedy struck again on Jan. 17, 1910 when John was instantly killed in an accident at the Donald No. 1 Mine. The 1910 book, Report of the Department of Mines, states that John "was found dead under his trip of loaded cars. It is supposed that he fell off the front of [the] trip."
Widowed for the second time in 13 years, Jennie remained in Uniontown. It's known that her nieces Grace and Myra Minerd of Smithfield spent entire days visiting at her home.
Jennie
moved to Warren, Trumbull County, OH in about 1926, to be near her brother, James
'William' Minerd. "Since that time," said a Warren newspaper,
"[she] has become the center of an admiring group of friends."
Four years later, on March 15, 1930, "following a major operation," she died at Warren. She was buried beside her second husband at the Hopwood Cemetery near Uniontown.
For
many years, our research efforts failed to determine the burial site of Jennie's 1st husband. His
military records from the National Archives showed no record that his body was
ever returned to Pennsylvania. A letter from the National Memorial
Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu reported that the Nuuanu Cemetery had no
record of his burial or disinterment. Research by the curator of the
Uniontown Library's Pennsylvania Room showed that he was not listed in burials in
and around the area. However, in 2004, a cousin discovered the website of
the National Cemetery Administration,
providing a searchable "nationwide
gravesite locator" for US soldiers. Using that database, Albert's name
was found, and the mystery of his final resting place was finally solved.
Son James Worrick resided in South Brownsville, Fayette County in 1930. His home was at 124 Angle Street.
Copyright © 2000, 2003-2004, 2006 Mark A. Miner