Emanuel Family - Person Sheet
Emanuel Family - Person Sheet
NameGilbert Perry Gordy 
Birthabt 1831, Burke, Georgia, USA
Death4 Oct 1864
FatherWilson Gordy (1801-1890)
MotherMary Jane Scott (1809-1881)
Spouses
Burialaft 17 Nov 1890, Henrietta, Clay, Texas, USA [313]
FatherMark Alexander George (1802-1891)
MotherJane Boswell Dennis (1809-1874)
ChildrenCaroline Virginia (1861-1940)
Research notes for Gilbert Perry Gordy
Presidential Ancestor's Confederate Uniform to be Restored and Preserved:
April 8, 2002, the butternut colored uniform has been sitting in a drawer in a judge's office in the Chattahoochee County, Ga. courthouse since the 1940's. It is accompanied by a very old typewritten note entitled "About This Suit Of Cloths". The author of the note is unknown, but the identity of the owner of the uniform is not. It belonged to GILBERT PERRY GORDY, who, turns out, has a famous relative. Perry Gordy was the great-uncle of Bessie Lillian Gordy Carter, who became known to the world as "Miss Lillian" during the time her son, Jimmy Carter, was President of the United States.
The uniform was brought out of the judge's drawer last Thanksgiving when the former president and his family were celebrating the holiday in the area and asked to see it. Now the fragile cloth is going to get a full restoration thanks to the efforts of the Judge, Ken Van Horn, and a Georgia state legislator, Sen. Ed Harbison, (D-Columbus), who obtained state funding for the $25,000 cost of the repair and a case to display it. "I not only don't have any problems doing it, I'm very proud to do it," said state Sen. Ed Harbison, (D-Columbus). "It is a significant historical item and it needs to be preserved." Harbison, who is black, obtained the money from local assistance grants to lawmaker's districts for everything from band uniforms to arts programs.
Van Horn told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that President Carter was enthusiastic about the uniform, which includes the coat, pants, a black hat, socks and saber belt. "He knew a lot about the Civil War and even about the acorn-squash color of homespun fabrics like this one is made from," he said. Several museums have expressed an interest in displaying the uniform after the restoration is completed, Van Horn said. "We'd like to keep it in the courthouse here," he said. "But really don't have a proper display area for a textile this delicate. The "History of This Suit of Clothes" reads: "On the old Gordy homestead...about three miles west of Cusseta, wool was sheared from sheep, thread spun from this wool and cloth woven for this thread on a hand loom and this suit cut and sewed by hand by Mrs. Mary Scott Gordy for her son Gilbert Perry Gordy." "He left Columbus, Ga. , with the Chattahoochee Rangers on Oct. 29, 1861, and after engaging in many battles, died from wounds on Oct. 4, 1864." Van Horn noted that the uniform has a tear in the leg which has been repaired, causing him to speculate that the tear was caused by the bullet that took Gordy's life. Gordy's brother, William was killed in the Civil War in 1863, another brother Lt. Henry M. Gordy was severely wounded but survived. Gordy left behind a wife, Martha S. George and a young daughter, Carrie. His wife remarried and moved to oklahoma and in the 1930's, the daughter, Carrie, gave the uniform to the Cusseta area branch of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. When the chapter disbanded in the 1940's, the uniform was left to the probate office, of which Van Horn is now in charge.
Courtesy of, Civil War Interactive: The Daily Newspaper of the Civil War.