HISTORY OF KENTUCKY AND KENTUCKIANS, E. Polk Johnson, three volumes,
Lewis Publishing Co., New York & Chicago, 1912. Common version, Vol. III,
p. 1321-1322.  Carter County.

CHARLES KITCHEN is the president of the Second National Bank of Ashland,
Kentucky, besides being engaged in various other important business
interests, and the history of his family connections and of his business
career will prove an interesting chapter in the annals of Kentucky.  Mr.
Kitchen was born on a farm in Carter county, Kentucky, four miles from
Willard, on January 28, 1845, the son of Andrew J. and Winnie (Bays)
Kitchen.  The former was a native of Greenbrier county, West Virginia, of
English ancestry, and the latter was born in Scott county, Virginia, of
Scotch-Irish descent.
     Andrew Kitchen, the grandfather of our subject, was a native of
Greenbrier county, West Virginia, then old Virginia, but left there about
1830 and brought his family to Kentucky, locating on a farm in Carter
county, near Willard, becoming an agriculturist, well known and respected,
and continuing in that business the remainder of his life.  He became an
extensive farmer and slave owner and raised large quantities of corn,
which found a ready market throughout that section.  Soon after coming
to Kentucky, he was elected to the legislature, served one term, being a
leading Democrat.  He had served in the war of 1812 in a Virginia regiment
and was known thereafter as Major Kitchen.
     Andrew J. Kitchen, the father of our subject, was reared in Carter
county on the homestead, where he became a farmer and in which occupation
he passed his entire life, dying at the age of seventy-four.  He was a
justice of the peace for many years and known far and wide as Squire
Kitchen.  His widow survived him for several years, dying in March, 1908,
at the age of eighty-four years.  She was the mother of ten children,
two of whom are dead, our subject being the second in order of birth.
     Charles Kitchen was reared on the farm in Carter county and early in
life was disciplined to the tasks of hard work in the hills of Kentucky.
He was a boy when the Civil war broke out, and during that strenuous
period educational advantages were almost at a standstill and Mr. Kitchen
was enabled to attend school for only a few weeks of each year.  He was
at the home place until a young man and in the fall of 1865 engaged in
the merchandise business for himself near Leon, then known as Deer Creek
post office, the post office being in his store and Mr. Kitchen was post
master for many years.  Later he bought a farm of two hundred acres from
his grandfather, on which a store was located.  He continued farming and
merchandising very successfully for many years, and during that time
bought more land adjoining, having twelve hundred acres in one piece
besides farms in other places.  He has a hobby for farming and enjoys
that branch of industry in all its phases.  He still continues to increase
his holdings, and at one time owned over two thousand acres of land.
     In 1880 Mr. Kitchen engaged in the lumber and saw mill business,
building a mill at Leon on the bank of Little Sandy river, buying logs in
Elliott county and floating them to the mill.  He has been in this line
of manufacturing lumber ever since and is one of the leaders in Kentucky,
his business having increased to enormous proportions.  In 1898 he became
interested in lumber manufacturing at Ashland and engaged with a partner
under the firm name of Van Sant, Kitchen & Company, which owns a large
mill at Ashland, one at Mayhan, West Virginia, and a small one on the
Kentucky river.  They recently bought the poplar timber on twenty-seven
thousand acres of timber land in Breathitt county, Kentucky, which is
being shipped by train loads to the mills in Ashland.
     Mr. Kitchen helped organize the Second National Bank at Ashland and
has been a director from the first and is now president of same.  His
business interests are widely scattered, but such is his energy and the
cognizance of the fact that a man to prosper must attend personally to
his affairs that he supervises his various interests while he has been
able to continue his residence at Leon, Carter county.
     In politics Mr. Kitchen is a stanch Democrat.  At the time of
election of the State Board of Equalization by vote of the people he was
elected from his congressional district and served one term of two years.
During the early days of Carter county he served as school superintendent
of that county.  Mr. Kitchen is a member of the Masonic order, allied
with the Royal Arch Chapter and the Commandery, Knights Templar in Ashland.
     In February, 1866, he was married to Loretta King, a native of Carter
county, Kentucky.  They are the parents of ten children, of whom nine are
living.  Their names are: James H., Ida May, Mollie Lee, John W., Icy
Myrtle, Effie Winnie, Lula Belle, Lottie Florence and Charles J. Jr.  One
son, Andrew William, died at the age of two years.  These children were
all raised in their native county, well educated and all married and
settled in life except Lottie Florence, who is still at home.  Mr. Kitchen
and family are members of the Methodist Episcopal church, South  at Leon.
Mr. Kitchen died in May, 1904, and he was again married in 1910, to Nellie
B. Golden, of Normal, Kentucky.

Kitchen Bays King Golden
=
Boyd-KY Scott-VA Greenbrier-WV VA

http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/carter/kitchen.c.txt