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I am friends with Virginia Cropper Kuntz, gggranddaughter of Thomas Corwin. She lives in Lebanon, OH. She told me that her father said they were of hungarian descent.
From Howe's history of Clark Co Ohio
Chat About Interesting People.—Mr. CUMMING’S acquaintance with interesting people has been unusual, and he abounds in anecdotes. Old gentlemen who lived in the time of Tom CORWIN love to talk of him, and he is not an exception. CORWIN’S father (said Mr. CUMMING) came from Morris county, N. J.; his mother was a native of Long Island, and daughter of a sea-captain. Thomas was born in Bourbon county, Ky., was quite a lad when his father moved into Warren county, and settled on Turtle creek. It was a common thing for eastern emigrants to Kentucky, in moderate circumstances, through disgust of slavery to feel as though it was no place to raise a family, and so they moved to the north side of the Ohio. Such was the case with Mathias CORWIN.
Anecdotes of Corwin.—Mr. CORWIN was a farmer, and the services of his young son Thomas were at this time especially important. He told me that his older brother was clerk of court. and that he was extremely desirous of obtaining an education, and importuned his father to that end. He replied that in the condition of the family he could not spare his services; that he must remain with him and work on the farm. “A little while after this,ö continued CORWIN, “I broke my leg. Competent surgical assistance was difficult to procure. Time passed very tediously and life irksome, when one day I got hold of a Latin grammar, and I became so deeply interested that I committed it entirely by heart. This awakened in me with renewed vigor the desire for an education. I again importuned my father and he again denied me, whereupon I again, and purposely, broke my leg to get the leisure for study. Upon this, my father seeing the folly of opposing me, gave in, and I pursued my education with my brother.ö
His brother, Mr. CUMMING said, was a good English scholar, and had a fair knowledge of Latin. All the teaching CORWIN had was through him; he never was a college man. Mr. CORWIN acquired quickly and retained tenaciously. He was very proud of his Hungarian descent, and regarded whatever talent he possessed as of that lineage.
It was extremely interesting when Mr. Corwin returned from Congress to listen to his characteristic anecdotes of public men with whom he had associated. Being a Kentuckian by birth, he was very fond of the society of Southern and Western men. He had a large circle of acquaintances; his social nature was prominent. His extraordinary dramatic power, his keen sense of the ludicrous, was shown on these occasions. The mobility of his countenance was wonderful, and all was helped on by the movement of hands, head, and eyes, and when he laughed he set everybody else in a roar. When in Cincinnati he was in the habit of stopping over night at the Burnet House, and from his social qualities was wont to gather a knot of listeners around him. It is related of him that on one of these occasions the group sat out the entire night, and were only dispersed by the light of morning breaking in upon them. They were, however, about half-dead from their social intoxication. Nobody could get tired listening, he was so brilliant and witty. Gen. Samson Mason (said Mr. CUMMING) was of marked ability. He served several
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