^Eicher, p. 253, Warner, p. 171, Tagg, p. 44, Lavery, John Gibbon, p. 838, Nolan, p. 40, Wright and Magner, p. 119, and Gibbon's gravestone list his name as John Gibbon. In the preface (p. ix) to Gibbon's Adventures on the Western Frontier, editors Alan and Maureen Gaff list a middle name of Oliver. A genealogical websiteنسخة محفوظة 2008-06-22 على موقع واي باك مشين. on the "Heysham-Gibbon Branch" of the Hissem-Montague Family refers to possible middle names of Hannum, Heysham, and Oliver, but states that "a letter written by his younger brother, Nicholas, indicated that their father disliked middle-names, perhaps adverse to his own, and gave them to none of his children, excepting Nicholas who was given his by his mother."
^Lavery and Jordan, p. 2. Despite the Wright and Magner article that states that Gibbon's mother's surname was Larder (and that may simply be a typographical error), her actual surname was Lardner. A genealogical Websiteنسخة محفوظة 2008-06-22 على موقع واي باك مشين. on the "Heysham-Gibbon Branch" of the Hissem-Montague family also refers to her surname as Lardner with the exception of three typographical errors. The site also provides this linkنسخة محفوظة 2008-06-23 على موقع واي باك مشين. to the Lardner family. In addition, Gibbon's mother spelled her first name with an "a" rather than an "e" according to Lavery and Jordan who cite letters written by her that are available in the Lardner-Gibbon papers at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. According to Alan and Maureen Gaff, Gibbon's father dropped the "s" from the end of his surname around the time of his 18th birthday and prior to his marriage to Catharine Lardner. However, Gibbon's biographers Dennis Lavery and Mark Jordan maintain the Gibbons spelling throughout their study when referring to General Gibbon's parents.