Dear Richard

I had heard that we were related to Belle Boyd, but I didn't know how.  Maria and Isabella Stephenson  were the sisters who married the Boyd brothers.  Let me see what I can put together from what you've sent; it is definitely my Boyd line.  My cousin Nancy Hall has a painting of one of the Stephenson sisters (and a gentleman we can't identify).  I have the one of their mother/grandmother who was old at the time of the painting Nancy also has the glass bowl she carried on the "long trip over the Allegheny's" as we were always told. 

John Boyd (b. 1776 in Frederick County VA-d. 1846) is buried in the First Presbyterian Church yard in Knoxville alongside his wife Isabella Stephenson (b. 1777 in Adams Cty, PA).  They married in 1803 in Berkeley County, WV.  His child, James Stephenson Boyd,  is my great grandfather.  He is buried in Knoxville in Old Gray Cemetery, so I can find out what his dates are from his stone.  My grandfather, John Stuart Boyd (b. Knoxville 1865 d. LaGrange, TN  1938 or 1939) takes his "Stuart" from his mother's family.  He had four children, of whom my mother was the youngest.  He is buried in LaGrange, TN in Fayette County.  He married Lelia Maria McClure (b. 1872 Louisville KY d. 1951 La Grange TN) in 1891 in Knoxville.  Their four children are: 

1. Juliette McClure Boyd Zenner (b. Knoxville 1891 d. Greenwich, CT 1967, buried in Putnam Cemetery there.  She and her husband, Philip McKnight Zenner, had no children. 

2.  Iva McMullen Boyd Franklin (b. Knoxville ~1893 d. LaGrange, TN
~1978, buried there).  She and her husband, Wilburn Bernard Franklin had
two daughters.:  Both are living and each has five children.

3.  John Stuart Boyd (Jr.?) (b. Knoxville 1895 d. 1948 LaGrange, TN, buried there).  He never married. 

4.  Lelia Louise Boyd O'Neil--my mother (b. Knoxville 1905 d. Knoxville
1989, buried in Highland Memorial Cemetery).  She married William
Patrick O'Neil (b. 1902 Memphis d. 1991 Princeton, NJ  but buried in
Highland Memorial, Knoxville)  in 1929 and had one child.  I have three children.

I know that we had family who fought for the North as well as the South.  Whether they were Boyds or other surnames I don't know.  James Stephenson Boyd was a Tennessee state legislator at the time that TN joined the Confederacy.  I have a clipping from the newspaper saying that he "voted as his constituency wished him to vote" but that he personally was against it.  My great aunt "Pattie" (Sarah "Sallie" Rebecca Boyd, b. 1869 in Knoxville d. 1947 in Knoxville buried in Old Gray Cemetery there) was the society "editress" for the Knoxville Journal (morning newspaper) for 50 years.  She never married.  Her older brother, Robert
Park Boyd (b. 1867 in Knoxville d. 1945 Knoxville, buried in Old Gray) also never married.  My grandfather, John Stuart Boyd, was the only one of the three children of James Stephenson Boyd and Iva McMullen Boyd to marry.  He was their oldest. 

James was a "farmer" and slaveholder.  Later he (or his wife and children after his death) also quarried marble from at least two quarries on their farm; one was TN pink marble from Victoria Quarry; the other was gray marble from Graystone Quarry.  Victoria marble was used in an important building in Washington, DC.  I want to say it is the Smithsonian or the Mellon Gallery. 

After the death of their parents and after John had married Lelia McClure and moved into town, Pattie and Robert lived still on the old Boyd "place" at the origin of the Tennessee River (where the French Broad and the Holston (sp?) come together) at what is known now 
as Boyd's Bridge. The bridge was named for James Stephenson Boyd because he had ferried people across the river at that point before any bridge was built.  My grandfather and his brother Robert rode horseback into Knoxville to attend "school".  He may have attended the Bell House School  which my mother attended too, but I may have this
wrong.  I know my grandfather went to U of T (whatever it was called then) when the sole building was Ayres Hall.  Pattie was home schooled by her mother as were the boys for their early schooling.  Their mother later taught at the East Tennessee School for the Deaf in Knoxville. 

I mention that we had relatives who fought on both sides because Aunt Pattie and Uncle Robert had Civil War uniforms and memorabilia in their old farm house at Boyd's Bridge from both sides that I saw during my childhood.  This was all stolen when they moved to a "city house" in downtown Knoxville when they were too old to live comfortably "in the country" (around 1943 or 1944).  They simply closed their family home then and rarely visited it; it was the site for much vandalism over the several years until after Pattie's death.  My dad used to drive out there on Sunday afternoons to check on the place for Aunt Pattie and Uncle Robert.  I remember once that he told me to "stay in the car with the doors locked" because a truck was backed up to the front steps of the house (after breaking the padlock and chain at the end of the driveway that--along with a no trespassing sign--was supposed to keep people out).  It turned out that day to be an antique dealer's truck, and he made her (I still remember her name too!) unload all the things she was stealing back into the house!  Eventually, by the time both Robert and Pattie died, that house was completely wrecked.  Vandals had removed the stained glass windows, tore up the floorboards and removed stones from the fireplace--looking for money I guess.  What I remember most vividly was all the sheet music which was ankle deep on the floor. 

Iva McMullen Boyd's brother "Brother Stuart" was a Confederate soldier.  I have an original letter he wrote from Jonesboro, TN during a winter stay there where he talks about how many soldiers had no boots.  It is hard to decipher because of the florid handwriting style.  I can't find a "Stuart McMullen" on any roster of TN Confederate troops on the web.  Maybe "Brother Stuart" had another last name too--or a different spelling.  I don't know where she was born, but she is buried in Old Gray. 

I would guess further that James Mason Boyd (the physician) was the son of Samuel Beckett Boyd and Susan Howard Mason. 
 

Juliette Arnheim 

For more data on the earlier Boyds in this line:

William Boyds Will

Return to Belle Boyd page

Return to Main Boyd Site

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