Mystery Monday: Mystery No More

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  

You know, science is a marvelous thing.  You can go for years BELIEVING something is true but still be haunted by that nagging possibility that you’ve been mislead.  Science can bridge that gap between BELIEVING and KNOWING.

Take the case of Russ and Patricia.

Like many Boyd researchers, they grew up hearing the family legend that their great-grandfather William Preston Boyd had changed his name to avoid punishment for some unspeakable crime.  They knew that his son had burned some letters while preserving just enough to point the family to William’s true identity as a Jollett while keeping that horrible secret a secret.

William and Hattie Boyd
Photo Courtesy of Tim Rugenstein

Russ and Patricia are distant cousins who made their connection online but have never met in person.  In sharing their research, they discovered they both had heard those stories about their ancestor and those burned letters.  They knew the letters had been sent to various people and agencies in Page, Rockingham, and Shenandoah Counties of Virginia under the pretext of informing William Jollett that he was coming into an inheritance.  In actuality, William and Hattie Boyd were trying to determine if William Jollett was still a wanted man. 

While the letters made it a certainty that their great grandfather had changed his name due to some illegal activity, Russ and Patricia have made it their mission to PROVE  - not merely accept - that William Boyd was actually William H. Jollett. 

This past year when Patricia found my blog, she sought my help in putting together a DNA project.  Russ volunteered to be the Boyd half of the equation.  We needed a Jollett man to provide a possible match. The Jollett name is rare today, but I had a few contacts that I could ask.  Patricia even had a benefactor willing to pay for the test.

In the meantime, Russ purchased the Ancestry DNA test because he had other interests besides the Boyd-Jollett question.  He wanted to know whether he had any Native American heritage.   Within a couple weeks, Russ had the answer:  surprisingly, no Native American DNA, and not surprisingly, plenty of British Isles.

Before we could seal the deal with a Jollett donor out of California, Russ was contacted by a woman named Kathy.  She isn’t even a Boyd or Jollett researcher.  Her family’s DNA had been submitted for entirely different reasons, but there it is:  Kathy’s and Russ’s family trees intersect with James and Nancy Walker JOLLETT, Kathy through their daughter Lucy Walker Jollett and Russ through their son Fielding Jollett.  Fielding was William’s grandfather. 

Ta Da!

Thanks to DNA, Boyds and Jolletts have crossed that bridge from BELIEVING to KNOWING their suspicions have proved true.  Only one question remains which might never get answered:  What was that horrible crime that started this whole mess to begin with? 

It was Mystery Monday exactly a year ago that I began a month-long series called “Man on the Run.”  I love the timing of this final chapter!

The full story can be read here:

Part 1 – The Early Years

Part 2 – The Getaway

Part 3 – The Letters

Part 4 – Annie Found

Update

© 2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

A to Z April Challenge: U is for Ursula

This is Day 21 of the A to Z April Challenge.  My theme is women with unusual names although I must cheat now and then or I’ll have a name and no story.

is for Ursula Clarissa Boyd.  My half-second cousin twice removed was the daughter of William Preston Boyd (a.k.a. William H. Jollett) and Hattie Echols Boyd.  She was born March 25, 1887 in Giles County, Virginia.  In 1909, she married John Arthur Hebb in Monroe County, West Virginia. 

They lived most of their married life in Beckley, West Virginia, where Hebb was an electrician for a coal mine.  They raised five sons, most of whom also became coal miners.

The 1940 census for Beckley, West Virginia recorded that “Ersie” had taken back her Boyd surname, suggesting she was divorced.  She was earning a living as a laundress and her sons were still with her.  John Arthur Hebb, meanwhile, had a new family:  a much younger wife and six children, the oldest of whom was 12.

Interesting.  Why?  Because John Arthur was still head of household with “Ersie” and the boys in 1930. (Doing the math….)  Ever in search of the dirt, I then checked for the 12-year old in the 1930 census to see where she was.  What a surprise:  just 11 miles away in Slab Fork, that frisky J.A. Hebb was head of household for his young wife and 2 children too.  Was he leading a double life? 

No wonder Ursula took back the Boyd name.

I Urge you to Unite with Umpteen Users over at A to Z April Challenge  to Uncover some Utterly Unequal blogs.

© 2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Mystery Monday: Just in - update on William Jollett

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  With any luck fellow genealogy bloggers will lend their eyes to what has been found so far and possibly help solve the mystery.

What I know about the William Jollett – William Boyd mystery is complete, with the exception of one interesting addition.

It’s a newspaper clipping that arrived in my email just the other day thanks to Jan Hensley, an online friend with whom I have swapped genealogical information for several years.  (In fact, her work to find the grave of her patriot ancestor and organize a ceremony to dedicate a new tombstone inspired me to pursue DAR membership.)  Jan found this brief mention of William Jollett’s run-in with the law:

News clipping courtesy of Jan Hensley

A man giving his name as Wm. Jollett, was arrested on the 26^th  ult., by Wm. Campbell, constable of Page county, suspected of having stolen a bay mare, which he had in his possession.  He was committed to jail by Justice T. M. Almond.  He has light hair, fair complexion, about 22 or 23 years of age, and has a conspicuous scar upon his neck.  The mare, which is now in possession of Mr. Campbell, is a dark bay, with hind feet white, a narrow blaze in the forehead, about ten years old, and in good condition.

Harrisonburg Rockingham Register

September 3, 1868

I'm glad to know that William's crime made the news, but now I wonder what caused that conspicuous scar.  There's just no end to this mystery.

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Mystery Monday: Part 4 Man on the Run - Annie Found

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  With any luck fellow genealogy bloggers will lend their eyes to what has been found so far and possibly help solve the mystery.

Click HERE for Part 1 The Early Years.

Click HERE for Part 2 The Getaway.

Click HERE for Part 3 The Letters.

Many years ago, my sister and I spent a lovely afternoon with our maternal grandfather’s cousin Vessie Jollett Steppe.  We were on a fact-finding mission in our early days of genealogy research, and Vessie was just the person to talk to.  She identified people in old photos and talked at length about various members of the Jollett family. 

Then she asked US a question:  In your research, have you run across anything about Annie Found? 

Annie who? 

As if trying to recall just exactly what she had heard as a child, Vessie said she had always heard about a baby girl being left by a Jollett boy on somebody’s doorstep.  She didn’t know who the boy was, where this was supposed to have happened, or even in what time period.  And who dubbed the baby “Annie Found”?

Of course, we were no help with that little mystery, so it became a little scribbled notation on a legal pad.

Fast forward about thirteen years.

A few weeks ago, I heard from “Patricia,” one of several Boyd family researchers.  In her Internet surfing, she found a page from the now-defunct Geocities where I had housed my research.  And because Patricia is such a good thinker, she immediately noted a possible connection between my Annie Found story and her Vinie Martin story.  Could Annie Found be the illegitimate child of Vinie Martin and William Jollett, a.k.a. William Boyd?  Was he the Jollett boy who deposited a baby on someone’s doorstep as he fled out of town in 1876?  And whose doorstep?

Among the letters that William and Hattie Boyd had sent to people in Rockingham County, Virginia was a response that could be a clue.  It said a family named Lichliters “. . . can give all information that anyone wants.” 

The mention in the letter of other names, Ruby, Georgie, Helen, and Oscar, led us to David and Sarah Munch Lichliter in Shenandoah County, the same county William Jollett visited when he was released from prison, the same county he rode through in his mad escape to Giles County.  Perhaps coincidentally, the 1880 census shows David and Sarah with two daughters:  Ida age 2 and – wait for it – Annie age 4.  Doing the math makes it clear that her birth year corresponds with the time that William Jollett disappeared.

1880 Shenandoah County, Virginia Census
click to enlarge

So did David and Sarah FIND little Annie on their doorstep?  The family Bible simply records Annie as their daughter.  But really, would anyone write “Found on a doorstep” in the family Bible?  It’s doubtful.  For now, the notion that we might have found Annie Found is only conjecture.

And what about Vinie Martin?  What became of her?  Not so surprisingly, there was a Virginia Martin in the 1870 Page County, Virginia census, the same county where William Jollett and his family lived.  Vinie sounds like a reasonable nickname for Virginia.  In 1876, she would have been about 17 or 18, certainly old enough to have attracted a man like William Jollett.  But whether this is THE Vinie Martin we don’t know for sure. 

In 1878, just two years after the reported incident with William Jollett, this Virginia Martin married Daniel Cullers of Shenandoah County.  The Cullers were neighbors of – are you ready for this? – Sarah Munch Lichliter’s family.  Munch, Lichliter, and Cullers families were living side by side for decades.  Certainly it’s not unthinkable that a woman like Vinie would be curious about her child, insert herself into the community where she could observe from a distance, and meet someone to marry.

Now if you aren’t already dizzy from trying to keep up with this soap opera, grab the Dramamine.  In the 1880 Warren County, Virginia census we find Daniel and Virginia Cullers and two daughters.  Warren County is where William Jollett and his wife Mary Elizabeth Martin were living when he was tried, convicted, and sentenced for horse theft.  And thus the story comes back to where we began.

1880 Warren County, Virginia Census
click to enlarge

Remember, I’m not claiming that Annie Lichliter was Annie Found or that Virginia Martin Cullers was the same Vinie Martin, but the circumstantial evidence is strong.  For now, however, that’s all it is – circumstantial. 

While I am satisfied that the letters offer enough clues to prove William Jollett and William Boyd are the same person, the Boyd researchers would like definite confirmation through DNA testing.  I have contacted several Jollett men, but so far none have responded.  The more compelling mystery for both of us is the terrible story that prompted William Boyd’s grandson to burn crucial parts of the letters.  Searches for court records and newspaper articles have produced no answers.

In that sense, William H. Jollett / William Preston Boyd remains a mystery.

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Mystery Monday: Part 3 Man on the Run - The Letters

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  With any luck fellow genealogy bloggers will lend their eyes to what has been found so far and possibly help solve the mystery.

Click HERE to read Part 1 The Early Years and HERE to read Part 2 The Getaway.

In 1876 William Henry Jollett ceased to exist at the same time that William Preston Boyd appeared on the scene with no signs of a past.  At least a past that could be verified. 

William Preston Boyd’s past began in August of 1876 when he married Harriet Lavina Echols, daughter of Harrison Perry and Clarissa Atkins Echols. Their marriage record in Giles County, Virginia states William was a widower and his parents were George A. and E. A. Boyd of Virginia.  If such a couple existed, there was no record of it that could connect to a son William Preston.

William and Hattie led an unassuming life on a farm raising thirteen children, first in Giles County and then in Monroe County, West Virginia.  In between babies and harvest, William was careful to avoid any legal entanglements that might raise suspicion.  Land was either quit-claimed or purchased in Hattie’s name.  William Boyd’s past ended in 1924 when he committed suicide by a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

William and Hattie Boyd
Photo courtesy of Tim Rugenstein

Son Kyle Emanuel  Boyd came across a series of letters written between the 1890s and 1914 that aroused suspicion about their father’s past, letters that also hinted at a reason for their father’s suicide.  Apparently William Boyd’s past was too much to live with or his past deeds were about to be revealed. 

But whatever dark secrets William harbored were burned by Kyle’s son Dexter who swore the truth would never come from him.  He preserved only parts of the letters that would confirm that William Boyd was indeed William Jollett. 

Click to enlarge

The earliest letters had been sent to agencies, sheriff’s office, and ordinary citizens of Warren County, Rockingham County, and Page County under the ruse of trying to find William H. Jollett who was ostensibly an heir to some land and money.   They were signed supposedly by Kyle Boyd.  Kyle knew he had written no such letters.  Besides, the earliest letters were written when he was just a young boy making it even more unlikely that he would have written them.  

Surely Kyle was taken aback when he saw reference to William Jollett’s father Emanuel, which was his own middle name.  One letter from John W. Breeden of McGaheysville, Virginia confirmed that the Jollett family believed William Jollett to be dead.  

Today’s Boyd family believes that William and Hattie wrote the letters themselves out of curiosity about his family and to determine if he was still a wanted man.  But wanted for what?  He had already served time for horse theft.  Certainly there had to have been something else more horrible than that, something that was not subject to any statute of limitations for prosecution.  Otherwise the need to invent a new identity made no sense.  Otherwise suicide made no sense. The only explanation that seems reasonable is murder. 

According to one letter, William Jollett had gotten Vinie Martin “in a family way.”  Then when that fact became known, he rode out of town and into obscurity.  Was THAT the shameful act?  Or could his involvement with Vinie have led to murder?  Could William have killed an irate father or perhaps a protective brother?  Or was the horrible act something else entirely?  Only Kyle and Dexter knew, and they took it to the grave.  As one letter concluded, “and the rest is known to all.”

Next time -  What became of Vinie Martin? And who were the Lichliters who apparently could “give all information anyone wants”?

Part 4 (Oct. 22) – Annie Found

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Mystery Monday: Part 2 Man on the Run - The Getaway

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  With any luck fellow genealogy bloggers will lend their eyes to what has been found so far and possibly help solve the mystery.

Click HERE to read Part 1 The Early Years.

In 1870 William Henry Jollett was sentenced to five years in prison in Richmond for stealing a horse.  Despite a rigorous search through newspapers and court records, Boyd researchers found no explanation for his crime. 

By 1874, William must have been eager to get out of prison because he made himself ill by eating soap.  In what must have been William’s plan all along, Dr. Shuller approved his early parole in October in order for him to return home to recuperate.  What brought on this sudden need to get out early?  He had survived most of his term; what’s one more year? 

Maybe it had something to do with his wife, the former Mary Elizabeth Martin.   Birth records for Warren County, Virginia include the birth of little Emma C. Jollett, June 1874, with parents listed as William H. and Mary E. Jollett.  Barring the possibility of conjugal visits, this blessed event came with a significant question mark.  Certainly if William got word that his wife had delivered a baby while he was behind bars 150 miles away, he most assuredly would be eager to get home.

As the story goes, William was to have left prison and gone to Shenandoah County to be with relatives for several months.  From there he was to have gone to McGaheysville in Rockingham County, Virginia, to stay with his father’s half-brother John Wesley Jollett.  While there William visited a neighboring family quite often and supposedly got a young girl named Vinie Martin pregnant. (Odd – another Martin girl!)  When the truth was made known, he fled on his sister Nancy’s black mare and was never heard of again.  That was 1876.

But William was not the only one to make a getaway.

Who were these relatives in Shenandoah County?  In my research, any close relatives like aunts and uncles and cousins would have been in Page, Rockingham, and Greene counties.  Nobody in Shenandoah County.  But in both the 1870 and 1880 census, William’s own family was missing – no widowed mother, no brother, no sisters.  My best theory is that his mother likely remarried, but to date I have found no marriage record.  Likewise, all his sisters were of marrying age, so they probably disappeared among thousands of wives named Susannah, Margaret, Sarah and Nancy.  If William’s mother Anna did in fact marry, it is also possible the children were using their step-father’s name.  So now I’m wondering if the relatives in Shenandoah County might then be his mother or sisters.  And of course, there is always the possibility that someone confused the TOWN of Shenandoah (which is in Page County) with the COUNTY Shenandoah, making finding this family a little more difficult. 

Another disappearing act was performed by William’s own wife, Mary Elizabeth.  Where was she in 1870 while her husband served his prison sentence?  Where was she when he got out?  Where was she when he disappeared off the face of the earth in 1876? 

1870 Warren County, Virginia
Click to enlarge

She eluded me for awhile, but I caught up with her.  In 1870, Mary Elizabeth was living with her father Absalom and a long list of Martins, whose relationships are not indicated.  Mary Elizabeth is listed as a Martin.  However, based on the 1874 birth record of her daughter, Mary Elizabeth and William were not divorced, so it is likely that enumerator error can account for her name being listed as Martin rather than Jollett.  There are some very young children, possibly hers.  

1880 Warren County, Virginia
Click to enlarge

The 1880 census is where the story gets interesting.  Next door to Absalom Martin is the Lookingbill family: John and his wife Mary E., and children Samuel L. (13), Elizabeth (9), Emily C. (6), Laura (3), and A. Franklin (1).  It’s not a big stretch to conclude that Mary E. Lookingbill was Mary Elizabeth Martin Jollett.  And Samuel has to be the same Samuel who was 2 in the Martin household in the previous census.  Emily C. at age 6 lines up quite nicely with the birth record for Emma C. Jollett, born in 1874. Just coincidence?  I don’t think so.  A death record for A. (Augustus) Franklin Lookingbill confirms his mother’s MAIDEN name was MARTIN.   

So, it appears that the two oldest Lookingbill children, Samuel and Elizabeth, were probably William Jollett’s children.  But his bad behavior and subsequent punishment left Mary Elizabeth vulnerable.  She may not have been faithful, but it appears she carved out a stable and satisfying life for her family while William Jollett was riding that horse out of Rockingham County and on to Giles County where he was reborn as William Preston Boyd. 

Next time – the letters that sent present-day Boyd researchers on the hunt for their great-grandfather William P. Boyd, a.k.a., William Henry Jollett

Part 3 (Oct. 15) – The Letters

Part 4 (Oct. 22) – Annie Found

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Mystery Monday: Man on the Run (Part 1 - The Early Years)

Mystery Monday is a daily prompt at Geneabloggers that asks us to share mystery ancestors or mystery records – anything in our family history research which is currently unsolved.  With any luck fellow genealogy bloggers will lend their eyes to what has been found so far and possibly help solve the mystery.

The story of William H. Jollett is the stuff of crime fiction: a Civil War veteran turned horse thief turned fugitive for some other unknown crime, a man who disappeared in 1876 only to emerge with a new name and a new past, a man who shared his terrible secret with only a few who managed to take the truth to the grave. 

Descendants have scoured county records and newspapers throughout Virginia to uncover the story of their great-grandfather known to them as William Preston Boyd.  Through the miracle of the Internet, Boyd researchers and Jollett researchers have come together with two halves of a story that might come close to providing answers to their questions about this man of mystery. 

Let’s start with a little background.  On paper, William’s early life was nothing out of the ordinary.

1850 Page County, Virginia

William Henry Jollett (1847 – Jun 1924) was the fourth of eight children born to Emanuel and Anna/Ann Elizabeth Breeden/Breeding Jollett.  The family lived among generations of Jolletts and Breedens along Naked Creek in Page County, Virginia, where Emanuel worked as a carpenter.  In the 1850 Page County census, Ann is listed as being seven years older than her husband.  Five children are listed:  Jonathan Breeden (age 11 – born before Emanuel and Ann married), Susannah (6), Margaret (5), William (3), and Nancy (4 months).

1860 Page County, Virginia

By the 1860 census, several major events had occurred.  First of all, two more children had come along, Sarah and Andrew.  William’s father Emanuel died of typhoid fever in October 1859 just a couple months after an unnamed baby was born and died.  Suddenly at age 13, William was the man of the house, and we are left to wonder how this family managed. 

Perhaps fortunately for the Jolletts, William’s age kept him home while others joined the effort to defend the Confederacy.  But in 1864, a 17-year old William signed on with the 9^th Regiment of the Virginia Infantry.  He is on the roster for both November and December.  Then in April 1865 he is listed as a Prisoner of War at the surrender in Appomattox.  Now whether he was REALLY there or whether all Virginia soldiers were considered prisoners of war is not clear.

Regardless, the war is over and happy days are here again.  In November of 1865 William married Mary Elizabeth Martin, daughter of Absalom and Ceatta Martin of Warren County, Virginia.  

So how did William’s life go so wrong in 1870 that he ended up stealing a horse and being sentenced to five years in a Richmond prison?  Attempts to locate newspapers and court records that might explain what led him to commit such an act have produced no answers.

Next time:  William’s life after prison goes from bad to worse.

Part 2 (Oct. 8) – The Getaway

Part 3 (Oct. 15) – The Letters

Part 4 (Oct. 22) – Annie Found

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.

Sepia Saturday: A Jollett by any other name

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

The obvious topic for this week’s Sepia Saturday should be the movie theater, but since I’ve done that already, I have no choice but to look for inspiration in the movie being shown in the prompt, “The Ex-Convict.”

The world of the family historian is usually rather dull and pedestrian.  It means sifting through census records, studying handwriting and fiddling with magnifying glasses to discern the name of a missing ancestor. It means posting inquiries on surname boards and county forums in hopes of connecting with a distant cousin who wants to share information.  It means creating a family chart with 7 generations only to have your husband/daughter/cousin/BFF say, “Wow that’s a lot of work. What time does the game come on?”

If it weren’t for the few criminals in my family tree, I’d have nothing to look forward to as a family historian. 

Actually, most of my ancestors' crimes are not THAT shocking:  a couple of guys perpetrating fraud and some Confederate deserters.  I have a wife abuser and one murderer – maybe it was manslaughter. 

But my favorite criminal actually served some serious time.  Yes, in jail.  The joint.  The clink.  The pokey.  The slammer.  The hoosegow.  The Big House. 

And the crime?  He was a horse thief.

In the nineteenth century, a horse was more than just transportation; it was a means to making a living.  Even more than that, it was essential to survival when one needed to escape from harm.  Horse theft was a serious crime that led to the hanging tree out west.  But here in Virginia, William H. Jollett (my great-grandfather’s nephew, my first cousin three times removed) got to spend about four years of a five-year sentence in Richmond’s “Greybar Hotel.”  

1870 Richmond Census
Click to enlarge

Horse thieves were considered to be no good, dirty, rotten scoundrels. And by all accounts, William H. Jollett was just that.  He reportedly ate soap in order to get sick enough for ol’ Doc Shuller to approve his early release from prison so that he could recuperate at the home of his father’s half-brother in Rockingham County, Virginia.

From there William Jollett’s life really went to hell. He got a young girl “in a family way” and then took off on his sister’s black mare.  From that moment William H. Jollett ceased to exist.  He is nowhere to be found in census records, death records, or land dealings.  

But a year later in 1876 a Giles County, Virginia, girl named Hattie Echols married one William P. Boyd, a man who did not exist before then.

William and Hattie Echols Boyd
photo courtesy of Tim Rugenstein via Dexter Boyd

Boyd researchers have some strong evidence that their ancestor William Preston Boyd was the notorious William Henry Jollett, a man on the run for committing some unknown act more horrific than stealing a horse and getting a girl pregnant, a man whose questionable and shameful past was revealed only to two who succeeded in taking the truth to their graves.

It would be absolutely criminal to miss what’s showing over at Sepia Saturday.  

©2014, Wendy Mathias.  All rights reserved.