Finding Your Folks: The many Mary E. Tidwells

I hate to tell you this, but we’ve got some refiguring to do on statements made in last week’s column about Mary E. Tidwell, identified as the daughter of Benjamin Tidwell and Martha Moody. It appears there are several Mary E. Tidwells and two families are laying claim to the same one.

We also need to deal with a Boyd marriage record in Meriwether County that, up until now, I have tried to ignore. It fits with the theory I’m about to tell you. And that’s all it is right now ... just theory. It’s one of those things where evidence is everywhere but hard proof hasn’t been found.

The problem arose last week (after I wrote the column) when I checked the Coweta Cemeteries book to find confirmation of the burial place for Mary E. Tidwell Byram Hayes, daughter of Benjamin Tidwell and Martha Moody. She appears in a section dedicated to the Cook Cemetery but there is actually no grave.

Information was submitted to the cemetery committee on several people thought to be buried there. Mary Tidwell was one of them. But ...

The cemetery book said she was the daughter of Benjamin Tidwell and Permelia Byram, not Benjamin Tidwell and Martha Moody. Uh oh. Houston, we have a problem.

So, I checked both the 1850 Coweta and Meriwether censuses and found the beginning of the conflict: Benjamin and Martha Tidwell with a daughter Mary E., age 13 (Meriwether), and Benjamin and Permelia Tidwell with a daughter Mary E. age 11 (Coweta). There was no way anyone could have mixed the families up because Permelia had a bunch of kids while Martha just had two.

In the 1860 census, neither Mary was with her family.

Just for the record, there was one more Mary E. Tidwell, the daughter of John Tidwell and Mary Brown ... same age ... same area. This Mary married Matthew Mitchell and lived in Coweta County. In 1870, her mother and unmarried sister, Rachel, were living with her. (I was checking every Mary E. Tidwell I could find.)

Next, I looked at marriage records for Benjamin Tidwell in Coweta and Meriwether (and Pike) and I found three which pertained to our time frame: Benjamin Tidwell m. Hannah Permelia Byram in 1832 (Coweta); Benjamin Tidwell m. Nancy Boyd in 1837 (Meriwether) and Benjamin Tidwell m. Martha Moody in 1840 (Pike).

We know the Benjamin who married Permelia and who appeared in the 1850 Coweta census was the son of Benjamin and Milly Grimes Tidwell. He was living next door to his brother, William.

We also know the Benjamin who married Martha Moody and who appeared in the 1850 Meriwether census was the son of William and Mary Amelia Jones Tidwell. He was living next door to his brother, John J. Tidwell.

But who was the Benjamin who married Nancy Boyd? And where the heck did she come from? We know it couldn’t have been the Benjamin who married Permelia because he married her in 1832 and was still married to her in 1850.

That leaves one possibility, that it was Benjamin, son of William and Amelia, and that Nancy Boyd was his first marriage — and she was probably the mother of Mary E. Tidwell. I will attempt to show how family associations later on will support this possible scenario.

First, who was this Nancy Boyd? I can’t say with absolute certainty, but I can tell you that James Boyd who married Benjamin’s sister, Milly Tidwell, had a sister named Nancy who was born between 1810 and 1820, according to the 1820 census of Newberry, S.C. She was named in the will of her grandfather, along with James and his siblings.

I looked at my notes from the in-depth study I did on the Boyds of Meriwether a few years ago and could find no other Boyd family with a daughter named Nancy who fit the bill.

I also can tell you that James Boyd and his father, that ol’ rascal Wagonner Jack, came to Meriwether before 1830 along with James’ sister, Mary Boyd Bell, and Nancy may very well have accompanied them. Another of James’ sisters, Margaret Boyd Spence, arrived in Meriwether with her husband, Wilson Spence, and family sometime after 1840. Their daughter, Nancy E. Spence, married John S. Moody, brother of Martha Moody, Benjamin Tidwell’s wife (probably his second).

If this Nancy Boyd was James’ sister, then that would mean that three members of the Boyd family married into the family of William Tidwell and Mary Amelia Jones. So, the Boyd relationship in this family group was firmly established. I could find no instances of Boyds marrying into the family of William’s brother, Benjamin, who married Milly Grimes.

Then we have the matter of Mary Tidwell’s children. She married first John Byram and second William Henry Harrison Hayes. She had two daughters with her first husband and named them Alice V. and Nancy Lavonia Byram. She had one son with her second husband and named him Oscar Boyd Hayes. I think those are strong indications of Mary’s background, i.e., her mother was more than likely Nancy Boyd.

I checked the probate records for Benjamin Tidwell in Meriwether County last week and found that he died in 1862, probably August. His brother, John J. Tidwell, applied for letters of administration on his estate on 1 Sept. 1862.

The estate was considerable. I have the names of those who made purchases at his estate sale. Martha applied for guardianship of her children, Luraney and Benjamin J. Tidwell. Mary E. Tidwell was not mentioned anywhere.

Although I have drawn several tentative conclusions, this situation is still in the investigative stage. There is much more. Your help and feedback are encouraged.

I don’t have time to research for you, but I welcome stories about your ancestors who lived in the south metro Atlanta area. Send your stories to The Citizen, P.O. Drawer 1719, Fayetteville, GA 30214, or e-mail jkilgore@thecitizen.com or JodieK444@aol.com.

Until next week, happy hunting!