OHDELAWA-L Archives

From: <>
Subject: [OHDELAWA] Boyd-Hill-Wheeler-French-English, etc
Date: Fri, 12 Jan 2001 17:41:41 EST

Luther Boyd 1781-1867, born in Whitingham, Vermont, died in Delaware County,
Ohio, was youngest son of Abraham Boyd 1740?- 1820? and Hannah Hill married
1766 in Hopkinton, Mass.

He married Betsy Wheeler 1801 and had a son Elam Boyd (1803). Luther left
Vermont 1813/1814 and next time I find him is when he married Easther English
in Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio in 1822.

Where was he between 1813-1822? Did he divorce Betsy? He had 7 more children
in Ohio and I am a great-great-great grandson.

There is a Luther Boyd who served during the war of 1812 from New York. Is
this my Luther Boyd?

Why did Luther leave a wife and a 10 year old son? Did he want to "go west"
and Betsy refused to go? Or did he chop down the tree that accidently killed
his
brother Stephen Boyd in 1813--couldn't handle the guilt--and left? Did he
ever
return or write to family or ever see his son Elam again? I'll probably
never know.

When Betsy died and was buried in the Boyd Cemetery on Elam Boyd's old farm
she was "widow of Luther Boyd" on the gravestone. She died in 1873 and
outlived
both Luther and Easther.

Luther ended up with a prosperous 200 acre farm just north of Columbus, Ohio
which
is still known as the "old Boyd farm" although it has long since passed out
of
family ownership (1880s). It was on Powell road just off today's US 23.

That two-hundred acres today is worth millions of dollars.

Abraham Boyd, Luther's father, owned land (1770s) along the Deerfield river
which land had to be given up by family in the 1920s when the New England
Power Company built the Harriman dam. The original farm has been underwater
since the 1920s. Folks said at the time that the reservoir covered up the best
bottom land in Windham County.

Although the cemetery is now underwater all the graves were said to be moved
to
higher ground. Abraham and Hannah's graves have never been found and I
believe
they were missed and are under water in the old cemetery along the river.

When I visited Wilmington, Vermont during 1990s "Old Home Week" I met more
than a dozen cousins and Phillip Ware (late of Wilmington) said "if you are
a Boyd you are related to most everyone in town". Abraham had six sons,
those sons had sons, and just one grandson Jasper Elam Boyd, son of the
aforementioned Elam Boyd, had 14 children, eight of them sons.

Thanks for listening and best of 2001.

Richard G. Boyd, Mt. Morris, Michigan
PS. More data including dozens of names of Massachusetts, Vermont, Ohio, etc
residents who married into this Boyd family can be found on this website:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~confido/bkindex.htm

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