Belle Boyd

Her first husband Samuel Hardinge died in 1866 and on November 11, 1869 she moved back to the US and the same year she married ex-Union officer John Swainston Hammond. The couple had four children and they divorced in 1884.

In 1885 she married Nathaniel Rue High, a young actor.

On June 11, 1900, she succumbed to a heart attack in Kilbourne City (at present Wisconsin Dells) in Wisconsin. She went there to address members of a GAR post while on a tour in the United States. She was interred in Wisconsin at the ‘Spring Grove Cemetery’.

She was born on May 9, 1844, to Benjamin Reed and Mary Rebecca (Glenn) Boyd in Martinsburg, Virginia (at present West Virginia) as their eldest child. Her father owned a shop.

She was vivacious, courageous, witty, and spontaneous and had strong willpower since her childhood. She led an extremely pleasant and care-free childhood that was marked by her domination over her siblings. Her tomboyish and daredevil attitude was exhibited in her riding a horse in the middle of a party held by her family where she was not allowed as a child.

After her preliminary education she joined the ‘Mount Washington Female College’ in Baltimore in 1856 and studied there till 1860.

Though most of Martinsburg supported Union, her family had strong conviction for the cause of the Confederate. While her father volunteered in the Virginia infantry, she came forward to raise funds to aid the Confederate at the very outset of the ‘American Civil War’.

Following an encounter at the Falling Water town, the Union troops came to Martinsburg on July 3, 1861. When the Union occupied Martinsburg, Belle Boyd freely mixed with the soldiers and after extracting whatever information she could manage, forwarded them to the Confederate officers through messengers.

When a group of Union soldiers came to know that there are Confederate flags in her room, they came to her family residence on July 4, 1861, to check and raise their own flag. However, she along with her mother prohibited the group to enter the house. This was followed by an altercation and when one of the soldiers hurled abusive languages at her mother and tried to enter forcefully, Belle Boyd straightaway took a pistol, shot the soldier and killed him.

She had to undergo a trial and following investigation the Union commanding officer concluded that her action in such situation was appropriate and she was released on defensive ground. Albeit her release, her house was kept under high vigil with sentries keeping watch around the house as also on her movements.

Instead of getting worried she took advantage of the situation and with her flirtatious best she was successful in alluring one of the soldiers, Captain Daniel Keily. She extracted substantial information from him and through her slave Eliza Hopewell transferred those to the Confederate soldiers.

On May 23, 1862 she passed on crucial information to the Confederate General Stonewall Jackson in the middle of firing by the Union troops, one of which hit her skirt. The information given by her aided General Stonewall Jackson’s troops in reclaiming the town of Front Royal. The general showed his gratitude through a note sent to her and later conferred her with the posts of captain and honorary aide-de-camp. She also received the ‘Southern Cross of Honor’.