Family Ties

My Aunt Donna has been doing incredible family history research. She's a true wealth of information, and I'm so very appreciative of all that she's done and learned. She is, after all, the reason I know I had a collateral ancestor in the Alamo!

But how is that related to me now? Well, let's back up: Joseph Bayliss moved to Texas in order to assist Texas in its fight for independence. For that, he was promised land in Texas. Well, Joseph was part of that group that went to the Alamo, and we know that didn't turn out so well. But the land was given to his brother, Harris Bayliss, who moved from Tennessee to claim the land. My grandmother's grandmother was Harris's daughter, Catherine Patience Bayliss. (She married James Mason Buck. They were the paternal grandparents of my paternal grandmother.)

Okay--back to Memphis. Catherine (my great-great-grandmother) had a second cousin named Rowena Bayliss. This makes Rowena my second cousin four times removed. Rowena married James Lee, Jr. (who was, by the way, an attorney). On Saturday, I visited their house! It's "The James Lee House."

It's an amazing structure, but sadly, in bad need of restoration. Indeed, the house is closed to the public. But as I was walking by, I say a lady around back, asked her if I could see the house, and she said to ask the caretaker. She even led me around back to meet him. Alvin lives in an apartment at the back of the house, and his job is to keep an eye on the property and open and close a specific gate on certain days. (And he also apparently gives haircuts in the room right off where he has his kitchen.)

I told him I was distantly related to the Lees--second cousin many times removed--and asked if there was any way I could see inside. (I had driven by on a whim after I voted Saturday afternoon---being in the general area. So I hadn't come armed with all the information I'd learned about exactly how I was related.) Alvin, judging my earnestness, smiled, paused, and said, "You want to see inside?" I said that I did, and he said he'd show me around.

Right about that time, two other ladies walked up, also wanting to see inside (they, however were more interested in seeing ghosts), and so they came along with us. (And yes, when they left, I pointed them in the direction of Ernestine and Hazel's for the pursuit of ghosts.)

Indeed, the house needs a lot of work. Alvin told us that it had been slated for restoration, but whoever had the money ran off with those funds. Sigh. He said there's litigation going on now, so they haven't lost all hope.

Still, the house is grand, and walking through it, you can easily imagine just how grand it once was. Here are shots of the first, second, and third floors.




Of course, then there's the fourth floor. Okay, not a whole floor. It was really just a small room. I and the two other ladies wondered up there, but Alvin said he'd never made it that far. This is looking up from the outside then a view looking down from the fourth-floor window down. You might be able to view my car under the tree--with the top down, of course. (It was a gorgeous day!)




As to the story of Rowena and James, well, according to Aunt Donna, "Rowena Bayliss married James L. Lee, Jr., in 1858, shortly after he was graduated from Princeton law school. His dad James Sr. had been an iron producer on the Cumberland River near Clarksville and then sometime before 1840 decided to cut out the middleman transporter and develop his own steamboats to carry his iron to market. In the census of 1840, he is listed in the category of 'employed in navigation of canals, lakes, and rivers.'

"So James Sr. navigated the Cumberland for a while, expanding his shipping business, and then about 1860 or so he and his son James Jr. (and Rowena) moved their families to Memphis to locate their Lee Line Steamship company offices there on the Mississippi River. This put them in the position to become one of the major inland steamer lines in the U.S., navigating the Mississippi, Cumberland, Ohio, and Tennessee Rivers. During the War, Lee steamboats were used to transport men, artillery, horses, etc., for the CSA..

"Edna Ferber used the Lee steamboat Stacker Lee as a fictional backdrop for her novel Show Boat, which eventually became a Broadway musical first produced by Florenz Zigfield. The Lees often named their steamboats after their children, and this one was named after Rowena's bro-in-law, Samuel Stacker Lee."

Here's a pic of an advertisement for the Lee Line.


Aunt Donna gave me other addresses where the Lees lived or had buildings. I'm going to print those out and make them my destinations next time I'm out driving around enjoying such a gorgeous day---sun on my face, and of course, the wind in my hair.