Historic Portrait of General Elijah Boyd (1769 - 1841)

Elisha Boyd (October 6, 1769 – October 21, 1841) was a Virginia lawyer, soldier, hero of the War of 1812, and politician who served in both houses of the Virginia General Assembly, and developed Berkeley County, Virginia (which later seceded and eventually became part of the State of West Virginia). This portrait was purchased as part of the Boydville Plantation in 1992. It is a modern painting commissioned during the Berkeley County Bicentennial Festivities of 1976. As there were no extant portraits of Boyd at the time, an artist was commissioned to use the image of Boyd appearing in a large group portrait of the Virginia House of Delegates which hangs in the Richmond, Virginia Capitol.

Elisha Boyd was born on October 6, 1769, in what became Berkeley County, Virginia (in 1772) to Sarah Griffith Boyd and her husband John Boyd, who had purchased a large tract from Lord Fairfax at the headwaters of Tuscarora Creed at the east base of North Mountain and the northernmost end of the Shenandoah Valley. His father was thus one of the early emigrants to Berkeley County, which the Virginia General Assembly split off from then-vast and later neighboring Frederick County, Virginia.

Boyd received a private education, including at Liberty Hall Academy, a predecessor of Washington and Lee University in Staunton, Virginia, graduating in 1785. He also studied law in the office of Colonel Philip Pendleton. Elisha Boyd helped to establish Martinsburg Academy, which closed near the end of his life (after the Panic of 1837). He married three times, one of them in 1795 in Frederick County, Virginia. His first wife was Mary Waggoner, a daughter of Major Andrew Waggoner, and they had one child. His second wife was Ann Holmes, daughter of Colonel Joseph Holmes and the sister of both Virginia Congressman (and Mississippi Territorial governor) David Holmes and Major Andrew Hunter Holmes. They had four children. Their daughter Mary Boyd Hunter, married Charles J. Faulkner Sr. (and their son Charles J. Faulkner would become a Confederate officer and later U.S. Senator from West Virginia).

Elisha Boyd built the “Boydville” Plantation house in 1812 and bequeathed it to Mary and Charles Faulkner Sr. upon his death. His third wife was Elizabeth Byrd of the Westover Byrd family. They married in Richmond, Virginia on March 10, 1827 and she died not long before him, on November 16, 1839.

Boyd served in the War of 1812, receiving a commission as Colonel of the 4th Regiment of Virginia Militia. Their troop of Berkeley County militia defended Norfolk and Portsmouth against a British naval and land attack; another Berkeley County militia troop would be the first to reach Washington, D.C. after the British burned our new nation's capital. His first father in law, Andrew Waggoner, would be cited for heroism at the Battle of Lundy's Lane. For his services defending Virginia, the General Assembly elected Boyd a Brigadier General.

In 1796, Berkeley County voters first elected Boyd to the Virginia House of Delegates, a part-time position. He would be re-elected to the House of Delegates several times, as well as lose several elections. Boyd won election to the Senate of Virginia in 1824, representing Berkeley, Hampshire, Morgan and Hardy Counties.

General Boyd died October 21, 1841, less than two years after his third wife, and was buried in the family plot at Norborne Cemetery in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Two years later, Episcopalians were able to erect Trinity Episcopal Church in Martinsburg, based on his donation of land for the church.

Two historic sites and three historic districts in Berkeley County, West Virginia, are associated with Elisha Boyd and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. They are: "Boydville" and the surrounding Boydville Historic District; Edgewood Manor; and a number of buildings located in the Bunker Hill Historic District and Mill Creek Historic District.

This portrait would be an ideal purchase for descendants of the Boyd family or for institutions or museums that celebrate the rich history of America's first successful English Colony, Virginia.