Montgomery County TN Archives Biographies.....Byrd, John A. (Sr.) 1845 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@gmail.com October 30, 2005, 3:53 am

Author: Will T. Hale

   JOHN A. BYRD, SR. AND JOHN A. BYRD, JR. The Byrd family has been identified

with Tennessee fully a century, and its career has been marked by that

distinctive achievement and influence which are the chief factors in social

prominence. The grandfather and father, respectively, of the men named above was

John C. Byrd, who was born in Tennessee in 1815, and the family name and

fortunes had keen established here some years before that.



   John C. Byrd, who married Elizabeth Herring, also a native of this state, was

a trader and also followed the occupation of house carpenter. Although past

middle age when the war came on, he enlisted in 1861 in Company A, of the

Fiftieth Tennessee Volunteers, and continued in the service until November,

1862. He was captured at Fort Donelson, where he was kept some time. After his

exchange he started home and died on the way. Politically he was a Democrat. His

wife's father was Spirus Herring, one of the early settlers of Tennessee and for

many years engaged in farming.



   Of these parents John A. Byrd, Sr., was born on November 2, 1845, at New

Providence, Tennessee. Reared and educated in Montgomery county, he was only a

boy at the time of the Civil war, but as statistics show it was largely the

youth of both North and South that composed the great armies of that war. He

became a member of the cavalry, serving in the Eighth and Twelfth Consolidated

Regiment of Kentucky Cavalry, under the leadership of the gallant General

Forrest. In one of the many skirmishes in which he engaged he was severely

wounded and captured, and was kept eighteen months in the Federal prison at Rock

Island, Illinois.



   After the war he worked as a farm laborer two years, spent a similar period

in Padueah, Kentucky, and then returned to Montgomery county, where he bought a

farm. As a progressive farmer and one who has acquired most of his prosperity

through his own efforts and good management, he has had few superiors in this

part of the state. For a number of years tobacco has been his special crop and

he also has raised a large amount of stock. His farm in Montgomery county

consists of four hundred and fifteen acres, and is one of the best in the county.



   In 1874 he married Miss Helen O'Neal, daughter of John and Elizabeth

(Britton) O'Neal, a well known family concerning whom more information will be

found in the sketch of W. A. 0 'Neal, elsewhere in this work The only child of

Mr. and Mrs. Byrd is Dr. John A., Jr. The father and mother are both members of

the Methodist church, and he is a Democrat.



   Dr. John A. Byrd, Jr., who is a successful dentist at Clarksville, was born

in Dotsonville, Tennessee, October 13, 1886. His early education was obtained in

the public schools of his home neighborhood and at Auburn, Kentucky, after which

he located in Clarksville and went into the livery business. After a year he

moved to Nashville and continued in the same line two years. He then entered

Vanderbilt University and spent three years in study in the dental department,

until his graduation as D. D. S. in 1909. For two years following his office was

in Nashville, where he built up a fine practice, and would have remained there

but that his father's failing health made it advisable for him to return to

Clarksville, where he opened his office on October 11, 1911. He is one of the

rising men in his profession, and is a member of the state and national dental

associations. He is a Democrat in politics, is affiliated with the Clarksville

Elks lodge, and is a member of the Cumberland Presbyterian church.



Additional Comments:
From:



A history of Tennessee and Tennesseans : the leaders and representative men in

commerce, industry and modern activities

by Will T. Hale

Chicago:  Lewis Pub. Co.,  1913



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