Two Main Characters: A Brief Introduction

My second-great grandparents seem like an unlikely couple: he's a Yankee from Illinois, but with roots back to New England and the Mayflower; she's a quintessential Southern girl, born during Reconstruction in rural southwestern Virginia.  

Taylor Holt, ca. 1888
T.H. = Taylor Holt
F.H.K. = Frances Huckstep Kyle
T.T.L.V. = you'll have to wait and see

Taylor Holt was born in Kankakee, Illinois, on February 13, 1868. He was the only child of Stephen Philip and Aurelia "Lelila" Morgan Grimes Holt.  Stephen died before Taylor's first birthday, so Lelia took Taylor back to her hometown of Princeton, Illinois to live with her mother and sisters in their little house on the southeast corner of the Main Square.  After Taylor graduated from Princeton High School, he lived for a little while in Chicago, where he apprenticed himself with a metal worker.  Though I haven't found the name of his employer there, he wrote in a letter to his family in October 1886, "I like my work ever so much it is very light easy work some times all I have to do is to sit in a chair and manipulate 2 or 3 little cranks ...the other day I worked the new milling machine it is a splendid great big one. Cost $600.00 I have been on every machine in shop except one planing machine I like them very much."

The mining boom which struck Leadville, Colorado in the late 1870s impacted the Grimes Family in a big way. Lelia's two younger brothers, Bill and Lee Grimes, moved to Leadville around 1880.  Both of them appear in the Leadville City Directory starting that year.  They were followed sometime before 1884 by their sister, Ida V Grimes.  She married an east coast transplant named Oliver Smith there in 1884. I'm not entirely sure of the exact date, but Taylor eventually followed, along with his mother, her mother, and two other Grimes sisters, Angeline and Nira, settling together in a small house on West 6th Street (no longer standing).  Taylor got a job as an assayer/chemist with the Elgin Smelting Company in Leadville. Taylor and family were life-long devout Presbyterians and likely were members of the First Presbyterian Church in Leadville.

Frances "Fanny" Huckstep Kyle,
ca. 1887-8

Frances "Fanny" Huckstep Kyle  was born in 1867 - most likely in Big Island, Virginia, which is on the far northern border of Bedford County, right along the James River.  This information is based primarily on an interview Fanny gave for a newspaper article published on the front page of the Amherst New Era Progress on 22 March 1951, in which she states "...her life had led her to many other places far away from her birthplace in Big Island..." I have not been able to locate any official birth records for Fanny, though others place her birth in either Amherst County (where she spent most of her childhood) or Botetourt County (where her father was born).

Fanny had a rather tragic childhood.  She was the daughter of Andrew McCartney Kyle and his second wife, Frances Ann Huckstep. Andrew had three other children (though one died young) with his first wife, Susan Page Dameron, before marrying Miss Huckstep in 1866 (as a side note, Miss Huckstep is Susan's niece - I had to make myself a chart to keep all the intermmariages straight). Andrew died in November 1875 of tuberculosis.  His wife died not much later, in February 1877 - leaving behind four children with no parents.  

In July 1888, Fanny left Virginia to visit her older half-brother, Rufus Page Kyle, who had caught the Gold Rush bug and moved to Leadville sometime before 1888 to work in the mines there. In Leadville, she met the dashing young Taylor Holt at a church social. Thus began their courtship, and they became engaged in the spring of 1889.   Taylor needed to earn enough money to support a family and Fanny had debts of her own to pay off. So, in early June of 1889, Fanny returned to Virginia. There, she lived as a boarder in the home of Isabella "Bell" and James Woods in the small rurual community known as Pedlar Mills in Amherst County - at least through September. I'm not sure why she chose this home rather than that of her aunt and uncle, Jennie and Moses Kyle, just up the river at Snowden. Perhaps it was for lack of work there. Sometime in October, she moved to the "backwoods" (as she described it) of Forks of Buffalo - also in Amherst County - where she boarded with the Dodd family and taught at a little country school.  Fanny's return to Virginia may also have been due at least in part to Rufus moving to Montana to work for the Granite Mining Company.

In May 1890, Fanny and Taylor were married at the Woods' home in Pedlar Mills.  They wrote to each other nearly every day (and sometimes more than once a day) between the day Fanny left Leadville and the day Taylor arrived in Virginia to marry his sweetheart.  Those letters contain wedding plans - big wedding or small? church or not? who will marry us? where will we go before returning to Leadville? what will be in the trousseau....etc. etc. But, they also contain wonderful descriptions of family and friends - enough to make them seem real enough that I could pick up a phone and call them when I have a question (which is often).  

Once they were married, Fanny and Taylor lived a rich and varied life - moving between Colorado, Mexico, Virginia and Utah. They raised a family and suffered devastating losses. Official documents like births and deaths are not always easy to find, but some seriously interesting family secrets are shared in the letters. Some that completely took my by surprise and have been (so far) nearly impossible to document any other way. 

Also, I'll just say this: I adore the Grimes and Holt families.  I wish I could have known them.  They were a jolly bunch and I can't wait to introduce everyone!

Sources:

• Holt, Aurelia Grimes. "Taylor Holt Expenses." Kankakee and Princeton, Illinois, 1868-1878. Privately held by Erin Pittman [address for private use,] Davidsonville, Maryland, 2018.
• McGee, Carol. "Grimes Family Research." Series of emails from Bureau County Genealogy Society [(e-address for private use),] to Erin Pittman, 2019-2020. Privately held by Pittman. Davidsonville, Maryland, 2019-2020.
• Holt, Taylor (Chicago, Illinois) to "Dear Folks" [Holt/Grimes Family]. Letter. 17 October 1886. Privately held by Erin Pittman, Davidsonville, Maryland, 2018.
• Corbett & Ballenger's, compiler. Leadville City Directory. Leadville, Colorado: Corbett & Ballenger's Publishing, 1880-1893.
• Colorado. Lake County. Marriage Book B. County Clerk's Office, Leadville.
• Wimer, Elizabeth. "To Return to Pedlar Mills in 1936 Childhood Visits Led Mrs. Fannie Holt (sic)." Clipping, 22 March 1951, from Amherst New Era Progress. Privately held by Susan Drage, [address for private use], Loveland, Colorado, 2016. Online version available at https://virginiachronicle.com/?a=d&d=ANE19510322.1.1&e=-------en-20--1--txt-txIN-------- 
• Death registers: Buckingham County, 1853-1896 -- Amherst-Dinwiddle 1853-1896 (many years missing) -- Alexandria County 1853-1896 -- Amelia County 1853-1896 (FamilySearch.com)
• Henley, Sarah C (Amherst, Virginia) to "Dear Fannie" [Frances Huckstep Kyle]. Letter. 8 January 1888. Privately held by Erin Pittman, Davidsonville, Maryland, 2018. 
• Holt-Kyle marriage certificate (1890 marriage). Issued 1890. Lexington Parish, St. Luke's Episcopal Church (Pedlar Mills, Virginia). Privately held by Erin Pittman.