Belle Boyd

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Isabella Maria Boyd (May 9, 1844– June 11, 1900), best known as Belle Boyd (and dubbed theCleopatra of the Secession or Siren of the Shenandoah, andlater the Confederate Mata Hari) was a Confederate spy in theAmerican Civil War. She operated from her father's hotel in FrontRoyal, Virginia, and provided valuable information to ConfederateGeneral Stonewall Jackson in 1862.

Early life

Isabella Maria Boyd was born on May 9,1844 in Martinsburg, Virginia (now part of West Virginia). She wasthe eldest child of Benjamin Reed and Mary Rebecca (Glenn) Boyd. Shedescribed her childhood as idyllic. After some preliminary schoolingin Martinsburg, she attended finishing school at the Mount WashingtonFemale College in Baltimore, Maryland in 1856 at age 12.

Southern spy

Boyd's espionage career began bychance. According to her highly fictionalized 1866 account, a band ofUnion army soldiers heard that she had Confederate flags in her roomon July 4, 1861, and they came to investigate. They hung a Union flagoutside her home. Then one of the men cursed at her mother, whichenraged Boyd. She pulled out a pistol and shot the man, who died somehours later. A board of inquiry exonerated her of murder, butsentries were posted around the house and officers kept close trackof her activities. She profited from this enforced familiarity,charming at least one of the officers whom she named in her memoir asCaptain Daniel Keily, She wrote in her memoir that she was indebtedto Keily "for some very remarkable effusions, some witheredflowers, and a great deal of important information." Sheconveyed those secrets to Confederate officers via her slave ElizaHopewell, who carried them in a hollowed-out watch case. Boyd wascaught on her first attempt at spying and told that she could besentenced to death, and she realized that she needed to find a betterway to communicate.

General James Shields and his staffgathered in the parlor of the local hotel in mid-May 1862. Boyd hidin the closet in the room, eavesdropping through a knothole that sheenlarged in the door. She learned that Shields had been ordered eastfrom Front Royal, Virginia. That night, she rode through Union lines,using false papers to bluff her way past the sentries, and reportedthe news to Colonel Turner Ashby, who was scouting for theConfederates. She then returned to town. When the Confederatesadvanced on Front Royal on May 23, Boyd ran to greet StonewallJackson's men, avoiding enemy fire that put bullet holes in herskirt, as according to her memoir. She urged an officer to informJackson that "the Yankee force is very small [...] Tell himto charge right down and he will catch them all." Jacksondid and wrote a note of gratitude to her: "I thank you, formyself and for the army, for the immense service that you haverendered your country today." For her contributions, shewas awarded the Southern Cross of Honor.[citation needed] Jacksonalso gave her captain and honorary aide-de-camp positions.

Boyd was arrested at least six timesbut somehow evaded incarceration. By late July 1862, detective AllanPinkerton had assigned three men to work on her case. She wasfinally captured by Union officials on July 29, 1862, after her lovergave her up, and they brought her to the Old Capitol Prison inWashington, D.C. the next day. An inquiry was held on August 7, 1862concerning violations of orders that Boyd be kept in close custody.She was held for a month before being released on August 29, 1862,when she was exchanged at Fort Monroe. She was arrested again inJune 1863, but was released after contracting typhoid fever.

In March 1864, Boyd attempted to travelto England, but she was intercepted by a Union blockade and sent toCanada where she met Union naval officer Samuel Wylde Hardinge. Thetwo later married in England. and had a daughter named Grace. Boydbecame an actress in England after her husband's death to support herdaughter. Following the death of her husband in 1866, she and herdaughter returned to the United States. Boyd assumed the stage nameNina Benjamin to perform in several cities, eventually ending up inNew Orleans where she married John Swainston Hammond in March 1869, aformer British Army officer who fought for the Union Army during theCivil War. They had two sons and two daughters; their first son diedas an infant. Boyd divorced Hammond in 1884 and married Nathaniel RueHigh in 1885. She subsequently began touring the country givingdramatic lectures of her life as a Civil War spy.

Postwar years and death

Boyd published a highly fictionalizednarrative of her war experiences in the two-volume Belle Boyd in Campand Prison. She died of a heart attack in Kilbourn City, Wisconsin(Wisconsin Dells) on June 11, 1900 at age 56. She was buried in theSpring Grove Cemetery in Wisconsin Dells, with members of the GrandArmy of the Republic as her pallbearers. For years, her grave simplyread:

BELLE BOYD

CONFEDERATE SPY

BORN IN VIRGINIA

DIED IN WISCONSIN

ERECTED BY A COMRADE

In popular culture

Boyd's life inspired the silentfilm series The Girl Spy.

The Smiling Rebel is Harnett Kane's1955 novel about Boyd.

Boyd is a main character in CheriePriest's 2010 steampunk novel Clementine and its 2013 sequelFiddlehead.

Boyd appears as a character in book3 of the James Reasoner Civil War Series.

Boyd's bullet-riddled handbag wasthe featured artifact on an episode of the TV game show Legends ofthe Hidden Temple.

Boyd appears as a master-spy in theFiraxis computer game Civilization 4 Beyond The Sword