S.E. Boyer, Pittsburg, PA, 1905

Maryville Times, (Blount Co. TN) Friday, May 19, 1905:

"Next of Kin---At Nashville, March 15, 1864, an unknown lady passenger said to have light hair was lost off the steamboat "Revenue." A lady of the same descriptions had previously with other refugees applied for rations giving the name of Davis from Blount County, going to hunt her husband in the Confederate Army at Vicksburg. She left a daughter about 2 ½ years old who was taken and raised by strangers and who wants to learn the history or location of any of her relatives. Any such information will be very much appreciated by her brother-in-law, S.E. Boyer, 19 Maple Ave., Pittsburg, Pa."

"To The Maryville Times---Dear Sirs: Perhaps you or some of your readers may be able to give me the information desired.
My sister-in-law, Mrs. Kerr, of this city has given me the following items regarding herself which of course are all hearsay. She was living with her mother in Blount County, Tenn., and her mother was unable to hear from her husband who was with the Confederate Army at Vicksburg. Getting desperate, she started with her child to go to Vicksburg and in the night she fell off the steamer, Revenue, at Nashville and was drowned. A young couple were making a wedding trip on the boat and when the daughter was brought to them she held out her hands to the groom and called him papa, showing her mother had told her she was going to see papa. This married couple took the little girl, supposed to be 2 or 3 years of age and raised her, not telling her or letting her know she was not their own child. But of course in time she found out from schoolmates and finally from her foster parents that they were not her own father and mother and they told her the story as related above and that a woman answering same description had given name of Davis when she applied for rations and said she was from Blount County, and as the daughter has dark hair and this mother had light hair, the father was supposed to have dark hair. I might also say that while these people raised her they never adopted her legally. So she has no relatives that she knows of and would gladly hear from anyone who can give any information."---Yours, S.E. Boyer, 19 Maple Ave., Pittsburg, Pa.