Cornelius Boyle

Historians have often speculated about the bizarre Conclusion of the American Civil War, in that surrender appeared unintentionally delayed by the Confederates long after their army had been overcome and stood no chance of returning to the battlefield. One dominant theory is that the delay was simply to allow time for the Confederate Secret Service and specific individuals such as Mosby and Boyle to carry out spectacular reprisal actions such as the assassination of Lincoln.

On March 27, 1865, Boyle had been the relay for W. H. Taylor to pass orders to Mosby that he was to collect his men and take command of the entire section between Boyle's Gordonsville, to Blue Ridge, and the Valley - and to withdraw any forces possibly remaining in Northern Neck.[1] Meanwhile, Thomas F. Harney had been called to Richmond, from his work as a "torpedo planter" working on the CSS Hunley and later developments, but on April 2, 1865, the city was evacuated. Mosby, Sarah Slater from Montreal and John Surratt were among those scattering - Harney took a train to Gordonsville where he is believed to have met Boyle to pass a further message to Mosby. Boyle then gave Harney a horse and a guide believed to be Thomas Franklin Summers - who would help him bring his explosive payload to the White House.[24] During those same days, Mosby sent his personal friend Capt Robert S. Walker to meet with Boyle "to learn the true state of affairs".[1]

During his 12-day flight after assassinating Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth told Confederate Signal Corps officer William Rollins[lower-alpha 2] that his intention was to escape, presumably with the assistance of Mosby's Rangers, to the Orange County Courthouse near Boyle's encampment at Gordonsville.[23][1]

Those investigating the assassination came into possession of a letter dated April 10, four days before the assassination, appearing to have been written by a leader in the contemporary form of the Knights of the Golden Circle, although it was postmarked some weeks after the assassination.[25] It was addressed to Dr. Cornelius Boyle, John Surratt, Mary Surratt and seemingly George Atzerodt stating, "You're to attempt the murder of Secretary Seward, while I am to attempt for the life of Mr. Chase and if we succeed in getting away we are all bound for Canada". While it was Lewis Powell, of the Confederate Secret Service and Mosby's Rangers, who stabbed Seward, reports by War Department investigator Lt. David D. Dana initially named a separate bushwhacker, Capt. John H. Boyle, as the attacker - and Atzerodt testified on May 1 that "[John H.] Boyle also killed Capt. Watkins near Annapolis last month, was one of the party, in the conspiracy".[26] The three addressees of the letter other than Dr. Cornelius Boyle were all sentenced to hang for conspiracy of the murder of Lincoln.[23]

I believe the Major to be utterly, thoroughly, completely, disgusted with the entire condition of affairs in this country and that he thinks that matters will grow worse instead of better. I believe he will never be a happy or content man so long as he remains in it and under those circumstances if he desires to leave the country and thinks he would be better satisfied and that it would be better for the children that he should do so, I am willing to go.

— Fanny Boyle, to her sister, February 23, 1866.[27]

After the war, Boyle requested and was sent an Oath of Amnesty on August 14, 1865, but it was never deposited with the government; Boyle preferred to travel to Mexico to assist many among the Confederate veterans and Knights of the Golden Circle with mapping out their plans for an alternate resolution with a confederacy running through Central America and the Caribbean,[3] at the same time Gnl. Early was also there.[28]

He traveled there with Capt. George M. Cayce, May Miles O'Bannon (daughter of USA Col. Dixon Stansbury Miles and wife of CSA Major Laurens Willbrant O'Bannon), and wealthy landowner Eustace Barron, for whom he named his daughter, though their steamer Vera Cruz ran aground in North Carolina and Boyle was deemed instrumental in organising the safety of the passengers and return to New York to set off again on a steamship Manhattan.[29] Boyle carried a letter of introduction for himself, to give to the former commander of the Confederate Navy, Matthew Fontaine Maury.[30] CSA Col. Alonzo Ridley had refused offers to return to loyalty to the United States and aligned himself firmly with Maximilian, and now served as the colonization agent for Mezatlan where he'd secured land for Judge D. O. Shattuck in the Comacho Valley.[31] Boyle wrote to his wife that William Quantrill was accompanying him, as a bodyguard of sorts, under the false name "Wilson" - one of several rumors that the notorious bushwhacker had survived his alleged death; one of five Confederate sympathizers he tasked with surveying and setting out the residential development.[32][29]

While returning to Mexico with his wife in May 1867, Boyle's plan to settle 200 families in a "Barronville" plantation between the San Pedro River and Santiago River were abandoned following the execution of the Emperor Maximillian in 1867. Two months later Boyle's oath of amnesty, sent to him two years earlier, was deposited with the government and his pardon granted Aug 31.[33] Boyle was nonetheless among the 34 key architects of the war named in the 1869 filing of Treason charges for the purposes of dismissal, alongside Davies, Lee, Ewell, Longstreet, Early, Breckinridge and others.[34]

In 1903, Boyle's daughter FG Boyle arranged for the crystal flute crafted for James Madison, then owned by Boyle, to be put on display in the Smithsonian Museum, although it was subsequently purchased by Dr. Dayton C. Miller who gifted it to the Library of Congress.[35] In 2022, the flute made headlines as it was played by pop musician Lizzo.[36]

Returning to Virginia, Boyle took up running the White Silver Springs Spa in Fauquier, and in June 1868 invited the American Medical Association to hold their next convention on his property.[37] His wife Fanny and infant child died in childbirth in 1869, less than a year after the birth of Eustacia. In the 1870 census, he listed himself as a musician holding $80,000 of real estate and $6,000 of personal objects. Boyle listed residents of his home including Thomas Atkins, who had drawn up the expansion draftwork for the Silver Springs Spa, as his "Clerk" and Martha Journey as his homekeeper, with a 10-year old Alice Courtney living alongside his own children. He also listed Robert Taliaferro and Davy Randolph as his black labourers. In Sept 1868, AH and Eliza Morehead filed a $35,000 lawsuit against Boyle for having enforced Gnl. Beauregard's prohibition on Eliza Morehead being allowed to cross and re-cross from DC into Virginia for three years during the war.[38]

In 1871, following a petition signed by prominent physicians as well as Robert E. Lee, Boyle's DC property was eventually returned and he was permitted to re-enter the district. At some point he married Cherry Elizabeth Bethune, the daughter of Gen. James N. Bethune the man who owned and later held custody of the musician Blind Tom Wiggins, indeed one of Wiggins' songs was dedicated to Cherry. A fire engulfed the sulphur springs resort, and Eustacia later recalled how handsome her father had been holding her wrapped in a Chinese blanket on his knees during the fire.[5] Boyle's relationship with Cherry Bethune was a stressor inside the home, as his eldest daughter resented the replacement of the family's matriarch - and Eustacia, then under 8 years old, was sent to live with maternal relatives.[5]

Boyle died following an illness March 11, 1878 and was buried in an unmarked grave in Glenwood Cemetery, later marked and containing his first wife and several children. Cherry Bethune departed the family as she was disliked by the children, and left the two eldest teenaged Boyle children John and Frances to raise the younger children.[5] The Exchange Hotel in Gordonsville listed the ghost of Major Boyle among its haunted attractions.[39]