Bondurant-Hustin House

Bondurant-Huston House: Castlewood

Ca. 1991 photo from "Historic Pewee Valley," published in 1991 by Historic Pewee Valley, Inc.

According to the National Register of Historic Places, the Bondurant-Huston House (also known as Castlewood) was built about 1885 by Louisville realtor J.D. Bondurant and his wife, Myrah Gray, and is "...one of the few and ... best examples of Queen Anne-influenced residential architecture in Pewee Valley. "

Although a house existed on the site in 1879, the present house appears to date from about 1885, two years after the Bondurants purchased the nine-acre property for $1,500. In 1888, they sold it for $3,000 -- double what they had paid and strong evidence that they built a new residence. The historic carriage house on the property, however, predates the house. The National Register nomination states:

Set back from the house near its north rear corner are the adjacent garage and carriage house ... The fine two-story carriage house, built about 1870, has board-and-batten siding and a gable roof with a front cross gable. It is detailed with bargeboards, a cornice formed of a row of saw-tooth shingles, and diamond shaped, circular, pointed-arched, and rectangular vents and window openings infilled with wood lattice work.

The earliest known image of the Bondurant-Huston House was captured ca. 1909 and appeared in "Beautiful Pewee Valley." At the time the promotional brochure was published, the property was owned by W.A. Lee.

The Bondurant Years: 1883-1888

Bondurant Family Roots

Joseph Davis "J.D." Bondurant was a native Kentuckian and spent at least part of his childhood in Oldham County. He was one of four children born to farmer and physician Dr. Jeffrey W. Bondurant (February 2, 1798-May 23, 1859) and Lucinda S. Coleman (February 1, 1799-October 5, 1850):

Dr. James Coleman "Coleman" Bondurant (January 19, 1829- October 11, 1899), married first Catherine Taliaferro on April 7, 1851 (November 5, 1829-August 8, 1862), married second Mary Woolfolk
Joseph Davis "J.D." Bondurant (June 5, 1830-October 2, 1899)
Salathiel Taylor Bondurant (December 15, 1831-June 9, 1838)
Sarah Elizabeth Bondurant (b. April 12, 1834)

On April 22, 1836, when J.D. was about five years old, his father purchased a 250-acre farm for $3,000 on Bull Creek near what is now Shiloh Lane, Skylight, Ky., from Mary Adams. By 1840, the U.S. census shows the family was living on the farm with seven slaves. Records for the nearby Liberty Baptist Church show that Jeffrey and Lucinda were among the church's first members when it was formed on July 11, 1844 at the Liberty Meeting House. Other members included Frances Clore, Lucy Wright, Susan Clore, Mary Meade, Samuel Guyton, and Rebecca Guyton. In 1871, their son Coleman became a trustee of the church.

Liberty Baptist Church, Courtesy Oldham County Historical Society

Liberty Baptist Church was built before 1871. The exact date of its construction is unknown, but it was already standing when the church bought the property. From "History & Families of Oldham County: 1824-1924," published in 1996 by the Oldham County Historical Society, pg. 157.

Dr. James Coleman Bondurant, J.D.'s older brother

The 1850 census provides more details about the Bondurant household, which by then was comprised of:

Jeffrey W. Bondurant, age 52, head of household, farmer and physician
Lucinda Bondurant, age 51, his wife
James Coleman Bondurant, age 21, his son and a physician
Joseph Bondurant, age 20, his son and a laborer on the farm
S.E. Bondurant, age 16, his son and unemployed
James Melone, age 19, laborer
Mary Adams, age 28, unemployed
Polly Adams, age 5, daughter of Mary Adam

From the census information, it appears that Mary Adams might have been J.D.'s half-sister from one of his father's previous marriages. She was listed on the deed as "widow and relict of Francis Adams," but she and her children continued living at the farm after selling the property to the Bondurants .

J.D.'s mother died in 1850. His father married again in 1854, but died in 1859. Both are buried in the Bennett/Bondurant Cemetery (062 in the Oldham County Graves Index) on private property off Shiloh Lane. By the time his father died, his older brother, Coleman, was married with children of his own and had left the family farm to practice medicine in Saltillo, Oldham County, Ky. Although J.D. had not yet tied the knot, he, too, had left home and was running a wholesale hardware and agricultural supply business in Louisville. J.D. and George and Sarah Radford sold the farm to Coleman the year their father died.

What became of the slaves is unknown, with the exception of three: Eliza Brooks and two of her children, a boy, James Henry, and a girl. They escaped and fled to Indiana, according to an article in the February 15, 2016 Courier-Journal written by Nancy Theiss, Executive Director of the Oldham County Historical Society. Theiss learned about the escape when two African-American women, Marie Brooks and her mother, Doris Benoit Brooks, visited the history center in LaGrange to research their genealogy. Theiss's interview with Marie Brooks is below:

"I was born in D.C. My parents came from Chicago and Mississippi. We heard that my family on my father's side was from Kentucky but didn't know the details My father was James H. Brooks and my mother is Doris Bnoit Brooks. We moved to Lexington when I was about 9. We always had a framed letter, the Bondurant letter on our wall. My grandfather gave that letter to my father on one of his visits from Chicago. The stamp on that letter said Louisville and we knew it was to my great grandfather, James H. Brooks. The imprint on the letter was from J. D. Bondurant & Co., Real Estate Agents, 508 South Side Main St., between 5th & 6th, Louisville, Ky."

Louisville, Ky. Dec. 17, 1885
J. H. Brooks
Monrovia, Indiana

Your favor came duly to hand, and I am and have all ways been glad to hear from you. I remember distinct answering your last letter, the day was reserved but do not remember your enquiring about your brother, Frank. If you remember he went to or was taken to Massachusetts and I expect joined a Massachusetts regiment under some Yankee name. I have thought it often, and have no doubt but there is some money coming to you or your mother and that under democratic rule there may be some day a chance of getting it. I should not wonder if some Yankee was not but drawing a pension that should be he.

"... My father passed away in April and we went to Indiana, to Kokomo, Indiana where my father grew up. So when we went to the funeral there I decided I would use that time to do family research. I found my great grandfather's obituary, my father's namesake and learned that he escaped slavery at the age of 5 with his mother, my great, great grandmother, Eliza Brooks.

"I went to the public library at Kokomo where I found my great grandfather Brook's obituary. We went to the town where he passed away and got the actual obituary from the Morrisville Times, April 18, 1919."

J. H. Brooks, for 39 years in business at Monrovia, died at his home there early Monday morning of kidney trouble, aged 67 years. Mr. Brooks, who was a colored man, was highly respected and was a model citizen. He was engaged in the restaurant business and also was a barber. He was born in slavery in Kentucky, but his mother succeeded in escaping to Indiana with him and a sister when he was five years old. They came to Plainfield and lived there until his mother died. She is buried a short distance west of Plainfield. He afterward settled in Monrovia. He was married twice. His second wife and a son by that marriage survive.

"We had heard he was a slave, but we did not know that he and his family had escaped slavery. The library directed us to resources for his mother, Eliza, and she was listed in the 1870 census which corroborated the person we thought was his mother. She was 50 years old when she escaped slavery. I started searching for months for Eliza Brooks but couldn't find anything. So I was at the Ky. Historical Society at Frankfort and just started searching for first names only, Eliza and Henry as slaves, and found them together. It gave his approximate birthdate which was July and the right birth year, which matched my great grandfather. And then the Bondurant letter that we had matched with the slave records. We had this Bondurant letter in our family all the time but never knew what it meant. J. D. Bondurant was the son of Dr. Jeffery W. Bondurant who lived and is buried in Oldham County.

"When my great, great grandmother escaped with my great grandfather and his sister, there was a woman named Lucy that lived with her in Indiana. I also found there was a slave, Lucy that lived on the farm in Kentucky. The more I learned about the institution of slavery, it makes me proud of Eliza and I feel privileged to have this information. Eliza worked as a housekeeper in Indiana according to the 1870 census. I also became very proud of my great grandfather's work in Indiana that was stated in things I found. I also was impressed by these letters between the slave owner's son, J. D. Bondurant, and my great grandfather..."

Union draft registration for J.D. Bondurant dated July 1863

October 3, 1899 Courier-Journal

In 1863, during the Civil War, J.D. Bondurant was required to register for the Union draft in Louisville, although he never served. Instead, he secretly supported the Confederacy as a member of the Order of American Knights. This dark lantern society, also known as the Sons of Liberty, was one of the groups behind the Northwestern Conspiracy of 1864, a Confederate plot to plunder and burn Chicago; release Rebel POWs from Northern internment camps; conduct raids from Canada; burn New York City; and divide the North. According to encyclopedia.com:

Military reversals in 1863–1864 led Confederates to promote insurrection in the Northwest. The plan relied on the Sons of Liberty and other Northern sympathizers and called for the liberation of Confederate prisoners from northern prison camps. Insurrectionists would use weapons from federal arsenals to arm themselves and overthrow the governments of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. With a Northwestern confederacy allied with the pre-existing Confederate states, a dismembered North would be forced to surrender.

The October 29, 1864 Prescott Journal included a long synopsis of Judge Advocate General of the United State Army Joseph Holt's report on the "Great Conspiracy Against the Union:"

Highly Important Revelations
___________________________________
Great Conspiracy against the Union.
__________________________________________
Secret Armed Organization to Defeat the Gov’t.
and Aid the Rebels.
________________________________________________________
Official Report of Judge Holt, of Ky.
_________________________________________
ORIGIN, HISTORY, SIGNS AND PASSWORD OF
THE SECRET ORDER.
_________________________________________________________
Names of Persons Concerned in Plot.

The official report of Hon. JOSEPH HOLT, Judge Advocate General, upon the mass of testimony in the possession of the Government respecting secret associations and conspiricies [sic] in some of the free States, by traitors and disloyal persons, contains many startling revelations...:

This secret association first developed itself in the West in the year 1862, about the period of the first draft, which it aimed to resist. It went by various names : “Mutual Protection Society,” “Circle of Honor,” “Knights of the Mighty Host” and “Knights of the Golden Circle.” In the summer and fall of 1864,it was somewhat modified. STERLING PRICE, in consequence of the exposure of some of its signs and secret forms, instituted as its successor in Missouri, a secret political association, which he called the “Corps de Belgique,” or “Southern League.” CHAS. L. HUNT, then Belgian Consul at St. Louis, was his principal coadjutor. In the autumn of the same year, the “Order of the American Knights,” was instituted in many parts of the North by disloyal persons, prominent among whom were C. L. VALLANDIGHAM , of Ohio, and P. C. WRIGHT¹ of New York. The Order in Indiana has boasted that its ritual came direct from JEFF. DAVIS himself. The “Corps de Belgique” subsequently became a Southern branch of the O. A. K. This Order finding that detectives were on its track was remodelled into “the Sons of Liberty ;” in Illinois it styled itself the “Peace Organization,” in Kentucky the “Star Organization,” in Missouri the “American Organization. A similar Society in New York, styled itself the “McClellan Minute Guard.”

Mr. HOLT next details its form of organization. The first “Supreme Commander” of the “Sons of Liberty” was P. C. WRIGHT, editor of the New York News ; his successor was C. L. VALLANDIGHAM. The organization is a military one, having Generals, Colonels, &c., among its officers. Judge HOLT says :

The greater part of the chief and subordinate officers of the Order, and its branches, as well as the principal members thereof, are known to the Government, and, where not already arrested, may regard themselves as under a constant military surveillance. So complete has been the exposure of the secret league, that, however frequently the conspirators may change its name, forms, passwords and signals, its true purposes and operations cannot longer be concealed from the military authorities.

It is to be remarked that the supreme council of the Order, which annually meets on February 22d, convened this year at New York city, and a special meeting was then appointed to be held at Chicago on July 1st, or just prior to the day then fixed for the convention of the Democratic party. This convention having been postponed to August 29th, the special meeting of the supreme council was also postponed to August 27th, at the same place, and was duly convened accordingly. It will be remembered that a leading member of the convention, in the course of a speech made before that body, alluded approvingly to the session of the Sons of Liberty at Chicago at the same time, as that of an organization in harmony with the sentiments and projects of the Convention.

It may not be observed, in conclusion, that one not fully acquainted with the true character and intention of the Order might well suppose that, in designating its officers by high military titles, and in imitating in organization that established in our armies, it was designed merely to render itself more popular and attractive with the masses, and to invest its chiefs with a certain sham dignity; but when it is understood that the Order comprises within itself a large army of well-armed men, constantly drilled and exercised as soldiers, and that this army is held ready at any time for such forcible resistance to our military authorities, and such active co-operation with the public enemy as it may be called upon to engage in by its commanders, it will be percieved [sic] that the titles of the later are not assumed for a mere purpose of display, but that they are the chiefs of an actual and formidable force of conspirators against the life of the government, and that their military system is, as it had been remarked by Colonel Sanderson,² “the grand lever used by the rebel government for its army operations.”

In regard to its strength, the actual numbers of the Order have, it is believed, never been officially reported, and cannot, therefore be accurately ascertained. Various estimates have been made by leading members, some of which are no doubt considerably exaggerated. It has been asserted by delegates to the supreme council of February last, that the number was there represented to be from 800, 000 to 1,000,000 ; but Vallandigham, in his speech last summer at Dayton, Ohio, placed it at 500,000, which is probably much nearer the true total. The number of its members in the several states has been differently estimated in the report and statement of its officers. Thus, the force of the Order in Indiana is stated to be from 75,000 to 120,000 ; in Illinois, from 100,000 to 140,000 ; in Ohio, from 80,000 to 100,000 ; in Kentucky, from 40,000 to 70,000 ; in Missouri, from 20,000 to 40,000 ; and in Michigan and New York, about 20,000 each.
The Order, or a counterpart, extends through the South, including large numbers of guerrillas. In March last the entire armed force of the Order North, capable of being mobilized for effective service, was represented at 840,000. These figures doubtless were greatly exaggerated.
Judge HOLT then gives a summary of its rituals, signs, passwords, &c. A favorite secret password is “Nu-oh-lac,” or the name of Calhoun spelled backward.

ITS WRITTEN PRINCIPLES.
The “Declaration of Principles,” which is set forth in the ritual of the Order, has already been alluded to. This declaration, which is specially framed for the instruction of the great mass of members, commences with the following specious proposition :
“All men are endowed by the Creator with certain rights, equal as far as there is equality in the capacity for the appreciation, enjoyment and exercise of those rights.”

And subsequently there is added :
“In the Divine economy no individual of the human race must be permitted to encumber the earth, to mar its aspects of transcendent beauty, nor to impede the progress of the physical or intellectual man, neither in himself nor in the race to which he belongs. Hence, a people, upon whatever place they may be found in the ascending state of humanity, whom neither the divinity within them nor the inspirations of the divine and beautiful asture around them can impel to virtuous action and progress onward and upward, should be subjected to a just and humane servitude and tutelage to the superior race, until they shall be able to appreciate the benefits and advantages of civilization.”

Here is the whole theory of human bondage—the right of the strong, because they are strong, to despoil and enslave the weak, because they are weak ! The languages of earth can add nothing to the cowardly and loathsome baseness of the doctrine, as thus announced. It is the robber’s creed, sought to be nationalized, and would push back the hand on the dial-plate of our civilization to the darkest periods of human history. It must be admitted, however, that it furnishes the fitting “cornerstone” for the government of a rebellion, every fibre of whose body and every throb of whose soul is born of the traitorous ambition and slave-pen inspirations of the South.

To these detestable tenets is added that other pernicious political theory of state sovereignty, with its necessary fruit, the monstrous doctrine of secession—a doctrine which in asserting that in our federative system a part is greater than the whole, would compel the general government, like a Japanese slave, to commit hari-kari [sic]³ whenever a faithless or insolent state should command it to do so.
Thus, the ritual, after reciting that the states of the Union are “free, independent and sovereign,” proceeds as follows :

“The government designated ‘The United States of America’ has no sovereignty, because that is an attribute with which the people, in their several and distinct political organisations, are endowed, and is inalienable. It was constituted by the terms of the compact, by all the states, through the express will of the people thereof, respectively—a common agent, to use and exercise certain named, specified, defined and limited powers which are inherent of the sovereignties within those states. It is permitted, so far as regards its status and relations, as common agent in the exercise of the powers carefully and jealously delegated to it, to call itself ‘supreme,’ but not ‘sovereign.‘ In accordance with the principles upon which is founded the American theory, government can exercise on delegated power ; hence, if those who shall have been chosen to administer the government shall assume to exercise powers not delegated, they should be regarded and treated as usurpers. The reference to ‘inherent power,’ ‘war power,’ or ‘military necessity,’ on the part of the functionary for the sanction of an arbitrary exercise of power by him, we will not accept in palliation or excuse.”

To this is added, as a corrollary [sic] :
“It is incompatible with the history and nature of our system of government that Federal authority should coerce by arms a sovereign state.
The declaration of principles, however, does not stop here, but proceeds one step further, as follows:

“Whenever the chosen officers or delegates shall fail or refuse to administer the government in strict accordance with the letter of the accepted constitution, it is the inherent right and the solemn and imperative duty of the people to resist the functionaries, and, if need be, to expel them by force of arms ! Such resistance is not revolution, but is solely the assertion of right—the exercise of all the noble attributes which impart honor and dignity to manhood.”

To the same effect, though in a milder tone, is the platform of the Order in Indiana put forth by the Grand Council at their meeting in February last, which declares that, “The right to alter or abolish their government, whenever it fails to secure the blessings of liberty, is one of the inalienable rights of the people that can never be surrendered.”

Such then are the principles which the new member swears to observe and abide by in his obligation, set forth in the ritual, where he says :
“I do solemnly promise that I will ever cherish in my heart of hearts the sublime creeds of the M. K. (Excellent Knights), and will, so far as in me lies, illustrate the same in my intercourse with men, and will defend the principles thereof, if need be with my life, whensoever assailed, in my own country first of all. I do further solemnly declare that I will never take up arms in behalf of any government which does not acknowledge the sole authority of power to be the will of the governed.”

In the same connection may be quoted the following extracts from the ritual, as illustrating the principle of the right of revolution and resistance to constituted authority insisted upon by the Order :

“Our swords shall be unsheathed whenever the great principles which we aim to inculcate and have sworn to maintain and defend are assailed.”

Again :
“I do solemnly promise, that whensoever the principles which our Order inculcates shall be assailed in my own State or country, I will defend these principles with my sword and my life, in whatsoever capacity may be assigned me by the competent authority of our Order.”

And further :
“I do promise that I will, at all times, if needs be, take up arms in the cause of the oppressed—in my own country first of all—against any power or government usurped, which may be found in arms and waging war against a people or peoples who are endeavoring to establish, or have inaugurated, a government for themselves of their own free choice.”

Moreover, it is to be noted that all the addresses and speeches of its leaders breathe the same principle, of the right of forcible resistance to the government, as one of the tenets of the Order.

Thus P. C. Wright, Supreme Commander, in his general address of December, 1863, after urging that, “the sp[i]rit of the fathers may animate the free minds, the brave hearts, and still unshackled limbs of the true democracy” (meaning the members of the Order,) adds as follows : “To be prepared for the crisis now approaching, we must catch from afar the earliest and faintest breathings of the storm ; to be successful when the storm comes, we must be watchful, patient, brave, confident, organized, armed.”

Thus, too, Dodd, Grand Commander of the Order in Indiana, quoting, in his address of February last, the views of his chief, Vallandigham, and adopting them as his own, says : “He (Vallandigham) judges that the Washington power will not yield up its power, until it is taken from them by an indignant people, by force of arms.”

Such, then, are the written principles of the Order in which the neophyte is instructed, and which he is sworn to cherish and observe as his rule of action, when, with the arms placed in his hands, he called upon to engage in the overthrow of his government. This declaration—first, of the absolute right of slaver ; second, of state sovereingty [sic] and the right of secession ; third, of armed resistance to constituted authority on the part of the disaffected and the disloyal, whenever their ambition may prompt them to revolution—is but an assertion of that abominable theory which, from its first enunciation, served as a pretext for conspiracy after conspiracy against the government on the part of southern traitors, until their detestable plotting culminated in open rebellion and bloody civil war. What more appropriate name, therefore, to be communicated as a password to the new member upon his first admission to the secrets of the Order could have been conceived than that which was actually adopted—that of “Calhoun !”—a man who, baffled in his lust for power, with gnashing teeth turned upon the government that had lifted him to its highest honors, and upon the country that had borne him, and down to the close of his fevered life labored incessantly to scatter far and wide the seeds of that poison of death now upon our lips. The thorns which now pierce and tear us are of the tree he planted.

Judge HOLT then sets forth the specific purposes and operations of the Order under the following heads, giving a summary of evidence under each :

Encouraging and aiding soldiers to desert, and harboring and protecting deserters.
Discouraging enlistments and resisting the draft.
The circulation of disloyal and treasonable publications.
Communicating with and giving intelligence to the enemy.
Aiding the enemy by recruiting for them, or assisting them to recruit within our lines.
Furnishing the rebels with arms, ammunition, &c.
Co-operating with the enemy in raids and invasions.
Destruction of government property.
Destruction of private property and persecution of Union men.
Assassination and murder.
Establishment of a Northwestern Confederacy.

THE WITNESSES AND THEIR TESTIMONY.
The facts detailed in the present report have been derived from a great variety of dissimilar sources, but all the witnesses, however different their situation, concur so pointedly in their testimony, that the evidence which has been furnished of the facts must be regarded as of the most reliable character. The principal witnesses may be classified as follows :

1. Shrewd, intelligent men, employed as detectives, and with a peculiar talent for their calling, who have gained the confidence of loading members of the Order, and in some cases been admitted to its temples, and been initiated into one or more of the degrees.—The most remarkable of these is Stidger [Felix G. Stidger], formerly a private soldier in our army, who, by the use of uncommon address, though at great personal risk, succeeded in establishing such intimate relations with Bowles [William A. Bowles], Bullitt [Joshua F. Bullitt], Dodd, and other leaders of the Order in Indiana and Kentucky, as to be appointed grand secretary of the latter State, a position most favorable for obtaining information of the plans of these traitors and warning the government of their intentions. It is to the rare fidelity of this man, who has also been the principal witness upon the trial of Dodd, that the government has been chiefly indebted for the exposure of the designs of the conspirators in the tow states named.
2. Rebel officers and soldiers voluntarily or involuntarily making disclosures to our military authorities. The most valuable witnesses of this class are prisoners of war, who, actuated by laudable motives, have their own accord furnished a large amount of information in regard to the Order, especially as it exists in the South, and of the relations of its members with those of the northern section. Among these, also, are soldiers at our prison camps, who, without designing it, have made known to our officials, by use of the signs, &c., of the Order, that they were members.
3. Scouts employed to travel through the interior of the border states, and also within or in the neighborhood of the enemy’s lines. The fact that some of these were left entirely ignorant of the existence of the Order, upon being so employed, attaches an increased value to their discoveries in regard to its operations.
4. Citizen prisoners, to whom, while in confinement, disclosures were made relative to the existence, extent and character of the Order by fellow-prisoners who were leading members, and who, in some instances, upon becoming intimate with the witness, initiated him into one of the degrees.
5. Members of the Order, who, upon a full acquaintance with its principles, have been appalled by its infamous designs, and have voluntarily abandoned it, freely making known their experience to our military authorities. In this class may be placed the female witness, Mary Ann Pitman,4 who, though in arrest at the period of her disclosures, was yet induced to make them for the reason that, as she says, “at the last meeting which I attended they passed an order which I considered as utterly atrocious and barbarous ; so I told them I would have nothing more to do with them.” This woman was attached to the command of the rebel Forest [sic: Nathan B. Forrest], as an officer, under the name of “Lieutenant Rawley” ; but, because her sex afforded her unusual facilities for crossing our lines, she was often employed in the execution of important commissions within our territory, and, as a member of the Order, was made extensively acquainted with other members both of the northern and southern sections. Her testimony is thus peculiarly valuable, and being a person of unusual intelligence and force of character, her statements are succinct, pointed and emphatic. They are also especially useful as fully corroborating those of other witnesses regarded as most trustworthy.
6. Officers of the Order of high rank, who have been prompted to present confessions, more or less detailed, in regard to the Order and their connection with it. The principles of these are Hunt, Dunn and Smith, grand commander, deputy grand commander, and grand secretary of the Order in Missouri, to whose statements frequent reference has been made. These confessions, though in some degree guarded and disingenuous, have furnished to the government much valuable information in regard to the secret operations of the Order, especially in Missouri, the affiliation of its leaders with Price, &c. It is to be noted that Dunn makes the statement, in common with other witnesses that, in entering the Order, he was quite ignorant of its true purposes. He says : “I did not become a member understandingly ; the initiatory step was taken in the dark, without reflection and without knowledge.”
7. Deserters from our army, who, upon being apprehended, confessed that they had been induced and assisted to desert by members of the Order. It was, indeed, principally from these confessions that the existence of the secret treasonable of the K. G. C. was first discovered in Indiana, in the year 1862.
8. Writers of anonymous communications, addressed to heads of departments or provost marshals, disclosing facts corroborative of other more important statements.
9. The witnesses before the grand jury at Indianapolis, in 1863, when the Order was formally presented as a treasonable organization, and those whose testimony has been introduced upon the recent trial of Dodd. It need only be added that a most satisfactory test of the credibility and weight of much of the evidence which has been furnished is afforded by the printed testimony in regard to the character and intention of the Order, which is found in its national and state constitutions and its ritual. Indeed, the statements of the various witnesses are but presentations of the logical and inevitable consequences and results of the principles therein set forth.

In concluding this review, it remains only to state that a constant reference has been made to the elaborate official reports, in regard to the Order, of Brigadier General Carrington [Henry B. Carrington], commanding District of Indiana, and of Colonel Sanderson, Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Missouri. The great mass of the testimony upon the subject of the secret conspiracy has been furnished by these officers ; the latter acting under the orders of Major-General Rosecrans [William S. Rosecrans], and the former co-operating, under the instructions of the Secretary of War, with Major-General Burbridge [Stephen G. Burbridge], commanding District of Kentucky, as well as with Governor Morton [Oliver P. Morton], of Indiana, who, though at one time greatly embarrassed by a legislature strongly tainted with disloyalty, has at last seen his state relieved for the danger of civil war.

But, although the treason of the Order has been thoroughly exposed, and although its capacity for fatal mischief has, by means of the arrest of its leaders, the seizure of its arms, and the other vigorous means which have been pursued, been seriously impaired, it is still busied with its secret plottings against the government, and with its perfidious designs in aid of the southern rebellion. It is reported to have recently issued new signs and passwords, and its members assert that foul means will be used to prevent the success of the administration at the coming election, and threaten an extended revolt in the event of the re-election of President Lincoln.

In the presence of the rebellion and this secret Order—which is but its echo and faithful ally—we cannot but be amazed at the utter and wide-spread profligacy, personal and political, which these movements against the government disclose. The guilty men engaged in them, after casting aside their allegiance, seem to have trodden under foot every sentiment of honor and every restraint of law, human and divine. Judea produced but one Judas Iscariot,5 and Rome, from the sinks of her demoralization, produced bu[t] one Catiline,6 and yet, as events prove, there has arisen together in our land an entire brood of such traitors, all animated by the same parricidal spirit, and all struggling with the same relentless malignity for the dismemberment of our Union. Of this extraordinary phenomenon—not paralleled, it is believed, in the world’s history—there can be but one explanation, and all these blackened and fetid streams of crime may well be traced to the same common fountain. So fiercely intolerant and imperious was the temper engendered by slavery, that when the southern people, after having controlled the national councils for half a century, were beaten at an election, their leaders turned upon the government with the insolent fury with which they would have drawn their revolvers on a rebellious slave in one of their negro quarters ; and they have continued since to prosecute their warfare, amid all the barbarisms and atrocities naturally and necessarily inspired by the infernal institution in whose interests they are sacrificing alike themselves and their country. Many of these conspirators as is well known, were fed, clothed and educated at the expense of the nation, and were loaded with its honors at the very moment they struck at its life with the horrible criminality of a son stabbing the bosom of his own mother, while impressing kisses on his cheeks. The leaders of the traitors in the loyal states, who so completely fraternize with these conspirators, and whose machinations are now unmasked, it is clearly the duty of the administration to prosecute and punish, as it is its duty to subjugate the rebels who are openly in arms against the government. In the performance of this duty, it is entitled to expect, and will doubtless receive, the zealous co-operation of true men everywhere, who, in crushing the truculent foe ambushed in the haunts of this secret Order, should rival in courage and faithfulness the armies which are so nobly sustaining our flag on the battlefield of the South.

J.D. Bondurant was specifically named as a conspirator in reports made to Provost-Marshall Col. J.P. Sanderson in Missouri, according to this excerpt from "The War of the Rebellion: v.1-8 [serial no. 114-121] Correspondence, orders, reports and returns, Union and Confederate, relating to prisoners of war and to state or political prisoners. 1894 [i.e. 1898]-1899," United States. War Dept, Robert Nicholson Scott, Henry Martyn Lazelle (U.S. Government Printing Office, 1902 ), pp. 258-259:

LOUISVILLE, May 7, 1864. SIR: I drop you a line for advice. We have found out some men who are doing a heavy business in furnishing men and arms to the enemy. There has been $17,000 spent in the last two or three days for arms. There is another place where they are doing the same work. I can join them and find out the whole arrangement if it is your wish. There is a rendezvous out some ten miles from this city. They steal all the horses they need out of the Government corral. They have told me all about their arrangements. They intend to stay out there until 300 of them get together, and then run into the city and rob the bank and post-office, and then leave for Dixie. I think that if something is not done very soon with this State she is gone by the board. Since I have been here they have furnished over 2,000 men to the enemy. Let us know by return mail what to do, and I will do your bidding. FORRESTER.

Report of James M. Forrester.
SAINT LOUIS, May 24,1864. Col. J. P. SANDERSON Provost-Marshall-General Department of the Missouri:

SIR: I respectfully report that in obedience to your instructions I left this city for Louisville on the morning of the 11th of May and reached the latter place next morning. Soon after my arrival there I made the acquaintance of Edward F. Hoffman, one of your agents you had directed me to and with whom I afterward co-operated while there. By Mr. Hoffman I was introduced to one Doctor Thornton, of Missouri, and Henry Foster, of New Orleans. They proved to be rebels. Foster afterward proved to be a rebel spy, belonging to the Fifty-sixth Indiana Eric] Volunteers, 0. S. Army. He had been all through the cities of Saint Louis, Memphis, and had gone down to Louisville to pick up what few items he could. Through them I got acquainted with other parties in the city of Louisville of Southern proclivities. They gave me to understand they were furnishing arms and munitions of war and men to the rebel army. I professed to be from Missouri and a rebel. They wanted me to join and go with them.

I made the necessary preparations with the authorities at Louisville to receive the arms that they furnished us, also money. I took down the names of those who donated them and handed them to the authorities. I caught one man who was aiding and harboring those recruits while they were trying to get away. I also caught the spy Foster and he is now in the hands of the authorities at Louisville. He was traveling under a false passport and a false name. He got the passport from a young man named Henry Foster at New Orleans. His name is Robert Wilbur. I got information that they were going to concentrate all the recruits at a man’s by the name of Grant to be fed and taken care of. The place was on the Bardstown road, thirteen miles from the city and five from the road and also at a man’s by the name of J. C. McCormick; he lives within half a mile from the road on the opposite side of Grant’s. They were to concentrate there and after they were armed and equipped they were to enter the city of Louisville in the night and rob the bank and post-office and make their way off. They were to get their saddles and horses out of the Government stable on Eighth street, in Louisville, and at the Government corral there. They were then to join Forrest, near Smithland, at the mouth of the Cumberland River or thereabouts.

A great many of the citizens of Louisville were posted in this matter and helping. John Schneider, 306 Main street, Louisville, was treasurer of the fund. Joseph Martin, same firm, was the leader in Louisville to raise money and buy arms and ammunition. There was also a man by the name of Steele, at Westport, Ky., who was in the same business. J. H. Cutler, Main street, between First and Second, was a party concerned; also a man in the same house by the name of Sparks. J. D. Bondurant, 322 Main, between Third and Fourth, furnished some funds to my certain knowledge. I saw him do that. C. C. Spencer, same street, and a man by the name of Moore furnished money at the same time. J. N. Willard & Co., 309 Green street, furnished ammunition, revolver, and money. Donnell, the other member of this firm, is the main man, and from him I myself received money and a pistol.

My true object for visiting Louisville, Ky., was to ascertain something in relation to a secret organization that was going on in the States of Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and was supposed to be also in Louisville, Ky. I thought Louisville would be the starting point to find out something about it. Soon after I got there I learned there were some members there. The aforesaid Thornton and Foster were members, as were also J. C. McCormick, Donnell, Martin, and Sparks. I obtained the first degree of the order—myself and Mr. Hoffman together. McCormick and Foster told me about it first, and then they invited me up, when they initiated me. There is no regular lodge there. They gave me the signs and the name of the order and its intentions, which are to oppose the present Administration in all measures whatever; never to join the Federal Army on any account whatever; to resist their draft; join the Southern Army if you feel like it, they being those we are to look to in our present embarrassments and trouble for relief; to oppose the confiscation of property by the Federal Government; protect with our lives if necessary the property of Southern men. The order is called the Star Organization. Captain Goloses, of Saint Louis, is a member of the organization. They are required at all times to keep arms and ammunition in the house—Colt revolvers and double-barreled shotguns.

On my way from Louisville to Saint Louis I suspected a man of being a member of the order and gave him the sign. He answered it correctly. This was in Illinois. He remarked, “You can hid plenty of them kind of men in Illinois.” The conversation did not go any further, because the cars were crowded. I did not learn the man’s name.

In my travels I got letters of recommendation to parties in Smithland and in Uniontown, on the Ohio River—recommendations to men who are furnishing arms and ammunition to the Confederate authorities. The letters were kept by the authorities at Louisville. I also understood there were parties in Memphis who are furnishing the Confederate authorities daily with these things. There is a firm in Saint Louis who have a contract and its name is Anderson 8: Watson.

The feeling in Louisville is generally in favor of the South and they rejoice at the hearing of a Federal loss and a Southern victory. They also say they are turning the Federal officers and soldiers to be Southern men, and they (the Federals) are getting weaker in the cause.

From all that I can learn my impression is that the present officers ought to be removed from there and others put in from loyal States. The Kentucky forces ought to be removed from there.

The same book, p. 298, also listed J.D. as a known member of the Order of American Knights:

Names of members of the Order of American Knights In different localities as far as known to date.
B. B. Piper, Judge Treat, S. D. Staly, Judge Rice, Doctor Van Dusen, J. R. Perkins, Mr. Hicks, sheriff, J. S. Vredenburg, mayor, E. B. Herndon, Springfield, Ill.; L. D. Norton, Lincoln, Ill.; William H. Renfro, Springfield, Ill.; Mr. Judd, Lewistown, Ill.; G. W. Shutt, Springfield, Ill..; Doctor Baxter, Chicago, Ill..; C. M. Morrison, Springfield, Ill.; D. Edwards, R. T. Merrick, Springfield, Ill.; W. A. Turnoy, Springfield, Ill.; Doctor Thornton, Louisville, Ky.; Alex. Starne, Springfield, Ill.; Grant, Bardstown road, thirteen miles from Louisville, Ky.; J. C. McCormick, Bardstown road, near Grant’s, Ky.; John Schneider, Joseph Martin, 306 Main street, Louisville, Ky.; J. H. Cutler, Sparks, Main street, between First and Second, Louisville, Ky.; J. D. Bondurant, C. C. Spencer, Moore, 320 Main street, Louisville, Ky.; J. N. Willard, Donnell, 309 Green street, Louisville, Ky.; Steele, Westport, Ky.; L. P. Clover, Springfield, Ill.; S. Dow Elwood, J. H. Harmon or Howard, Detroit, Mich.; Dr. Z. Anderson, Carlyle, Ill.; William M. Springer, Springfield, Ill..; Holly Hareford, Lima, Ill.; Virgil Hickox, Springfield, Ill.; W. A. Bowles, senior major-general, Indiana; Judge Bullitt, grand councilor of the State of Kentucky; C. L. Vallandigham, commander-in-chief, Dayton, Ohio; Robert Holloway, department grand commander, Illinois; N. H. Ridgely, Springfield, Ill.; Doctor Massey, grand secretary and Secretary of State, Ohio; Doctor Gatling, inventor of gun so called; jailer of Louisville jail, Kentucky; Lafayette Develin, Wayne County, Ind., grand commander of the State of Indiana; Humphreys, major- general for Indiana; Milligan, major-general for Indiana; Yagel, major-general for Indiana.

Whether he was arrested and punished for his treasonous actions during the war is unknown. Based on the fact that his wholesale agricultural supply business, real estate holdings and personal estate were still intact in 1870, J.D. may have escaped the U.S. government's wrath relatively unscathed. Federal prosecutions primarily focused on the organization's officers.

Gray Family Roots

Myrah Gray Bondurant was the daughter of Myrah McConnell Gray (abt. 1807-1879) and Angereau Angerson Gray (1797-1856). Her father, Angereau, was a direct descendant of Revolutionary War veteran Captain George Gray of Virginia. According to DAR records:

In 1776, George Gray was an ensign in the Third Virginia Regiment; in 1777 he was a lieutenant, Continental Dragoods, and also captain of a company which he organized and supported. His cousin, James Monroe, afterwards President, was a lieutenant in his company and a pall-bearer at his funeral.

Like her husband, Myrah grew up with slaves. Her parents married on August 11, 1828, and the 1830 census shows the Angereau Gray household included three free whites and three slaves. Her father also ran an ad about a runaway slave in the Louisville Journal on August 2, 1839.

August 2, 1839 Louisville Journal

Myrah also came from money. Her father owned valuable real estate (four years after his death, his real estate holdings were valued at $150,000 -- about $4.5 million today); ran a successful freight-forwarding business near the Louisville wharf; was an officer of the Franklin Fire & Marine Insurance Company; was also elected an officer in the Bank of Kentucky in 1840; and was one of six men (Samuel Cassidy, James Pickett, Ormsby Hite, John P. Morton and Elisha Applegate) who incorporated the Louisville Cotton Manufacturing Company on February 17, 1841.

By 1850, the Grays had seven children, listed in the 1850 census as:

William A Gray, age 15
Alice Gray, age 14
Sarah Gray, age 13
Myra Gray, age 11
Weeden Gray, age 9
Laina Gray, age 6
Horace M. Gray, age 2

Business Interests of Angereau Gray

After Myrah married J.D., the couple lived with her widowed mother for a time at 515 2nd Street in Louisville. The 1860 census shows the household was comprised of:

Myrah Gray, age 52, head of household
Sarah Gray, age 22, daughter
Weeden B. Gray, age 19, son
Joseph D. Bondurant, age 30, farmer, with real estate holdings valued at $10,000 and a personal estate valued at $4,000
Myrah Gray Bondurant, age 21, wife of Joseph and daughter
Horace Gray, age 12
Bridget Reardon, age 23, domestic servant
Fran Dogarthy, age 39, domestic

J.D. may have taken over his late father-in-law's old freight-forwarding stand on Wall street to start his business. It's unknown whether Angereau and his partner were able to sell it when they put it on the market in 1839, but based on their ads, they were clearly willing to rent the space if it didn't sell. The earliest ad found for J.D. Bondurant's business dates from 1856, the year Myrah's father died. J.D. may have met his future wife when he decided to go into business in Louisville, and rented or purchased the stand from her mother.

Myrah's relationship with her baby brother, Horace Minor Gray, may have been behind the Bondurants' decision to build in Pewee Valley. When her mother died on March 25, 1879, she willed Horace the income from several properties "for the support of himself and his family."

These properties included a house on the southeast corner of Fifth and Market streets in Louisville, a lot on the east side of Fifth street in Louisville, and a 6.5-acre lot in Pewee Valley. The Pewee acreage appears to have been located on Maple Avenue, south of Elm, based on the 1907 property owners map at right.

Property owners map of Pewee Valley created by Mayor Frank Gatchel in 1907. The Gray property adjoined property owned by Clarence Smith on Maple Avenue south of Elm.

On June 19, 1875, Horace had married Mary Evelyn Dalmazzo in Indiana. Horace and Mary set up housekeeping in Pewee Valley, where they had seven children:

Horace J Gray (1876–);
John McConnell Gray (1877–)
Edmund Halsey Gray (1880–1885)
Weedon Angereau Gray(1882–1910)
Sarah Mildred Gray (1885–1886)
Katherine Elizabeth "Bessie" Gray (September 27, 1887– March 27, 1977), married house painter Seldon Smith, October 24, 1905. Selden was the great-grandson of Henry Smith, a founding father of Pewee Valley and the man who originally sold the acreage on Maple Avenue, where Bessie grew up, to Myrah Gray, Bessie's grandmother,

With Myrah's mother's death and her husband's career change, the Bondurants had few reasons to remain in downtown Louisville. The move to Pewee Valley allowed Myrah to spend more time with her brother and his children.

October 25, 1905 Courier-Journal

Career

By 1856, J.D. was regularly running ads for his wholesale business on Main Street in Louisville. In the beginning, he carried a wide assortment of merchandise, including foodstuffs such as butter, lard, potatoes, meal, flour, and cranberries; hydraulic cement, lime and plaster; gunny sacks; paper; and seeds for orchard grass, turnips and clover. Over time, however, his company became more focused on agricultural supplies.

During the 1850s, manufacturing was booming in Louisville, and several local companies began making farm implements. The July 12, 1859, Daily Courier noted:

It has only been in the last five years that much has been done in Louisville in the way of manufacturing mowing, reaping, threshing and other agricultural machines. The business, since its commencement, has grown up with astonishing rapidity...

There are two firms engaged extensively in this ... manufacturing ...

Messrs. Miller, Wingate & Co.'s large Agricultural Works are situated on the corner of Jefferson and Ninth streets. They make "Kentucky Harvester" (which we believe combines the properties of both a reaping and mowing machine) .... (Editor's note: James Miller of Miller, Wingate & Company was one of Pewee Valley's earliest settlers and in the 1850s built two homes in Pewee Valley: Undulata and the house that later became the Mt. Mercy Camp & Boarding School)

Messrs. Munn & Co.'s Southwestern Agricultural Works are at the corner of Eighth and Green streets. They manufacture principally combined threshing and cleaning machines ...

In addition to the manufacturers above named, there are several highly respectable houses who do a heavy business in seeds and sell on commission all agricultural implements made here ...

The principal Seed and Agricultural firms are --

Peter & Buchanan, on Main, below Fourth street.
Pitkin Brothers, on Main below Third street.
G.W. Bashaw, on Main, below Third Street.
H.B. Howard, on Main, near Seventh Street.
J.D. Bondurant, on Third, between Main and Water streets.
H. Brent & Co., on Main, near Second street.

The business was evidently successful. At the time of the 1870 census, J.D. 's personal estate was valued at $20,000 and he owned real estate valued at $60,000. By the 1880 census, however, he was out of the agricultural supply business and was running a paper store.

Seed & Hardware Business Ads

In 1881, J.D. left the wholesale/retail trade and went into real estate. A profile of this venture, J.D. Bondurant & Co., appeared in the January 1, 1891 Courier-Journal:

J.D. Bondurant & Co.

There are in the city a number of substantial and representative firms devoting their attention to transactions in real estate and real estate investments. One of the best known and most successful of these is that of J.D. Bondurant & Co., conducting business with offices at 355 Fifth street; the members of the firm being Messrs. J.D. Bondurant, J.S. Miller and W.T. James. Mr. Bondurant established this business about ten years ago, under its present style, and the other members becoming associated with him during the third year. The firm does an active business in all departments of general real estate agency, buying and selling real estate on commission, negotiating loans on real estate securities, selling real estate notes or cashing them, making investments for non-residents or other capitalists, taking entire charge of properties for sale and looking after every detail, and in every way giving efficient attention to every interest confided to their charge. They have at all times on hand and for sale a desirable list of property in the city and its vicinity, suitable either for manufacturing, business or residence purposes, including in their offerings many of the most attractive bargains now in the market; and they are prepared to undertake the disposition of real estate, either at private sale or by auction, giving prompt attention to every commission and in every way rendering efficient service to their patrons. Mr. Bondurant of this firm is a native of Kentucky and was engaged in the agricultural and hardware business in this city, previous to starting in the real estate business in 1870, and Mr. W.T. James is the son of Thomas J. James, in the coal business, and is a young and enterprising business man, and in very way the firm combines every element of experience and efficiency necessary to the success of the enterprise, and enjoys a most excellent reputation for the reliability and accuracy of its dealing.

Real Estate Ads

Family & Death

Marriage license and certificate for J.D. Bondurant and Myrah Gray. They were married December 22, 1859, at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Louisville.

The Bondurants had four daughters:

Myra Gray Bondurant (Nov. 3, 1861–1931), married newspaper editor Joseph J. Eakins
Louisa Bondurant (ca. 1863–April 3, 1947) married Louis P. O'Shaughnessy
Alice Gray Bondurant (Nov. 11, 1867– September 30, 1942) married first William Otto Inglis and second Alfred Henry Kraft
Lillie Bondurant (1869–1917) married first L.B. Henry and second William Kean Ryan

J.D. Bondurant died of cancer on October 2, 1899 in New York City. His obituary ran in the next day's Courier-Journal:

DIED IN NEW YORK
__________________________
J.D. Bondurant, For Many Years a
Well-Known Real Estate
Dealer of Louisville
_________________________

Mrs. Sallie Ewing Marshall Hardy received a telegram from Joseph J. Eakins of New York yesterday announcing the death of J.D. Bondurant. Mr. Bondurant, who was about sixty-five years old, had been in failing health for several years and spent the summer at Long Branch. When he returned to New York his condition showed no improvement and he passed away at the apartments of Mr. and Mrs. Eakins, Fifty-seventh street and Broadway, on Sunday evening at 6:30 o'clock.

For many years Mr. Bondurant was engaged in the real estate business in Louisville. He retired about three or four years ago and went to live with his daughter, Mrs. Eakins. Mrs. Bondurant, who, before her marriage, was Myrah Gray, a member of a prominent Louisville family, survives with four daughters. They are Mrs. Joseph J. Eakins, of New York; Mrs. Louis O'Shaughnessy, of Cincinnati; Mrs. W.O. Inglis of New York; and Mrs. Lillie Henry. All were famous for their beauty and were popular in Louisville society.

Mr. Bondurant's body will be brought to Louisville and will be buried in Cave Hill Cemetery. The funeral service will be held at Calvary Church on Wednesday afternoon at an hour not yet fixed.

At 8:15 p.m. on November 17, 1899, his wife, Myrah, died unexpectedly of kidney disease just six weeks after her husband. The November 20, 1899 Courier-Journal carried a story about her funeral:

FUNERAL TO-DAY.
_________________
MRS. BONDURANT'S REMAINS
BROUGHT FROM NEW YORK.
__________________
Members of the John Marshall
Chapter, D.A.R. To Attend
As An Organization
__________________

The body of Mrs. Myrah Gray Bondurant, whose death followed so quickly upon that of her husband, Mr. Joseph Davis Bondurant, arrived in Louisville last night from New York and the burial services will take place to-day from Calvary Church, 913 Fourth avenue, at 11 a.m.

Mrs. Bondurant leaves four daughters, Mrs. J.J. Eakins, Mrs. W.O. Inglis, Mrs. L.B. Henry and Mrs Louis O'Shaughnessy, and is a sister of Mrs. S.M. Heinsohn, Mr. Weedon B. Gray and Mr. Horace Gray.

The following resolutions have been adopted by the Memorial Committee of the John Marshall Chapter of the D.A.R. on Mrs. Bondurant's death:

Whereas, Mrs. Myrah Gray Bondurant, a charter members of this chapter, having passed to eternal rest, this organization suffered an irreparable loss, a valuable member, and a zealous worker.

Resolved, That we extend to her bereaved family our heartfelt sympathy, and a copy of these resolutions will be sent to her family and recorded in the minutes of the John Marshall Chapter.
MRS. DUDLEY S. REYNOLDS
MRS. EDW. N. MAXWELL
MRS. HARRY C. GRINSTEAD
MRS. W. I. MCNAIR

A handsome floral design -- a spinning wheel -- the emblem of the chapter will be sent by the charter members of the chapter.

Mrs. Julia C. Blackburn, Regent, requests all members of the chapter to be present at Calvary church at 11 o'clock this morning to attend the funeral services of Mrs. Bondurant.

The pall-bearers will be Prof. H. Taylor, Theodore Harris, Patrick and Morton Joys, John White, William Doyle, John Hughes and Norborne Gray.
***************
Tribute to Mrs. Bondurant.
________________
Mrs. Myrah Gray Bondurant, widow of Joseph Davis Bondurant, died in the city of New York, November 17, in the sixty-first year of her age.

Less than six weeks ago Mrs. Bondurant, after two years of tireless vigil with her stricken husband, followed his beloved remains to their last resting place in Louisville, and tried again to pick of the tangled skein of life where she had set it down. But the absence of the lover of her early girlhood, the devoted husband, who for more than forty years had never left her side, daily weighted the burden which she found so hard to bear.

In his last illness her husband pressed her hand and said: "This is the earthly end; but we shall be together soon." Who knows what voices may have called across the mysterious silences which part the living and the dead, needing loving help and asking it where no refusal has ever been known?

In all her life she never wavered in her faith in her fellows or her Christian belief in the world to come. For sixty years she was true to every trust reposed in her -- an affectionate daughter a self-sacrificing mother and a wife whose unselfish devotion only those who saw it exhibited day and night through months of exacting illness can know or appreciate.

Of all those with whom she came in contact during her life she never left one who wished her ill, and she never said of one an unkind word. Her last thoughts were plans for the comfort and happiness of others.

To-day when the grave closes over all that is mortal of her it will be deep consolation to those who knew her and loved her that her life has not been in vain, and that her influence will continue as long as the virtues of sacrifice and denial of self are respected among men.

Headstone of J.D. Bondurant and his wife, Myrah Gray, at Cave Hill Cemetery. From findagrave.com

On May 2, 1902 the John Marshall Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution was presented with the Bondurant memorial book, described by the Courier-Journal as "a beautiful leather-bound volume lined with white moire, and on the front cover is a large silver plate with the inscription, 'In loving memory of Myrah Gray Bondurant, 1839-1899. He giveth His beloved sleep.'" The same epitaph is inscribed on the tombstone she shares with her husband at Cave Hill.

The memorial book was a gift of Myrah's four daughters.

Photos from the National Register of Historic Places Submission, ca. 1989, by Carolyn Brooks

The Huston Years: 1888-1894

In 1888, J.D. and Myrah Bondurant sold their Pewee Valley property to Gloria Septima "Seppie" Barclay Huston (October 31, 1848-1926), wife of Philip Pryor Huston (April 12, 1838-January 18, 1924), for $3,000. Philip worked for the L&N and likely traveled for his job as a purchasing agent for the railroad. The Hustons appear to have met in Alabama, where Seppie grew up. She was the daughter of plantation owner Hugh Gaylord "H.G." Barclay (February 1, 1804-September 18, 1862) and his third wife, Mary Chilton (1820-1883). H.G. was 16 years Mary's senior and had been dead nearly a decade by the time his daughter Seppie married Philip Huston on February 15, 1871 in New Berne, Ala. Seppie may have inherited the money she used to purchase the Bondurant house from her mother or received it as her dowry when she married.

Philip was an Ohio native and had fought for the Union during the Civil War. He was a member of the Ohio Volunteers 2nd Regiment, Company G, which was organized between July 17 and September 21, 1861, at Camp Dennison, Ohio, 16 miles northeast of Cincinnati in Hamilton County.

From the Library of Congress

The Ohio 2nd saw action in Kentucky, Tennessee, northern Alabama and Georgia during their three year hitch, including:

Advance on Bowling Green, Ky., and Nashville, Tenn., February 10-25, 1862.
Occupation of Nashville, Tenn., February 25 to March 17.
Advance on Murfreesboro, Tenn., March 17-19
Advance on Huntsville, Ala., April 4-11.
Pittenger's Raid on Georgia State Railroad April 7-12 (Detachment).
Capture of Huntsville, Ala., April 11.
Action at West Bridge and occupation of Bridgeport, Ala., April 29.
Actions at Battle Creek June 21 and July 20.
Battle of Perryville October 8.
Battle of Stone's River December 30-31, 1862, and January 1-3, 1863.
Battle of Chickamauga, Ga., September 19-20.
Siege of Chattanooga, Tenn., September 24-November 23.
Chattanooga-Ringgold Campaign November 23-27.
Reconnaissance of Dalton, Ga., February 22-27, 1864.
Atlanta (Ga.) Campaign May 1 to August 1, 1864.
Assault on Kenesaw June 27.
Siege of Atlanta July 22-August 1. Ordered to Chattanooga, Tenn., August 1.

The regiment was mustered out on October 4, 1864 after serving three years. Over the course of their service, the 2nd Ohio suffered 243 casualties, including nine officers and 98 enlisted men who were killed or mortally wounded in battle, and another 138 enlisted men who died of disease.

Whatever Philip's experiences were during the war, they were not terrible enough to prevent him from marrying a Southerner!

By 1880, the Hustons had moved to the Louisville area at Harrods Creek and had three children:

William Chilton Huston (1873-1949)
Ellen Huston (1857-?)
Philip Pryor Huston (1878-1948)

By the time the Hustins bought their Pewee Valley property, they had three more children in tow:

Edith B Huston (1881-?)
Roland Huston (1883-?)
Margaret P. Huston (1887)

Their last two children were born while they were living in Pewee:

Cecilia Huston (1890–)
Paula A Huston (1890–)

Philip P. Huston served on the Pewee Valley Town Council in 1889 and from 1891 until 1896. No doubt the council found his connections at the railroad very helpful. Houston Lane was probably named for him.

By the 1900 census, the Hustons had moved down the road to Anchorage, Ky. Philip was 85 when he died of heart trouble at their home at 525 Belgravia Court in Louisville on January 18, 1924. Seppie died two years later in Palm Beach, Fla. No obituaries for either have been found. They are buried at Cave Hill Cemetery.

From findagrave.com

The Fulton Years: 1897-1903 and Little Colonel Conncections

From his September 1953 obituary published by the Courier-Journal

In 1900, Annie Fellows Johnston published “The Story of Dago” separately from the Little Colonel series and dedicated it “to ‘Gin the Monk’ whose pranks are linked with the boyhood memories of Dr. Gavin Fulton, one of the best of physicians and friends…” Later, the volume was renamed “The Three Tremonts” and the promotional description for the re-released book noted, “The three motherless Tremont children have taken prominent places with Lloyd Sherman and Mary Ware in the last seven volumes of THE LITTLE COLONEL SERIES." The Tremonts’ characters – Phil, Elsie and Stuart – appear to have originally been inspired by Dr. Gavin Fulton and his siblings.

Gavin Fulton was born April 8, 1873 to Edward and Caroline Wilson Fulton in Middletown, Kentucky, a suburb of Louisville. He was the youngest of the couple’s three children and had an older sister, Caroline (who later married W. Hector Dulaney), and an older brother, Thomas. On June 14, 1882, Caroline Wilson Fulton died, leaving her three children motherless. At the time of her death, Caroline would have been about 17, Thomas 14 and Gavin only nine.

By the 1900 census, Gavin was married to Mary Henri Peter; had a three-year-old daughter, Nellie; and was living in Pewee Valley near the O’Neals and the William Alexander Smiths, whose home was at the corner of what is now Mt. Mercy Drive and Rest Cottage Lane. An article called, “Winter Colony at Pewee Valley,” which ran in the November 28, 1897 Courier-Journal, noted:

Dr. and Mrs. Gavin Fulton are in possession of their pretty little cottage which guards the road to Rest Cottage, which by the way is closed for the winter.

Fulton served for a short time as Pewee Valley's town physician. The Town Council meeting minutes for February 6, 1899 noted his role in vaccinating residents against smallpox:

$50.00 appropriated for purpose of Vaccinating all persons in the Town (Dr. G. Fulton appointed Town Physician) excepting those persons who can exhibit a satisfactory scar of a certificate of successful vaccination from a Physician. All persons who refuse to abide shall be fined $5.00 or Imprisoned 5 days in the Town Jail. The Town to pay 25 cents for those persons who refuse to pay or are not able to pay. (Dr. Fulton paid $20.00)

A biographical sketch of Dr. Fulton from HISTORY OF KENTUCKY AND KENTUCKIANS, E. Polk Johnson, three volumes, Lewis Publishing Co., New York & Chicago, 1912. Common version, Vol. III, pp. 1182-83. [Jefferson County], provides additional information about his family and career:

...Edward …Fulton…was born in Zanesville, Ohio, the son of Robert Fulton, who was born in Pennsylvania and was one of the first men to cross the mountains into Ohio in his own conveyance, bringing with him his family. He was a pioneer of Zanesville, the old Fulton homestead there still standing and being occupied. The great grandfather was John Fulton, who came from Scotland with his widowed mother when a child and settled in what was then Robbstown, Pennsylvania.

Edward Fulton, the father of our subject, came to Louisville as a youth of eighteen or nineteen years of age, and became one of the Spring Hill distillers of Louisville. He died on January 7, 1893, at the age of fifty-two years, and during his life was a quiet, home-loving man, and very fond of his large, well-selected library. The mother of our subject was born in Louisville, the daughter of Dr. Thomas Wilson and grand-daughter of Dr. Daniel Wilson, who founded what is now the Peter-Neat wholesale drug concern. Dr. Thomas Wilson was born in Louisville and graduated from the Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, but never practiced, as he took up the drug business upon the death of his father. Daniel Wilson, the pioneer, was a native of Georgia, of Virginia parentage. The mother died in 1882, at the age of forty-two years.

Dr. Fulton was reared in Louisville and received his education in that city, first attending the public and high schools. After grounding himself thoroughly in these preparatory courses he entered the University of Louisville in 1890, and was one of the two first four-year students to enter that institution. He was graduated there in 1894, with the degree of M. D., and was assistant to the professor of chemistry for one year in the Louisville University, then adjunct professor of diseases of children in the Kentucky Medical College for two years. At the end of that time he engaged in country practice in Oldham county, Kentucky, where he went on account of his health, but in 1903 he returned to Louisville and for the next three years was adjunct professor of physiology in the old Hospital College of Medicine.

He is now (editor’s note: this was written in 1910) adjunct professor in the diseases of children. Dr. Fulton is engaged in the general practice of medicine, at the same time making a specialty of children's diseases and obstetrics. He is a member of the staff of the Deaconess Hospital and chairman of the medical committee of the Baby's Free Milk Fund. He is a member of the Jefferson County Medical Society, the Kentucky State Medical Society and the American Medical Association. The Doctor married Mary Henry Peter, who was born in Louisville, daughter of M. C. Peter, the well-known citizen and wholesale druggist of Louisville, of whom a sketch is published elsewhere in this work. From this union there are two children: Nellie Crutcher and Rhoda Peter.

As a physician and surgeon Dr. Fulton is constantly broadening his knowledge and promoting his efficiency as a practitioner by reading and study.

Dr. Fulton became acquainted with Annie Fellows Johnston during the years he lived in Pewee Valley. Mortuary records show he was the physician in attendance when Rena Eaves Johnston, Annie’s 21-year-old step-daughter, died of appendicitis on September 12, 1899.

It’s possible that he became her stepson’s physician, too, or at least provided suggestions on his care. John Johnston suffered from tuberculosis, the same illness that killed his mother and later, his father, and his health was a constant concern. After Rena’s death, Annie Fellows Johnston took John to the Catskills for several months, and then in 1901 moved her little family to the Southwest, stopping first in Arizona before finally settling in Boerne, Texas. Since Dr. Fulton’s own father appears to have moved to Phoenix for health reasons, it’s possible the physician recommended the Southwest as the healthiest climate for her stepson – a move that led to all the “Little Colonel” tales that took place in Arizona, as well as the re-introduction of the Tremonts as major characters in the books.

Another aspect of Dr. Fulton’s career that appears in the Little Colonel stories is his early relationship with the Children’s Free Hospital (now Norton Children’s Hospital). In the “The Little Colonel’s Holidays,” copyrighted in 1901, the hospital is the setting for the touching reunion of Molly and Dot, the two orphaned sisters who were separated for several years after their father lost his job as a railroad conductor and took to drink and then lost both their mother and grandmother. Dr. Fulton might have also influenced Annie Fellows Johnston’s decision to include the relatively new facility in the tale.

Dr. Fulton died on September 9, 1953 and was buried in Cave Hill Cemetery, Section 3, Lot 382, with his parents. His obituary is shown below:

Dr. Gavin Fulton, Whose Worked Helped Youngsters, Dies at 80 After Fall
Dr. Gavin Fulton, active in many projects to benefit Louisville children, died yesterday at 19:30 a.m. at Norton Memorial Infirmary. He was 80.

The physician was taken to Norton after a fall Saturday in which his hip was broken. He had been in poor health for more than a year, and had retired. He practiced in Jefferson County for more than 50 years.

Dr. Fulton was one of the original backers of the old Babies Milk Fund, founded to provide pure milk to babies who otherwise could not afford it.

He was also a leader in the campaign to bring certified milk to Louisville shortly after the turn of the century. Milk being sold here then was considered dangerous.

Dr. Fulton served on the old Certified Milk Commission, which administered the program. The system later gave way to the graded-milk plan now in effect.

Helped Found Hospital
One of the initial supporters of the founding of Children's Hospital, Dr. Fulton was among the first doctors on its staff, as well as on the staff of Kosair Crippled Children's Hospital.

He was president of the Norton Infirmary staff in 1936 and 1937. He was also president of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Louisville.

A native of Louisville, Dr. Fulton graduated from the University of Louisville Medical School in 1894. He practiced a few years in eastern Jefferson County , then began practice in Louisville in 1903.

His home was at 1 Hawthorn Hill. His wife, Mary Henri Peter Fulton, died three years ago.

Survivors include two daughters, Mrs. Nell Fulton Norman and Miss Rhoda Fulton; a granddaughter, Mrs. Mary Norman Pollack; and a sister, Mrs. John Tevis (formerly Caroline Fulton Dulaney).

The funeral will be at 11 a.m. Friday at Christ Church Cathedral, of which he was a member. Burial will be in Cave Hill Cemetery. The body is at Pearson's, 1310 S. Third.

His sister, Caroline Fulton Dulaney Tevis, died on February 26, 1957 and is also buried in Cave Hill, section 26, Lot 150.

The Bondurant-Huston House in 1975

From "35 Landmark Homes of Pewee Valley" by Ann H. Montgomery, published in 1994. The photos, above and below, were taken for the March 1975 Call of the Pewee. The owners at the time were G.E. executive Richard Stuart Thomas and his wife, Marge.

Castlewood Subdivision

In 1967, the front portion of the Bondurant-Huston House estate was subdivided into three lots served by Castlewood Avenue, a street that followed the path of the home's original driveway. The owners of the property at that time were Clark and Mary F. Kaye, and they were living in the house when they subdivided the property.

104 Castlewood Drive 2018 Photos

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