Life began for Stokely as the first son of the wealthy-in-land Col. Robert Hays and his wife Jane Donelson, daughter of the Nashville pioneer, John Donelson. His family was one of the preeminent Nashville families. His father was a very close personal friend and brother-in-law of Andrew Jackson. ( He married Rachel and Andrew the second time they married.) Stokely spent much of his time growing up on his father’s property Haysboro and the Hermitage plantation of his Aunt and Uncle Jackson. Little is known about his early education except that he appears to have had the benefit of a good education because his occupations later in life were lawyer and surveyor. History mentions Stokely first in December, 1806 when his Uncle Andrew Jackson permitted seventeen year old Stokely to accompany Aaron Burr on a trip to New Orleans, thinking the association and experience would improve the young man’s education. However, Andrew must have suspected something amiss, because he instructed Stokely to keep an eye out and if he saw anything happen that might appear harmful to the United States of America, he was to report to Gov. Claiborne of Mississippi and place himself under his protection. After they had left, Jackson found out that a warrant had been issued for Burr’s arrest by President Jefferson for treason---conspiracy to seize New Orleans, revolutionize the Louisiana Territory and invade Mexico. Aaron Burr was arrested in Natchez and shipped off to Richmond for trial. Stokely apparently was protected by the letters given him by his Uncle Andrew and returned home safely. Jackson, ever a romantic, looked out for his nieces, nephews and wards and on May 15, 1811, he married Stokely, then 23 to his ward Lydia Butler and Stokely’s sister Patsy Hays to Lydia’s brother (also Jackson’s ward) Dr. William Edward Butler. The double wedding could have taken place at the Hays’ home Haysboro or at the Hermitage. (In 1808 Jackson had married Rachel Hays, sister to Stokely and Patsy, to the older Butler brother (also his ward) Col. Robert Butler, newly graduated from West Point.) (The Butlers were the children of Col. Thomas Butler who died in New Orleans in 1803. The Jacksons also raised his brother Edward Butler’s sons.) In September 1813, Uncle Jackson, his best friend Gen. John Coffee, and Stokely were deliberately strolling past the Nashville City Hotel where they knew Thomas Hart Benton and his brother Jesse were staying. The Bentons confronted them on the sidewalk, their pistols loaded with two shots each. There had been a feud brewing between Jackson and the Bentons for several months and both parties had made strong threatening statements; Jackson was never one to run away from a fight. As Jackson came at Thomas Benton, he brandished his riding whip and told Thomas he was going to punish him. Thomas acted as though he were pulling a gun and Jackson pulled his; Jesse who had run to the back of the hotel fired at Jackson hitting him in the shoulder and arm with a ball and a slug. Jackson fired at Thomas, missing as he fell. Coffee came running in to see Jackson gushing blood and attacked Thomas, knocking him backwards down the stairs. Stokely overpowered Jesse and began stabbing him in the arms with his dirk. The blade glanced off a shirt button or he would have stabbed him in the chest. Jesse pulled his pistol and fired pointblank into Stokely’s chest to “blow him through” but the charge did not go off . (Both Coffee and Hays are described as being men of gigantic stature so it is easy to see how they overpowered their enemies.) Andrew Jackson barely survived his wound and was much weakened when the summons came to lead his troops to the Creek War a month later. (I find it fascinating that Stokely’s first child, a girl and my ancestress Sarah Jane Hays, was not born until Dec. 1814 - more than a year later. If Jesse Benton’s gun had not misfired, surely a fatal chest wound, I would not be writing this story.) Stokely then went on with his Uncle Jackson and Gen. John Coffee to fight in the Creek War and the Battle of New Orleans. During this time, the following story is told of him: In Emily Donelson of Tennessee (Vol. 1, p. 51-52) by Pauline W. Burke, she tells the story that Stokely Donelson Hays, then a private, was on Sentry Duty when General Jackson came by and handed him a letter which Stokely read and handed back to him. An officer observed this exchange and asked the young sentry his name. “Hays, sir” was the reply. “You seem to be acquainted with the General.” “Oh yes, sir. He is my uncle---that is, you know, my uncle up home in Tennessee.” The officer asked, “What is he here?” “Oh here he is the General, sir.” When the officer said, his uncle could have done better for him, than by placing him in the ranks, the young man replied, “Well, sir. That doesn’t make any difference to him. So long as I am here with a gun, he’s satisfied.” These are the ranks recorded for him during the War of 1812 so I am guessing the aforementioned incident was during the Creek War in 1813-1814. Jackson and Company did not make it to New Orleans until 1815. Surname Given Name Middle Initial Company Unit Rank Induction Rank -Discharge Misc. roll-Box roll-Exact 1.HAYS STOKELY D. COFFEE’S BRIGADE, CAV. AND MTD. GUNMEN, TN VOLUNTEERS. CAPT BRIG LINSP 95602 2.HAYS STOKELY D. COFFEE’S REG’T CAV., W, TENNESSEE VOLS. LIEUT PAY MASTER 95602 3.HAYS STOKELY D JACKSON’S DIVISION, TENNESSEE VOLUNTEERS. Q.M. GENL 95602 How Stokely occupied his time after the War is not known to me and why he is referred to as Col. is another mystery, but what is known is that in 1822 at the age of 34 he and his wife Lydia and his two children, Sarah Jane, age 8, and a baby boy named Richard Jackson “Hickory” Hays, floated down the Cumberland River from the Nashville area to the Forked Deer River on a flatboat to the very young settlement which would become known as Jackson, Tennessee. Dr. William Edward Butler, Stokely’s brother-in-law and old playmate from the Hermitage, had scouted out the area, built a home and racetrack and induced most of his in-laws, 4 adult Hays children with their spouses and children, and his mother-in-law Jane Donelson Hays to move there. (Col. Robert Hays had died impoverished in 1819, so the family may have felt the need of a new start.) Considering they were all related to Andrew Jackson, it’s not too surprising they decided to name the town after him. Stokely and Dr. William Edward Butler were very involved in founding the new institutions of this new community. Stokely took his lawyer’s oath in Jackson on June 17, 1822. He was appointed one of the new commissioners of the town of Jackson on Aug. 17, 1822. Described as deeply interested in education, in 1825 he was chosen as “body politic and corporate” of the newly founded Jackson Male Academy. He apparently surveyed many of the roads leading into and from the new town. One source called him the “finest looking man in Jackson in the early days of the city”; another source commented that he possessed “much personal magnetism.” He was over 6 feet tall and weighed 200 pounds. However, I think Stokely may have had a problem with alcohol from time to time. Here is a story found in a book called "Madison County" by Cisco. “The first society organization in the county was called the “Sacrificial Club.” It had thirteen members, among whom were William Armour, Charles Sevier, W. R. Harris, Stokely D. Hays, John B. Cross, B. G. Stewart, W. R. Hess, Colonel Theobold and Adam Huntsman. The names of the others are lost. The origin and the object of that organization are unknown at this day, but it is reported to have originated on an occasion when those old pioneers had been for several days worshiping at the shrine of Bacchus. After they had reached a point where they began to wish that they had been engaged in some other occupation, one of them proposed that a human sacrifice should be offered as a propitiation for their sins. The proposition was favored and they agreed to cast lots to determine who should be the victim, each having previously bound himself, in the most solemn manner, to abide the result. Major John B. Cross, who was at that time, one of the members of the court of pleas and quarter session of this county, and had been an Indian fighter under Jackson, was the member on whom the lot fell. A pen of logs was then built on the corner of Lafayette and Liberty streets, the present situation of the Murray Block, which was filled with the most combustible material that could be found, and thus an altar having been prepared, the master of ceremony deprived Major Cross of his apparel, put on him a white robe, and having delivered him to two high priests of the Sacrificial Club, they led him to the altar, put him on it in an erect position and then deliberately proceeded to apply to it the torch which was to set it aflame; but before that act could be successfully accomplished the Major was saved from death by fire through the timely appearance of a man, who was neither a member of the club nor knew that for its manifold sins one of its members had been selected as the propitiation. Major Cross lived for many years after he was thus saved from death and was one of the most honored citizens of this county which he represented in the Legislature of this State whenever he sought that honor.” The fly in the ointment of the Hays and Butler families in the early days of Jackson appears to have been Davy Crockett who ran against Dr. William Edward Butler, the founder of Jackson, for Congress and won! Crockett campaigned against him as an “aristoocrat” who had carpets on his floors and could not understand the needs of the common man. Enmity developed between Crockett and Jackson over this election and the fact that Crockett opposed Jackson’s election as President. Once he was elected President in 1828, Jackson tried to help Stokely Donelson Hays get a governmental appointment as Registrar of the Land Office in Clinton, Mississippi. Pres. Jackson wrote to Robert I. Chester, Stokely’s brother-in-law, husband of his sister Elizabeth Hays: Nov. 2, 1830... “I do wish you to say to Col. S.D. Hays that he must get and send on here, as early as he can, testimonials of his sobriety and capacity as a surveyor. This will be necessary for so sure as an opportunity offers, if one should, to give him a surveyors district, that in order to mortify me his appointment will be opposed in the Senate and Crockett (Davy) and Deshea? will represent him as intemperate. Let the recommendations be strong and go to his capability and ability to give the necessary security as required.” (Historic TN Documents) Letter from Pres. A.J. to Samuel Jackson Hays (Stokely’s brother) Washington, April 23d, 1831 “Dear Saml, I have just recd your interesting letter of the 4th instant and hasten to acknowledge it. I trust for the honor of the state, your Congressional District will not disgrace themselves longer by sending that profligate man Crockett (that would be Davy) back to Congress. You have judged rightly in the matter, in withholding from Col. Stokely D. Hays the information of Crockett’s conduct toward him if the result would have been an attack by Col. Hays on him. My view in communicating it, was that those who had recommended him might be informed of his base course as a machine in the hands of my enemies, for it was a direct attack upon those who had recommended him.... “Historic Madison, p. 403 Stokely received the appointment in spite of Crockett and went to Clinton, Mississippi. He returned to Jackson where he became gravely ill. After reporting that Stokely D. Hays died in the home of his brother-in-law Dr. William Edward Butler, “The Southern Statesman”, Sept. 10, 1831 carried the following obituary: “Mr. Hays’ death of bilious (yellow?) fever has spread an unusual gloom around us----possessed of hospitable, kind, and generous feelings, even to a fault, no man had fewer enemies. Hays was by profession a lawyer--endued with a strong mind, and possessing advantages of liberal education. Fame and fortune were within his grasp, but such were his social habits that neither ambition or parsimony could find a resting place within his bosom. For the purpose of removing his family, he had just returned apparently in good health from Clinton, Miss., where he had been for some time attending his official duties as Register of the Land Office. He has left a widow, two children, and a numerous train of relatives. Masonic honors.” (p. 6 of Historic Madison) Stokely’s remains were buried in the Hays plot in Riverside Cemetery in Jackson. His daughter Sarah Jane Hays married her second cousin John Hutchings Rawlings two years later in Jackson, Feb. 14, 1833. His mother Jane Hays died in 1834, leaving a hundred dollars to each of her daughters and to her daughter-in-law Lydia Butler Hays for “a fine gold watch.“ The widowed Lydia moved with her daughter and son-in-law to Memphis in 1848. Lydia outlived both John and Sarah Jane, dying in 1865 at age 77, and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery in Memphis in the Rawlings family plot. Her son Richard Jackson “Hickory” Hays remained in Jackson, dying in 1899, and was buried in the Hays family plot in Riverside Cemetery. Note: Davy Crockett finally did loose an election in Jackson, Madison Co., TN, thanks in part to Jackson ‘s political machine, and is reported to have said to the people, “You all can go to Hell: I am going to Texas.” and the rest, as we know is History.... The following letters relating to Stokely Donelson Hays and his appointment as Surveyor are arranged in chronological order and were obtained from a variety of sources as cited. http://oai.sunsite.utk.edu/sgm/sl043.html Letter from Andrew Jackson, then President of the United States, to his nephew-in-law Robert I. Chester, Jackson, TN Summary: This document is a letter written by Andrew Jackson to Robert I. Chester on November 7, 1830. In the letter, Jackson agrees to sell some of his slaves, one woman named Charlotte and her three children, to Chester for $800.00. Jackson also asks for Chester to send a certificate to him regarding Colonel S. D. Hays on the matter of his sobriety and abilities as a surveyor. collection: Tennessee Historical Society, miscellaneous documents box: J1 folder: 44J document: sl043 Washington Novbr [November] 7th 1830 -- My Dr [Dear] Sir Your letter of the 25th ultimo has just been recd [received] and I hasten to reply to it. There are no complaints here against Genl [General] Purdy, nor have we recd [received], any intimation of his intention to resign -- but should the office become vacant you may rest assured your enemy shall not be appointed. I recd [received] a letter from Mr Steel my overseer informing me that Charlotte had applied to you to purchase her, being discounted where she now is -- I bought her being the wife of Charles at his request, he appears now desirous that she with her children be sold -- I have therefore come to the resolution to part with her. But from the great reduction of hands on my plantation by recent deaths since the first of the year 1829 -- having lost set of my best hands. I was glad to hear that you had said to my overseer, that you would pay me here, so that I can get Andrew to reinstate, Charlotte by purchase here in due time to aid in the next years crop I have therefore concluded to let you have them, that is to say Charlotte with her three children for Eight hundred dollars, paid here in all the month of February next, and on your application for them, and [deleted: sends] ⁁ [added: handing to Mr Steel] on a note payable in this Bank; ⁁ [added: to me] with Doctor Butler endorser, I have directed her to deliver them to you or if it will suit you better, to placce [place] a note in Bank at Nashville, due & payable, by the 10th of Febry [February] next, which will enable the cashier to remit a check for the amount to me here by the last of February, it will answer as I wish to send my son out early in March, by whom I would send the purchase in lieu of Charlotte & her children I give my overseer $500 per annum & my hands have I decreased so much, that really this year with the bad season I will not clear from my farm what its [unclear: cuther] has cost me -- I think I have placed Charlotte & her children as low as they could be bought now here, & sent to my farm, but I do it that she may be contented -- let ⁁ [added: me] hear from you on the receipt of this letter. I wish you to say to Colo. [Colonel] S. D. Hays, that he must get, & send on here, as early as he can, testimonials of his sobriety & capacity as a surveyor, -- This will be necessary, for so sure as an opportunity offers if one should, to give here a surveyors District, that in order to mortify me [deleted: that] his appointment will be opposed in the Senate & Crockett & [unclear: Desha], will represent him as intemperate. Let the recommendations be strong and go to his capacity, and ability to give the necessary Security, if required. This must be attended to early to be here by the middle or 20th of Decbr [December] past if practicable. Present ⁁ [added: me] to Betsy & the children all friends -- to my good old friend Mrs Hays (Jane Donelson Hays-- his sister-in-law, AJ’s niece and my gggg grandmother), Narcissia (his unmarried niece)-- to Daniel J Hays & his sweet little wife, & kiss my namesake for me (Note: I think the transcriptionist made an error. This should read “Samuel J. Hays and his sweet little wife” Frances Pinckney Middleton Hays. They had a son Andrew Jackson Hays. JM): to the Doctor & Patsy & Son (Dr. William Edward Butler, Martha “Patsy” Hays Butler and son William Ormonde Butler), to Stockly (sic) & Lydia, Jane & little Jackson (Richard Jackson ‘Hickory’ Hays) and believe me yr [your] friend [Signed] Andrew Jackson Mr. Robert I.. Chester -- Robert I. Chester Esqr [Esquire] Jackson, Madison County West Tennessee The Historic New Orleans Museum Collection, EGW Butler Letters, MSS 102, F 540 Letter from Stokely Donelson Hays to Edward George Washington Butler. Stokely’s wife Lydia was Edward George Washington Butler’s cousin. His sister Caroline Butler Bell was about Lydia’s age; they had grown up together and gone to Moravian Seminary for Young Ladies in Bethlehem, PA, together. Stokely and Edward grew up together because Stokely’s aunt and uncle Andrew and Rachel Jackson had reared the Butler boys after their father Edward’s death. Italics are notes from the transcriber, the ggg granddaughter of S. D. Hays, Jean Meaney. Envelope Major E G W Butler Alexandria VA (arrived Washington DC, Jan. 7) Jackson Dec. 4, 1830 Dear Edward, The Old Chief (Andrew Jackson) will nominate me to the Senate for the appointment of Surveyor Genl. for the Mississippi District. My friends here and at Nashville have with an unusual zeal and promptitude given their names as testimonies of my worth and pretentions? in a manner very gratifying to my feelings. I have sent many to_____(torn) but I hope only of the very stringent kind?---of both parties---- I have no fears, except from the enemies of the Genl. And because I am his relation.---what part will Major Levy? play I expect he has a candidate in Major John Campbell of Nashville. You may serve me by mentioning my ______ to your friends in the city and in the Senate. I left Caroline (Bell, EGWB’s sister and first cousin to Stokely‘s wife Lydia) in good health at Nashville on Tuesday last; she was to have left the next day in the stage but has not moved and it is more than probable she will go down the river for there has been heavy rains which must raise the water. She is extremely anxious to get home (to New Orleans) and will take the most expediting avale? You promised to write me------ Our friends here are all in good health and _____ to be held in all kindness by yourself dear? Frances (EGWB’s wife) and Ned­­­ (Edward Jr., his son)----- Lydia joins me in the desire to be presented? to our old friend Col. Gibson. ____ yr friend ____ S. D. Hays Letter from Andrew Jackson in Washington during his presidency to his nephew Samuel Jackson Hays in Jackson, TN. The section relating to the appointment of S. D. Hays, brother to Samuel, is quoted. (Historic Madison by Emma Inman Williams, p.403 “Washington, DC April 23, 1831 Dear Saml, I have just recd your interesting letter of the 4th instant and hasten to acknowledge it. I trust for the honor of the state, your Congressional District will not disgrace themselves longer by sending that profligate man Crockett (Davy) back to Congress. You have judged rightly in the matter, in withholding from Col. Stokly (sic) D. Hays the information of Crockett’s conduct toward him, if the result would have been an attack by Col Hays upon him. My view in communicating it, was that those who had recommended him might be informed of his base course as a machine in the hand of my enemies, for it was a direct attack upon those who recommended him. ..” Letter from Andrew Jackson to Richard Jackson Hays, son of Stokely Donelson Hays. From the Hermitage, Feb. 10, 1843 (found on p.417 of Historic Madison by Emma Inman Williams.) “Although I can scarcely hold the pen from debility, I cannot but attempt to yield to your request, particularly as you are the only son of a deceased friend whose memory I cherish with lively emotions (Stokely D. Hays) and on whom a fond mother (Lydia Butler Hays) relies as a prop and a comfort in her declining years…”