BOYER, DENNIS AND SARAH E. FIELDER

by Gussie Boyer Osborne

Entry F32 from the History of Hooker County Nebraska
with permission of the Hooker County Historical Society

Four Generations about 1918. L-R - Lolita Goldizen (Stacy),
Lessie Boyer Goldizen, Hugh Bee Boyer, Dennis Boyer.

Dennis Boyer came to Mullen by train in
1899 with his wife, Sarah and son Hugh Bee.
They established a homestead seven miles
northeast of Mullen in Cherry County and
built a 3-room frame house. Dennis' sister,
Virginia and husband, Steve James were on
a homestead in the next valley north. A
brother, "Big Hugh" lived nearby with his
wife, Margaret James Boyer (sister of Steve)
and their nine sons. Another sister, Missouri,
also lived nearby with her husband, John
Riley Pool and their two youngest children,
Delia and Rose. Hugh Bee ( "Little Hugh")
located a homestead two miles west of Dennis
and returned to Texas to bring his family.

Dennis was born 5 August 1842 in Grayson
County, Virginia, to John & Jane Fielder
Boyer. On June 24, 1861 , he and his three
older brothers, Hugh, Leander and Daniel,
enlisted in the 51st Virginia Infantry of the
Confederate Army at Independence, VA. In
1863 he returned home on leave and on the
24th of August he married his cousin, Sarah
E. Fielder, daughter of Dennis Fielder and
Polly Cornett. After returning to the war, the
following month Dennis and Daniel were
wounded and taken prisoner at Winchester,
VA 19 September 1863.

Following the war, he took up farming in
Grayson County, where William K. was born
in 1866 and Malon D. in 1869. After moving
to a farm in Mercer County, West Virginia,
Hugh Bee was born in 1871 . Shortly after,
they emigrated by team and wagon to Sevier
County, Tennessee, where Mary Jane
(Molly) was born in 1873 and John Pender
in 1878. After about six years there, they
moved on to Anderson County, Texas, near
Elkhart, where their last two children were
born, Charles Claudia in 1880 and James
Ewing in 1884. Three of their children died
there-Malon in 1887 at the age of 18, C.C.
in 1888 at age 8, and John Pender in 1889 at
age 11 .

William K. remained in Texas and, in 1892
he married Sarah Alice Starr, daughter of
Daniel Parker Starr and Martha Elizabeth
Self. She died shortly after the birth of their
only son, Ernest, in December of that same
year. In 1900 he was remarried to Avor
Fincher and they had two children, Lala in
1901 and Charles Russell in 1907. Wm K. died
at Elkhart in 1926.

Mary Jane (Molly) married Benjamin
Franklin Douthit in Anderson County in
1894. After his death in 1912, she moved to
Nebraska and lived in the Mullen area until
her death at Alliance in 1955.

James Ewing Boyer moved to Beaver
Crossing, Nebraska where he was a barber.
He was married in a buggy on Main Street in
Mullen 26 Jan 1906 to Myrtle Edith Willis.
She died in 1921 and is buried at Beaver
Crossing. They had one daughter, Felma, who
married Lou Franzen in 1924. Jim, Lou &
Felma moved to Laurel, Montana, where he
lived until 1939 when he was killed near Red
Lodge in an auto accident. He is buried at
Beaver Crossing. Felma died in 1958 and Lou
in 1980. Both are buried at Sunset Memorial
Gardens in Billings, Montana.

Dennis' youngest sister, America, fondly
called "Aunt Mec" never married. She lived
with her sister, Virginia and Steve James
until her death in 1917 at the age of 64. She
is buried in Cedarview Cemetery in Mullen.
Dennis Boyer died 27 February 1919 and his
wife, Sarah, died 8 January 1924. Both are
buried in the Virginia community cemetery
near their old homestead.