Benton Gatch Ray

GEDCOM Note

The Lyons of Surrattsville connection to President Lincoln's assassination When Mary Catherine Lyons was a young lady, her mother, Mildred Ripple, told her that the Lyons family was connected to Samuel Alexander Mudd, the American physician who was imprisoned for conspiring with John Wilkes Booth in the assassination of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln. Mildred grew up in Surrattsville (now Clinton), Maryland, the hometown of Mary Surratt, who was hanged in 1865 for being a co-conspirator in the assassination. Mary's grandfather, Thomas Lyons, married Rebecca Bryan. Rebecca's Aunt Eleanor Ann H.Bryan, married Walter Parker Griffin. Their daughter, Mary Ida Griffin, married Sydney Emanuel Mudd, who was a 2nd cousin, once removed, of Samuel Alexander Mudd. Although the Lyons connection to theMudds is rather complex, it helps to remember that the families lived in close proximity to one another.