Elizabeth Gray Young

Elizabeth "Lillie" Gray Bryan was born in North Carolina, the youngest of 8 known surviving children (6 girls/3 boys) born to John Stevens Bryan Sr. and his wife, Lucy Davis Haywood. She was the paternal grandchild of Gen. William Bryan II & Elizabeth S. Gray of Bertie Co, NC; and maternal grandchild of Sherwood Haywood & Eleanor Hawkins of Wake Co, NC.

Lillie was born 7 months after her father died in New York City, and her widowed mother returned to Raleigh where she raised her children.

Lillie was 21 when she married 37-year old attorney, William Hamilton Young, who had served as a Corporal with Co. D of the NC 12th Infantry, during the Civil War. The couple would reside in Henderson where they were parents to 3 known children:

• Alice Hamilton Young Rose (1870-1958)
• Lucy Haywood Young Powell (1874-1960)
• William Hamilton Young, Jr. (1880-aft 1930).

Lillie was widowed in 1885 when her husband of 16 years died at age 48. Lillie never remarried, and removed her children to Washington, DC where she gained employment as a government clerk. She would eventually return to Henderson where she died in 1922 at age 73.