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Fourth Generation


146. William Webster (Billy) Bray59,66,114 was born on 1 Jul 1875. He appeared in the census in 1880 in Anderson County, Tennessee. William 4 son m s w TN TN TN He appeared in the census in 1880 in Anderson County, Tennessee. William 4 He was known in the family as Uncle Billy. He referred to himself as "W.W. Bray" or as "W.W. Bray of Texas". I do not have records to prove it at this point, but he did move to Texas. He was involved in a famous or infamous court case where he was accused of burning down his own house after taking out large insurance policies on the house. The well known Knoxville trial lawyer Ray Jenkins got him off. Part of the defense strategy was to cry about poor Billy into a large handkerchief, where the lawyer's tears where helped along by an onion hidden in the handkerchief. As a part of the crying strategy, Ray Jenkins made reference to Uncle Billy's war record, which was actually non-existent.

William Webster (Billy) Bray had the following children:

337

i.

Mary Ann Bray.