Harris-Brent photograph collection

The Lloyd family occupied Wye House (home and farm) in Talbot County, Maryland for many generations, starting in 1650 and continuing into the 20th century. Among the generations of Lloyd family occupants were many statesmen, soldiers, and otherwise influential figures, including three who served as Maryland state governor. The family’s roots went back to Francis Scott Key and General John Eager Howard.

Alice Lloyd Oliver (1855-1942) was the great grand-daughter of both Key and Howard through her mother Mary Howard Lloyd. She married Thomas Harrison Oliver, and lived in the Tudor Hall Apartments on University Parkway in Baltimore city by the end of her life. Mary Howard Lloyd had strong ties to Baltimore, having been born there in 1831, the daughter of Charles Howard and Elizabeth Phoebe Key Howard; she moved to Wye House not long after her marriage to Colonel Edward Lloyd in 1851, but returned to Baltimore as a widow to live with Alice Oliver at the end of her life. At the outset of the Civil War, the wealth of Colonel Lloyd was said to be unparalleled on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, and he held nearly one thousand slaves on the plantation; it was at Wye House that Frederick Douglass was born.

Nannie Tilghman Lurman (1857-1918) married Theodor G. Lurman, after spending her early life on the Tilghman family estate, Grosses, at Miles River Neck (Talbot County). One of their four children was Gustav W. Lurman, III (1887-1918). The Lurman family had a home called Farmlands in Catonsville, the site of which is now occupied by Catonsville Senior High School.

Robert Fenwick Brent (1849-1922) was a Baltimore lawyer whose family was involved in the early settlement of St. Mary’s County and had connections with the Lord Baltimore back in England. His mother, Matilda Lawrence Brent, was a descendant of Johathan Hager, the founder of Hagerstown. His father, Robert James Brent (1811-1872) had been Maryland’s Attorney General in 1851-1852. Robert F. Brent was attended the University of Virginia, and was a member of the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity. He married Alice Harris Brent (died 1958).

Julia Morris Murray Bowdoin (died 1954) was born at Rockburn in Elkridge (Howard County), which was built in 1738 by her ancestor Daniel M. Murray. She was the daughter of Capt. Francis Key Murray, USN, and Anne Willing Morris Murray. She married Henry J. Bowdoin (1860-1922) in 1891.