Goodspeed Biography of Sanders D. Broyles

Sanders D. Broyles, a well-known and influential citizen of Rhea County, Tenn., and a resident of Dayton is a native of East Tennessee, born in McMinn County February 15, 1824. His parents were Cornelius and Polly (Farley) Broyles. The father was a native of East Tennessee, born in Washington County about 1786, and died in Rhea County in 1861. He was of German descent, his grandfather having come from Germany to America at an early day. The mother was a North Carolinian by birth, and was a few years older than her husband. She died in Rhea County about 1870, at the advanced age of ninety. They were married in White County, Tenn., about 1814, and after living in that county a few years moved to McMinn County, where they resided until the fall of 1839, at which time they came to Rhea County, and there passed the remainder of their days. The father was a farmer, an old line Whig, and a member of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. He was a soldier in the war of 1812. His father, Daniel Broyles, served three years in the Revolutionary war, enlisting at the age of fifteen years. Our subject is the fifth of seven children. He secured by his own efforts a common-school education in Rhea County. He followed agricultural pursuits on his father’s plantation in Tennessee and this occupation has been his life-long employment. In October, 1848, at the age of twenty-five, he married Miss Delilah Compton, a native of Rhea County, born in 1818, and settled in that county as renters, and it was nine years before they owned a home of their own. In 1857 he purchased a farm in the Eighth Civil District of Rhea County, and moved to it in January of the next year. This farm then contained about 300 acres. This has been the home of our subject ever since. His residence at that time was near what was known as Smith’s Cross Roads, which consisted of a post office and two dwellings. Since that time the name has been changed to Dayton, and the town has about 3,000 inhabitants. Our subject has been a stirring, energetic man, and now owns upward of of 250 acres, a portion of which lies in the suburbs of Dayton. In the fall of 1862 he entered the Confederate States Army and served three years and four days with credit. He then returned home and resumed his farming interest. He and wife are members of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, and of the family of six children born to them all are living but one son.

Published by The Goodspeed Publishing Co 1887