Adelicia Hayes Franklin Acklen Cheatham

Adelicia Hayes Franklin Acklen Cheatham. March 15, 1817 - May 4, 1887. Adelicia Hayes was the daughter of Oliver Bliss Hayes. At times Hayes was a lawyer, judge, Presbyterian minister and a land speculator. Adelicia married 50-year-old Isaac Franklin when she was 22. Franklin's home, Fairvue, still stands outside of Gallatin. It became their home at the centre of a 2,000-acre plantation. Franklin raised tobacco, cattle, and thoroughbred horses in Tennessee and also had six cotton plantations in Louisiana. Isaac and Adelicia had four children, one of whom died at birth. Franklin died after being married seven years., Three years after Isaac Franklin's death, Adelicia married Col. Joseph Acklen, a lawyer from Huntsville, Alabama. Adelicia's net worth was about one million dollars, which led her to have Acklen sign a prenuptial contract. But Col. Acklen was a fine businessman, tripling Adelicia's wealth. They built Belmont Mansion in 1853 to serve as their summer house. Six years later Adolphus Heiman was hired to enlarge and remodel the house; Heiman is buried under the Confederate monument behind you. The couple had had six children when Col. Acklen died in 1863., Adelicia's most extraordinary feat came in 1863; it was the negotiation of a million dollar cotton sale. When the war began the Confederate government halted cotton exports, hoping to leverage political benefits with European powers. Also, the U.S. Navy began a blockade of the Confederate coast, making exporting difficult. Cotton was being grown on Adelicia's Louisiana land, but the Confederates threatened to burn it. Miraculously arrangements were made with them not to burn it, and with the U.S. forces to allow it to pass through the blockade. After the war Adelicia traveled to England and retrieved the proceeds in gold., Postbellum days found Adelicia one of the few Southerners whose wealth was not destroyed. Belmont was a centre of social activity. Adelicia even remarried in 1867, at age 50. Her final husband was 47-year old Dr. William Archer Cheatham, who also signed a prenuptial contract. When Tennessee constructed a lunatic asylum in 1852, Cheatham was selected as superintendent. It was known as one of the finest mental hospitals anywhere when the U.S. Military Governor, Andrew Johnson, arrested him. Cheatham had established a private medical practice when Adelicia married him. After 20 years of marriage they separated. Cheatham is the only one of her three husbands not buried in the mausoleum. Adelicia died on a shopping trip to New York City. She and nine of her ten children are in the mausoleum.