Edmond Young Chesteen was born in South Carolina on Oct. 27, 1822. There, around 1847, when he was 25, he married Susan E. Holley (1832-1869), who was then ten years younger. Shortly after, seeking new land, they, along with Susan's mother, Margaret E. Holley, and her younger siblings, Amanda and Sion Holley, headed west. They settled in Alabama, where Edmond and Susan were blessed with two children, James T., born Feb. 20, 1848, and Elizabeth, born in 1849.

Shortly after, they moved further west, and by 1850 they had a farm in Neshoba Co., Mississippi, and Margaret E. Holley remained in the household. During the 1850s, they had more children: George Elam, William, Charles Hudson, and Amanda. By 1860, they moved to Attala Co., Mississippi, where they had 90 acres of land, 30 of it improved.

In the Fall of 1862, E.Y. Chesteen, then age 40, was conscripted under the Second Confederate Conscription Act. Having a wife and six children, ranging from ages 4 to 14, and a farm to run, he decided to send his eldest son, James T., as a substitute. James, beginning at age 14, would serve in two different regiments during the next two and a half years of the war, and died of measles on April 10, 1865, at age 17, sixteen days before Johnston's surrender. He was buried at Pleasant Ridge Cemetery, Attala Co., Mississippi. In the meantime, E.Y. and Susan had one more son, Sion.

On Dec. 10, 1869, Susan E. (Holley) Chesteen died at age 37 and was buried next to their eldest son, James T., in a matching tombstone at Pleasant Ridge Cemetery. Two months later, on Feb. 13, 1870, E.Y. Chesteen, then age 47, married Susan Ann Grantham (1850-1876), who was then 19. In the next six years, they would have five children: Jane, Edmond, Jenny, Sudie, and Neal. Between 1860 and 1870, Edmond had increased his farm to 60 acres of improved land and 180 acres of woodland.

On Aug. 12, 1876, Susan Ann (Grantham) Chesteen died at age 26 and was buried at Pleasant Ridge Cemetery, near Edmond's first wife. He moved to Montgomery Co., Mississippi, and married his third wife, Lydia Garrett Farris. Lydia, born in Mississippi around 1841, was a widow with at least one son. (Two of her sisters, Susan Alice and Sarah Garrett, had married two of Edmond's sons from his first marriage, George Elam and Charles Hudson Chesteen.) Edmond and Lydia were blessed with one daughter, Mary, in 1879. (With his three marriages, Edmond had a total of 13 children.) By 1880, Edmond had 50 acres of improved land and 50 acres of woodland. He died on Sept. 20, 1899, at age 77, and is buried at Pine Bluff Cemetery, Montgomery Co., Mississippi.

Leon Basile