William Cloyd was an immigrant, of Scotch origin, who was born in 1751 in Ulster, Ireland. He landed in Philadelphia in 1774 or 1775, from Ballymony County, Antrim, Duchy Ulster, Ireland. It is said that he was a son of James Cloyd who married a Reed. He served as a private in the Pennsylvania line during the Revolutionary War and was pensioned in 1833. He also served as a private in the Virginia Army in the company of Captain Benjamin Biggs at Fort Pitt and was at the Battle of Brandywine.

William Cloyd Private, Pennsylvania Line, $45.55 Annual Allowance $136.65 Amount Received February 12 1833 Pension Started Age 82 (1835 TN Pension Roll)

William married Jeannette Barr, daughter of James Barr, a man of wealth, whose wife was a Caldwell. She was a niece of Lady Jane Barr, a woman of considerable prominence in Ireland . Jeanette followed William to the colonies against the wishes of her parents, and kept him waiting for two years before she married him. She was nine weeks in crossing the water. When he learned of her arrival in Philadelphia, he walked 54 miles, and reached Philadelphia, to be refused admission to the house of her cousin, Charles Stewart, with whom she was living. She met him at the gate and promised to marry him in two years if he proved worthy, and he evidently did as they were married at the appointed time.

The information listed above is a copy of the record in an old Bible in the possession of J. Bruce Cloyd, Mosheim, Tennessee, except the marriages are not included and the name is spelled Cloid. The Bible is reputed to have been brought from Ireland.
Washington County, Tennessee, where the Cloyds, Clingans, Pattons, Clicks and Campbells settled, is located in extreme eastern Tennessee. Washington County is one of the state's three "grand divisions." The county was formed in 1796 from portions of Washington County, North Carolina.

The earliest European settlers came in the 1760's. In 1772, they formed the Watauga Association, whose written constitution was the first in America. The Wataugans changed the name to Washington District in 1775, and in 1777 the district was incorporated into North Carolina as a county. The "county" included land from the present North Carolina border west to the Mississippi River.

When North Carolina ceded its western lands to the federal government in 1784 to settle Revolutionary War debts, the region's people formed the state of Franklin and named John Sevier, Governor. North Carolina opposed the new state and John Sevier was arrested for treason, although he was later pardoned. Jonesboro, established in 1785, is the county seat and oldest town in Tennessee. In 1790 the federal government accepted the ceded lands and incorporated them into the Territory of the United States South of the River Ohio. William Blount was appointed governor and Tennessee was admitted as the 16th state of the Union on June 1. 1796. John Sevier was the state's first ELECTED governor.