Gray, Mary Anna

Alternate name: Pitts

Mary Anna (Ann) Pitts Gray became widowed when her first husband, a respectable lawyer of North Carolina, died, and she remarried a younger man, Franklin C. Gray, in November 1834. The couple lived in Texas and were involved in the rumored attempt to assassinate General Antonio López de Santa Anna with poisoned champagne . The Grays moved to Arkansas and eventually separated. Mary Anna sued Franklin for divorce in 1851 on the grounds of adultery and was awarded $5,000 in alimony when he failed to show up in court. Franklin officially married Matilda C. French in March 1853, In July 1853, Franklin stepped in front of a train in New York and was killed. In December 1856, Mary Anna retained Abraham Lincoln and William H. Herndon and filed a writ of error in the Illinois Supreme Court to reverse the divorce decree and acquire more alimony. The court later dismissed the suit after Mary Anna Gray failed to join the issue on the plea.

Texas, U.S., Marriage Index, 1824-2019, 12 November 1834, Brazoria County (Lehi, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, 2005); Washington, D.C., U.S., Marriage Records, 1810-1953, 23 March 1853 (Lehi, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, 2016); Alton Daily Morning Courier (IL), 25 July 1853, 2:5; The Belleville Advocate (IL), 31 August 1853, 1:1; Illinois Daily Journal (Springfield), 23 July 1853, 2:1; Gray v. Gray, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, 2d edition (Springfield: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, 2009), http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=139084; Gray v. Gray et al., Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=139085.