In August of 1999, I was thinking about my childhood and trying to remember anything that my father may have told me about his childhood, parents, and growing up experiences. The more I tried, the more I realized that he had actually told us very little about his family or his past. Oh, there were those bigger than life stories about our father and his friends that us children passed around, but nothing really based in any fact. Some of these stories included that we were descendants of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, through our Scottish Stewart line, Ivan the Terrible, through our Russian Rudolph line, and a Dutch Sea Captain, through our Boyce line. We knew that my father had a sister named Gigi, who visited in the 1960's, when I was a child. We had also visited my fathers mother in the1960's, but we were not included in any of the conversations as we were all children and being baby-sat by one of Aunt Gig's daughters while visiting. We had also heard from my father, something vague about all the family records being burned up in a fire at the Friday Harbor County Courthouse, in Washington state. Apparently the courthouse did burn, but this wasn't why there was supposedly "no" information available about our family history.
In recent years I have become very envolved with the internet for the company where I work, and on that afternoon in August, I decided to make a random search on the terms "Boyce Friday Harbor" The search engine results found a business on San Juan Island, located on "Boyce Road". Hmmm, that sounds a little coincidental I thought to myself, so I decided to search for all phone directory listed Boyce's on San Juan Island. The results were five Boyce's listed, all with phone numbers. Hmmmm, very interesting. I decided, what the heck, I am going to call them all and see if there is a connection. The only one I was able to get through to was Alton Boyce, long time island resident. After a very long and pleasant conversation, Alton directed me to a Kitty Roberts, daughter of one of the Boyce's of the island, who also is a family historian. I called Kitty, and as we had a brief conversation, history unfolded and we made the connection!
Kitty then recommended that I get in contact with family member Clayton Francis Boyce, who was in the process of writing a "not to be published" book of family history entitled Four Generations-A Family History and had already completed the chapters on Stephen and Lucinda Boyce and their descendants and John and Almira Boyce and their descendants. Clayton then sent to me a copy of his book which covered the Boyce and Walter families, including a number of Family Group Records. Upon my request, Clayton granted me permission to use material from this book for the development of this web site with the provision that I clear any quotes that were used from other books and newspapers, which I have done.
I would like to make it clear that I am not the "Author" of all of the information provided at this web site. I will revise or omit any portion of this web site upon request of the family.
Michael Richard Boyce
Webmaster
(My Father's Profile, John Nathan Boyce, 1923 - 1976)
(My Grandfather's Profile, John Leroy Boyce, 1894 - 1954)
(My Great Grandfather's Profile, John Henry Boyce, 1859 - 1930)
(My G G Grandfather's Profile, Stephen V. Boice/Boyce, 1825 - 1909)
(My G G G Grandfather's Profile, Johannes Boice, 1794 - 1876)
(My G G G G Grandfather's Profile, Jacob Buys/Boice, 1767 - 1842)
(My G G G G G Grandfather's Profile, Rudolph Buys, ca. 1735 - 1800)
E-mail: Boyceweb@msn.com