Bella Boyd, born Maria Isabella Boyd, was a confederate spy in the American Civil War. She operated from her father's hotel and gave valuable information to Confederate generals.
Her career in espionage had a rather startling begining: when a group of Union soldiers broke in to her parents home with the intention of raising the US flag, one of them insulted Belle's mother. Belle pulled out a pistol and shot one of them.
She was 17 years old. A board of inquiry acquitted her but she was placed under surveillance. She profited from this by charming military secrets out of at least one of the Union sentries guarding her.
Belle passed the secrets she learned to the generals through her slave Eliza Hopewell. One evening in mid 1862 she overheard a general laying out plans for a move that would temporarily lower the Union military presence at Front Royal.
That evening Belle rode to a confederate general and confided the details to him. When the confederates rode on Front Royal, Belle ran through bullets to greet the captain. For her contributions she was awarded the Southern Cross of Honor.
Belle was arrested after her lover gave her up on July 29, 1862. She was held for a month in the Old Capitol Prison in Washington but was freed one month later.
She was arrested again but was set free on that occasion also. She died, during her tour in Wisconsin, of Typhoid at the age of 56.
