Cornelia E. Foy was born on November 16, 1843, in Greene County, Alabama, to John and Cecelia Foy. Her father may have died sometime before 1850. She grew up in Jackson County, Mississippi, and the family moved to Mobile, Alabama, in the 1850s. By 1860, the family owned $500 of personal property. Confederate soldier John I. Kendall apparently courted her unsuccessfully in the fall of 1863.

 

She married Confederate soldier William Reed Davol on December 18, 1865, and they had five children: Cornelia, born around 1867; William, born around 1872; Daisy, born around 1876; Robert, born around 1878; and Lizzie, born around 1880. They lived in New Orleans, Louisiana, and her husband worked as a bookkeeper. The family moved to Mobile, Alabama, in the late 1800s, and her husband died there on September 29, 1895.

 

She applied for a Confederate pension from the state of Alabama soon afterward. As a local writer noted, she earned a living by “rent[ing] rooms, but [she] does not succeed well,” and she depended on assistance from her children. She remained in Mobile for the rest of her life, and she died there on July 14, 1922.

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