Clay County, Arkansas

Welcome to Clay County, Arkansas

A Member of ARGenWeb

My name is Scot Stout and I'm your Clay County coordinator. Everything I have on Clay County has been posted. I do not live in or near Clay County and cannot answer specific research questions. Please send any questions or comments to me at the address below.

Contact Clay County Coordinator
s_cotstout@aol.com (Please remove the underscore after the first character before e-mailing.)

Clay County, first called Clayton County, was formed in 1873 with Corning as the county seat. It was formed from parts of Greene and Randolph Counties with Western Clay County being formed from Randolph County and Eastern Clay County being formed from Greene County. There seems to be some controversy over which Clayton was the namesake of Clayton County in the beginning. It may have been John M. Clayton or his brother, Powell Clayton. Henry Clay was the person honored when the name was changed in 1875.

Powell Clayton

John M. Clayton

Henry Clay

TWO County Seats?

According to History and Traditions of Clay County, compiled by Robert T. Webb, edited and indexed by Frank Cochran, the people moved the county seat from Corning to Boydsville in 1877. Most of the people lived in the eastern part of the county and it was difficult to travel through the bottoms to Corning. Changing the county seat did not change the difficulty of crossing the bottoms, but only transferred it to the people in the Western part. In 1881 the county was divided into two districts with Boydsville the Eastern county seat and Corning the Western county seat. In 1888 the people voted to move the eastern county seat to Piggott. More detailed information may be found here.

Archives (contains information on 1880 census, obituaries, publication indices, and much more)

Cherokee Bay Post Office

Churches

Clay County Courier Excerpts

Clay County Home

Clay County Court Records

Clay County Courthouses
Corning
Boydsville
Piggott

Clay County Genealogy & Historical Society