He was son of
William Byrd II and
Maria Taylor Byrd, and the grandson of
William Byrd I. Byrd inherited his family's estate of approximately 179,000 acres of land in Virginia and continued their tradition of serving as a member of the
Virginia House of Burgesses. He chose to fight in the
French and Indian War rather than spend much time in Richmond. In 1756 he was colonel of the Second
Virginia Regiment. At age 18, Byrd was sent to London to study law. In 1752, he imported a chestnut horse from England, Tryall. That year, he initiated what was said to have been the first major horse race in the New World, involving fellow Virginia planters
John Tayloe II, Francis Thornton, and
Samuel Ogle &
Benjamin Tasker Jr. of
Maryland. Byrd offered 500 Spanish
pistoles for any horse in the land to race Tryall, with the winner taking the lot. Tryall lost to Tasker's mare
Selima, who would go on to become one of the foundation mares of American thoroughbreds. After he squandered the Byrd fortune on building a magnificent mansion at
Westover Plantation, gambling, and bad investments, Byrd parceled up much of the land he had inherited from his father and sold it off to raise money to pay his debts. He also sold the enslaved African laborers who had worked on his estate plantation. Despite his debts, Byrd continued horseracing. In 1766, his horse Valiant Tryall, would lose to Tayloe's horse Hero. Although his sale of property in assets of land, and enslaved, generated a huge sum, it still was not enough to pay off his creditors. Later, Byrd resorted to a lottery, the prizes of which would come from his estate, Belvidere, at the falls of the
James River. However the lottery failed to generate sufficient revenue. Byrd was unable to retire his debts. Despondent and nearly broke, Byrd killed himself on January 1 or 2, 1777. He was buried in the cemetery at the old
Westover Church. == Marriage and family==