When John Bledsoe Gilliam was born on 1 September 1872, in Sumner, Tennessee, United States, his father, John Rice Gilliam, was 57 and his mother, Sarah Edythe Robertson, was 43. He married Lucy A. Creasy on 28 January 1893, in Sumner, Tennessee, United States. They were the parents of at least 1 son and 6 daughters. He lived in Civil District 12, Sumner, Tennessee, United States in 1900 and Westmoreland, Sumner, Tennessee, United States in 1910. He died on 22 July 1935, in Sumner, Tennessee, United States, at the age of 62, and was buried in Pleasant Grove, Sumner, Tennessee, United States.