LETTERS OF CHARLES STEVENS
Edited by E. RUTH ROCKWOOD
The library Association of Portland has recently come into possession of a series of letters from Charles Stevens, a pioneer of 1852, to friends in Illinois. They were written on his journey across the plains and in the early days of his residence in Oregon, and are of considerable interest for the descriptions of the country and for the light they throw upon the conditions in those early days.
Charles Stevens was of English ancestry. The first of the name to come to America was John[1] (1605-1662) who arrived in the Confidence in 1638, and was one of the founders of Andover, Massachusetts. He had a son, Deacon Timothy (1641- 1708) who went to Roxbury, Massachusetts. The third in the line of descent was the Reverend Timothy (1666-1726), the first of the name to graduate from Harvard College, and who was the first minister of the first Congregational church at Glastonburg, Connecticut. He is given by Mr. Stevens as the ancestor who first came to America. Charles was born in Glastonbury,[2] in 1813. His description of his birthplace sounds like the typical New England home, “the House shaded by the old apple-trees in front, the Corn House and Barn behind it, the brook that crossed the road north of it, the Gate by the corner through which we drove to the back yard, the chimney with the No. 1777 cut deep in the brick near the top.” He went to Pennsylvania, where, at Frankfort, on June 13, 1837, he married Ann Hopkinson, who was born in Afterton, England, December 18, 1814,[3] and died at Astoria, October 26, 1887. He must have gone to Illinois soon after their marriage, as the first letter in the series is dated at Troy Grove, La Salle Co., Ill., Aug. 13, 1837, and in it he makes arrangements for his wife to come to Illinois
and tries to prepare her for the frontier conditions she will find
- ↑ Virkus, Compendium of American Genealogy, IV, 143, 769.
- ↑ Gaston, History of Oregon, II, 1051, says that he was born in Pennsylvania, but his own letter of March 7, 1895, says Glastonbury.
- ↑ Oregonian, October 29, 1887. Gaston says she was born in 1827 and died in 1882, but the Oregonian article was written at the time of her death and seemingly is more reliable.
