Leonard Stephens Letter, 10 May 1838

Beech Woods , Campbell County, Ky., 10th May 1838

Your affectionate & highly interesting letter, written to Father Myself & Caty was received by Thomas & as Father & Caty neither of them write, it is the duty of myself to answer it which I readily & cheerfully undertake to perform. This letter leaves our family or several of its members in bad health. Father is complaining very much & Caty has been quite unwell for some considerable time.

Reuben Louis Bristow
Reuben Bristow
She went to Reuben Bristow's sometime about the first of February & in returning home caught cold & has been in bad health ever since tho she is now mending & I hope will soon be well again. My own health continues bad sometimes I am almost unable to get about & I often think it will shortly be the case with me that I shall be compelled to give over going about altogether but still I trust in God that I may be permitted to keep up for some time yet & I shall endeavor to not despair or give over untill compelled to do so. Father's health has become considerably worse than it was before you left us & indeed it is alarming to see how rapidly he has failed of late. You will recollect that he walked over to your house the evening before you moved & he appeared to do it without much inconvenience as he did not complain of being fatigued after it. Since that time he has never been out as far as to the Barn & at this time he can scarcely walk even about the house. His limbs seem as if they would fail altogether, his nerves have become very much affected & his speech has also become seriously affected. He begins to fear he will almost entirely loose it. At times he has to make several tries before he can speak some words. His eyesight too has failed considerably since you saw him; it frequently happens that he does not know some of our own family by looking at us as we pass about the house. Poor old man, it makes me feel very unhappy to see his helpless situation. You will recollect that reading was his favorite amusement & that he devoted almost all his time in reading, but I suppose he has not read a line for three months & there is no prospect that he ever will again. Indeed if he continues to decline as he has done for the last three months he cannot stand it long. I sincerely hope however that he will yet improve & live for some considerable time to come. Mrs. Bayty (Caty's sister as you know) came over to see us about the first of Feb. & has been over ever since; she expects to go home in about two weeks.

You will recollect that when you started or were about to start from where William lived you requested me to have your house swept & made clean which I attended to & then locked the doors & kept the keys untill Mr. Respess moved down so the house was perfectly clean when they came & took possession. He came on about three weeks before his wife and children moved; he had some of his servants with him. His family of whites consists of his wife & four children & a widow lady that lives with them Mrs. Rust who appears to be about thirty five years of age. He & his wife appear to be very social & clever & so far I have seen nothing about them to find fault with. I went over about two weeks ago to dine with them. They had been to see us several times & insisted so strongly that I feared if I did not go they would think I was not disposed to be friendly so I went over on Sunday. They received me apparently with much friendship & I spent a few hours with them without any inconvenience. I could not however help reflecting that I was there in the house that had lately been the residence of my near relations & dear friends where I had been accustomed to visit & always felt perfectly free & easy, friends that I would have done anything on earth that they would have required to serve them, that then at the time refered to above I was amongst strangers comparatively speaking & persons that I never could expect to be friends such as you & brother William had been. Oh My Dear Sister you don't know how we all miss you both. When I think of the many pleasing interviews we have had, how often we have visited each other to cheer & make each other as happy as it is in the power of friends to do by conversing & laughing off dull cares & what a source of consolation it has been to me after working hard all the week to have you & brother Wm. come & see us on Saturday evening. I say when I think of these things & when I reflect too that Brother Wm. was not only a near & dear brother but the best friend I had on earth, one that I could confide in more than any other. We had been a great deal together & had never had any unfriendly feeling & that now that source of comfort is gone perhaps forever I cant for the life of me feel otherwise than extremely bad & unhappy. I know the loss I have sustained in parting with you & him is one that cannot be repaired, but my sister it is not impossible but that we may live near each other again, for I assure you I often think that I cannot reconcile it to myself to live amongst strangers when I know it would be greatly to my benefit to sell out here & move to Mo. & then could live amongst the best of friends.

Statira Stephens Bristow
Statira Bristow
Statira has got another son about a week ago. I have not seen it & do not know by what name they intend to call it . We cincerely hope this letter will find yourself & all the family in the enjoyment of good health. Sister Betey we are much pleased at receiving a letter from yourself & wish you to write us often & we will with pleasure keep up a correspondence with you. We are compelled to close this letter for want of room tho far from want of inclination. Father, Catey & myself all Join in love to you. Farewell.

Your affectionate brother till death,
Leonard Stephens

Mrs. Elizabeth Stephens

P.S. Mr. Baity & Lucy has this evening returned from Reuben Bristow's & desire to be particularly remembered to yourself, Brother William & all your children & their families. They say Statira calls her last boy after me.

Yours as above,
Leonard Stephens

[Address] Mrs. Elizabeth Stephens
Monroe County
Missouri

By: Mr. C. C. Herndon

Notes:

General Stephens' home, Beech Woods, was about a dozen miles from Covington, and a mile east of the Lexington Pike. A photograph of the original residence, said to have been one of the earliest brick structures in the area, graced the cover of Kentucky Ancestors for July, 1972. The old building survived into the 1920s; the bricks were recycled into the present residence on the site, which also includes the family graveyard. Return.

Mrs. Elizabeth Louisa Nelson Stephens (1785-1854), daughter of James Nelson and Lucy Robinson. She had married Leonard’s brother William (1782-1873) in Orange County, Virginia in 1803, before the families moved west. Return.

Father was the widowed Benjamin Stephens, Sr. (1754-1839). His wife, Dorothy Jemima Waller (1756-1836) had died two years before, just short of her 80th birthday. Return.

Catherine Sanford (1793-1843), Leonard’s wife, was the daughter of Winifred Redman and Richard Sanford, from the Northern Neck of Virginia. Her father had died in at Great Crossings, in Scott County, shortly after arriving in Kentucky, when Caty was a small child. Her widowed mother settled in Campbell County and married Richard Dicken. As seen below, both Caty and her father-in-law were in poor health. Return.

Rather than relying on the Post Office, letters were frequently entrusted to family members or friends who happened to be traveling to the right destination. Thomas is probably William and Elizabeth’s son, Thomas Nelson Stephens (1808-1888) who lived near his parents in Monroe County, but several cousins shared the name. Return.

Reuben Louis Bristow (1811-1871) had married Leonard’s daughter, Statira Bonaparte Stephens (1817- 1902), in 1834. Reuben had moved to Boone County from Bourbon County with his parents, James and Jane Shelton Clarkson Bristow, three years before, in 1831. Return.

Elizabeth Sanford (1791- —), who had married John R. Beaty (1789- —), in Boone County in 1809. They later settled in Marion County, Indiana. She was listed as 64 in the 1850 census, when she was enumerated at the home of her nephew Napoleon Stephens in Covington. Leonard’s grandson, Louis Lunsford Bristow, was in contact with his Beaty cousins a century later. Return.

William Machen Respess (1799-1854), from Bourbon County. His title was probably from service in the militia. Return.

The Major’s wife, Susannah Conde Russell Corlis (1803-1874), was the daughter of John Corlis (1767-1839). Their children were Frances Adela Respess (1828-1898), Susan Conde Russell Respess (1832-1912), Thomas Machen Respess (1834-1840), and William Corlis Respess (1837-1910), who married in 1863 Leonard’s granddaughter, Catherine Sanford “Bittie” Bristow (1844-1875). Several other children died in early childhood. Return.

Mrs. Rust may have been a cousin or in-law of the Major's. A Frances Rust who had married Machen C. Respess was named in her brother John’s will in 1820. Bourbon Wills G: 273. Return.

Leonard Stephens Bristow (1839-1847), Reuben and Statira’s second child. He died of a fever just short of his eighth birthday and was buried in the family cemetery at Beech Woods. See Neil Allen Bristow, ed., Aunt Mary’s Diary: The Writings of Mary Beckley Bristow (San Diego: [editor], 1996), 27-28. Return.

Probably Mrs Beaty; she may have been a widow by this time. Lucy was Leonard’s fifteen-year-old daughter, Lucy Waller Stephens (1823-1847), who was to marry Alexander Franklin Hughes in 1842. Return.

A nephew, Columbus Herndon, son of Leonard's sister, Mary Waller Stephens (1789-1869), and Benjamin Herndon (1786-1839). He was in his twenties at this date; he is said to have died young. Ryle, 291. Return.

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This page updated 10 October 2002.