Memories of Elizabeth and Charles at the time of their deaths

Unfortunately, there is a gap without many life details from the last letter of 1849 from cousin Louise to the 40th anniversary in 1890, of all the years in Sherman, Connecticut where Elizabeth Radford Evans is a mother, a farm wife  -- who was she, what was her life like?  We have some hints from her own writing.

Evans farm on Evans Hill Road in Sherman, Connecticut

After she died 5 December 1915, a former minister from the 45 years she was in Sherman, Connecticut and his wife each sent her children a letter of condolences from where they were working in Cuba.
These two condolence letters give us a hint of life in Sherman ... she was more than an unknown isolated country woman just caring for her children and working on the chores that helped to keep a farm family going.

To the Children of Mrs. Elizabeth H. Evans, 
Dear Friends:  
  The news has come to us of the home going of your beloved Mother.  
  You have a double reason for gratitude to God.   1st: For having given you such a noble gifted Mother, and also for having  spared her to you for so many years.  
   Many of Gods gifts to his Children are repeated.  He gives us a Mother's  love, and care but once, as if to teach us how choice it is.  During her  long friendship, stretching through over forty years, I have been  impressed by her many qualitites of mind and heart, her unshaken faith in God, her personal love for her Savior, her quiet unostentatious devotion to duty, and her capacity for true lasting disinterested friendships were  noticeable the light of her christian fidelity.

   I have afar from the hill of Sherman in the home she loved so well and  made sacred by her gracious presence and loving service.  
   My pastoral calls included frequent visits at her home where we always  received a hearty welcome.  We enjoyed our interviews and her conversations, which were uplifting and inspiring.  
   Her cheerful optimism impressed me.  She looked on the bright side of  everything and saw the best in every life, and that sweet smile which was  the expression of her joyful sould life, she carried with her into the  presence of her Lord with whom she walked by faith.

Nor do I forget her  kind and devoted companion and his pure quiet, unselfish life.  Theirs  was an ideal married life.  
   What maternal pride characterized her.  The mother heart followed with  tender love, each child as they went forth to form new homes and enlarged  to take in the grandchildren who will now miss her love and counsels.  
   She was a fine example of New England Christian womanhood.  We saw those  ideal puritan virtues in her life.  Reverence for sacred things,  conscientious and unselfish love of country, honest, uprightness perfect  veracity.  High ethic ideals, and all irradiated by a supreme affection  for God, and a sympathetic love for humanity.  May her blessing abide  with you all.  The most precious legacy she has left is the memory of  what she was, and did.  
  “How these holy memories cluster 
   Like the stars when storms are past, 
   Pointing us to that far Heaven 
   We too hope to reach at last." 

  You could not have wished her to tarry longer in the worn out tabernacle  undermined by the increasing weakness of old age.  
   She awaits your coming over there, where sighs give place to Psalms, and  the aged are forever young.  Mortality has been swallowed of life.  
    Doubtless you all recall the Thanksgiving days and the happy family reunions of the ended years, how she waited to welcome each and every one, with a love that stronger given with the added years.  
   And how you can look forward with a hope that never grows dim to the  family gathering younder and know that the Mother heart still yearns to  meet and welcome you all to the Thanksgiving Feast of Heaven.  
  May God in his infinite love grant this to you and his consolation and  peace.  
   This in loving sympathy,  
Rev. E.P. Herrick  

Thanksgiving 1894 in the house on Evans Hill Rd that Rev. Herrick mentioned in his condolence letter above.
Elizabeth and Charles are here along with their children and grandchildren.

Rev. Herrick's wife, Amelia also wrote a condolence letter.  The family typed a copy and shared carbon copies.

December 14, 1915 
Dear Friends:  
  It seems very hard for me to realize the active brain and warm heart of  your mother is no longer residing in the body on this earth.  For so many  years I have felt her to be a living, acting friend, one to whom I appealed for so many different things.  In sickness and death she was a strong tower.  Then when I came from the South with my family of boys,  what a help she was those summers when I had no help and no stove for  proper cooking.  No one ever made such brown bread and biscuits and doughnuts.  Then when I wanted to know of the new books, it was to your  mother I went, and she so often supplied me with reading.  You have so much to be proud of in your strong-minded, noble-hearted mother, and the  generations that follow her must have something of her talent and  character.  
   I always miss her in the old home, and shall miss her more now she is really gone to the other side -- the unknown home you and I will enter before long.  Each year the number increases of the forever-absent  friends, whom we cannot reach with our Christmas greetings, and we miss the name as we make out our list.  But how much happier for them to be  numbered with the redeemed ones who are where sorrow and sighing forever  fled away.  
  With your great sympathy for all of your family, and with love to each  member.  
Very Sincerely yours, 
Amelia G. Herrick 
In memory of Mrs. Elizabeth Evans, 
died Dec. 5, 1915. Age 91 and 11 mo.  December 15, 1915  

Reading these letters gives one the feeling of her as a beloved personal friend who knew how to reach out to others at just the right time (food, friendship, strength) and information on the books you ought to be reading!

Daughter and mother together.
Augusta Evans Bristol and Elizabeth Radford Evans in front of Augusta' home.

The obituary for Elizabeth:
Mrs. Elizabeth Evans passed away, Saturday night, at the home of her son, Charles H. Evans, in Gaylordsville.  She would have been 91 years old, had she lived until January.  She was a woman of great loveliness of character.  Two sons, Charles H. Evans of Gaylordsville, and Edward Evans  of Great Barrington, Mass. and two daughters, Mrs. Agusta Bristol, of  Milford, and Mrs. Grace Olmstead of Newtown, survive her.  The funeral  took place on tuesday afternoon from the residence of Mr. Evans of  Gaylordsville.

The obituary says she died in Gaylordsville at her son's home, but her death certificate was issued by Great Barrington and said she died in Great Barrington.

Her husband Charles Evans died on 4 December 1903 -- 12  years before her.

Charles Evans heading up Evans Hill Rd to their farm.

Rev. Herrick wrote to the family then too.

To the children of the Late Charles Evans-- 
Dear Friends-- 
   was made very sad when I heard of the illness of your beloved father and longed to hear that his precious life was to be lengthened but when I  learned the golden bowl was broken I felt keen sorrow for he was dear to  me -- a man whom I have known, admired and loved for over twenty years  --  Few children are favored with such parents --- May the life of your  dear mother be long continued.  Your father possessed many choice  qualities of mind and heart that endeared him to us all.  He was a keen  intellect  -- a memory well stored with interesting and profitable  information.  A kindly heart that throbbed with sympathy for all troubled  and needy men.  He had great descriptive powers and a choice flow of  interesting anecdotes of persons and events reaching into the long gone  past.  I recall some of the vivid word pictures which he drew so well--  all unconscious of his own gifts for he was one of the most modest and  unassuming of men.  I know of no man more competent to have written a  book on the early history of Sherman and its prominent citizens.  The law  of kindness was in his heart a born humorist-- a veritable wit-- his  deliverance of human foibles and failings never lead to wounding of  sensitive feelings.  His presence brought sunshine and good cheer -- his  wise counsel and cherry suggestions were always timely and helpful.  He  was free from osterlatim  -- self seeking and conceit -- quick to see and  appreciate what was good in others and speak of it.  I do not need to  speak of what he was as a husband and father -- it was touching to see  his deep love for you all and his paternal pride in our success.   Reticent as to his own spiritual beliefs and experiences -- yet was  reverential and appreciative of all things pertaining to religion.  We  felt we were in the presence of a good man.  Who put character before  creed and right living before outward professions -- one who guarded his  words and let his example rather than his lips tell what he was.  A noble  heart was slitted on the day when he went home -- he longed to go and god  granted the wish of the tired pilgrim.  He wrapped the draperies of his couch about him and lay down to pleasant dreams.  May the holy memories  he has left be ever your inspiration.  

   How delightful were those old  family gatherings in the old house on the hill.  How pleasant to look  forward to the Thanksgiving of Heaven when all your journeys ended, you  will all meet and be forever with him and forever with the Lord. To your father God I commend all your children  
Yours sincerely -- 
E.P. Herrick 
Matangar Cuba 
Dec. 28 -- 1903

You might recall, that the newspaper profile of couples of Great Barrington who were married more than 50 years, was written just 3 months before Charles died.






Two lives well-lived as told by the people who knew them.


©Erica Dakin Voolich 2014
The link to this post is http://genea-adventures.blogspot.com/2014/05/memories-of-elizabeth-and-charles-at.html

Elizabeth and Charles Evans' Aniversaries

As I've been sharing information on Elizabeth Radford Evans (her newspaper profile, recipient of letters from her cousin Louise, author of poetry & letters), keep in mind that she married Charles Evans in January 1850.  The actual date of the marriage, seems to be a bit fuzzy.  The vital record I received from the Middlebury Town Clerk say 15 January 1850 which is a xerox of the page of the minister's journal.  Mount Holyoke Seminary's alum records say she was married on the 16th.  Her story below, says the 16th.  The published vital records for Middlebury Connecticut where they married, says they were married on the 14th or 15th.  How they ever met, has yet to be discovered, she lived in Middlebury and he lived in Sherman, 26 miles away.


The gem below she wrote describing their 40th anniversary celebrations, 16 January 1890 -- both the one they planned and the surprise one:

Written by Elizabeth Evans at the time 
of her 40th wedding anniversary-
Gaylordsville Jan. 16th 1890
    And it came to pass when Zachery 
Taylor ruled over the land, there dwelt 
in the east country one Elizabeth of 
the family of Beers.  And there came to 
that place one Charles whose surname 
was Evans, and he took Elizabeth for 
his wife and she went with him to 
his home in the land beyond the 
river even the Housatonic and they 
dwelt there-  And sons and daughters 
were born unto them.  The sons took 
to themselves wives and dwelt in the 
north country and the daughter 
dwelt in the south.  And when two 
score years were past, Elizabeth said 
to her husband, “Lo this forty years 
have we dwelt together, let us make 
a feast and invite our children and 
grand children that we may rejoice 
together” and the saying pleased him 
and he said “Do even as thou wilt.”  
And they sent this message to their 
sons who dwelt in the north “Come 
to us on the sixteenth day of they first 
month and bring with you your 
wife and your children” and they 
answered “We will come” and to the 
daughter was sent a like message and 
she said “we will come.”
     Now there was in the land one Susan 
who had dwelt there many years and  
had known Charles from his birth.  She 
was also one of the first to welcome 
Elizabeth when she was a stranger 
in the land.  When she heard of the feast 
she called her children and neighbors 
together and said to them “Lo these many 
years have this couple have dwelt in 
our midst, let us go in a company 
to their house and surprise them and 
let us carry a present to them and thus 
saying pleased her friends and they 
said “We will do so.”

    Now when the day had come the 
children and grand children assembled 
together and one Julia (who was at the 
marriage) and Henry her son and he 
that ministered to this people and his 
wife and children and twenty and 
one did dine there and all enjoyed 
themselves and one Nelson brought 
verses that the minister read before 
them.  And when the evening was 
come and they who could not spend 
the night had departed and the 
children were in bed there was a 
knocking at the door.  When Elizabeth 
opened the door it, there was Susan 
and some of her neighbors who had 
come on foot and with oxen and 
had brought with them baskets of 
things to eat that none might say 
“Where shall we get food for this great 
company” and they spake pleasant 
words to Charles and Elizabeth and 
wished them many days even a 
golden wedding.
    And Anna the daughter of Susan 
made coffee and prepared supper 
and when all was ready a small 
table was placed before Charles and 
Elizabeth and John whose sur-
name was Duncan put a lighted 
lamp there-on and he made a 
nice speech, saying the lamp was 
a present from the neighbors given 
with love and good wishes and 
hoping as age dimmed their eyes
the light of the lamp would remind 
them of the love that would be a 
comfort to them as they pass on 
toward the end of life’s journey.  
They were so astonished they could 
only say “Thank you” but in their 
hearts they will remember the 
kindness of the neighbors and bless 
them for their friendship.  
And at midnight they departed 
every one to his own home.  

     Now the rest of the acts of the company. 
How they raced for potatoes and 
attached a candle appendage to 
the donkey and other things they did 
are they not written in chronicles of 
Giddings St?

Sounds like they had quite the party that night in Sherman with their neighbors  after their family who couldn't stay over went home.  The Evans home on Evans Hill Road was in Sherman, as were the Evans homes on Giddings St, so I'm not sure why it is called Gaylordsville here and in the next article.

Fast forward 13 more years, where their long marriage was celebrated in The Great Barrington Courier (where they had moved in their old age to be nearer their sons, Charles H and Edward).

This article appeared just 3 months before Charles died at age 83.
The Courier (vol. LXIX, page 1, 3 September 1903) extolled "the Berkshire Hills region being especially favorable to longevity and conducive to dispositions"

“I. MR. AND MRS. CHARLES EVANS, GREAT BARRINGTON. 

   Mr. and Mrs. Evans are an adopted 
son and daughter of Great  Barring-
ton, having been residents here for 
the past four years.    Prior  to that 
they lived here for several winters.  
The celebration of their fiftieth 
wedding anniversary occurred at 
their home on Rosseter street Tues
-day, January 23, 1900, a few days 
later than it naturally would have  
been because of illness on the part 
of Mr. Evans.  The event was no-
-table  in that for the second time 
there was a reunion of all the chil-
dren and  grandchildren, of the latter 
of whom there were four more to 
participate  in the second than in the 
first family gathering.   
     Charles Evans and Elizabeth Brad-
ford [Radford] were married in  Middlebury,
Conn., May 16, 1850 [January], the ceremony 
occurring at the  early hour of six 
o'clock in the morning.  Neither the 
clergyman or anyone present at the 
ceremony, the bride and groom ex-
cepted, is now  alive.  Most of the 
married life of Mr. and Mrs. Evans 
was lived at  Gaylordsville, Conn.; 
where Mr. Evans followed the  occu-
pation of a farmer, and also did more 
or less work as a carpenter. 
    He was the youngest and is the 
only survivor of a family of nine  
children, while his wife is also the only 
survivor in a family of four children.  
Both are in fairly good health, Mrs. 
Evans in particular.  She  is the 
possessor of a vigorous mind and 
takes an active interest in the Thurs-
days Morning Club meetings and in 
current affairs generally.  Mr.  and 
Mrs. Evans have sons and daughters 
as follows:  Messrs. Charles H.  and 
Edward Evans, the well known con-
tractors of this village; Mrs. Samuel  
G. Bristol, Milford, Conn.; Mrs. 
Edward Olmsted, Danbury, Conn.; 
Mrs. D.  H. Bronson, Beacon Falls, 
Conn., and Mrs. Charles Edwards, 
Seymour Conn.   Besides these they 
have 13 grandchildren."  

I think the month of their wedding listed above is a typo.  Here it is listed as MAY 16th instead of January.  The family celebrated in January, delayed a few days because of the health of Charles Evans.  I'm not sure what the first celebration referred to actually was; maybe their 40th anniversary party.
We know that Mrs Evans [Elizabeth] is in particularly good health, is busy with the Thursday Morning Club and current affairs.  He would die in three months, she in a dozen years hence.

This story raises a question:  why would anyone get married at 6 AM?
Any ideas?

Beers Radford (1784-1876)

After their wedding in January 1850, it appears that Elizabeth continued to live with her elderly father, Beers Radford and is listed as "Elizabeth Radford" not "Elizabeth Evans" in the census.  When the US Census was taken in September 1850, she is listed living with her widowed father in Middlebury CT, and Charles is listed as living with his older sister Lydia Evans in Sherman CT.  Since their first child was born in October 1851, they did move together after that census was taken.

©Erica Dakin Voolich, 2014

The link to this post is http://genea-adventures.blogspot.com/2014/05/elizabeth-and-charles-evans-aniversaries.html

Elizabeth in her own words!

After thinking of Elizabeth Radford Evans as the silent correspondent who received the letters from her cousin Louise in upstate New York describing the life of an an 1840s woman and
of Elizabeth Radford Evans as an elderly woman, profiled for her memory of multiple presidential campaigns and up to date on current events; we have a few things written by Elizabeth herself which give us a hint as to who Elizabeth was.  She might be busy with the chores of a mother and farm wife, but her mind was working too!

ππππππ

At some point she was in a reading circle.   There is no year included in her minutes for the meeting but the minutes themselves give a hint.

     And it came to pass in
the 3d month on the 16th day thereof
that some members of the Reading
Circle met at the house of Gay 
whose surname is Buckingham.
     And the president said let
order prevail among you.
      And he further said as our
Scribe is not with us, choose
ye one who shall perform his
duties at this time, and the
mother of the absent scribe was
chosen and she read unto them
the report of the last meeting
and the members approved thereof.
     And the president read from 
the book wherin is written of
Mexico and its conquest by the
Spaniards.
     Then a recess was had, when

each held converse with his neigh
-bor, and stories were repreated
that the great temperance speak
er told the day before.
     After a time more was read
even about some distinguished
poets their manners and habits
and the scribe read of Miss
Flora McKlimsey who dwells in
the great city of Gotham and
though she owned 500 dresses still
had nothing to wear.
     And after that the president said we
will now adjourn till the 29th
day of this 3d month when we
will meet at the house of George
who dwelleth in the Straits and
they did so.
                    E. H. Evans
                           Scribe

I found a blog post about "the fictional 'Miss Flora McFlimsey of Madison Square' whose complaint was that she has 'nothing to wear.'"  She first appeared in Harper's Weekly in the 7 February 1857 issue.  The blog Secondat (Sunday 17 January 2010), includes the poem and magazine illustrations that date from 1857 to 1863 including Miss Flora McFlimsey.  That poem dates that Reading Circle meeting to that era, when Elizabeth was a mother and farm wife raising children in Sherman -- in 1857, she has two children 6 and 4; by 1863, three children 12, 10, and 4 and yet finds time to go to twice monthly meetings of the Reading Circle.

ππ

The family found poems she wrote and transcribed them to share among her descendants by typing them up using carbon paper.


             -: OUR WANTS
1 Man wants but little here below
     Nor want that little long
   Thus Goldsmith wrote long long ago
     But this is not my song

2  Our wants are many more than I
     In a short time can tell
   And if you should not hear them all
     It were perhaps as well.

3  A few of our most pressing wants
     To you I now will mention
   If for a little you will give
     To me a slight attention.

4  We want the house of worship here
     Where we have met tonight
   All covered o’er with coats of paint
     To make it nice and white.

5  And to the windows we want blinds
     Put up wihen this is done
   To help exclude the winters cold
     And heat of summer sun.

6 To pay for these we want the cash
     Greenbacks both new and old
    Stamps of Nationals will do
      And silver coin or gold.

7 Kind friends we want that you tonight
     Shall give at least a score
   Of dollars toward this last great want
     We’ll find no fault with more.

8 If with our exercises here
     You have been pleased then try
   To have the contribution now
     Your pleasure testify.

9 But, if your weary of it all
     And wished you’d staid away
   Call it a humbug if you like
     But don’t forget to pay.

Composed by Elizabeth Evans
    In year of 1862
Greenwood Lake, Orange Co. N.Y.

Not sure why she was fundraising for a church in New York state, possibly visiting or vacationing. Greenwood Lake is across the Connecticut border and south of Sherman, down on the NY/NJ border.

ππ

Poem Written by Grandmother Evans, found on the back of Y.M.C.A. Poster  (no date)

Wake up, turn over, yawn and sneeze 
The weathers changed -- my feet will freeze 
Oh dear, how thin the blankets are 
I wish I had another pair, 
But ere I could my wishes tell 
In Morpheus arms again I fell 
And neer before had such a train 
Of dreams passed through a troubled brain. 
I thought I wandered all alone 
Far northward in the Frigid zone 
The cold moon shone on all around 
And brightened up the snow-clad ground 
And still no sign of life was there 
And I was sinking in despair 
When my ear, distinctly fell 
The tinkling of a distant bell. 
and Lapplander with sledge and deer 
Upon that snow clad plane apprear 
But deaf is he to call and cry 
For alike the wind he passes by 
And I am left alone again.  

Whose turrets seem to touch the sky 
Rose to my view -- toward it I pressed 
Thinking her to find warmth and rest 
But turret high and heavy walls 
And spacious rooms and lengthly halls 
Were made of ice -- it might have been 
The plaything of the Russian Queen.  

No more a brilliant throng  
Of merry skaters sped along 
Now far apart -- now side by side they glide 
They move so swiftly and so light I think them spirits of the night I try to flee, 
theyre on my track 
They overtake and bring me back, 
Shivering I wake and leave the bed 
With chattering teeth and aching head, 
In haste I seek the warmth and light Made by the glowing anthracite.  

Waking up on a cold winter mooring and ending with seeking the warmth and light of burning anthracite coal.

ππ

Of course she wrote letters, but not many have survived, to my knowledge.

A letter written to Charles from his mother, no year given:

     Dec 1
My dear son
One would have thought if you was doing New Haven you would have visited the land of “Your ancestors”  They are in the crypt under the Center church.  Edward has been there--- Alling & his wife and son Fitch Alling-my grandmother was Hannah Alling- married to Timothy Higgins.  There daughter Harriet Higgins married Beers Radford, their daughter Elizabeth married Charles Evans so you see where you come in.
      I had written so much when I found my pen was dry so waited till Earl could fill it.  He did that for me though some one else would do it as well.  I dont remember the name of the first Alling neither did Edward so you will have to go to the Center church to find out.
[the rest of this letter is lost]

Here she is giving her son Charles H Evans the information on her ancestors who were settlers in New Haven, CT and where to find their tombs.  Too bad the rest of the letter didn't survive.

ππ

In a letter written to her 12-year-old granddaughter Alice Olmstead, she mentions her great granddaughter Marjorie Evans who was born 3 May 1913.  So this letter was written on 3 May 1914, a year and a half before she died:

      Sunday PM.
My dear Alice,
   It is so good that you can write letter when your mother is busy or has a headache or anything else to hinder her and I was pleased to hear from Newtown as I already am.   It is a lovely day.  I roded down to the street when Edward took your aunt Kathleen to church I don’t go to meeting as it not possible to hear much of the service it tires me to listen so intensely.  I presume E & L.W. & K and the baby have gone for a drive.  It will do Mrs Edward a deal of good.  She has been so confined and it has been such bad going the car has been out only a week but the ground is getting settled now.
While I think of it did your mother find my kid gloves and comb when she was cleaning house I thought they would come from somewhere sometime 
Have you sowed Sweet peas yet?  Edward has made no garden at all
Charlie sent me arbutus yesterday and it scents the room
Marjorie is one year old to.day.  I gave her a teaspoon, the boys a fork and her other grandmother a cup and grand mother Smith sent her a dollar.  She is very well but  has only three teeth.
I am glad to hear uncle Alan is away and better.   Of course he will be better if he gets away from old things and friends
something new to think about
Your mother says Wilbur isn’t well.  He ought to work out in school but hates to give it up now this last terms but there is nothing like working out of doors in this season.  So your father is a carpenter that is nice for him.  Your mother washes, irons, bakes and sews as usual making old clothes look like new and I hope her children appreciate all the work she does for them.
There is no news only Wooster has a car so K can go now.  She wanted him to get one two years ago so she could drive it but had their business then.
Love to all, 
from grandmother

This letter mentions various children and grandchildren.  Now, one of her children is doing well enough to own a car in 1914, which she mentions casually along with the day-to-day nitty gritty.  She does make a point of telling her granddaughter Alice to appreciate all her mother (Grace Evans Olmstead) does for her and her four siblings.  She is showing her age, 89: she finds the church services tiring and hard to hear, but otherwise, she clearly is still on top of things mentally.

All these writings by Elizabeth adds a bit of humanity.  She is not just the young woman school teacher receiving letters from cousin Louise, or the 88 year-old who has led a long life which she can tell fascinating stories about presidential campaigns (which only one was included in the paper).



Everything in this blog post was shared with me by my wonderful 2nd cousin once removed, Craig.   Thank you Craig!

©Erica Dakin Voolich, 2014
The link to this blog post is http://genea-adventures.blogspot.com/2014/05/elizabeth-in-her-own-words.html