Stow Family Added Papers, 1853-1893
Held by The Filson Historical Society
Creator: Stow Family
Title: Stow Family Added Papers, 1853-1893
Rights: For information regarding literary and copyright interest for these papers, contact the Collections Department.
Size of Collection: 0.33 cu. ft.
Location Number: Mss. A S891a
Biographical Note
The collection centers on the family of Uzziel Hayward Stow (1809-1890) and Catharine Manser Stow (1811-1899) of Switzerland County, Indiana. Uzziel and Catharine shared New England ancestral origins, as well as similar experiences migrating from western New York to southeastern Indiana as children in the late 1810s. Independently, their parents settled in Cotton Township, Switzerland County, Indiana in the early 1820s, and there Uzziel and Catharine ultimately met. They were married in 1834, and for the remainder of their lives resided at “Stowtown,” south of East Enterprise, Indiana. They had four children: Hiram S. Stow (1835-1853), Loring B. Stow (1838-1860), Viola A. Stow Dufour (1841-1912), and Baron P. Stow (1847-1864). Tragically, the three sons of the family all died young.
The Stows were farmers who by the 1850s were entering upon prosperity, due in part to the sheer industriousness of Uzziel Stow, and his pursuit of “improvement” in agricultural practice and technology. The family home was situated in the Ohio Valley, along one of the major inland transportation and migration routes of the day. The Stows were active members of the Methodist Episcopal Church and commentators on matters of importance to the church during the mid-19th century. Uzziel and Catharine are buried in the family cemetery at Stowtown.
For more information on Uzziel and Catharine Stow and their extended relations, consult the descendant charts and person reports in folders 3-6 of the Stow family papers [Mss. A S891].
Sources:
Ellen Stepleton notes on the origin of the Stow archive. [Mss. A S891 / 1]
Descendant charts and person reports. [Mss. A S891 / 3-6]
Scope and Content Note
This collection contains diaries, autograph albums, and a commencement oration belonging to members of the Stow family, Methodists and farmers in Switzerland County, Indiana in the 19th century. Materials date primarily from the 1850s and 1860s and document agricultural labor and housework, Protestant religious activities, social get-togethers, and sicknesses and deaths.
Volumes 1-3 are autograph books belonging to Viola Stow, daughter of Uzziel and Catharine Stow, and to Viola’s cousin Julia Stow. The albums contain notes and autographs of family members, fellow students, and friends. Viola’s two autograph albums begin in 1853 when she was 12 years old and cover her time as a student at Elizabethtown Female Seminary in Ohio from 1856-1860 and the years before and after her marriage to Frank Dufour in October 1862. Julia Stow’s autograph book spans her last half-year at Elizabethtown Female Seminary and her marriage in April 1860 to Lemuel Bledsoe.
Volumes 4-10 are diaries belonging to Catharine Stow, Uzziel Stow, and their children Loring, Viola, and Baron Stow dating from the mid-1850s through the mid-1860s. Catharine Stow’s 1854 diary documents the work and activities of family and hired laborers. It includes many entries chronicling her ailments as well as ones processing her grief after the death of her oldest son Hiram at college in December 1853. Uzziel Stow’s 1855, 1859-1860, and 1865-1866 diaries primarily document labor on the Stow farm. He also writes about sicknesses and deaths, his attendance at religious services and meetings, and his purchases from stores in nearby towns. Loring Stow’s diary, which opens in January 1860 when he was 21 years old, documents a flatboat trip he took down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to deliver hay to New Orleans. Less than a month after his return by steamboat, he died of typhoid fever on April 30. Viola Stow’s 1862 diary opens when she is 20 years old. She writes of her dislike of teaching and describes quilting work, social gatherings, news of Civil War battles in other states, sicknesses, and memories of her brother Loring’s death two years earlier. Baron Stow, whose 1862 diary opens when he is 14 years old, writes of news of Civil War battles, his days at school, his farm work, his attendance at religious services and events, and the early stages of his courtship with Anna Ogle. Folder 11 contains a commencement oration that seems to be in Viola Stow’s handwriting. If written by Viola, the address would have been prepared for the Elizabethtown Female Seminary graduation exercises in June 1859.
Folder 12 contains Ellen Stepleton’s notes about the collection, as well as transcriptions for volumes 4 and 7-9 and for folder 11. The finding aid on the Filson’s web site include links to PDF scans of the notes and transcriptions.
Related Collections:
Stow family papers [Mss. A S891].
Stow family photograph collection [018PC4 and 021PC24].
Folder List
Box 1
Volume 1: Autograph album of Viola Stow (Dufour), ca. 1853-1859, 1893 (click to access transcript)
Volume 2: Autograph album of Viola Stow (Dufour), 1859-1892 (click to access transcript)
Volume 3: Autograph album of Julia Stow (Bledsoe), 1858-1862 (click to access transcript)
Volume 4: Diary of Catharine Manser Stow, 1854 (click to access diary transcript and list of names appearing in the diary)
Volume 5: Diary of Uzziel Stow, 1855
Volume 6: Diary of Uzziel Stow, April 1859-January 1860
Volume 7: Diary of Loring Stow, January-April 1860 (click to access transcript)
Volume 8: Diary of Viola Stow, January-August 1862 (click to access transcript)
Volume 9: Diary of Baron Stow, 1862 (click to access transcript)
Volume 10: Diary of Uzziel Stow, January 1865-January 1866
Folder 11: Commencement oration attributed to Viola Stow, ca. 1859 (click to access transcript)
Folder 12: Notes and transcriptions
Subject Headings
Agricultural exhibitions – Indiana.
Agricultural laborers – Indiana.
Agriculture – Indiana.
American Party.
Autograph albums.
Bledsoe, Julia C. Stow, 1843-1865.
Canning and preserving.
Cattle.
Clothing and dress.
Christians – Indiana.
Commerce – United States.
Consumer goods.
Courtship – Indiana – 19th century.
Cross-dressing.
Death – Psychological aspects.
Dentistry – Indiana.
Diseases – Indiana.
Dufour, Viola Stow, 1841-1912.
Elections – Indiana.
Elizabethtown Female Seminary (Elizabethtown, Ohio).
Falls of the Ohio (Ky. and Ind.) – Navigation.
Farm equipment – Indiana.
Flatboats.
Fourth of July celebrations.
Gender expression.
Guerrillas – Confederate States of America.
Hay trade.
Housekeeping – Indiana.
Indiana – Social life and customs – 19th century.
Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865 – Assassination.
Medical care – Indiana.
Methodists – Indiana.
New Orleans (La.) – Description and travel.
Orchards – Indiana.
Pets.
Physicians – Indiana.
Quilts.
River boats.
Schools – Indiana.
Schools – Ohio.
Sewing.
Singing schools – Indiana.
Slavery.
Solar eclipses – 1854.
Southern states – Description and travel.
Stow, Baron, 1847-1864.
Stow, Catharine Manser, 1811-1899.
Stow, Loring B., 1838-1860.
Stow, Uzziel Hayward, 1809-1890.
Sugar crops – Indiana.
Swine.
Teachers – Indiana.
Temperance – Indiana.
Thompson, Josiah C., 1841-1930.
United States – History – Civil War, 1861-1865.
Women – Education.
Women household employees.
