18 November 2012

Stone Takes His Case to the Paper


Apparently Isaac Stone wrote a letter to the Ontario [New York] Republican to make his case that he was not at fault in the burning of St. Davids, Ontario, on 18 July 1814. This letter was dated 10 days later and was copied by other newspapers in the area, including the one where this image was located on  Genealogybank.com

According to Stone's letter (reproduced below) he was given orders to retire the day after the incident--19 July 1814. None of the volunteers are listed, but it is reasonable to conclude that Rufus D. Stephens was one of them as he was in Stone's unit. 

Date: Saturday, August 20, 1814  

Paper: New Hampshire Sentinel (Keene, NH)  obtained on  Genealogybank.com. 

For now, we'll put the research on Stone on hold as it does not appear that it will yield any information on Rufus D. Stephens. But it certainly has been interesting and I'll be certain to search for commanding officers of other family members in the future.

Note--a careful reading of the claim Rufus D. Stephens submitted for his horse mentions that the horse was taken by order of the assistant adjutant general on 19 July 1814. Interesting date, given the incident in St. Davids the day before.

We'll have an update on the horse claim in a future post.