BIRTH, HOME, MARRIAGE, CONVERSION.
Rebecca Gould, afterwards Rebecca Steward, was born in Gouldtown on the 2d of May, 1820. But Gouldtown a half century ago was not what it is now. It was then almost unbroken forest. The early childhood of this family was passed in a rude little log house, in which one room answered for kitchen, dining-room, parlor and bed-room for eleven souls.
A brave and stalwart father, a slight and sickly mother, seven girls, and two boys, made up that household. A little uncomfortable school house, answering on the Sabbath for church, was the only public building known. In such circumstances, grew up this family; the children early learning to work in the fields and in the woods, girls and boys, very much alike, getting now and then a few months in school, and working occasionally in other families. Thus they learned quite early the stern realities of life.
This home, though rude, was the abode of good cheer, in which the wayworn traveler and especially the minister of the gospel, always found a welcome.
Let me picture it as it lives in my earliest recollections. The log-house had then given way to one of frame scarcely larger, and this was old. The heavy oaken door painted red swung lazily on its hinges, and the leather latch string answered for a knob. In one corner of the room stood an ancient corner cupboard, with its glass doors and abundant carvings; in another the old clock, with its two brothers clasped in affectionate embrace on its front; the fire place and the innovation of a ten plate stove, occupied one side of the room; while opposite, stood the old table, with its legs terminating in dragon's feet, from which I have crept away in terror many times, imagining that the cloth concealed some hideous beast. A long settee and a few rush bottom chairs completed the furniture.
My earliest recollections carry me to this house; to the well that stood before it; to the old pear tree and apple tree near by. But clearest in my memory are the white bread, the rich butter and sweet milk, that "Grandmother" dealt out to her hungry juvenile visitors with such liberal hand. Oh, how peaceful and sweet appear the beginnings of life when we look back upon them from the smoking perilous battle field of manhoods labors.
At nineteen years of age, Rebecca Gould was sought and won in marriage by James Steward. He was then a young man of promise, a steady and thrifty mechanic, having worked nine years in the Cumberland Nail and Iron works. He had been reared practically an orphan, his mother having gone to San Domingo, doubtless with an intention of one day returning. She never returned; and thus his last earthly relative, so far as he knew, departed. Alone he battled his way up. Providence, however, ultimately gave him a home in the family of Elijah Gould, father of Rev. T. Gould, where he remained until twenty-one. At twenty-four years of age he took to his side Rebecca Gould and the twain became one.
Of James Steward and Rebecca, were born six children, viz: Margarette, William, Mary, Theophilus Gould, Alice, and Stephen Smith.
Permit me henceforth to speak of this couple as my father and mother, and I beg the reader to pardon me, if I should manifest a degree of love and respect, which may seem to him somewhat partial.
I write, I trust, as a man who feels that there can be no nobler sentiment than real filial love.