#52Ancestors - Week 10

Prompt – Strong Woman

Deborah Stephens – 4th great grandmother

How fitting that the name Deborah is Hebrew for queen bee, warrior. Deborah was a Hebrew
warrior. Deborah Stephens is my family warrior. She is a woman of great strength, resilience,
leadership, and encouragement.

Deborah was one of ten children born to Robert and Abigail (Davis) Stephens in 1805 in Dana,
Worcester County, Massachusetts. Her life story stretches from Massachusetts, to Erie County,
New York to Detroit, Michigan and finally to Iowa. She married three times and raised 14
children!

At the age of five, her family moves from Dana, Massachusetts to the town of Wales in western
New York. Why the family decided to move and the route they took is unknown. One can
speculate that Erie county, New York was on the western fringe of the United States and the
desire for farm land was a draw but also the building of the Erie Canal could also been a pull.

In 1822 Deborah married Joel Davis. And in the next eleven years they had eight children. In
1835, a year after Deborah birthed her 8th child, her three -year-old daughter Elnora died and
two months later her husband, Joel Holmes Davis, died. There is no record of cause of death
but cholera was prevalent in the 1830’s. We also know by census records that Deborah loses
two more sons during the 1830’s.

Deborah proceeds to raise her five remaining children living next door to her brother and his
family. Then in 1847 Deborah has decided to travel to Detroit, Michigan to marry Benjamin
Lapham and raise his six children who are all under the age of 12. I’m not sure how she met
Benjamin Lapham but she left her home in Wales, New York, her parents and several siblings
and traveled to Michigan to start a new family taking her eldest child, Margaret Ann Davis, my
3rd great grandmother and her youngest child Clark Adarastus Davis with her.

From 1847 till 1860 several of Deborah’s children and step-children get married but in January
1860 her second husband, Benjamin Lapham died and shortly after his death her daughter
Rhoda died and her oldest daughter, Margaret Davis Larkins, died in 1866. From 1861-1865 her
two sons plus all four step-sons fought in the Civil War with her step-son, George Lapham,
dying at Gettysburg and her youngest son, Clark Davis, dying in June 1864 at City Point, Virginia.
This woman who outlived three husbands, seven of her siblings and six of her children can truly
be called a family warrior. She had to be a woman of great strength and resilience. The last
record I have of Deborah she is living in Montgomery County, Iowa with her son Lewis and his
second wife. Deborah cannot be found in the 1880 census thus she probably passed and is
buried in Iowa. Her last two children, Lewis died in 1891 and Isaac died in 1895.