History of Swansea, Massachusetts, 1667-1917; - citizen hylbom blog

232 History of Sivansea
Company. Four years later he came to Swansea. The rural village offered
few opportunities to a Californian of those days and Mr. Stevens' natural
activity found a field for expression in the neighboring city of Fall River
and he soon became associated with its business interests, fUUng important
positions both as banker and manufacturer.
After a residence of twenty-six yeeirs in this town he was elected to the
Massachusetts Senate. It was said of him he had a rare combination of the
qualities which go to the making of a good legislator. He was at the head
of the committee on Federal Relations and practically shaped the poUcy
of the other important committees on Banks and Harbors of which he was
a member.
A memorial tribute paid him by a vote of the delegates of the fifteen
corporations of Fall River with which he was identified as President,
Treasurer and Trustee, perhaps, is a fitting close to this personal sketch :
"Mr. Stevens was a man of marked individuahty, strong force of
character, unconmaon business sagacity and of spotless integrity ; a man of
generous impulses, of broad hberality and systematic benevolence.
For a third of a century he had been largely interested in the
great industries of Fall River. From his wide and varied experience and
extended business interests he erected in this community a potent influence
for good and in his death it has sustained an irreparable loss.
We, his surrounding associates, appreciated the value of his wise
counsels and were often assisted through troublesome perplexities by his
cheery and inspiring personality, and have profited by his sound judgment,
executive abihty—and clear business insights."
Mr. Stevens' wife died in 1871. In 1873 he was married to Ehzabeth
Richmond Case, who is living at this writing, (1917). She and her sister
Mary A. Case, natives of this town are the surviving children of Joseph
and Eliza Gray Case and the eighth generation from William Case
who came from England in the seventeenth century and in this locality
he and many of his hneal descendants have hved.
The genealogy of the Case family from this ancestor is: William II
whose wife was Abigail; William III whose wife was Francis Davis;
William IV (1730-1777) was a resident of East Greenwich, F. I., and his
wife was Abigail Bell (1735-1836); his son was Joseph Case (1757-1843)
and his wife was Jane Kelton (1760-1843) and his son was Aaron Case
(1788-1871) and his mother was Lovina Pierce. (1792-1870). The last
named were the Grandparents of Mrs. Stevens and Miss Case. On the
maternal side they are the great grandchildren of Col. Peleg Sherman of the
Continental Army. His services to the Town are recorded in another place
in this history.
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