Robert Amasa Stephenson
Robert Amasa Stephenson is a prominent and successful physician and surgeon of Manchester. He was born near Ripley, Brown County, Ohio, August 11, 1838, and comes of a family of Irish origin, which was established in America about 1750, its representatives settling in Sussex County, Delaware. Captain John Stephenson, the great-grandfather of our subject, commanded a sailing vessel which made trips between the Emerald Isle and Atlantic ports in the United States. His family lived in this country, and his son William, when a youth of seventeen years, ran away from home to avoid going on a sea voyage with his father.
William Stephenson afterwards settled in Pennsylvania, near the town of York, where he married. At the breaking out of the Revolution, he joined the Colonial army and served until American independence was achieved, after which he removed with his family to Fort Duquesne, now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he resided for several years. About 1793, he joined a party of emigrants destined for Limestone, now Maysville, Kentucky. Among the number was a Mr. Kilpatrick with his two motherless little girls. During the trip Kilpatrick was killed by an attacking party of Indians, and William Stephenson took charge of and cared for the orphans. One of them afterwards became the wife of his son, Colonel Mills Stephenson. The party proceeded to the town of Washington, founded by the noted Indian scout of that day. Simon Kenton. William Stephenson remained in Kentucky until 1798, when he crossed the Ohio and located his land warrant for services in the Revolution, on Eagle Creek, in Adams, now Brown County, where he erected a cabin and passed the remainder of his eventful career.
On reaching manhood, Colonel Mills Stephenson married Miss Kilpatrick, as above stated, and settled on a farm near his father. He was a leading spirit in Southern Ohio in affairs of business and politics, and in the second war with England served with the rank of Colonel, and built old Fort Stephenson, named in his honor, the post so heroically defended afterwards by young Croghan, where now stands the town of Fremont, Ohio. Colonel Stephenson was one of the early Sheriffs of Adams County before the formation of Brown County. He afterwards became interested in the milling business near Ripley, and built and ran flatboats from that point to New Orleans. On one of these trips he contracted a fever and died at Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1823. Colonel Stephenson and his first wife had born to them the following children; Ephriam, who died in childhood; Elzabeth, who married Thomas Wallace, of Ottawa, Illinois; Charlotte, who died at the age of twenty years; Young, who became a steamboat captain on the Ohio, and who, during the Mexican War, was in the employ of the Government, transporting supplies from New Orleans to Matamoras, Mexico, where he died in 1847; and Lemuel, a steamboat engineer, who followed the river for years. In 1857, he quit the river and opened a hotel in Catlettsburg, Kentucky, where he died in 1862.
Robert Prettyman Stephenson, the father of our subject, was born in Ripley, Ohio, June 22, 1801, and died February 23, 1884. His wife {nee Mary Wallace) passed away August 13, 1883. They were married September 23. 1819. and had seven children.
Robert A. Stephenson, whose name heads this record, spent his childhood days at the old homestead, and in September. 1861, entered the United States Army as a medical cadet. He was then stationed at Georgetown. D. C, where he remained until September, 1862. when he entered Jefferson Medical College. Philadelphia, graduating from that institution in 1863. He soon after was made Assistant Surgeon, and was assigned to duty with the Sixty-ninth Regiment, Ohio Volunteers, then at Murfreesboro, Tennessee. He thus served until May, 1865, when he was commissioned Surgeon and almost immediately afterwards appointed Brigadier Surgeon by General George P. Buell. At the close of the war, he was mustered out at Camp Dennison, Ohio, July 25, 1865. While in front of Atlanta, on the twelfth of August, 1864, he was severely wounded in the head by a piece of shell, and yet suffers from the injury. He was present at all the engagements in which the Sixty-ninth Regiment participated after April 20, 1863, and did much good service in healing the wounds and allaying the pains of those that rebel lead had injured. At the close of the war, Dr. Stephenson returned to the private practice of his profession, locating in Bentonville, Adams County, where he remained until 1873. In that year he removed to Manchester, where he has resided ever since, engaged in the successful labors of his cbosen profession.
In politics the Doctor has always been a Jeffersonian Democrat, and when Cleveland became President, was appointed by him United States Examining Surgeon on the Board of Pension Examiners for Adams County, serving until 1889. He was again appointed to the position in 1893, during President Cleveland's second administration. On November 7, 1899, he was elected Auditor of Adams County on the Democratic ticket, and now holds that responsible position.
The Doctor was married October 27, 1867, to Miss Arcada Hopkins, daughter of William E. and Eliza ( Brittingbam) Hopkins. They had born to them William Prettyman, July 31, 1868; Mary, August 26, 1872; Robert Ellison, July 17, 1879, who was accidentally killed while duck hunting on Brush Creek Island, December 29, 1897; and Ralph, born May 16, 1884.
The Doctor is a member of the Masonic and Knights of Pythias Lodges, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and of George Collings Post, No. 432, G. A. R. He is a close student of his profession, an untiring worker, and his abilities, both natural and acquired, have placed him in the front rank among his professional brethren in Adams County. In stature, he is above the medium, strongly knit frame, inclined to corpulency, of vital-sanguine temperament, a rather strong face, and withal good personal appearance. He is sociable and courteous in his daily intercourse with his fellow men, and active and earnest in all matters pertaining to the advancement of the community in which he resides.
From History of Adams County, Ohio from its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time - by Nelson W. Evans and Emmons B. Stivers - West Union, Ohio - Published by E. B. Stivers - 1900