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Winfield Scott Ebey papers, 1849-1919

Overview of the Collection

Creator
Ebey, Winfield Scott, 1831-1865
Title
Winfield Scott Ebey papers
Dates
1849-1919 (inclusive)
Quantity
4.35 cubic ft. (9 boxes)
4 microfilm reels : positive
Collection Number
0127 (Accession No. 0127-001)
Summary
Papers documenting the Ebeys' overland journey from Missouri to Washington and the affairs of Winfield Scott Ebey, an early Washington lawyer, farmer, and prospector, and other family members in Washington Territory.
Repository
University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections
Special Collections
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, WA
98195-2900
Telephone: 2065431929
Fax: 2065431931
speccoll@uw.edu
Access Restrictions

The collection is open to all users.

Request at UW

Additional Reference Guides

Languages
English
Sponsor
Funding for encoding this finding aid was partially provided through a grant awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities
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Biographical Note

Winfield Scott Ebey (1831-1865) left Plum Grove Place, Missouri in April 1854 and settled on Whidbey Island, Washington Territory. He followed his brother, Isaac Neff Ebey, who had taken out a claim on Whidbey Island in 1850 and became the first permanent white settler there. Isaac's wife, Rebecca, and sons, Eason and Ellison, had followed in 1852. Winfield was accompanied on his trip by his sisters, Mary and Ruth, parents Jacob and Sarah, and cousins George Beam and George Ebey, both of whom settled on Protection Island, located northwest of Port Townsend.

Isaac Ebey entered politics and quickly rose to prominence. Winfield benefited from his brother's influence. In 1853 Isaac was appointed Collector of Customer on Puget Sound; after Isaac successfully petitioned for removal of the port of entry from Olympia to Port Townsend, Winfield became Deputy Collector of Customer at Port Townsend. At the start of the Indian War in 1855, Winfield, Isaac and George Beam joined the Territorial Volunteers, but did not see a single hostile Indian during their military service. That same year Winfield was admitted to the territorial bar, appointed U.S. Deputy Marshall and made a delegate to the 1855 Democratic Territorial convention. He lost his bid for a seat in the territorial legislature in 1855, but he was elected the second Supervisor of Common Schools for Island County in 1857. News of gold strikes throughout the Northwest tempted Winfield, but he remained on Whidbey Island to look after his sick father while farming and practicing law. In 1862, following the deaths of his father and sister, Winfield and his brother-in-law Urban Bozarth departed for Oregon’s John Day River to pan for gold. Between 1862 and 1863, they made a small amount of money prospecting in the John Day area and the Powder River mining district. Winfield, however, developed tuberculosis, a disease which eventually killed him in 1865.

Isaac Ebey was killed and beheaded in 1857 on Whidbey Island by a band of Indians from British Columbia or Alaska, perhaps avenging the attack of tribal members at Port Gamble by a U.S. warship the prior year. Isaac’s eldest son, Eason, also entered politics. He was elected to his uncle’s former position, Supervisor of Common Schools, and served as Supervisor of Common Schools for Island County from 1868 to 1876 and as Island County’s delegate to the territorial legislature from 1876 to 1878. After his defeat for re-election, he concentrated his energies on managing the family land, which he rented to tenant farmers.

George Beam married Almira Ebey, the daughter of his cousin (and Winfield's sister) Mary Ebey. Almira and George farmed Jacob Ebey’s old claim and also rented land. Four years after George’s death in 1866, Almira moved to San Francisco with her children Arthur, Mary, and Edith. Arthur made a fair amount of money as a realtor in Hayward. Almira eventually married a San Francisco banker, Abraham Enos. Edith also married a banker, John Allan Park of San Leandro.

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Content Description

The Winfield Scott Ebey Papers contain correspondence, diaries, financial records, legal documents and scrapbooks documenting the Ebeys' overland journey from Missouri to Washington and the affairs of Ebey and other family members in Washington Territory.

The main body of accession 127-1 consists of Winfield Scott Ebey's papers. His diaries run from April 1854 to January 1864 with few gaps. It describes his journey from Missouri to Whidbey Island along the Mormon and Oregon trails, farming on Whidbey, his participation in the Indian War, his political ventures, and his efforts to find gold in Central Oregon. The diary was assigned volume numbers some time after Ebey's death, but the source of the numbers is unknown. The accession also contains Ebey’s correspondence from 1850 to 1865. As with all correspondence in this accession, incoming letters are sorted by author, while outgoing ones are arranged chronologically. The only exception is Ebey’s correspondence regarding prospecting for gold, which is kept in a separate subject series. Major correspondents include George Beam, George W.P. Ebey, Isaac Ebey, Francis A. Chenowith, George Corliss and J.J.H. Van Bokkelen.

The accession also includes two scrapbooks of newspaper clippings which report the financial dealings of Allan Park, Arthur Beam, and Abraham Enos and which retrospectively describe the Ebey family’s early years on Whidbey Island. These were probably compiled by George Beam's daughter, Edith Beam Park.

The papers also contain 19 subgroups, all but two of which are devoted to separate members of the Ebey family. Although some subgroups contain financial records, they are primarily composed of correspondence. The Isaac Neff Ebey subgroup includes Isaac's diary. Although the bound volume is a printed diary for 1851, many of the entries are dated 1858. A very small amount of correspondence deals with the Ebey family before it left Missouri. The correspondence of George Beam, Mary Wright Bozarth, Urban Bozarth, and Isaac Ebey primarily discusses the family’s first years on Whidbey Island. The contents of some of these letters are briefly summarized in notes held at the respository. However, the largest subgroups--those of Almira Wright Beam Enos, Abraham Enos, and Edith Beam Park--deal with the branch of the family that moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and are not summarized. These subgroups include some material on real estate and banking in the Bay Area, but are mostly letters between family members (including those still on Whidbey Island) during the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. There is also one subgroup of Ebey Family papers and one for the papers of M.V. Patrick Salmon.

Click here to link to a partial family tree of the Ebey family.

A 4-reel positive microfilm copy of the Winfield Scott Ebey Papers is also a part of this accession. The only portions of the papers not filmed are the newspapers and covers in Winfield Scott Ebey's personal papers.

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Other Descriptive Information

The Winfield Scott Ebey Papers have been previously cited as the Ebey Family Papers.

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Use of the Collection

Alternative Forms Available

View selections from this collection in digital format.

Alternative Forms Available

The Winfield Scott Ebey Papers are also available on positive microfilm, which is included as part of this accession.

Restrictions on Use

Photocopies of the Isaac Ebey diary must be made from the positive microfilm.

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Administrative Information

Custodial History

Winfield Scott Ebey's diaries were kept by his sister, Mary Ebey Wright. Mrs. Wright took the diaries and the Ebey family papers with her when she moved to California and passed them on to her daughter, Almira Beam Enos. Mrs. Enos in turned passed the papers on to her daughter, Edith Beam Park. Mrs. Park donated the papers to University of Washington historian Edmond Meany in the 1910s.

Acquisition Information

The University of Washington Libraries acquired Winfield Scott Ebey's papers and diaries from University of Washington professor Edmond Meany in 1929. Additional Ebey family papers were acquired from Robert Hawley in 1960.

Processing Note

The Winfield Scott Ebey Papers are a merger of accession 0127, materials acquired from Robert Hawley in 1960, and the materials acquired from Edmond Meany, an unnumbered accession.

Merger completed in 1994.

Separated Materials

A portion of the Beam Family's papers related entirely to Southern California were deposited in the University of California, Los Angeles, Library during the 1970s.

Seven photographs were transferred to the Ebey Family Photograph Collection in 2004.

Bibliography

Ebey's account of his overland journey from Missouri to Washington Territory has been published as Winfield Scott Ebey, The 1854 Oregon Trail Diary of Winfield Scott Ebey , ed. Susan Badger Doyle and Fred W. Dykes (Independence, MO.: Oregon-California Trails Association, c1997).

Extant diaries of Issac Ebey which are still held by his descendants and not part of this accession have been printed in Victor J. Farrar, ed., "Diary of Colonel and Mrs. I.N. Ebey [1852-3]," Washington Historical Quarterly 7 (1916): 239-49, 307-21 and 8 (1917): 40-62, 124-42and L.A. Kibbe, ed., "Diary of Colonel Isaac N. and Mrs. Emily Ebey, 1856-1857," Pacific Northwest Quarterly 33 (1942): 297-323.

Related Materials

The Bancroft Library at the University of California at Berkeley holds a manuscript of Winfield Scott Ebey's diary for the period April 27 to July 16, 1854.

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Detailed Description of the Collection

 


2011 (Last modified: 4/2/2020)

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