Biography of G W Stevenson, Greene Co, AR

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Submitted by: Michael Brown
        Date: 5 Sep 1998
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
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Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Northeast Arkansas

page 174

G. W. Stevenson has attained wealth as a planter and stock raiser by honest
labor, and is a gentleman who commands the respect and esteem of all who know him. He
was born in the year 1831, in Giles County, Tenn., and is the youngest [p.174] in a
family of ten children born to Elem and Lydia (Payne) Stevenson, both natives of the
“Old North State.” They were married there and at an early day moved to Tennessee,
locating in Giles County, where the father opened up quite an extensive farm and was
a large slaveholder. He died in 1876 at the age of ninety-one years, having been a
minister of the gospel for sixty-seven years, being the oldest one in Middle
Tennessee at the time of his death. His wife died in 1874 at the age of eighty-nine
years. The paternal grandfather was born in Ireland, and was one of the early
settlers of North Carolina, and a soldier in the Revolutionary War. The maternal
grandfather, also born in the Emerald Isle, was an early resident of North Carolina,
and was a soldier in the Revolutionary War. G. W. Stevenson was reared to manhood in
Middle Tennessee, and received his education in Forest Hill Academy, and Giles
College, at Pulaski. At the age of twenty-one years he began teaching school, and has
followed this occupation very successfully up to the present time, being also engaged
in tilling the soil and raising stock. He was married in Lincoln County, Tenn., May
29, 1855, to Miss M. J. Thorp, who was born in that county, and is a daughter of Joel
and Elizabeth (Osborne) Thorp, who were also Tennesseeans. The father was a wealthy
planter and died in 1847, still survived by the mother. In 1861 Mr. Stevenson
enlisted in Company A, Eleventh Tennessee Cavalry, and was mustered into service at
Nashville, afterward participating in the battles of Corinth, Iuka, Chickamauga, and
others of minor importance. He served as a scout for some time, and after the war
returned to Tennessee, emigrating in 1884 to Greene County, Ark., where he is now
residing on a farm of 200 acres, 123 of which are under cultivation. He is interested
in buying, selling and raising stock. He is a stanch Democrat in politics, and was
elected by that party to the office of county treasurer, and also to the office of
justice of the peace. Socially he belongs to the I. O. O. F., Paragould Lodge No. 13,
of which order he has been a member for over forty years, having passed all the
chairs, and was grand lecturer of West Tennessee. He is chaplain in the A. F. & A.
M., and also belongs to the Center Hill Wheel. He and wife are members of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and are the parents of eight children, five of
whom are living: Margaret Alice (Mrs. Huckabay), Louisa A. (Mrs. Dover). William
Ernest, Ulpian Baker and Mollie Ann Barter. Mr. Stevenson has been identified with
the county's interests for many years, and has always been an advocate of churches,
schools and temperance. He was the first examiner of Greene County.