Clackamas-Multnomah County OR Archives Biographies.....Kelly, Rev. Clinton June 15, 1808 - 
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Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com May 4, 2007, 7:18 pm

Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company

     REV. CLINTON KELLY came to the northwest as one of its pioneer settlers. 
He was made of that stern stuff which was manifest in the frontiersmen who 
reclaimed the wild region and planted the seeds of civilization on the Pacific 
coast. Throughout his life he was actuated by an unfaltering faith in his 
Creator and he devoted much of his time to the ministry of the gospel. No 
record could be so complete and satisfactory as that written by a descendant, 
as follows:
     “Clinton Kelly was born in the wilds of Kentucky and grew up as rugged as 
his native mountains. Reared amid hardships, his labor-scarred hand grasped 
the hand of the humblest toiler and called him brother. He wore the garb of 
the lowly and his feet trod the by-ways of the poor; but his was a great soul 
that held daily converse with his God. If the tide of world-fret ever reached 
him it left him unruffled, for he had a great peace—the peace of God. It would 
be unseemly to offer him praise; he dwelt in an atmosphere above it. His 
biography is written in communities where he lived – upon the hearts of the 
people for whom he labored, but his interest in humanity was not confined to 
these; it extended to the outermost ledge of this old world of ours, wherever 
a human soul might be found. His heart was big enough to take in all.
     “Mr. Kelly was born on Clifty Creek, Pulaski county. Kentucky, June 15, 
1808. His father, Samuel Kelly, was born in Botetourt county, Virginia, 
February 7, 1776, and was the third son of Thomas Kelly, whose birth occurred 
near Philadelphia in 1742. The ancestral home was Castle Kelly, Ballinasloe, 
County Roscommon, Ireland. When a young man Thomas Kelly ran away from home to 
avoid being pressed into the English army. He settled in Virginia, and from 
here was recruited as a private in Captain Moore Fauntleroy’s troops, Fourth 
Pennsylvania Dragoons Continental Troops. He enlisted December 22, 1777, for 
three years, which enlistment he served out. About 1800, with his wife, Peggy 
(Biles) Kelly, and their family, he emigrated to Kentucky, settling in Pulaski 
County, where he died a few years later (1812) at the home of his son Samuel 
on Clifty Creek. His wife passed away in 1814.
     “Samuel Kelly, having arrived at years of maturity, was married September 
3, 1807, to Nancy Kennedy, a niece of General Kennedy, and they began their 
domestic life on Clifty Creek, seven miles from Somerset, Kentucky. There he 
erected two mills and manufactured flour, saltpetre, Epsom salts, turpentine, 
linseed oil and gun powder. Though he had no educational privileges in early 
youth, he became well versed in law and history.  His wife was a woman of 
unusual personality, of strong religious tendencies, enthusiastically 
supporting the Methodist Church and openly antagonistic to the use of liquor, 
then so common. Samuel Kelly died October 13, 1834, his wife surviving until 
the 26th of January, 1841. Their children were Clinton, Albert, Temperance, 
Gilby, Cyrene, Sena, Gilmer, Samuel, Rachel, Talitha and Thomas. Of these 
Clinton, Gilby, Albert and Samuel were itinerant ministers and Sena became the 
wife of Josiah Godbey, also a preacher.” (Clinton Kelly’s brothers—Albert, 
Gilmer and Thomas—also crossed the plains. Albert Kelly and his wife, Nira 
(Bingham) Kelly, settled in the Tualatin Valley. The Colonel Dosch home is on 
a portion of their homestead. Gilmer and Mary (Burns) Kelly, the latter a 
sister of the second wife of Clinton Kelly, took up their abode in Powell’s 
Valley after crossing the plains in 1852. Thomas Kelly married Christina 
Sunderland in Portland and later moved to the Wenas valley, in the Yakima 
country. All have descendants.)
     “Clinton Kelly spent his boyhood on the home farm with little chance for 
the attainment of an education. He came of a Methodist home and a consecrated 
mother; it was also the home of the traveling preacher; hence it is not 
strange that Clinton and three of his brothers became Methodist circuit 
riders. He was converted at eighteen and so marked was the change that it was 
evident to his neighbors and friends what his mission to the world would be. 
He began preaching, using the second story of his father’s house as a meeting 
place. With his yoke of steers he hauled logs with which he built a 
schoolhouse and taught the first school in his home neighborhood. Soon 
afterward he and his brothers built the church, the site of which was and is 
still called Mount Zion, and there they continued to preach the Gospel for 
some time.
     “When nineteen years of age Clinton Kelly was united in marriage to Miss 
Mary Baston and to obtain the license fee, for which he had to pay a dollar, 
he made and sold in Somerset a barrel of cider, crushing the apples by hand. 
In 1834 he attended the annual conference in Kentucky, became an itinerant 
minister and was assigned to the Elizabethtown circuit. He traveled up and 
down the knobs and vales of Kentucky, enduring privations as a good soldier of 
Jesus for many years. He was self-taught; rather he was taught of the Spirit. 
He had three months of schooling; nay, his whole life was spent in the school 
of Christ, and he who learns in that school is truly wise. Diligent 
application at the pine-knot blaze gave him a start, and a life of reading and 
study rounded out a well formed character. But his chief study was the Bible. 
He carried a testament in his pocket and read on the way to his appointment or 
while waiting at the mill for his grist; no precious moment was lost. He 
talked well upon all subjects but the Bible was his textbook, the love of God 
his theme. He had studied to such purpose that where others stumbled he quoted 
correctly no matter what the passage; his expositions were rich and clear, for 
they were Spirit-illumined. His illustrations appealed to the masses; his 
pictures were of life as he saw it every day; no incident was too homely to 
point a lesson. As his family increased he worked the harder, his shoemaker’s 
kit dividing the time with his books on long and lonesome horseback journeys. 
Perhaps it was a basket to be woven as he rode or some other useful art was 
brought into play, for in those days men and women did everything and children 
early fell into the habit.
     “Twice his Kentucky home was bereft of wife and mother.  His first wife 
died leaving five sons: Plympton, Hampton, Archon, Calmet and Benjal. All of 
these have crossed the flood. The oldest and last to go was Plympton Kelly, 
founder of Kelly Homstead Farm near Portland.”
     (Calmet and Benjal Kelly, sons of Clinton and Mary (Baston) Kelly, died 
the first winter after reaching Oregon City. Plympton Kelly later married 
Elizabeth Clark and settled upon a claim east of the Willamette River. Kelly 
Butte, a portion of this homestead, was purchased from Plympton Kelly by 
Multnomah county, and is in use as a rock-pile for prisoners, by the sheriff, 
at the present time. As a youth Plympton Kelly named Mount Tabor. His father, 
Clinton Kelly, had held preaching services upon that eminence for some time 
and it was decided that the place should have a name. The minister suggested 
that it be called Mount Zion, but Plympton wished it named Mount Tabor. To 
settle the matter, a coin was tossed and the latter won out. Hampton Kelly 
married Margaret Fitch. His donation land claim lay just east of that of his 
father. Later he removed to a new place adjoining what is now the Reed College 
campus. In after years he and his good wife and youngest sons became pioneers 
of Eastern Oregon, near Wapinitia. Archon Kelly married Elizabeth Roork, of 
Tennessee, and together they made their choice of a claim at Pleasant Home, 
east of Portland.)
     “Not long after losing his first wife Clinton Kelly married Miss Jane 
Burns, died three years later, leaving a daughter, Mary Jane.  On the 11th of 
March, 1840, he wedded Moriah Maldon Crain, a daughter of John and Sarah 
(Rousseau) Crain, of Pulaski county, and a granddaughter of Samuel Crain, of 
Culpeper county, Virginia, who was a member of the United States navy during 
the Revolutionary war and in 1797 removed to Kentucky. In the maternal line 
Mrs. Kelly was descended from Hillaire Rousseau, a Huguenot who came from 
France in 1689 and settled in Virginia following the revocation of the edict 
of Nantes by Louis XIV, October 22, 1685. Her great-grandfather, David 
Rousseau, wedded Mary Harrison, a niece of Benjamin Harrison, a signer of the 
Declaration of Independence. It was she who made the trek across the plains.
“Rev. Clinton Kelly continued to preach and to work with the aid of his wife, 
so that his entire salary might go for books. His cash receipts for an entire 
year often fell below five dollars in coin. At the time of their marriage Mrs. 
Moriah Kelly had twelve dozen pairs of socks which she had spun and knitted 
and these were exchanged for broadcloth for a suit for her husband. He was a 
man of plain and simple tastes and habits but a hard worker, never idle for a 
moment. When political strife divided the Methodist church he decided to move 
to the west, built wagons, gathered his belongings together and in the fall of 
1847 started for Oregon with his brothers Albert and Thomas. The first night 
out after reaching Independence, Missouri, in a hailstorm the cattle stampeded 
and Albert Kelly was compelled to remain behind in an effort to regain his 
cattle, all of which had been lost in the stampede. The ever generous nature 
of Clinton Kelly is indicated by the fact that on this occasion, realizing the 
great loss sustained by his brother, he insisted on giving him liberal 
financial aid. The toilsome journey of six months was made with ox teams over 
burning sands and cragged mountain ranges. In the fall they arrived at Oregon 
City, the capital of the provisional government of Oregon. The Methodist 
church had already established a mission at this point and the place was 
partially fortified against Indians. The sturdy Kelly boys soon found work 
getting out timbers for George Abernethy, the provisional governor.
     “An incident narrated by Plympton Kelly lent variety to their lonely 
life; it was in regard to the coming of the first territorial governor, 
General Joseph Lane. The new governor was expected on a certain day and great 
preparations were made for his reception. Everybody was on the alert when a 
canoe was sighted coming up the river. At nearer range it was observed to be 
paddled by Indians and carrying a white man. When within hailing distance a 
man on shore called through his hands: ‘Is Joe Lane in that canoe?’ A form 
rose in answer and shouted back: ‘I’m the man!’ The guns boomed a joyous 
welcome and the air rang with acclamations of delight as General Lane stepped 
on shore. The new governor dined with the old that day and everybody rejoiced 
that ‘The Oregon Country’ was at last a regularly organized territory of the 
United States over which ‘the stars and stripes’ spread its protecting folds.
     “The Grim Messenger did not forget Clinton Kelly in the new land—came 
often enough to preserve in his heart a God-like tenderness. That winter two 
promising boys, Calmet and Benjal were laid under the sod of Green Point, 
hushed to their long slumber by the music of the Willamette.  In the spring 
the family moved to a cabin on the James B. Stevens place on the bank of the 
river opposite Portland, then merely a few log shanties. Clinton Kelly and 
sons cutting out the roadway for the wagons as they advanced. Later in the 
same season Mr. Kelly bought the right of a previous homesteader to six 
hundred and forty acres of what was afterward known as the Clinton Kelly 
Donation Land Claim, lying two miles east of the river, for which he was to 
pay fifty dollars. There was a log hut on the place and a few acres partly 
cleared. He sowed all the cleared land to turnips, raised a big crop and paid 
for his claim that year.
     “In the course of time an immense log house rose on the site now occupied 
by the Williamson Sanitorium. The log house was a landmark for many years. It 
was running over with people during the Indian troubles of 1855 and 1856, 
farmers hurrying in well armed, expecting an attack. It gave place to a frame 
dwelling from which Clinton Kelly  passed out into the Life Eternal, in the 
year 1875. The present structure was built by his son-in-law, Captain J. W. 
Kern, who died some years ago.
     “Toiling for his daily bread, the subject of this sketch never forgot the 
charge Divinely given in his far-off Kentucky home—to preach a gospel of love 
wherever he went. He preached it most forcibly in his life. At different times 
he filled preaching appointments at Portland, Milwaukie, Oregon City, Fosters, 
Mount Tabor and other places. In 1849 he preached the first sermon ever 
delivered in Portland, the meeting being held in a cooper shop in the vicinity 
of what is now Front and Stark streets, on which occasion nearly the entire 
population, fifteen or twenty people, were present. Subsequently he hauled 
logs and assisted in building the first church in Portland. Clothed in 
homespun garments, his long jeans coat reaching nearly to the ground, a tall 
white beaver on his head and a Kentucky hickory in his hand, Sunday morning 
saw him setting out on foot for his appointment, his quaint ‘farewell’ 
lingering long after he had passed from sight in the dim, silent woods. 
Portland, Milwaukie, Mount Tabor, Oregon City, Columbia, Slough, Lents, St. 
Johns, Sandy, Fairview, Fosters-- indeed the greater part of Multnomah county 
derived spiritual food from his teachings. When it was too far to walk,—and 
ten or fifteen miles was no hardship—‘Bob,’ a favorite horse brought across 
the plains, accompanied him. After a long life of service the faithful animal 
was buried in the grove near the house, the children standing around in 
tearful grief. Under diligent hands the Kelly acres were cleared and produce 
raised for the market. At first a wheelbarrow sufficed for transportation, 
while later a handcart was used, but as the town grew and business increased, 
facilities kept pace with the growing need. The farm literally fed the town. 
There are still those who will recall the lumbering wagon drawn by oxen, the 
homely figure, the genial smile that came from a heart warm with love for 
humankind. He never over- reached anybody. One of his customers said to 
him: ‘Mr. Kelly, you sell too cheap!’ He answered: ‘My motto is—Live and let 
live.’ The beautiful Willamette was an obstacle to business. A rude horse-
ferry was in operation but on stormy days it was carried far out of its course 
and some days it never crossed at all. Often the loaded wagon with its 
occupants stood in the driving rain all day, only to return at night and try 
again the next day. Mr. Kelly built a flatboat for his own use, propelled by 
oars; but that was interfering with the business of others—at least it was so 
regarded—and the boat was cut loose from its moorings and left to drift along 
the flats of the east side. The truant craft was found, brought back and 
fastened by lock and chain to a tree. The next day both boat and tree were far 
down the river.  When he returned after a fruitless trip and told the tale the 
family were indignant, but his happy laugh is still remembered; he seemed to 
consider it only one of the ‘light afflictions.’
     “A stock company of east side residents was formed for the object of 
putting on a steam ferry. The Stark Street Ferry Company got out an injunction 
prohibiting any other company landing within certain limits. But the building 
went on, the steam ferry was finished and made regular trips, landing outside 
the prescribed limits. Plympton Kelly was the captain of the new boat and its 
name was ‘Independence.’ But the old company found it was time to wake up and 
ere long another boat was under way, to be fitted up with boiler and engine. 
When the ‘Victory’ appeared on the river with flying colors she made the short 
distance from bank to bank in much less time than was possible for 
the ‘Independence,’ restricted as she was to landing far above and below the 
city limits, the old company having purchased exclusive rights for a mile up 
and down the river. The ‘Independence’ was finally withdrawn and put in the 
cattle-carrying trade, and the ‘Victory’ was one in fact as well as in name. 
But the end sought had been obtained—an efficient means of crossing the river 
that could be relied upon with some degree of certainty.
     “In January, 1864, Clinton Kelly was called upon to bear what was 
probably the heaviest burden of his life; the Kelly home was again left 
without a mother. The years were telling upon him and he was less able to bear 
a load of sorrow that threatened to crush him. He had himself been near 
death’s door, and it was this fact that the consequent watching night and day, 
which she would yield to no other, that prostrated Mrs. Kelly. Sorrowfully he 
rose from a sick bed and with a breaking heart bade the companion of his joys 
and sorrows a final farewell. He gathered the younger children around him—of 
whom there were five, the youngest a boy of seven— and together they mourned 
their irreparable loss. It was long ere he regained his wonted cheerfulness. 
Sometimes, on the spur of the moment, he would call her name, only to be 
reminded that she was far away, beyond the sound of human speech.
     “It is said that troubles never come singly; in the fall of that year the 
log house, its cellars and storerooms fairly bursting with provisions, was 
burned to the ground. A frost-proof apple house and a barn soon followed and a 
few years later a large new barn stuffed with hay, the lower story containing 
hundreds of bushels of fruits and potatoes, was consumed by the flames. This 
happened at Christmas time. A heavy snow lay on the ground and the winter’s 
stores were in ashes. One approached him pityingly, expressing regret at his 
hard lot. He responded with a laugh of almost boyish freedom: ‘This is a very 
small matter; my treasure is laid up in heaven. What if one of the children 
had been burned!’ He might have said with Paul: ‘None of these things move me, 
neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course 
with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus.’ Once, in 
the early morning, while on his way to market with a heavy load of farm 
produce and while descending a hill near home, his youngest son, Richmond, 
still a mere boy, walking beside the yoke of cattle, at a narrow point in the 
road slipped and fell in such a way as to be caught by the near front wheel. 
The wet condition of the road caused the body to skid for several feet before 
the oxen could be brought to a halt and thus a tragic termination of the lad’s 
life was averted by a rare chance; or shall we call it Providence? The boy was 
only slightly hurt, but his coat bearing the muddy wheel marks was hung away 
in a closet to be worn no more, only to be taken out at times and contemplated 
with feelings of deep emotion, as if it were something sacred.
     (There were nine children by Clinton Kelly’s third marriage, of whom 
three died in childhood.)
     “Clinton Kelly reared a family who have been a credit to his name, 
several of them becoming valued citizens of this part of the country. His 
oldest son, Plympton Kelly, was a prosperous farmer of Kellys Butte, Oregon, 
but is now deceased. Hampton Kelly, a great Bible student and church worker, 
died in Wasco county, Oregon, in 1899. Archon, for many years an itinerant 
preacher in Oregon, died in Portland in 1890. Mary Jane became the wife of 
James Akin, of Benton county, Oregon, and is now deceased. John Crain died in 
infancy, Sarah Margaret married J. W. Kern, of Portland, and both are now 
deceased. Penumbra Kelly is also living in Portland. He was sheriff of this 
district for a number of years and also by appointment of President Arthur was 
United States marshal of this district for several years, while for four terms 
he represented Multnomah county in the state legislature. Laura F. is the wife 
of E. Turner, of Stockton, California. Maria Emily is the widow of Rev. John 
Shaver, of Portland. Fredrika B. is the wife of Rev. Martin Judy, of the 
Southern California conference. Dr. Richmond Kelly is a resident of Portland. 
Raymond, the youngest, died in infancy. The descendants of the Rev. Clinton 
Kelly to the third and fourth generation live in and about Portland. They 
constitute, with the descendants of his three brothers mentioned above, his 
cousins the Fawcetts and other more distant relatives, the ‘Kelly Clan,’ which 
holds its annual reunion at Portland the last Saturday in June.
     “As the years went by Clinton Kelly’s nature, always sympathetic, 
softened to a motherly tenderness. The cry of a child, the plaint of a hurt 
animal never went unheeded. No poor human waif was ever turned from his door; 
to such he tried to restore self-respect by giving him a chance to earn an 
honest living. In this way he gave home and employment to many luckless 
stragglers, saying to himself: ‘But for the grace of God I might be as they 
are.’ Nor did he turn away any one who came asking help for a worthy object. 
He began his religious life by building a house of worship; such was his love 
for the house of God that he delighted to lend a hand in all such enterprises. 
The first church erected in Portland owed much to his assistance and there he 
worshipped with his family until the coming of the log schoolhouse on the very 
top of Mount Tabor.
     “Of Mr. Kelly’s last days on earth we speak reverently. Calling in his 
neighbors he told them he had not long to stay—that he was going home to God. 
He assured them his mind was as clear as at any time in life and expressed the 
great comfort and satisfaction he derived from the religion of the Lord Jesus 
Christ that he had tried to preach for many years. Then they knelt together in 
love and commemorated the Last Supper, joining in one of his favorite hymns—’I 
will sing you a song of that beautiful land,’ after which he took each by the 
hand in an affectionate farwell, they ‘sorrowing most of all for the words 
which he spake that they should see his face no more.’ Shortly after he took 
his departure, to be ‘forever with the Lord.’
     “From a contemporary writer we quote: ‘That man of God, Clinton Kelly, 
left the following testimony, given in his last hours, in favor of the 
religion of Jesus. It was with the greatest difficulty that he could converse 
with the friends who called to see him, and in lieu thereof he requisted that 
a copy of these, his dying words, should be addressed to each. Friend, imagine 
yourself standing upon the brink of death, the boundless unknown spreading 
away from your feet; have you the grace that enabled Father Kelly to utter 
these noble words? “After a protracted affliction, very feeble in body and 
very near the end of my earthly pilgrimage, I feel a desire to inform my 
numerous friends, in and out of the church, of my prospects for another world. 
During my affliction I have had many manifestations of the great love of 
Jesus, which has given me patience and resignation and a good hope through 
grace; and I suppose that if hundreds, nay, even thousands of men and women 
were present to witness my unshaken confidence in God, who can have no such 
opportunity, it would be a saving lesson to them. I want to say to one and all 
that there is no name given under heaven whereby we can be saved only the name 
of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. For fifty years it has been my special 
care to make myself acquainted with the religious theories of the world, and 
the best you can do for your soul’s sake is to cast the whole of them to the 
moles and bats and trust alone in Jesus Christ for salvation from sin here, 
victory in death, and eternal salvation above. This you would all admit if 
your souls were in my soul’s stead, standing ready to depart. I want you to 
understand that this is not the result of a fevered brain or hallucination of 
any kind. I have not had an hour’s fever in the whole course of my disease. My 
mind has been all the while as clear and rational as through common life. Now 
if this little circular should bring any of you to God, I am content.”’”
     (The portion of the above biography that is in quotation marks was 
written in
1911.)


Additional Comments:
History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Pages 232-237 

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