The Hawaiian gazette., 1873-03-05
Edward .. Stokes.
HIS SAD AND SHAMEFUL CAREER-DoMES,
TIC SHAME AND SORROW.

The career of Edward ). Stokes, lately
sentenced to death for the murder OF
James Fisk, Jr., as given below, illustrates
how deeply great crime strikes among
innocent victims, and that wealth, culture
and standing are no sure safeguards
against the saddest vicissitudes of human
experience:
In the year 1855, Edward H. Stokes, a
successful cloth merchant of New York,
and nearly connected with some of the
most prominent representatives of the
wealth and benefcence of that city, re-
tired from business with handsome COM
potency. He married Miss Stiles, the
daughter of leading Philadelphia, and
seeking a home of ease and elegance, Mr..
Stokes chose Philadelphia as his future
residence. There his eldest son was born
in 1889, and named Edward Stiles, after a
maternal relative. The lad was boy of
unusual beauty and promise, quick, ac-
tive mind, a generous and loving DISPOSE
tion-these traits being remembered well
after the lapse of years by those who
knew him at that time. Two daughters
and two other sons were born in the pc
Rod between 1910 and 1850. The family
is recalled as being rarely endowed with
all that seemed needful to insure the hap
piness of a household The home was one
OF wealth and luxury, the culture of the
best.
Edward was educated at the University
and took high rank as a scholar. He went
to New York at the age of II to enter into
the store of Samuel Perry on South Water
street, an extensive cheese dealer. Perry
failed three years later, and young Stokes
made new partnership with junior of
the collapsed house, and they, as Stokes &
Budlong, opened a cheese store on Vesey
street. They had excellent success, their
foreign shipping trade being very large,
calling Stokes to visit Europe several
times within the next few seasons. About
this time the senior Stokes was induced to
remove to New York, where he made his
office with his son, though not originally
intending to become entangIed in business.
Such was the result, however, and not
only the father, but other and prominent
wealthy relatives, were gradually but
heavily involved in the extended ventures
of Stokes & Budlong. The failure of the
firm followed, and father and son were
thrown into bankruptcy.
With the wreck of his fortunes young
Stokes embarked next in the enterprise of
an oil refinery at Hunters
Point. Three hundred thousand dollars
were expended in the works, which were
to be of the best class, when the company
fell into difficulties, and at this juncture
the baleful light of Jim Fisk's countenance
comes into the story. Jim was in the full
tide of his operations with Erie. He held
the advantage 1--WE wish it were less en-
ployed by even more scrupulous railway
than hey, supplied by his corpo-
ration, in transportation and control of
market, as the Erie was the great thor
oughfare to the oil regions a compact
was struck. Fisk entered the refinery |
reinforced its capital, and with a
change of name and heavy drawbacks"
on the Erie freight bills, the Hunters |
Point refinery sailed strongly into success
full competition. Stokes was secretary as
well as partner At one time his profits
from the refinery gave him $1,000 per
week.
In 1864 Stokes married the daughter of |
J. W. Southwick, prominent furniture
lealer in New York, one of the oldest in
MS line in the city. A short time since
me OF cur oldest residents showed us set
If furniture, a wedding outfit brought TO
in 1886, bought of Mr.. Southwick,
who is now a man of immense wealth, and
still in active business in a great Broad
way establishment. The wedding of
Stokes with Miss Southwick seemed to
ack nothing that wealth, position and So
,ial surroundings could bring to insure
happiness. They made their sumptuous
nome in the Hoffman House, and moved
lmong the most brilliant life in the me-
.ropolis.
The next scene in the drama brings the
Infamous woman Mansfield into the plot.
Solomon described her many centuries
100, and we fear Solomon knew what he
was writing about. But his painting has
never been surpassed, and if somebody
,ould have slipped into Stokes mind this
title pen portrait, made two thousand
Years ago, of Josephine Mansfield and her
Infamous sisters, it might have spared the
community the fruits of the new acquaint-
.nce. Here are some of the wise mans
,olorings of the subjects:
She lieth in wait for prey, and increaseth the
among men.
Her feet go down to death her steps take hold on
len.
Her house inclineth unto death, as an OK goeth to