The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1891-08-01
A NOTABLE WOMAN.
General Armstrong; Mother
Dead.

Mrs Clarissa Armstrong, who died in
this city on July 21st, at an advanced
age, was the daughter of family distin-
guished throughout New England, and
sister of the late Chief Justice Chapman
of Massachusetts,. She was married in
1881 to Rev. Richard Armstrong, and
went with him as missionary in the Pa
cific Islands. After brief experience
among the cannibal tribes Of the South
Pacific, Mr.. Armstrong went to the
Sandwich Islands, and there established
the entire system of public schools
throughout the island kingdom, becom-
ing Minister of Public Instruction, an
Office which he held at the time of his
death, early in the sixties.
Mrs. Armstrong reared large family
on the islands, but one by one these
children travelled eastward and became
identified with the history, social and
political, of the country from which their
PARENTS had come. The most notable
among them, General Armstrong, head
and founder of Hampton School, recent
| ly visited San Francisco and is now in
| the islands, where the sad news of his
mothers death will reach him. Mrs.
Weaver, one of her daughters, lady for
wears identified with philanthropic and
| progressive work in our city, recently
went with her husband to take charge of
| the city's poor. Another daughter, Mrs.
Beckwith, is the wife of minister now
occupying a prominent place in the
islands.
Mrs. Armstrong herself long dung to
| the island life, and it was not until after
more than fifty years of uninterrupted
residence that she yielded to her chill
dren's solicitations and regretfully sailed
| homeward. Up to the time when she
landed in San Francisco in the eighties,
herself nearly 80 years of age, she, a
woman of high education and intelli-
gence had never seen railway engine
or ever witnessed thousand sights fam
iliar to the tiniest school child in San
Francisco. Her frank delight over the
commonplace marvels of modern science
was charming to see, and she herself
was quick 10 join in the laugh often
raised at her startled exclamation over
some new and exciting discovery.
Mrs. Hemenway of Boston, lady
widely known as the patron of various
scientific enterprises and benevolent
projects, happened to be in California at
the time. She was a friend of the fam
iIy, and was so bewitched with the novel
situation in which the old lady was
splaced that she insisted upon rounding
out the visitors strange experience and
carrying her off to her Boston home tC
spend the winter there, where she mer-
rily declared that Mrs. Armstrong should
be the "helle of the season"
So Mrs. Armstrong, at nearly 80 years
of age, took her first railway journey
travelling across the continent in the
Hemenways' sumptuous private car
surrounded by every attention and com
fort.
Her useful life on earth is ended, after
long period of helpless suffering. Up
to about year ago she preserved the
whole measure of her mental vigor, with
her physical strength but slightly inn
paired. A fall in stepping from car
riage gave her shock from which she
never recovered, so that death finally
came as glad release.-[S. F. ChroH.
| icie