The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1894-10-02
MRS. YOUMANS' BIOGRAPHY.
An Interesting Life and Character
Of Uncommon Strength.

The following notice of the death
of Mrs. Youmans, appeared in the
Richfeld, Conn, papers, and was
written by Mrs. Charles Dudley
Warner:
When the biography of Mrs. YOU
mans is written ii will reveal most
interesting life and a character of I'M
common strength and lovliness. She
was twice married. Her maiden name
was Katharine Elizabeth Newton and
she was a resident of Albany, \. Y.
In lS49 she married William Little
Lee, her fathers cousin, who was at
the time Chief Justice of the Hawai-
ian Islands, whittier he had gone in
1876. He was lawyer OF great abil-
ity, a statesman, and a publicist, and
a man of the highest character and
virtue. 1t is to Judge Lee more than
any one else that the Sandwich ISL
ands owed its constitutional develop
ment and its place among nations.
The wear before his death, in 1857, at
the age of thirty-siX, he was Minister
Plenipotentiary to the United States,
England, France and Russia, but the
state of his health compelled him to
abandon the European part of his
mission. He was born leader of men,
and the Islands never sustained a
greater loss than in his death. His
wife shared with him his enthusiasm
and his labors in Honolulu, and was
deeply attached to her adopted coun-
try. Honolulu was far off in those
4
serious business and likely to be full
of adventure. She made three voy-
ages around Cape Horn.
In 1861 Mrs. ee was married to the
late Edward l.. YOumans, the distin-
guished scientist, and since then her
residence has been New York. Her
life there is familiar to those who
know the literary, scientific and social
life of the metropolis. Her fine gifts
had full field of action, her always
hospitable home was the resort of for
eign visitors of distinction and of the
best culture OF America, and she was
known far and wide for her charities,
and her interest in public institutions
of benevolence, and in many private
enterprises Of literary or scientific
character.
Mrs. 6OumanS was woman oil very
rare abilities, and of wide and intel
ligent interest in the important move
ments of her age. Widely and well
read, of keen perceptions aud much
humor, she was the charming COM
panion of intellectual men and women,
and beloved not less for her vivacity
and wit than for her charitable, kindly
and amiable spirit. Refined and gen.
tie, she had great energy and deter
mination, and she gave time and
thought freely to all good causes that
sought her aid. Her literary talent
was of such a high order that she
might have had distinction as writer,
but her energies were given 10 other
things. After all, her mission in the
world was to brighten it, to make it
cheerful, to do good as she had oppor-
tunity, to make herself beloved, and
to give abundantly of herself in friend
ship and in good works. The graceful
and spirited girl never lost her vivacity
or her interest in life, and her ad-
vanced years were perfect sunshine
of unselfishness. We might dwell
upon her intellectual and her social
gifts, and upon the great loss sustained
by so many in so many ways by her
death. But in this hour of general
grief. what more can be said than that
she was noble woman, that her life
was good and useful, and that she is
deeply beloved and mourned.