Stephen Ball, 1/6th-Plate Daguerreotype, Circa 1848
"Stephen Ball, died in Barracks."
After some frustrating research, I think I have located some records that shine a small light on this young man. In Fort Vancouver, Oregon Territory, records for July 1850, written by the fort's commander William W. Loving, report that in the new Vancouver Barracks (built in 1849) was a private soldier named Stephen Ball. He had been received at the post on 28 June, 1850. By 19 July, Ball was discharged and ordered "to report to General Smith at Sonoma, California."
The July report lists one of the other soldiers at the fort had died--probably from disease, as there was no action occurring at the fort. My suspicion is that Ball also died of disease before leaving the Barracks, or shortly thereafter, and never arrived in Sonoma.
This image may have been taken for his family before Ball joined the army.
Wikipedia says of Fort Vancouver, "It was was a 19th century fur trading outpost along the Columbia River that served as the headquarters of the Hudson's Bay Company in the company's Columbia District (which covered the northern half of the region known to Americans as the Oregon Country). Named for Captain George Vancouver, the fort was located on the northern bank of the Columbia River in present-day Vancouver, Washington, near Portland, Oregon. Today, a full-scale replica of the fort, with internal buildings, has been constructed and is open to the public as Fort Vancouver National Historic Site."
For a fascinating writeup about the fort and pictures of it as Ball would have known it: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Vancouver.
Stephen Ball, 1/6th-Plate Daguerreotype, Circa 1848
"Stephen Ball, died in Barracks."
After some frustrating research, I think I have located some records that shine a small light on this young man. In Fort Vancouver, Oregon Territory, records for July 1850, written by the fort's commander William W. Loving, report that in the new Vancouver Barracks (built in 1849) was a private soldier named Stephen Ball. He had been received at the post on 28 June, 1850. By 19 July, Ball was discharged and ordered "to report to General Smith at Sonoma, California."
The July report lists one of the other soldiers at the fort had died--probably from disease, as there was no action occurring at the fort. My suspicion is that Ball also died of disease before leaving the Barracks, or shortly thereafter, and never arrived in Sonoma.
This image may have been taken for his family before Ball joined the army.
Wikipedia says of Fort Vancouver, "It was was a 19th century fur trading outpost along the Columbia River that served as the headquarters of the Hudson's Bay Company in the company's Columbia District (which covered the northern half of the region known to Americans as the Oregon Country). Named for Captain George Vancouver, the fort was located on the northern bank of the Columbia River in present-day Vancouver, Washington, near Portland, Oregon. Today, a full-scale replica of the fort, with internal buildings, has been constructed and is open to the public as Fort Vancouver National Historic Site."
For a fascinating writeup about the fort and pictures of it as Ball would have known it: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Vancouver.