Biography - Charity T. Camp
CHARITY TEAGUE CAMP, relict of Rev. Thomas Camp, resided at Abingdon for
more than a fourth of a century. She was born in South Carolina, May 7,
1818, and died at Shenandoah, Iowa, Sept. 26, 1885. She was the fourth
daughter of Dr. John and Rebecca B. Neal, scions of an old South Carolina
family. Dr. Neal was a man of great skill as a physician, but of such
restless energy that no single vocation satisfied him. To his professional
labors he, from time to time, added those of merchant, planter, drover,
mill-owner, etc., but not with uniform success. He made and lost fortunes
with marvelous rapidity and equanimity. The excitement of frontier
enterprises and dangers had a peculiar fascination for him, and, in 1834,
led him to locate among the Creek Indians, in Alabama, where he died a few
years later. He was a man of spotless character, and of broad usefulness in
his time.
The subject of this sketch had few advantages derived from schools of any
grade, being reared in the same vicinity and amid surroundings similar to
those of her husband. But, in addition to the intellectual character and
pursuits of her father, she had large compensation in her mother, who had
been bred with great care and tenderness, and who devoted herself with rare
assiduity and success to the culture of the minds and manners of her
daughters. Mrs. Camp sympathized heartily with the tastes and pursuits of
her husband, and, by her cheerful, hopeful views of life, shed continuous
sunshine upon their often rugged and shadowy pathway. She was womanly in the
last degree by nature, and instinctively leaned upon her husband in all
purely business affairs - a habit strengthened by her her Southern
education. When, therefore, she was left a widow, with a limited income and
eight children, all minors, she felt, as she expressed it, "like a child
confronted by a stone wall, through which it must pass." She, however,
bravely consecrated the energies of her life to carrying forward the work
begun by her husband, in the education of their children, and never turned
aside from it while opportunity lasted. How she struggled and sacrificed, in
that work, many know in part, and her children will cherish in holy
remembrance.
In the summer of 1861, her married daughter emigrated across the plains to
California, and her eldest son entered the service of his Government in a
foreign land. In the autumn of the same year, her other sons, aged 20 and 17
respectively, enlisted in the Union Army, for a term of three years'
service.
About the same time, death claimed little Lizzie, the idol of the household,
leaving only the widow and three young daughters in the broken home. What
she endured in her loneliness, from domestic cares, anxiety for absent ones
- more specifically the awful suspense that hung about the results to her of
oft-recurring battles in the field, during the terrible years of the Civil
War - no mortal ever knew, for she bore her great burdens in secret.
She was devoutly pious from early youth, and her faith gave tone and
strength to her character. Trusting implicitly in the promises of God of the
Bible, she rested in the arms of Omnipotence with a quiet courage which no
calamity could wholly break. Her religion was, to her, a fountain of hope
and cheerfulness, even in the darkest days of her long widowhood, and kept
her heart young to the end of life. She was ever the ideal of children, the
welcome companion of youth, the cherished friend and counselor of young
manhood and womanhood. She was a wife and mother in all those sacred terms
imply, and lived a widow nearly 30 years, not in name only, but in heart. In
every relation in life, she filled the full measure of a true woman - loved
while living, and mourned when dead, by a wide circle of friends. She lived
to see her seven remaining children heads of families, and to rejoice in the
love and veneration of her grandchildren. Her four daughters are women of
high character and liberal culture, ranking with the useful members of the
community in which they live. Mrs. Rebecca A. Nye lives at San Jose,
California; Sarah E., wife of Dr. S. M. Spaulding, lives at Minneapolis,
Minn.; Maggie M., wife of Dr. H. F. Duffield, lives at Shenandoah, Iowa; Ivy
C., wife of M. J. Duffield, lives at Omaha, Neb.
John N., the eldest son, who was educated at Abingdon College, was appointed
at the beginning of President Lincoln's administration Consul to Kingston,
Jamaica. After the expiration of his term, he was engaged for awhile in
business in Central America. From that country he went to Galveston, Texas,
where he has since made his home, and entered the customs service. During
this period, he was married to a lady of Kingston, Jamaica, and subsequently
he was appointed by President Grant Collector of Internal Revenue for the
First District of Texas. He became active and prominent in the latter part
of the reconstruction of Texas, being a member of most of the conventions of
his party (Republican), and a wise counselor in all its deliberations, as
the writer of this sketch personally knows. In Galveston, especially, has he
been the leader of his party, and directed here all its movements. He is a
man of fine personal appearance, of large intellect, extensive culture, of
exalted character and unquestionable integrity.
Sterling T. and Henry Clary served over three years in the Union Army,
participating in many battles, among them Fort Donelson, Shiloh, Corinth,
Pleasant Hill, and the two days' fight near Nashville. They were in the 58th
Ill. Vol. Inf., Col. Lynch. S.T. resides at Abingdon, Ill.; H. C., in St.
Paul, Minn.
Contributed by Pat Thomas, extracted from the 1886 Portrait and Biographical
Album of Knox County, Biographical Publishing Company, Chicago, page 930.
