Ashley Bowen - Family Life and Giving Up The Sea

Family Life and Giving Up The Sea

In 1758, Bowen married Dorothea Chadwick, who bore him six children during their marriage. At the time, Bowen was 30 years old, and the fact that he had a wife on land made him think of retirement. Eventually, Bowen gave up seafaring at the age of 35, and set up a rigging business in Marblehead, Massachusetts. The business was a moderate success, providing enough income to get by, but never by much. Dorothea died in 1771; the same year, Bowen married Mary Shaw. Shaw died in 1781, and the next year Bowen married Hannah Graves. Bowen's final child was born in 1797. Although Bowen had amassed some wealth through his business and his adventures at sea, as he grew elderly, he was completely dependent upon his children for his upkeep. Bowen died in 1813.

Read more about this topic:  Ashley Bowen

Famous quotes containing the words family life, family, life, giving and/or sea:

    The touchstone for family life is still the legendary “and so they were married and lived happily ever after.” It is no wonder that any family falls short of this ideal.
    Salvador Minuchin (20th century)

    Of all the vices, lewdness is the worst; of all the virtues, family duty is the first.
    —Chinese proverb.

    Rhyme.

    I have no scheme about it,—no designs on men at all; and, if I had, my mode would be to tempt them with the fruit, and not with the manure. To what end do I lead a simple life at all, pray? That I may teach others to simplify their lives?—and so all our lives be simplified merely, like an algebraic formula? Or not, rather, that I may make use of the ground I have cleared, to live more worthily and profitably?
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    The principal thing children are taught by hearing these lullabies is respect. They are taught to respect certain things in life and certain people. By giving respect, they hope to gain self-respect and through self-respect, they gain the respect of others. Self-respect is one of the qualities my people stress and try to nurture, and one of the controls an Indian has as he grows up. Once you lose your self-respect, you just go down.
    Henry Old Coyote (20th century)

    Another success is the post-office, with its educating energy augmented by cheapness and guarded by a certain religious sentiment in mankind; so that the power of a wafer or a drop of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea over land and comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look upon as a fine meter of civilization.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)