Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/42

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34 WILLIAM H. PACKWOOD

grandmother died, which was about ten years after grand- father. The will was an old one and was made when Texas was a republic.

"A good many years ago I met an old Scotchman named Archie Downey in Baker County. He said his people and the Packwoods were neighbors in Virginia and that my name was Duncan. He told me I was of Scotch descent and at the time of the flood on the James River four Scotch families had settled higher up the James and that they were all drowned except one boy. He said that it was a matter of common knowledge that one of those four families named Duncan was the only one who had a boy of the age of the one found float- ing down the river on the tree. I suppose my name really is Duncan but inasmuch as the name Packwood has served our family for 100 years or so I guess it is too late to change.

"My grandfather, Larkin Packwood, was born in Virginia and from there went to Kentucky and still later to Tennessee. He had ten sons and two daughters. My father, Larkin Can- ada Packwood, was one of the youngest of the children and was born in Tennessee. My father's father went to Illinois with his family and took his slaves with him. When Illinois was admitted to the Union as a state he moved to Ozark Coun- ty, Missouri, where he could continue to hold his slaves. One of the boys, Larkin Canada Packwood, did not go to Missouri as he had found an attraction which held him in Illinois. He was married on October 31, 1831, to Elizabeth Cathcart Stor- mont. She was born in South Carolina and her people came from Ireland. She had come to Illinois about 1826. My mother had two sons and four daughters. Two of her daughters died while children. Another of the daughters, Mary, married a physician and died in early womanhood, while Agnes, the re- maining daughter, died in Coos County about 40 years ago. My mother died while giving birth to a son, who also died at the same time. I was the other son.

"I was born on October 23, 1832, on Jordan Prairie just north of Mt. Vernon, Illinois. I was named for my grand- mother's family, the Henderson's of Kentucky. My mother's