BARTON, Harriet Augusta (née STOWELL) (1833-after 1913) and Major (1822-after 1900)

Daughter of Lewis B. and Laura B. Stowell of Paris, Maine, who in the spring of 1845 were among the first Adventists in that state to adopt the Sabbath. In 1859 Harriet married Major Barton in Warren, Illinois. Barton, born in Rochester, New York, came to Warren in 1853 and operated a livery business, later opening a hotel in the same town in 1873.1EGWLM 788.3

Harriet presumably kept the Sabbath with the rest of her family from 1845, and there is a record of her attending a Sabbatarian conference in 1849, at the age of 16. After that, however, no further mention of Harriet or her husband has been found in the Review or other denominational sources, nor do their obituaries appear in church papers. It is likely, therefore, that Harriet did not remain with the Seventh-day Adventists.1EGWLM 788.4

Harriet Stowell was present at a conference in Topsham, Maine, in 1849 at which Ellen White received a vision. According to an observer who called Harriet by her middle name, Augusta, while “putting the Bible on Augusta Stowell,” Ellen White uttered the words “Study it, study it, take it, believe it, walk out on it, the Word of God, faith, the Book of books, the all-seeing eye!” This is the only mention of Harriet Stowell in Ellen White's writings.1EGWLM 788.5

See: William Berry Lapham, History of Paris, Maine, From Its Settlement to 1880, p. 738; The History of Jo Daviess County, Illinois, Containing a History of the County—Its Cities, Towns, Etc. (Chicago: H. F. Kett & Co., 1878), p. 661; obituary: “Marion Stowell Crawford,” Review, Dec. 18, 1913, p. 1230; Merlin Burt, “… Sabbatarian Adventism From 1844 to 1849,” pp. 123, 124; 1900 U.S. Federal Census, “Barton Major,” Illinois, Jo Daviess County, Warren, p. 202B; Ellen G. White, Ms 5, 1849 (Sept. 23); Joseph Bates to “Brother & Sister Hastings,” Sept. 25, 1849.1EGWLM 788.6