Lot Title

Location in Cemetery

Section: a     Lot: --     Grave: --

Date of death

Jan-4-1867

Date of birth

Jul-6-1839

Age

Verse (Legibility: G - GOOD)

Bless thee dear Stephen at rest in the lord The friends that now mourn thee will follow on And when the last trumpet shall wake the dead …all meet thee where tears are not shed.

Veteran Information

No War Periods Served

Veteran: No

Relatives

Husband of Mary Wordell daughter of Gershom and Sylvia

Stone Shape

Stone Decoration

Stone Condition

Stone Material

State of Stone

Other Information

Stone was cleaned in 2021 and repaired in April 2022. Stephen A. Wood was born to Samuel A. Wood and Mary (Andrews) Wood in New Bedford on July 6, 1839. As a young man, Stephen became a ship's carpenter and at age 23, married 18-year-old Mary Ann Wordell, daughter of Gershom and Sylvia (Mosher) Wordell on October 26, 1862. The couple lived in Westport for all of their married life which turned out to be a scant four years. Stephen was only 27 years old when he died of cancer on January 14, 1867. He was buried in the Wordell Cemetery, where Mary's ancestors had been buried as early as 1809. At age 24, Mary remarried two days after Christmas, 1868, to Edmund Gifford (1844-1909). They had two children, a son and daughter, and moved to Fall River in 1884. While in her mid-50s, Mary suffered a paralyzing stroke and was an invalid for the final 15 years of her life. She died in 1914 at her daughter's home on New Boston Road and was buried alongside her husband, Edmund, in Fall River's Oak Grove Cemetery. Her obituary made no mention of her first husband, Stephen, and he rests alone in the northwest corner of this lot. Research: T. Baptista