HAWKINS, RICHARD

HAWKINS, RICHARD

Yaphank

from Yaphank As It Is and Was

by

Beecher Homan

1875

Richard Hawkins

Richard Hawkins was born in Setauket, 1796, and died at Yaphank, April 29th, 1855. He was fifty-nine years old.

Mr. Hawkins was a quiet, retired man, and not very popular or exceedingly unpopular. He reared a large family, and died poor. He died in obscurity, and in the bosom of his family.

No lioness cast her whelps in the streets when he was born or when he died. No warring of the elements, or strange appearance in the heavens, denoted that a great soul had passed into eternity; but, calmly and serenely, as the sun rose in the east, his spirit sank down the west.

He was a laboring man, and worked alternately at farming, tailoring and carpentering. He never gained pre-eminence in his combined callings, or even distinction in one.

His children are separated far and near. One son lies beneath the dark waters of the Atlantic, and another, Robert, entered the Mexican war, came home, "went up the Mississippi," took ill and died.

Mr. Hawkins married a daughter of Dea. Simmons Laws, and settled in the home of his after scenes.

He established no enduring name, and his god and bad acts lie wondering with his mortality.