His nurse Alison Cunningham (known as Cummy)

was more fervently religious. Her mix of Calvinism and folk beliefs were an early source of nightmares for the child, and he showed a precocious concern for religion. But she also cared for him tenderly in illness, reading to him from John Bunyan and the Bible as he lay sick in bed and telling tales of the Covenanters. Stevenson recalled this time of sickness in "The Land of Counterpane" in A Child's Garden of Verses (1885), dedicating the book to his nurse.

 

​The Marriage 1880⁠–⁠1894​:

 

Spouse - ​(m. 1880⁠–⁠1894)​ -

 

Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne (1840–1914)

Fanny Vandegrift (1840-1914)

 

Frances "Fanny" Matilda Van de Grift Osbourne Stevenson

Fanny Vandegrift on her birth

Birth 10 March 1840, Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.

Fanny Vandegrift was born in Indianapolis,

the daughter of builder

Jacob Vandegrift and his wife

Esther Thomas Keen

Died 18 February 1914, Santa Barbara, California, U.S. (73y.o))

was an American magazine writer.

 

Frances "Fanny" Matilda Van de Grift Osbourne Stevenson

Maiden name Fanny Vandegrift  

Parents

Jacob Vandegrift, a builder

Esther Thomas Keen

Birth 10 March 1840, Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.

At the age of seventeen she married Samuel Osbourne, a lieutenant on the state governor's staff. Their daughter Isobel (or 'Belle') was born the following year.

Life was difficult in the mining town, and there were few women around. Fanny learned to shoot a pistol and to roll her own cigarettes.

 

Her Two Spouses

1). (m. 1857⁠–⁠1880)​ (a divorce in 1880)    

Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne (1840–1914) with

Samuel Osbourne 

 

Their three Children           

Isobel Osbourne

Lloyd Osbourne

Hervey Stewart Osbourne

         

​2). ​(m. 1880⁠–⁠1894)​​

Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne (1840–1914) with

Robert Louis Stevenson

in May 1880

she and Stevenson were married in San Francisco.

 

In August 1880,

the family moved to Great Britain, where Fanny helped to patch things up between Robert and his father. The couple travelled to the Adirondacks in the US.

 

In 1888,

Fanny Stevenson published a short story, "The Nixie", which William Ernest Henley recognized as based on Katharine de Mattos's idea they had discussed the previous year.

 

In 1888,

the Stevensons chartered the Casco out of San Francisco and sailed to Western Samoa.

Later voyages on the Equator and Janet Nicoll with Fanny's son Lloyd Osbourne followed.

They settled in Upolu, at their home Vailima,

where

Stevenson died on 3 December 1894.

 

Return to California

After Stevenson's death, Fanny returned to California

to begin a new life in America and Europe with an adoring companion decades her junior, newsman Edward "Ned" Salisbury Field.

 

When Fanny died in Santa Barbara, California in 1914,

Ned Field,

her last companion-in-adventure,

described her as

"the only woman in the world worth dying for."

Soon after,

he married her daughter

Isobel Osbourne.

 

Her Relatives (of Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne (1840–1914)):

Edward Salisbury Field (son-in-law)

(Edward "Ned" Salisbury Field)

 (Ned Field)

 

Edward "Ned" Salisbury Field Jr.

(February 28, 1878 – September 20, 1936 (58yo))

was an American author, playwright, artist, poet, and journalist.

His parents:

Edward Salisbury and

Sarah Mills Hubbard Field.

He (Edward "Ned" Salisbury Field Jr.)

was the husband of Isobel Osbourne

 (the step-daughter of Robert Louis Stevenson)

(the daughter of Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne (1840–1914) and Samuel Osbourne).

 

Isobel "Belle" Osbourne Strong Field (1858–1953) (94 yo)

was an author and the daughter of Fanny Stevenson and sister of Lloyd Osbourne.

Through her mother's second marriage, she was a stepdaughter of Robert Louis Stevenson.

 

Isobel "Belle" Osbourne Strong Field (1858–1953) (94 yo)

Isobel Osbourne is a maiden name

"Belle"                  - a shortage from Isobel

Isobel Strong, -  a wife of Joseph Dwight Strong ​(m. 1879; div. 1892)​

Isobel Field, - a wife of Edward Salisbury Field ​​(m. 1914; he died 1936, a widow since 1936))​                              till she died 1953)  

Isobel "Belle" Osbourne Strong Field (1858–1953)  (94 yo)

"Belle"

Belle

Isobel Osbourne / Belle

Isobel Osbourne / Belle Osbourne

Isobel Strong    / Belle Strong

Isobel Field      / Belle Field

 

Note:

"Strong" on Russian would be translated as Silaev Silaeva Strong Strogonov Strogonova

" Стронг " с английского