In the early 1880s, Alfred C. Bevers immigrated to the United States of America from England. About a year later, his wife Mary N. Bevers followed him to America with their three daughters. At the time, their two sons remained in England, but they would immigrate also within a few years.

One of the items Alfred and Mary brought with them was a Bible, which was entitled Brown’s Self-Interpreting Family Bible. The original edition of The Self-Interpreting Bible was published in 1778 by Rev. John Brown of Haddington, Scotland.¹ During a period of about 140 years, Brown’s Bible would be reprinted many times in Scotland and America.² Although there is no publication date printed in Alfred and Mary’s Bible, it was probably printed after 1859. (For more information about their Bible, see the blogpost, Alfred and Mary Bevers’ Family Bible.)

In their Bible, there are pages for recording family information. It is assumed that most of the handwriting on these pages is either Alfred or Mary’s handwriting. Note the handwriting on the page that records the details of their marriage and the pages listing their children’s births and deaths. The page of the children’s marriages appears to be written in different handwriting and it is not known whose handwriting it is. The entries for the deaths of Mary and Alfred begin with “Mother” and “Father” so they may have been written by one of their children. Also on the page of the deaths, a third person made the final notes, which were entered in Vera Bevers’ handwriting.³