Stuyvesant Fish Morris

Stuyvesant Fish Morris I (August 3, 1843 - May 10, 1928) was an American physician and the progenitor of Manhattan's prominent family of physicians.

He was the son of Richard Lewis Morris I (1805-1880) and Elizabeth Sarah Stuyvesant Fish (1810-1881) and he was born in Manhattan. His siblings include: Richard Lewis Morris; Elizabeth Stuyvesant Morris; and James Morris. His uncle was Hamilton Fish.

Civil War

Stuyvesant enlisted as a private in the Union Army, Company K, 7th Infantry, New York Regiment on June 1, 1862 and he mustered out on September 5, 1862.

Marriage and children

He married Ellen James Van Buren (1844-1929) aka Elly Van Buren, on December 10, 1868 at Saint Mark's Church in Manhattan, New York City. Ellen was the granddaughter of Martin Van Buren (1782-1862) 8th President of the United States. Together they had the following children: Elizabeth Marshall Morris (1869-1919) who married B. Woolsey Rogers; Ellen VanBuren Morris (1873-1954) who married Francis Livingston Pell I (1873-1945); Richard Lewis Morris II (1875-?) who married Carolyn Whitney Fellowes (1882-?); and Stuyvesant Fish Morris II (1877-1925) who married Ellen James VanBuren (1844-1929). In 1920 they were living at 16 East 30th Street in Manhattan.

Writings about Morris family

Jeffrey Thomas writes:

"In 1864 Henry James wrote of [Ellen Van Buren] in a letter, 'Miss Ellen Van Buren is here -- pale, thin, and drooping. We taunt her facetiously with being in love ... whereat she smiles languidly.' Four years later Henry James commented in a letter to William James, 'We heard from Elly Van Buren that she is engaged to one Dr. Morris of New Rochelle, a young physician who has cared for her for 4 years and never has been attentive to any girl in the interval. I should think Elly's own conscience should sting her.' About this time Alice James remarked acidly that Elly's flustered carryings - on about her engagement were likely to exasperate her fiancé beyond endurance. In 1913, Henry, writing to his acolyte Howard Sturgis about the relatives he had mentioned in his memoir A Small Boy and Others, explained enigmatically, 'Yes, my Father's two other sisters were my Van Buren and my Temple aunts. I should have liked to drag in the former's daughter, the intimate of our childhood, or of mine, later Mrs. Stuyvesant Morris, but forebore.' In January 1902 William James wrote to Henry during a visit to the United States, 'I also saw Elly Van Buren, old looking but unaltered in manner.'"