Talk:William P. Ragsdale

Additional sources



 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17937095/annie_green_ragsdale_death/
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17937006/william_p_ragsdale_visit_to_the/ Visit to the Leper Settlement The Hawaiian Gazette (Honolulu, Hawaii) 24 Jun 1874, Wed • Page 2
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17936925/william_p_ragsdale_the_leper_asylum/ The Leper Asylum of Molokai The Pacific Commercial Advertiser (Honolulu, Hawaii) 18 Apr 1874, Sat • Page 2
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17936742/william_ragsdale_23_dec_1871/
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/12399456/william_p_ragsdale_and_james_i_dowsett/ Election Day The Pacific Commercial Advertiser (Honolulu, Hawaii) 07 Jan 1864, Thu • Page 2
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/12399240/william_phileppus_ragsdale_molokai/
 * https://www.newspapers.com/image/?spot=12399149
 * Bill Ragsdale The Pacific Commercial Advertiser (Honolulu, Hawaii) 02 Dec 1871, Sat • Page 2
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/12399094/bill_ragsdale_cl_1/
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/12399149/bill_ragsdale_cl_2/

Death

 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17936794/william_p_ragsdale_gone_to_molokai/
 * https://www.newspapers.com/clip/17936794/william_p_ragsdale_gone_to_molokai/

In 1898, Mark Twain wrote: "We all know about Father Damien, the French priest who voluntarily forsook the world and went to the leper island of Molokai to labor among its population of sorrowful exiles who wait there, in slow-consuming misery, for death to cone and release them from their troubles; and we know that the thing which he knew beforehand would happen, did happen: that he became a leper himself, and died of that horrible disease. There was still another case of self-sacrifice, it appears. I asked after 'Billy' Ragsdale, interpreter to the Parliament in my time--a half-white. He was a brilliant young fellow, and very popular. As an interpreter he would have been hard to match anywhere. He used to stand up in the Parliament and turn the English speeches into Hawaiian and the Hawaiian speeches into English with a readiness and a volubility that were astonishing. I asked after him, and was told that his prosperous career was cut short in a sudden and unexpected way, just as he was about to marry a beautiful half-caste girl. He discovered, by some nearly invisible sign about his skin, that the poison of leprosy was in him. The secret was his own, and might be kept concealed for years; but he would not be treacherous to the girl that loved him; he would not marry her to a doom like his. And so he put his affairs in order, and went around to all his friends and bade them good-bye, and sailed in the leper ship to Molokai. There he died the loathsome and lingering death that all lepers die."

Relatives
Mr. Dowsett married Annie Green Ragsdale of Honolulu and they were the parents of thirteen children, James Isaac, Jr. (deceased), Alexander (deceased), Phoebe K. (Dowsett) Raymond, Edward Ragsdale (deceased), Mary K. (Dowsett) Parish, Alexander Cartwright, Annie K. (Dowsett) Kirklady, Elizabeth Jane (Dowsett) Knight, David A. (deceased), Rowena N. (Dowsett) Turner, Samuel Henry K. (deceased), Marion C. (Dowsett) Worthington and Genevieve N. (Dowsett) Dunbar (deceased).
 * http://files.usgwarchives.net/hi/statewide/bios/dowsett22bs.txt

Ragsdale was the son: Author interview with Cari Castro, a Ragsdale descendant. William Ragsdale's father,Alexander Ragsdale,arrived in Hawaii in 1819 and married a Hawaiian woman of minor royal birth. The couple had three children: Annie, William, and Edward. One of Annie Ragsdale Dowsett's grandchildren, William Dowsett, later adopted her maiden name as William Kamanao Ragsdale, to continue the Ragsdale line after William died in the colony.


 * Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2014 July 11

Bibliography - Pennie Moblo
The link for Pennie Moblo under Bibliography is no longer valid. Or, perhaps it just doesn't work with my browsers. However, if you have JSTOR subscription, I found the following that might substitute. — Maile (talk) 22:32, 29 January 2019 (UTC)