Abigail Stoneman (fl. 1760-1777-84) was a feisty loyalist businesswoman active in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, & New York. It is difficult to construct a biography of her early years, because there is no known record of her maiden name or birth.
In 1760, Abigail Stoneman was listed alone as a member of “Mr. Vinal’s [First Congressional] Meeting” (Ezra Stiles, Literary Diary, 1901, I, 44). While occupying “a large & commodious dwelling house” on Marlborough Street, Newport, in 1766, she was robbed of“about one hundred [Spanish] dollars, & some pieces of China belonging to Mrs Stoneman” (Newport Mercury, Nov. 17, 1766). By 1772, the house was noted as having a “Garden, Large Stable, a Chaise-House, and a Summer House…neatly fitted up, painted and papered…is used as a Coffee House” in the September 21, 1772, Newport Mercury.
The “Black Horse” was a popular coffee-house in Newport on Thames Street, kept by Thomas Webber prior to May, 1767, at which time it was taken by Abigail Stoneman , and it then became known as the Merchants’ Coffee-House, at the sign of the “King’s Arms.” She also noted in her June 1, 1767, opening announcement in the Newport Mercury announcement of the opening of her coffee house, that she also would sell there “West India goods cheap for Cash.”
Mrs. Stoneman added “an elegant ballroom” to her establishment in 1769, & advertised to “furnish Entertainment for large & small companies in the genteelest manner” By October, however, she had moved over to Whitehall, which she renamed Vauxhall after the popular London outdoor public pleasure garden.
On December 24, 1770, she advertised in the Boston Gazette,“The Royal Exchange Tavern in King Street (only six months after “the Bloody Massacre” had taken place before the door)…being now repaired and fitted for the Reception of Company, will be opened this day as a coffee house by Abigail Stoneman from Rhode Island…she keeps ready furnished Lodgings, constant or occasional Boarders.” She had placed an ad 2 weeks earlier in the December 10, 1770, Boston Evening-Post, announcing her intentions of converting the tavern into a coffee house.
Abigail was not content with one coffeehouse; for in the November 29, 1773, Newport Mercury, she announced that she had opened the“King’s Arms,” on the Point Bridge, where she had also a “very good dancing-room, any civil and polite person could have, with music and lights, at a quarter of a dollar for each gentleman to dance in from 6 to 9 o‘clock in the evening during the winter, except on Thursday nights when the assembly will be held in it.” The same year she made it known that she kept the “British Coffee-House” on Thames Street,“near the New Lane “ Mary Street—and 4 miles away, in Middletown, on the west road, she had a tea house.
The next year she invested 1,400 pounds (Rhode Island currency) in a house & land in Middletown, about 4 miles from Newport. She improved this property for the entertainment of the summer visitors, who already consisted of gentry families of merchants & planters from Pennsylvania & South Carolina.
Abigail Stoneman seemed to operate tit-for-tat in the male business world in Newport. Court records show that her landlord Thomas Bannister sued her for 70 Spanish dollars’ worth of unpaid rent in the early 1770s. She replied by suing him for broken dishes, food, drinks, lighting, and other incidentals between 1768-1773 for a total of nearly 20 pounds. She extended credit to and received credit from a variety of Newport merchants, craftspeople, and laborers. She was a consistent client of Timothy Waterhouse, Jr, from whom she purchased cloth, wine, and other dry goods to both use in her businesses and to resell.
By June 1772, she was advertising her country seat, a“tea house” in Middletown, offering to the summer colonial vacationers, “Large entertainment …on the shortest notice.” After the season ended she offered her property for rent & moved to Newport to open the British Coffee House on New Lane. She was the only woman of Newport to receive a license to keep a tavern & sell spirituous liquors in 1772 & 1773. When the summer colony began arriving again, she returned to “her Seat” in Middletown.
Upon the departure of the summering gentry in November 1774, the bustling innkeeper re-opened the King’s Arm in Newport near the Point-bridge. There she fitted out a good dancing room, for which she supplied music for gentlemen & their ladies to dance in the winter evenings from six to nine, save on Thursdays, when the Newport Assembly was being held. Mrs. Stoneman also advertised in the May 30, 1774, Newport Mercury,“Board & lodging for gentlemen.”
On Aug, 28, 1774, at Hampton, NH, the Newport Mercury announced, “was married…The Hon. Sir John Treville, Knight of Malta, Capt. of cavalry in the service of his most Christian Majesty, to Mrs. Abigail Stoneman of this Town.” The marriage was also announced in the September 9, 1774, New York Gazette Mercury. At the time of her 2nd marriage she was a widow, the Newport Mercury (Sept. 5, 1774) described her as “a lady descended from a respectable family, of a good genius, a very polite & genteel address, & extremely well accomplished to every branch of family economy.”
Apparently in an effort to accrue some cash, soon after her marriage, the bride announced in the September 12, 1774, Newport Mercury “a private sale” of her house & land in Middletown, a billiard table, & two pews (one in Mr. Hopkins’ Congregational Meetinghouse & one in Trinity Church).
Within 3 years, Abigail resumed her old business in 1777. Sir John seems to have dropped out of the picture by then. Rivington’s New York Loyal Gazette announced on October 25, 1777: “The London Coffee-House is this day opened next door to Mr. Francis’s, at the lower end of Broad-Street, by Mrs. Treville, who formerly kept a Coffee -House in Boston, & Rhode-Island-As she has sustained considerable losses during the present rebellion, & put herself to great expence in providing every thing necessary for the accommodation of gentlemen, she flatters herself she will meet the suitable encouragement.”
Apparently successful, on Nov. 29, 1777, she advertised that she had conducted “the Assembly at Newport…to the general satisfaction of the polite & gay,” she would open one for the gentlemen of the army & navy each Wednesday from 6 to 10 P.M. for a change of one dollar a ticket for a couple. She courteously acknowledged her indebtedness to the “politeness & humanity” of the British military gentry.
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These 1777 entries are the last records of her presence in the rebellious colonies, although, there seems to be no record of her death here. What could be the final report of her comes from Kingston, Jamaica. Abigail Treville, living in Kingston, Jamaica, died in 1784, was reported by the Saturday, July 31, 1784, South Carolina Weekly Gazette in Charleston, SC.