Jasper Gage/Gideon Baker, 1839-1885

Headstone GPS Coordinates: 

Birth: January 19, 1839, Machias, Washington County, Maine

Death: March 7, 1885, Seabeck, Kitsap County, Washington

Relatives in Seabeck Cemetery: Nellie Baker, Nicholas Baker

American Revolutionary War Patriots*: Moses Baker (Massachusetts) A005039, Aaron Hanscom (Massachusetts) A051231, Daniel Hoyt (Massachusetts) A058984.

Disclaimer: These lines have not been officially proven by NSDAR standards.

Jasper G. Baker was born on January 19, 1839, in Machias, Maine, to Zebulon Baker and Deborah Hanscom. He was the fourth of five children. His father owned and operated a farm in Maine.

In 1860, at twenty-one years old, Jasper was working as a sailor in East Machias while still living in his father’s household. Around 1868, he moved west and eventually settled in Seabeck.

By the time of the 1871 Washington Territorial census, Jasper was living as a boarder in the household of Gilbert Little, which included Gilbert’s ten-year-old daughter, Isabelle. A couple of years later, on January 12, 1873, Jasper married Isabelle Little at St. Paul’s Church in Port Townsend. Isabelle was very young and heavily pregnant at the time of the marriage. Their first child, Ida, was born just two weeks later, on January 28.

Depending on the record consulted, Isabelle was between twelve and fifteen years old when she married the thirty-three-year-old Jasper. Four census records list her year of birth as 1860, which would place her at twelve years old at the time of marriage, while her death certificate states she was born in 1857, making her fifteen. Regardless of the discrepancy, there is no dispute in either the records or family lore that Isabelle was a very young teenage bride and mother.

Jasper and Isabelle eventually had five more children: William (1877), Gilbert (1879), Clara (1881), Henry (1883), and Arthur (1886). The 1900 census recorded that Isabelle had given birth to seven children, six of whom were living. All known children were still alive in 1900. Fred Just recorded that local resident Ensley Doncaster reported a girl named Millie Baker was born in 1875, died in 1876, and was buried in Seabeck Cemetery. In Fredi Perry’s book, she wrote that two of the Baker children had died before Jasper. Fred Just also noted hearing from Ensley Doncaster about a Nicholas S. Baker buried in Seabeck Cemetery, though no dates or parentage were recorded. It remains uncertain whether Millie and Nicholas were part of the Baker family.

In 1872, Jasper became the second captain of the Colfax, earning a starting wage of $70 per month. In 1874, he received a raise to $80 per month, followed by another increase to $90 per month. His wages were twice those of the average millworker. At one point, he also bid on a mail route between Seabeck and Port Gamble but lost the contract to Edward Clayson.

Jasper owned 160 acres of land in Seabeck, where he raised cattle. Jacob Hauptly and Charles Reid both mentioned butchering cows for “Baker” in their diaries.

On February 4, 1885, Jacob Hauptly noted in his diary that Jasper was seeking medical treatment in Victoria, British Columbia, due to a serious illness, likely tuberculosis. Jasper died on March 7, 1885, and was buried in Seabeck Cemetery, leaving behind his wife and six children. The exact location of his grave within the cemetery is unknown today.