John J. Roe (1809-1870)
There were few, if any, commercial endeavors in which Jonathan
J. Roe, merchant prince, was not involved.  His first venture in St.
Louis was to establish a commission house and to have his steam-
boats run by salaried captains.  From the commission house evolved
the meat packing business of which he was probably the most pros-
perous in the midwest; being a railroad magnate and an insurance
executive were among his achievements.
Although it appears that John Roe was not an integral part of Mark
Twain's life, his daughter, Emma, and one of his steamboats never
left the author's memory.
Emma Comfort Roe (1843-1904), married John Geery Copelin who
became her father's business partner.  She was widowed at the age
of 31; she never remarried.  For decades she was prominent in the
social life of those for whom the term 'gilded age' was created.
Emma Roe apparently caught Sam's fancy at one time.  His mother
wrote him a letter reminding him of Miss Roe when he was out West.
In answer to one of her vague letters he wrote: O, say, Ma, who was
that girl--that sweetheart of mine you say got married, and her father
gave her husband $100 (so you said, but I suppose you meant
$100,000)?  It was Emma Roe, wasn't it?  What in thunder did I want
with her?  I mean, since she wouldn't have had me if I had asked her to?
Let her slide--I don't suppose her life has ever been, is now, or ever
will be, any happier than mine.
Emma Comfort Copelin died March 26, 1904 at the age of 60; less
than three months before the death of Olivia Clemens in Italy.
When Horace Bixby transferred to the Missouri River he, according
to custom, entrusted his cub pilot, Sam Clemens, to another pilot
to learn the Mississippi.  Clemens began to steer on the John J.
Roe on August 5, 1857 under the tutoring of Zebulon
Leavenworth and Beck Jolly.  The Captain was Mark
Leavenworth.
The John J. Roe, was a 691-ton freight carrier built the previous year.
Mark Twain remembered her as a "delightful old tug," friendly and fun.
In Life on The Mississippi Mark Twain wrote: There is a great difference
in boats, of course.  For a long time Iwas on a boat that was so slow
we used to forget what year it was we left port in.  But of course this
was at rare intervals.  Ferry-boats use to lose valuable trips because
their passengers grew old and died, waiting for us to get by.  This was
at even rarer intervals.
I had the documents for these occurences, but through carelessness
they have been mislaid.  This boat, the John J. Roe, was so slow that
when she finally sunk at Madrid Bend it was five years before the
owners heard of it.  That was always a confusing fact to me, but it is
according to the record, anyway.  She was dismally slow; still, we often
had pretty exciting times racing with islands, and rafts, and such
things."
In his autobiography Mark Twain wrote about life on the John J. Roe, a
steamboat, but she was actually a freighter.  She was not licensed to
carry passengers but she always had a dozen on board and they were
privileged to be there because they were not registered; they paid no
fare; they were guests of the Captain and nobody was responsible for
them if anything of a fatal nature happened to them.
It was a delightful old tug and she had a very spacious boiler-deck
--just the place for moonlight dancing and daylight folics, and such
things were always happening.  She was a charmingly leisurely boat
and the slowest one on the planet.  Up-stream she couldn't even beat
an island; down-stream she was never able to overtake the current.
But she was a love of a steamboat.
The fashionable, newly-muttonchop-sideburned, twenty-two year old
Clemens arrived in St. Louis September 24, 1857 to rejoin Captain Bixby
who had returned from the Missouri River.  They made two trips to New
Orleans in October, 1857 on the William M. Morrison; the captain was
John Bofinger.  John Bofinger is buried at the Bellefontaine Cemetery
in Block 174, Lot 1438.
Bixby again returned to the Missouri and transferred Sam, to his
misfortune, to the Pennsylvania to work under the fault-finding, mote-
magnifying tyrant, William Brown.
John J. Roe is buried in the Bellefontaine Cemetery in Block 74,
Lot 1798.

Main image is taken from my own personal cd
collection and the information that is on the
following pages have been researched through
genealogy links and the Bellefontaine Cemetery
listings.
This set is NOT linkware and is NOT to leave
this site by any means.  It is for my own personal
use and NOT yours.
Thanks.....Fiddlinsue a.k.a. Suzanne