Background
Charles Erskine Scott Wood (1852-1944) was a U.S. Army officer, lawyer, and author. After
graduating from the U.S. Military Academy in 1874, he became an aide to General O.O. Howard
in 1877, serving with him in the Pacific Northwest during the Bannock and Paiute and Nez
Percé Indian wars. He later attended Columbia University, obtained his law degree, and
established a practice of maritime and corporation law in Portland, Oregon. In addition to
his successful law practice, Wood painted, wrote, was a champion of social justice, and
liberal causes. Wood married Nanny Moale Smith (-1933) in 1878 and they had three sons and
two daughters: Erskine Wood, Max Wood, Berwick Wood, Nan (Wood) Honeyman, and Lisa Wood. In
1910 he met Sara Bard Field (1882-1974), who was campaigning for women's suffrage in Oregon.
Field married Albert Ehrgott in 1900 and they had two children: Albert Field Ehrgott and
Katherine (Ehrgott) Caldwell; the couple was divorced in 1914. Field was a poet, suffragist,
and author; professionally she always used her maiden name Sara Bard Field. Wood and Field
established a home together in 1917 (they married in 1938); "The Cats," their home near Los
Gatos, California, became a center of art, music, and culture. Wood's publications include
The poet in the desert (1915) and Heavenly discourse (1927), as well as various articles for
the Pacific monthly and Century magazines.
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