[7] After graduating from Yale, he spent three years abroad mostly in Berlin, before returning to America to enter Columbia Law School in October 1861.

His studies were cut short as the Civil War broke out and he volunteered as a Private in the 22nd New York Militia, serving from June to August 1862 during most of which he was stationed at Harper's Ferry.

[8][9] Before their legal separation in 1886, they had a home on Bellevue Avenue in Newport called "the Cedars",[9] were the parents of one son and three daughters, including:[7] After their divorce, his wife remarried to the Maurice, Marquis de Talleyrand-Périgord in 1887 (who was recently divorced from Elizabeth Beers-Curtis, another American heiress).

[18][19][20] They divorced in April 1903,[8][21] shortly before Stevens married Alice Caroline Seely in New York City on December 8, 1904.

They were the parents of one daughter: Stevens died on January 20, 1928, at 925 Park Avenue, his residence in New York City.