| Title: | Mary Anderson, Blount Springs to Her Mother, Baltinglass. |
|---|---|
| ID | 73 |
| Collection | Irish Emigration Database |
| File | Anderson, Mary/24 |
| Year | 1886 |
| Sender | Anderson, Mary (Minnie) |
| Sender Gender | female |
| Sender Occupation | housewife |
| Sender Religion | unknown |
| Origin | Blount Springs, Alabama, USA |
| Destination | Baltinglass, Co. Wicklow, Ireland |
| Recipient | unknown |
| Recipient Gender | female |
| Relationship | daughter-mother |
| Source | T 3258/4/11: Photocopied by Courtesy of General Sir John Anderson. |
| Archive | The Public Record Office, Northern Ireland. |
| Doc. No. | 9403210 |
| Date | 02/09/1886 |
| Partial Date | |
| Doc. Type | EMG |
| Log | Document added by LT, 18:03:1994. |
| Word Count | 1495 |
| Genre | |
| Note | |
| Transcript | President Sir E.S. Hutchinson, Bar Vice President, J.S. Smithson, Chicago THE ANGLO-AMERICAN LOAN AND INVESTMENT CO. Blount Springs. Ala [Alabama?] Managing Director. Tuesday 2nd Sept 1886 Henry Anderson. My darling Mother Henry remained away from this a week, & on his return last Saturday brought me a whole budget of letters from home, yours & the dear girls' & boys' among the number : oh how glad I was to get them _ I felt hungry for letters in this strange place - these were waiting for us at Birmingham forwarded from Wichita. The young people must have had a very delightful trip with Col. [Colonel?] Gamble, really a time to be remembered _ We are very sorry to hear of the disappointment of dear William's hopes _ it is a very great pity that the seemingly promising move could not be made _ I wonder should he not have gone on in spite of this Assistant? I do hope that something suitable may be found for him soon _ we shall be anxious to hear _ Just after my letter from this place last week, I got ill, a sort of low feverish attack brought on I am sure by the awful smells of the Hotel & its filthy surroundings. I wrote nothing of it to H. [Henry?] but was most of the time too ill to be out of bed. Violet had to dress the boys & herself, & take them to meals, give orders for their food &c. &c. & did it all so nicely that afterwards, many people spoke of her to me, & said that they had never seen 4 such beautifully-behaved children _ When H. [Henry?] returned he was perfectly horrified to find me so ill _ & instantly got us all removed to this house on a hill, close to the Hotel, but in higher purer air, & free from dirty surroundings & from the awful W.C. we take meals at the Hotel, & sit there or here first as we like _ I instantly began to get better, & am now, in 3 days, I may say, perfectly well again _ The children are as usual well & happy_ among a paradise of trees ferns, fossils, insects &c &c. They have discovered a family of lizards _ & sit outside their hole singing; till, one by one, all the lizards come out to listen _ they also find snakes, centipedes, tree-locusts & all manner of creatures _ I can hardly describe the admiration they get _ If I go out to walk with them I am stopped 20 times by people to ask about them, the 3 boys are so like each other & so much the same size they are almost like triplets, they have blue suits & scarlet caps & the 3 are always dressed alike, they are so completely unlike any other children in their Anglo _ Saxon fairness and largeness _ They have got the names of "The Young Englishmen"_ "The sturdy Britons" &c They go every where, climb the trees, mount the steepest rocks, go up walls &c, to the astonishment of the pale-faced Americans (they are not yankees in the South you know) & of course get many falls_ Yesterday Grenvil fell off a rock & another big stone fell down on him, a whole crowd of people ran thinking he must be badly hurt, but he got up with the air of the Giant who asked "did a rat tap me with its tail?" & marched off _ A man who has a little shop in the village has taken a great fancy to "The England boys" & brought them in one day & weighed them _ They were alone, he had told me afterwards that he had weighed my Twins, & the difference in weight was half a pound! which had the half pound he didn't know as he couldn't tell the difference between them They are not given to playing with other children. keep greatly to themselves_ V. [Violet?] however loves little girls wrote so far, & then went to dinner_ after dinner I got a letter from H. [Henry?] from Birmingham enclosing one from you which is delightful to get _ you tell of Harries doings, what a splendid time she is having _ indeed I should just love to go with her & Wm [William?] to London! All my English sight seeing has to come yet _ It may be a very good place for Wm [William?] to stay all winter at Ashford _ I am sure Hal looks lovely in her pretty tasteful dresses, she has such good taste about dress & everything_ Is Fred Finlay going to be married. You did not tell me so, but say something that looks like it. A very long wandering letter from poor Carrol [Carol?] to H. [Henry?] The weather very warm there, & he working hard at his ranche [ranch?]. Seems very lonely, no near neighbors, his only apparent comfort a protestant orphan boy _ "an excellent lad"_ who cooks &c _ W.C. drives his own wagon with fruit & vegetables from his ranche [ranch?] out to the nearest town & sells at the houses he passes on the way!! "Cadges" them as he says himself_ I think he regrets his bargain, & he says he fears there's little money to be made that way _ he wd [would?] gladly come South or anywhere to be near H. [Henry?] but really he is rather a responsability [responsibility?]. Much as we like him_ All this strictly private. H. [Henry?] did not much like Pensacola, & thinks that everything considered, Chattanooga will probably be the best place for us to settle in just now _ The boom in B'ham [BIrmingham?] has brought prices up so very high that cautious people are afraid to buy _ too much to risk _ The way prices have gone up there within 4 weeks is incredible. It is sure to be a great city, can't help it with its wonderful resources _ but this boom may subside soon & leave the place as it is for several years to come _ Chattanooga, Tennessee, is a very nice place, larger than B. [Birmingham?] with just as great advantages, & prices rising, but not with such a rush as at B. [Birmingham?] _ while H. [Henry?] was here we had a lovely walk along such a pretty quiet country road, on one side a deep wood, on the other a border of Cedar trees. Sumachs & other beauties, ferns of all kinds in hundreds. A rocky slope stretching down from these trees, & in the bottom of it the railway _ beyond this a wooded & rocky hill rising up _ nothing very striking, but soft & lovely to our eyes. Wearied with looking over prairie flatness _ such a quiet road is not to be found in all Kansas _ but this part of the country is all like that _ About Chattanooga is pretty H. [Henry?] says _ I have got to know some of the ladies here very well indeed _ & find many of them really nice _ rifined [refined?] in mind, & companionable _ So [-?]uperior [superior?] to the wretched Westerns & Northerns. I can hardly describe the intensely bitter feeling which still exists between north & south. The Southerns loath the northerns _ & despise them as vulgar parvenues [parvenus?] _ freedom is ruining the blacks, most of whom are found to be incapable of education, & whose only idea of happiness is "sweet doing nothing"_ They have no moral principles whatever, & need to be governed like children _ Are not half so happy as when they were with their old masters, whom they loved, & who were (with a few exceptions) so good to them _ Today I & the children walked up the mountain, which reminds me very much of Rostrevor Mountain, with a sort of private hotel on the top instead of [Cloughmore?] stone_ The weather delightful, quite cool & pleasant _ a cashmere or silk dress bearable, so much better than sweltering Kansas _ I am writing on the nice wide shady verandah of this house on the hill, the great oak & beech trees all round me _ a soft haze is over everything & a slightly autumnal look beginning to come _ I suppose Papa's teeth are only a temporary set _ I do hope & trust he may have comfort with the new ones _ How I long to see him and you. H. [Henry?] feels very anxious about his Father, he has been so ill _ My present to Edith Anderson was a pair of handsome salad servers, Sara chose them to match a salad bowl she had among her presents. She wrote me a nice little note of thanks _ It seems we are much admired here being [english?], every one wants to know us _ & all want us to go to where they live _ Fondest love to each & all Your own child Minnie |
