Old Time Letters

1895

AN EPISTLE WRITTEN NEARLY ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO.

The Reverential Manner In Which a Young Girl of That Period Addressed Her Father — Proper Way For a Lover to Ask His Sweetheart to Elope With Him.

If the prim Puritan maiden of a century ago did not startle masculinity by wearing bloomers on the public highway, or pompously presiding at political mass meetings, or — horrible to relate — smoking perfumed cigarettes on the sly, she must have been a deucedly charming girl withal. A typical gentlewoman, she commands, irresistibly, more than ardent admiration.

If character can be portrayed in letter writing — and no one doubts the fact — an epistolary message written nearly a century ago by a devoted young Bostonian maiden to her much beloved papa in Philadelphia will afford an intensely interesting study of commencement de siecle womanhood, as it were.

To be sure, the dear young girl who penned the loving message decades and decades ago never dreamed that her letter would be published at the dawn of the twentieth century in a Chicago newspaper and read by the eyes of modern woman, so called. For a fact Chicago was not on the map in those days, and woman — lovely woman — had not been modernized. To peer into this primitive maiden's private affairs really seems a sacrilege. The epistle is, however, so essentially unique, so different from the flippant style of correspondence today and withal so suggestive of the excessive formality and great reverence accorded parents by children in the proverbial good old times that its perusal may be pardonable. In a word, it is the embodiment of filial affection. It would doubtless surprise the average indulgent papa of today, who is quite used to being told a few things occasionally by his "advanced,” all wise daughters.

The fair writer was evidently a young woman of exceptional culture in those early days. Of course she must have been, or did she not reside in the Hub City and eat baked beans? In a peculiarly artistic and legible handwriting the remarkable letter is thus addressed: "Rev. John Murray, to the care of Colonel John Connelly, Philadelphia."

There is the customary heading — "Boston, Feb. 13, 1804" — but the usual salutation of "My Dear Father" is omitted. After this interesting fashion Miss Julia Marcia Murray makes reparation for a supposed slight to her paternal ancestor: "You are astonished, my dear papa, at not receiving an answer to your letter, and I, my dear sir, am equally astonished that my answer written as early as the 8th of January has not yet reached you.

"Yes, indeed, you are entitled to my utmost gratitude, my utmost affection, to my duty, and my veneration, and I should have considered myself inexcusable if I had delayed a day to acknowledge a letter which gave me such heartfelt pleasure. If you have received my letter, you will find in it expressions of the warmest gratitude. It will always, my dear father, make me unhappy to know that you are so, and particularly if I have any reason to suppose myself, even unintentionally, the cause of it. You ought not to be kept in suspense, and I do indeed, my dear papa, consider it a prime duty to attend to you, and I have given a circumstantial account of the school exhibition and other particulars. And now, my dear sir, indulging the hope that I have rendered you easy on the subject of my not writing to you, I will go on to a part of your letter over which I shed many, very many, tears.

"Oh, my father, my heart is indeed filled with tender affection for my dear, my excellent parent, and if my heart be an affectionate feeling heart how could you expect that I should read the following very affecting line in your letter without its being torn: 'Sweet soul, you will not have your parents long?' When I came to read this, I could no longer restrain my tears, so covering my face with my handkerchief I audibly sobbed. Can I endure the thought that those dear, indulgent parents must ascend to the bosom of their God before me? Would to heaven I could continue here as long as I could be useful to them and then wing my flight to the regions of the blessed, where I might prepare garlands of never fading roses to crown them with, but as this is a felicity too great for human beings to attain I must content myself with the lot of mortality and meekly bow my head in pious resignation.

"And now, my dear papa, hoping that you will acquit me of either neglect or inattention to the best of fathers, I repeat again and again that I am your ever affectionate and dutiful daughter,

"JULIA MARCIA MURRAY.

"We have got our buckwheat meal. Mr. Jones and Cousin Mary Allen desire their best regards. J. M. M."

A writer on etiquette of those days tells amorous youths how to write "fetching" billet doux to their ladyloves. Clandestine marriages must have been as popular in the long ago as they are today. At any rate, the writer gives an ideal letter from "a young gentleman, who is in expectation of an estate from his penurious uncle, to a young lady of small fortune, whom he desires to elope with him to New England." After this fashion was the anxious lover instructed in this interesting branch of lovemaking:

"MY DEAR MARIA — My uncle's laying his injunctions upon me not to see you more has only served to add fuel to my passion. I cannot live without you, and if you persist in refusing to comply I am miserable forever. I pay no regard to his threatening when put in competition with the love I have for you. Don't be afraid of poverty. If he should continue inexorable, I have still education sufficient to procure a genteel employment in one of the public offices, where I may rise to preferment. Therefore, if ever you loved me, let me beg that you will not make me any longer unhappy. Let me entreat you by all that's dear that you will comply with my request and meet me at 6 Sunday evening at the back door of the garden, where a chaise and four will be ready. I will fly on the wings of love to meet my charmer and be happy in her embraces forever. I am your dear lover." — Chicago Tribune.

Mother Whips Man Courting Her Girl

1920 (*1919)

But Maid Still Vows Love For Married Suitor

Unhappy Wife and Desperate Parent Are Victims of Sordid "Eternal Triangle"

KANSAS CITY, Mo., Jan. 1. — Love of the eternal triangle brand, which sneered at the marriage vow and set at naught horsewhippings of an angry mother and which had no regard for a little new life coming into the world, brazenly bared itself in the South Side Court.

Edward L. Branham, 22 years old, a telegraph operator, stood beside his wife, who is to bear him a child. He was there to answer a charge of disturbing the peace, sworn to by Mrs. Minnie Savage. Mrs. Savage's daughter, Lois Savage, 19 years old, Who is the "other woman," stood beside her mother.

Engaged Three Years Ago

Branham and Lois Savage had been engaged three years ago. Mrs. Savage would not approve the match. They parted. Branham married.

Mrs. Savage, a small, alert woman with reddish hair, was the first to testify.

"For two years Lois and Branham have been meeting each other, in spite of his marriage. My daughter is crazy in love with a married man. I have pleaded with them both in vain.

"I became desperate and went to his office and horsewhipped him publicly there. That had no particular effect. He would send her presents, candy, flowers. He would telegraph her when she was away on visits."

Judge Edward J. Fleming turned to the girl, Lois Savage.

Wished to Marry Him, Anyway

"Judge, I love him," she said. "If he got a divorce today, I would marry him tomorrow."

"Don't you realize," Judge Fleming asked, "that he is the type who would throw you over, too?"

The girl looked up boldly.

"It would not matter."

Then the wife, Mrs. Branham, spoke calmly:

"I love my husband. That woman has been breaking up my home. My husband has been urging a divorce, but I don't wish one. Everything would be settled if it were not for that girl."

Mrs. Branham told of Lois Savage visiting her home and asking Mrs. Branham to give up her husband. The girl went to Branham's room, the wife said, took a picture of him from the wall, kissed and caressed it and took it with her when she left.

"Is that all true?" Judge Fleming asked Branham.

Wife Refused Him a Divorce

"Yes," Branham admitted. "I kept company with her even after I was married. I desire a divorce, but my wife refuses it."

"Your fine is $500," the court told Branham. "I'll parole you if you leave the girl alone. If not, jail for you."

Then Judge Fleming turned to Mrs. Savage.

"As for that daughter of yours," he said, "a whipping would be a good thing for her, too."

Branham was paroled when he promised, after court adjourned, to cease association with Lois. The girl, weeping, was led from the courtroom by her mother and brother. Outside the building she attempted to return to the courtroom.

"Please," she said, "let me tell Edward good-by — for the last time! Please!"

She started to take a diamond ring from her finger, then said:

"No, I'll keep it to remember him!"

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 3. *Note: These events took place in 1919, like maybe November. The Blade seems to put a current dateline on everything, the date they were putting the story in the newspaper.

Jury Acquits Girl On Slaying Charge

1920 (actually happened in 1919)

16-Year-Old Defendant Plans To Resume School

Clara Bartel's Plea That She Slew Father in Family Defense Wins Freedom

DOYLESTOWN, Pa. — The plea of Clara Bartel, the 16-year-old girl accused of the murder of her father, Charles Bartel, that she had killed him in defending the lives of her mother and her sisters resulted in her acquittal by a jury here after only 20 minutes' deliberation.

The defendant burst into tears when the foreman of the jury announced the verdict. She swayed as if about to fall, and Mrs. Charles R. Nightingale, the probation officer who has taken care of her since her arrest, caught her in her arms. Then the crowd in the courtroom surged about her, showering her with congratulations.

Clara threw her arms about J. Hibbs Buckman, her chief attorney, and sobbed on his shoulder.

"Oh, I am so glad," she said. "Now I can help take care of mother."

Warns Against Sympathy

Judge William C. Ryan occupied thirty-five minutes in his charge to the jury.

"We have all been moved by the pathos of this case and story of the dark tragedy," said the court. "But it is your duty to render a verdict unaffected by the sympathy for this defendant of tender [years.] If she acted in [self-]defense or in defense of her mother, she would not be guilty of this offense."

"I shot my father. I had to do it to save us all."

That was the girl's first statement as she took the stand in her own defense at her trial for the murder of her father at their home near Edgewood, Bucks County, on the morning of August 22.

Three jurors wept openly as the girl told her story of a father who, she averred, abused her mother, herself and the other small children.

Bartel's aged mother, Mrs. Amelia Bartel, 81 years old, said Clara told her: "Grandma, I killed him. I had to do it to save us."

Says Father Beat Her

Under direct examination she told of finding a bundle of letters written by another woman to her father hidden in the peak of the barn. She testified that she read the letters and kept them for several days and finally showed them to her mother. For this her father beat her, she said.

After she had been given a medal for selling Liberty Bonds, she said, her father said he was "going to kill her" and expressed the hope that "they sink every d—n American." She also told of several instances when Bartel had threatened to kill her and her mother.

One night, she said, her father ordered her to go out into the barnyard and find a stick with which he drove his hogs. She told of his beating her mother the morning of the shooting and also chasing her downstairs, shouting, "I am going to kill the whole d—n lot of you and do it now!" She said he went to the place where the guns were usually kept, but they were not there. Then, she said, she ran into another room and got a shotgun and, closing her eyes, pointed it at her father, not knowing it was loaded. The gun was discharged and the shot tore thru her father's body.

--The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Jan. 3, 1920, p. 3.

Note: Two words in brackets are supplied because of breaks in the paper and so they're missing. Of course they're obvious to the context.

Daughter Can Save Mother

1915

There Are Many Little Pleasures Girl Can Give Her Parents — Don't Talk Disrespectfully

There is so much a daughter can do for her mother that it is hard to know where to begin. Remember, girls, that all your lives your mothers have been sacrificing themselves for you. Now you have a chance to reverse things.

Your shoulders are young and strong; help lift the burden a little from the tired shoulders that have borne it so long. Let mother see that you appreciate all that she has done for you. Take the heaviest part of the housework off her hands. Make her stay in bed in the morning while you get the breakfast. Send her out to enjoy herself while you look after the children.

Of course you cannot do this every day, but you can do your share of it.

If you are a business girl you cannot do much of this sort of thing, but there are many little pleasures you can give her.

Something pretty to wear will please her. She likes pretty things as well as you do. Confide in her and tell her your hopes and ambitions. She is better than all the girl friends in the world and will never tell your secrets.

The trouble about mothers is, that we get so used to them that we don't half appreciate them until we lose them. Then quickly enough we realize what all that divine care and tenderness meant. No matter how much you do, you can't begin to return all they have done for you, but do the best you can. A little love and petting is always appreciated by mothers; try it with yours and see if she does not thrive under it.

As for the girls who talk and act disrespectfully toward their mothers, for them no criticism is too harsh. If only they knew what outsiders think of it I believe they would stop it.

The prettiest girl in the world is absolutely devoid of charm if she is impertinent to her mother.

Begin today, girls, and save your mothers all the worries you can; show them all the consideration you can, and give them all the love you can. — Selected.

Gypsy Girl Bride Held for Ransom

1920

Father Gives Her Up When Hubby Pays $500

This is Romany Custom, Explains Parent

NEW YORK, N.Y. — The kidnapping of Mrs. Lena Stevens from her home in Cleveland by her father, who held her from her young husband for $500 ransom, has been explained. Instead of finding a villainous parent, Newark detectives learned of a gypsy custom which made the "ransom" legitimate.

George Stevens married Lena Judson, a gypsy, about a year ago. They hit the gypsy trail by automobile, slept outdoors, cooked their meals in the fields and enjoyed a prolonged honeymoon.

Father Starts on Their Trail

Through a mysterious channel Ephraim Judson, the father of the bride, heard that his son-in-law was mistreating his daughter. So he set out to find the couple. When he found them he discovered that the reports were false and had been spread by a rival for the girl's hand.

Judson then demanded $500. He said he had spent this amount of money in ascertaining that his son-in-law was the right kind of husband. Stevens promised to pay, and the couple returned to their Cleveland home.

But the money was not forthcoming, and a week or two ago Mrs. Stevens disappeared. The husband told the police, and they decided it was a case of kidnapping when he showed a letter asking $500 for the return of his wife. Stevens searched and finally found her at her father's home in this city.

Both Wait for $500

Judson explained the circumstances of the "kidnapping," and the son-in-law wired his father in Cleveland to send him $500, so he could get his bride.

The police found the young husband living with the gypsies in a small store in Newark, New Jersey. He explained that his father-in-law, by gypsy custom, was entitled to the $500.

So Stevens is in Newark, hoping his father will send him the $500, while Mrs. Stevens is in New York, hoping her father gets the $500. And husband and wife are hoping to be reunited soon.

Peculiar Chinese Parents and Daughters

1896

It is a disagreeable fact that Chinese parents are in the habit, in certain circumstances, of abandoning female infants to death by starvation, and it is one that an apologist for China would like to pass over in silence.

On the other hand, nothing is gained by exaggeration, and as far as my most limited experience allows me to speak, it is enormous exaggeration to talk as if Chinese mothers exposed their daughters habitually and without a second thought. At any rate, the people of Fair-Reply would repudiate the charge with amazement. "He han kai, tso mak kai fit?" "Is she a good one, why throw away?" they would ask.

Why indeed, when a girl of ten in good health and fairly bonny will always fetch $100; while each of the next five or six years will add $10 to her market value? So remembering that from the age of five she will be useful to gather bambu husks for fuel, mind the baby, feed the buffalo, and a year or two later cut fern, dig up pistachio nuts, and carry water, it will be seen that a healthy female child will be by no means an unprofitable investment.

But if the child be sickly, then it is different. The nasty little thing looks so red and helpless and repulsive. If it dies within doors its fractious spirit will remain there, and add another torment to the teeming world of imps that surround us. Better for all parties to deport the tiny spirit to some lonely spot, turn away quickly, and think of something else.

Charity might possibly accept some such revulsion of the maternal instincts in explanation; and the anthropologist will remember "Nature," that "holy thing," and the case of the rabbits once so aptly cited in this connection. — Blackwood's Magazine.

The Dying Wife (poetry)

1878

The Dying Wife.

Lay the gem upon my bosom,
Let me feel her warm breath,
For a strong chill o'er me passes,
And I know it is death.
I would gaze upon the treasure—
Scarcely given ere I go—
Feel her rosy, dimpled fingers
Wander o'er my cheek of snow,

I am passing through the waters,
But a blessed shore appears;
Kneel beside me, husband, dearest,
Let me kiss away thy tears;
Wrestle with thy grief, my husband,
Strive from midnight unto day;
It may leave an angel's blessing
When it vanishes away.

Lay the gem upon my bosom,
'Tis not long she can be there,
See! how to my heart she nestles,
'Tis the pearl I love to wear.
If in after years beside thee,
Sits another in my chair,
Though her voice be sweeter music,
And her face than mine more fair;

If a cherub call thee "Father,"
Far more beautiful than this,
Love thy first-born, oh! my husband!
Turn not from the motherless;
Tell her something of her mother—
You may call her by my name!
Shield her from the winds of sorrow!
If she errs, oh! gently blame.

Lead her sometimes, where I am sleeping
I will answer if she calls,
And my breath will stir her ringlets,
When my voice in blessing falls;
Then her soft black eyes will brighten,
And shall wonder whence it came;
In her heart when years pass o'er her
She will find her mother's name.

It is said that every mortal
Walks between two angels here;
One records the ill, but blots it,
If before the midnight drear
Man repenteth — if uncancelled,
Then the right-hand angel weepeth,
Bowing low with veiled eyes.

I will be her right hand angel,
Sealing up the good for Heaven;
Striving that the midnight watches
Find no misdeeds unforgiven.
You will not forget me, husband,
When I am sleeping 'neath the sod;
Oh, love the jewel to us given
As I love thee — next to God!