CLARA BARTON GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE Sheldon, Joseph & Abby Mar. 1868 - Aug 1884War Department, Bureau Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands. Washington, D.C.... Mar. 6. 1868 The Enclosed letter has been received with request to forward it. I do not know Miss Barton's address certainly, but think her brother whom I met in N.C. spoke of residing in Worcester Mass. E. [Whiatesy?] a.a.a.g. 11) New Haven. Feb 29th '68 Dear Clara. I see by the New York papers you are to speak in that City Wednesday of the present week. When you get so near as that, why not come up and talk over the matter of going to Paris with us next summer? I took you to be in earnest when in Syracuse you said you would go. I will give you a good deal of eager advice about that "farm" if you will but come! I have thought of trying to have you get this in New York, and conclude to bother the worlds servant - Horace Greeley with it. As the Irishman says, if you never get it, let me know. With best love Abby SheldonAbba Sheldon Ansd for Chicago came via of H Greeley & thru the War Dept [next page] [handwritten at top in different handwriting] 12 Travel in Europe Sheldon _________________ New Haven May 13" 1869 Dearest Clara. Hearing nothing from you since writing a week ago I am getting full of fear that I did not half make you know how very anxious [prev. two words underlined] we are to have you make one of our party on our journey across the water. I know I wrote in great haste while the children were out for a little walk, and I fear I was in too much of a hurry to make my letter give you assurance of the gladness in my heart only to think of the possibility [underlined] of your going. I don't want to think you may be in poorer healthor that you are not perfectly certain that we should ____ (mature old people even as we have become) fairly jump [underlined] up and down for joy [prev. three words underlined], if you would say positively that you would go. Perhaps with ill health you fear to go in company with two little folks - who are often troublesome to a whole party. If possible, do write us a few lines, answering my doubts, and telling me if I may hope to see you before I go to Syracuse. We still hope to be off on or before July 1st. Very truly yours. Abby B_______. Abby Sheldon About Europe May. 1869 Ansd No 23. Paddington Green London. Eng. My Dear Clara. Where in the wide world are you? Why is that we must be kept so cruelly apart. It really seems to me that some heartless fate has ruled over us the past six months. When Joseph rec'd your letter announcing your determination to go on the Caledonia, he represents that he was greatly excited by the news, and hurried down to New York - if possible to persuade you from that Line - even if you could not longer wait for us. We spent a whole day in that City trying to find you, and succeeded not. There was the same Fate hanging over us. He came to Syracuse to see me. I would gladly have packed up in a day and been with you on the Boat, but Joseph could not. He then Telegraphed you to write to him at No 5 Rue Scribe Paris. We sailed from N. Y 8" Sept - reached Liverpool the 20th. As soon as we got to London we wrote to Paris to know if anything awaited us there. Nothing came and we wrote finally clear back to old Worcester, and today have rec'd a letter from your friend Mr Vassal. He tells us he has not heard from you "since you left London if you have left-)". Imagine how provoking it is to us to learn that you have been here since we cameand even for aught we know are here now. He fails to tell us where you stopped while here - so we can only go on in the same back-handed way that we have all the time been going, and write to Switzerland to find out if you are in London, and you meanwhile will get away. I feel much disappointed by his letter. I did not suppose you had been in London yet, and I had been planning to try and get you here for a couple of months. You know I too was to make this journey for my health, and it was so long delayed that when I got here I was really sick, and fled at once to a Water Cure. We fortunately found a good one in the City, and have become so enamored of the treatment that I had hoped we might persuade you to come and try it with me as being I feel very sure the spediest and best way for you to recover health. We make great use of the Turkish Baths, and I believe it would be the best thing in the world for you - peculiarly the thing you need. I had set my heart on persuading you to try them, and having your company for a time. But just now comes another stone on my head, and I really feel very sad about it. To help [along?], Joseph finds it necessary for him to return to America next week, to be gone two months or so. I am to remain here with my two children and the woman we brought. Isn't it a little rough? And then that you, the only person on this side the ugly ocean that we care for, must be altogether inaccessible. Well, as I said I feel ver sad about it - very much unreconciled. We rent three rooms and play keep house. You know we can buy nearly every thing we want to eat, already cooked, so house keeping is made quite easy. I am sure we feel much more contented with these outward signs of home - cooking a little - washing dishes and keeping our rooms in order. Our Maggie is very efficient in all these ways, and says she should be homesick but for the work that fills up her time. And for me, I have all the marketing and providing for the family - just as if we were in New Haven We are going to be very lonely when Joseph goes away. So far we have improved nearly all the fine days by going to visit the Parks & other places of attraction. While alone we shall have none of that, and the short dark days - the dullest part of the year is coming on. Besides we find it very cold here. How I wish you and all of us could go to the South of France or Italy for the next two or three months. Will it ever happen that we shall meet again! I grow discouraged about it. Please however to write me whereyou are, and where you mean to be for the winter. I am sure you would do well to take Turkish Baths - that they would help you out of your torpid condition better than anything else. And if only we could have known you were here on our arrival, I am sure we could have persuaded you to stay with us for a time. As it is, I can only end as I began. - bemoaning the Fate that seems destined to torment us. Oh! how I do wish I could see you. With Great love. Abby Sheldon Nov 8" 1869 [*Abby Sheldon Engl Recd & answered Nov. 10th 1869 - Geneva - Suisse 33*] 23 Paddington Green Dec 5" 1869 [*33 Sheldon*] My Dear Clara. I am going to turn from a half dozen letters that I ought to write, to this one which I want to write. I am getting very impatient of my stay here, and long to hie away to sunshine and better weather. I am as full of plans as you are, but perhaps less independent about carrying any of them out - still I have a very strong hope that we shall get together in less than two months. - I am now well, and for my own part would not stay in London another day. I can see cold weather enough in America where I expect to spend all the winters of my life but this one, and I feel it a pity to pass this one here. We (you and I) are travellers - seeking health and pleasure - why do we submit to the disagreeable climates of either Geneva or Eng, when we might as well visit some of the warmer countries we want to see, before they are too hot to be pleasant. You ask what we want to do in the spring. I shall only pretend to answer for myself. and I will tell you the plan I want to carry out from now henceforth. Joseph expected to be back New Years - for the sake of seeing the dear old fellow the earliest possible moment I want to remain here till then. I know that he will have business in Paris early in Jan, and I shall hope it will seem to him best that we all go on there with him, and from there to the South of France. I long for Nice or Cannes, - not to live in either City perhaps, but quite near.And as I said before, I am not willing to lose this, my only chance of seeing what winter is in some of those world-renowned places. Then to go there, would be but beginning the journey we have all the time wanted to make in the spring - to Italy - Rome & Florence. We ought to be in Rome in Carnival week - then "do" Italy before the hot weather - return to Paris when that is fine, and by the last of May be ready for Switzerland. That is the plan I have laid out since I have got well enough to have some desires beyond getting well. But in truth - without exaggeration I must say I want most to see you - be near you - and lay our plans together. I shall always look upon this journey with regret if we cannot yet realise the pleasure I had in thinking of you as a travelling companion. I was relieved that you did not again mention Madagascar in your last - but frightened at the new prospect of Algiers. The sunshine and the warmth are of course delightful to think of, but I do not think we or you could be comfortable to stay long so far removed from civilization. I hope and pray you will not be enticed hence though I perhaps ought not to say so. I know you ought not to stay where you are, both because you cannot be comfortable - cannot be [enough] equal to the rough climate in so much as to gain in it, and because you are leading a caged life that ill suits you, and would of itself make you sick, if continued long. You ought not to remain there another month waiting to meet us in Paris - why not - since you are so self helpful and competent - go at once to the South of France, & I will be almost sure to join you by the middle of Jan. It is right on the way we ought by all means to go in the spring and so would add nothing in expense. I have had most flattering descriptions of Cannes, and judge it is more nearly to our style than Nice, but I am also told that there is an excellent Turkish Bath at Nice, and I feel that you are greatly in need of that, and I should like to be where I could get one occasionally. I saw by a letter in a Daily yesterday, that one could live just out of the City of Nice, and live inexpensively. Now I wish we were all there in some plain quarters - living & dressing as we pleased, and learning to talk French - as we certainly should if in a French town. I long to learn to speak that language more than to see the great sights most people seek, and I should be very glad to have the children get a smattering of it - I am sure it would help them when they get old enough to study it. And the only way, is to live where it is used. You see I have laid out a pretty straight plan - the next thing will be to carry it out. This great mistake - which has called Joseph back to America, hinders us, but I trust will not spoil the winter. Joseph I know must be here most of the time, and I shall want to be with him, but considering this my only time to live on the Paridisical shores of the lovely Mediterranean, and to learn the tongue I have striven so many times to conquer, I shall leave him here if he consents, - that is if I can find you by going there. I do so want to make the most of the nine or ten months I expect to be over here - I can't give six of them to grim old England. Oh! it did my heart good to have you say you have almost concluded Europe is a humbug. I appreciate why you would'nt have me repeat it - I am very careful what I write home, but at heart I have come to the same conclusion. Still I want to look And I fully believe that we are so related as to be of real use and assistance to each other if only we were near each other. I could not dare press so much this point if you did not seem to feel it so as much as I do. Do not you stay much longer in that cold region, and under the restraint of a visitor, but write me what you think of my proposition - let us resolve to use this winter to good advantage - not burrow some where waiting impatiently for spring. Let us see as fast as we can - study - be as careless as we please of dress, and get ready to go home together next July or August - full of heart for our home work, and strong in the love of Native land. I do feel that the greatest benefit I shall derive from this journey will be to make me so enjoy and rest in my own Country and own home ever after my return, as to make me a quiet and rational being perhaps. But I do not want to be brought to this by suffering all the time I am here, but by seeing as I must see, how much freer - better off are all the feebler members of society - the women and the poor, than they are here. where the few oppress the many - the strong, the weak. I do greatly rejoice in your letters, yet knowing you ought to write but sparingly, can not wish you to gratify me. And that is another reason for our being together - that we might walk and talk togetherabout as much as possible - make up my mind after a more extended view, and at any rate "Give the Devil his due." But I am already certain that I should consider it equal to being banished - to have to live here. The foundations and corner stones of things are not laid right for us. And the people - from the least to the greatest - how much they think of what makes a grand - an imposing appearance - how little they think or know of little every day comfort. I was just as much struck with this yesterday in visiting the Parliament Buildings, as I am every day by the discomforts and inconveniences of my land lady's kitchen. There seems to be no Yankee idea of overcoming - conquering little disagreeable things like cold, dirt - ill contrived houses, and the like - the only thing they do is to submit - pretty cheerfully too I confess. But to make their houses warm, to make them over if the builder did nt make them convenient - to continually wage war with dirt and disorder - they seem never to have thought of such things. We make ourselves feel much more like home because we do our own cooking - wash our dishes, and keep our own rooms in order. We cannot have the variety of food that our own land affords - especially of fruit, but for a time we do not much mind that. If we could all get down there where oranges and figs grow - how glad I should be. Pardon me dear friend if I have written too much as if I would influence or control you. My great desire is, that we make to ourselves - both of us - this year one of profit and of pleasure. not much to use the poor medium we now do, to get any interchange of thought. I have had one letter from Joseph, and now expect more any time. The children are very well - rather restive under the narrow limits that "lodgings" afford, but child-like pass the days rather unconsciously. It is a treat to me to write to you plainly of things as they impress me here - it is a relief to myself. My letters home are more carefully worded. I shall wait rather impatiently to learn what you decide upon - I feel like saying do not go to house keeping there this time of year - and do not go to Africa for sunshine when it can be found in France - But I ought not to say so much - you know I do not mean impertinence. Very much I long for a good old talk - but I must wait - only sending a deal of love. Abby. [*Abby Sheldon Dec. 5. 1869*]is no such thing in getting any social life here. I dont think I could ever heartily enjoy English people and English customs. They are the greatest eaters & drinkers under the sun I guess. They have as a nation done a vast number of cruel deeds, and they are as a people not very sensitive or sympathetic. I have finished my treatment and am very well. Can walk five or six miles a day with ease. I do hope to hear from you that you are not particularly ill. You spoke of rheumatism & such things, and knowing as I do that you can feel of disease that only waits an occasion, I feel troubled always about you unless I have just heard a good report. Oh! how I long to see you - to talk on for hours, and to be at liberty to plan some pleasant things. - So may it be. We have passed Christmas - it was dull as a Sunday. We are now enduring "Boxing Day" - a day of general license I judge -when excessive drinking - rude sports and "bawdy" things are all in order. Hoping this will find you well. I can only add A bunch of love from Abby [*Abby Sheldon Dec. 27 1869 33*] 23 Paddington Green Dec 27" 1869 My Dear Clara. I have been looking and looking for a letter from you, a great while it seems to me. And upon looking back to find that your last was written a month ago, and knowing that I wrote you very soon after, I feel quite worried about you. Is it that you are sick, or have you gone travelling all over "Europe, Asia and Africa" to find Dorr or warm weather. My fear of either is about equal. I hope most sincerely that you are not really sick, and - I hope too you have not gone off on any "wild goose chase". Only this morning I had a letter from Joseph in which he says he means to start Dec 29 - in the Nebraska.If he does so, he will with good luck, get here two weeks from today. As I wrote you the last time, I expect he will have business to take him over to Paris very soon after his return, and I still think I shall go with him, and still on to the South of France if you will go too. Winter has now fairly set in here, and I am exceedingly anxious to flee from it. My hearts desire is to see during the months of February and March, the South of France and something of Italy. I do not expect to make very extensive work of travelling, but I want to use to the best advantage the time I remain this side of the great water. I do not expect to "see all the sights" or write a "book of travels," but I do expect to go back wiser and more contented with my Country. I have A. S. Standard with full [...?] of a Womans Suffrage Convention lately held in Cleaveland. All the best speakers were there, and it was a very largely attended and most enthusiastic meeting. I fear that the Freedmen dont stand a very good chance under the present Administration, but hope it will turn out better than it looks. We brought out several letters of introduction but have presented only one - to the Rev Moncure D Conway - a Unitarian and radical man. I have been twice invited to their house of an evening and have there met some pleasant people. I have seen Mrs Smalley both times. She is a very sweet woman and to my surprise, the adopted daughter of Wendel Phillips. Met there also Monsieur Louis Blanc - a French exile, and Dr Elizabeth Blackwell of New York City. Without letters of introduction they say there [*1869*] 23. Paddington Green. London England. [*33 Sheldon*] Dearest Clara. Can you possibly know how glad I was to get your letter - this morning rec'd! Perhaps you can, because you too are in a strange land and among strangers. And then I was glad to find you in such good cheer - to have you say your health is better, and in short to know where you are. As to our coming there - it would suit me exceedingly well but I cannot yet We have now been two months in London - have been about a good deal and I feel that I have given as much time to this city as I can afford out of the eight or ten months we propose to stay on this side of the water. And I want so much - so very much to be studying and talking French. Three times in my life I have tried hard to get some knowledge of that language, and have every time been broken off just as I had got well started. Nothing I am sure would make me feel so well satisfied with my winters work as to get so I could speak French tolerably - I never hope to do it well. I should be delighted to be compelled to use that tongue since Joseph sailed for native land. It was a sorry thing for us to have him go, but he could not see any other way. To, of course your proposition Note: Moncure Daniel Conway (1832-1907), an American born into a wealthy slave-owing family in Virginia, and descended on his mother's side from Thomas Stone of Maryland, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was a Unitarian minister and an abolitionist who spent the last forty years of his life mostly in England and France, where he wrote biographies of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Thomas Paine. As a London literary agent, he represented Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, Louisa May Alcott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. He was interested in transcendentalism, became a Freethinker, and supported woman's suffrage. Among his friends in London were Charles Dickens, Robert Browning, Thomas Carlyle, and Charles Darwin. Note: Wendell Phillips (1811-1884), born in Boston and graduate of Harvard, was an attorney, abolitionist, orator, and advocate of women's rights and of the rights of Native Americans. He and his wife, Ann Terry Greene, an invalid, had no children but adopted the orphaned daughter of their friend, Mrs. Eliza Garnaut. Their adopted daughter later married George W. Smalley. Note: Louis Blanc (1811-1882), a French politician and reformer with socialist views. He was successful in advocating amnesty for the Communards after the Paris Commune following the Franco-Prussian War. Note: Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910), a British physician, was the first woman to receive an M.D. from an American medical school, the Geneva Medical College. A social reformer, she founded the New York Infirmary for Women and Children in 1857, and organized nurses during the Civil War.for him to escort us to Geneva, comes quite too late. As I have said, I should prefer to go on the Continent for winter, but as we are "fixed" here - have in the 2 months been all the time conforming ourselves to our surroundings and them to us - buying some things and tinkering those we have, I dont know as I ought to think of changing. But most of all I would remain here to be here when Joseph returns and see him the earliest moment. He expects to be gone about 2 months, and then will need to remain here a few weeks to finish his business. It may all be very different, but this is what he hopes. You know how uncertain business is. You speak of the Southern Countries as not being healthy. I know a lady from here who gives me most flattering pictures of Kamus a town in Southern France - every way preferable to Nice she says. She says it is not visited by the disagreeable winds that blow over Nice - that it is a more quiet place - a cheaper place to live, & every way preferable. She says "go to the English Quarter to the "Villa des Oranges". How I wish with all my heart that we could all meet in Paris in Feb, and go to the above named place & remain a time together before we make a visit to Rome and Italy. Can it be that we shall yet journey together in this old world? I am glad you have hope - I will work to that end, even if I have not the fullest confidence in the realization. Monday Eve. Nov 15. Tues. Nov 16. Dearest Clara, Yesterday I received your most welcome letter of the 11" and last evening began a reply. Closing on the previous page to go to my bath. After I had come home from my bath & made ready for bed, the post man bro't me your second letter, of the 12". You did not [...?] yourself in these two letters, but the two make an exceedingly interesting and satisfactory message from you. It is such a comfort to learn once more about yourself, and so delightful to have a letter only three days old. I am thoroughly glad you wrote me in just the mood you did, for now I know something of your inward life - which you seldom reveal. Be sure you could not write about your discomforts from cold, and from the restraints that visiting imposes, to a more sympathetic person than I am. I know I should feel these thing precisely as you do, to be in any family a guest. I should be wretched, and I advise you to get by yourself as quick as possible. I need not enumerate the reasons why this is best for you and me - the want of freedom so dear to us - the liberty to eat plain food - to be in simple dress, to live secluded if we desire - all you perfectly understand. Thank fortune that though I have been afflicted with illness, I have not added to this the torments of either being a visitor or boarder. I have fought a steady battle ever since I have been here to keep from the first named torture. We live in a very moderate - quiet way - rooms poorly furnished &c But we have front rooms - a southwestern exposure - so we get all the sunshine there is, and it is very cheering. to your liking and I assure you that for 2 shillings (English) per week you could keep warm. There you might "nibble your crust" and vegetate, and have all the "rest" "quiet" and seclusion you desire. You could go a few steps to the Turkish Bath every day, and I believe you would find that to take the cobwebs out of your brains better than anything else. This I am sure would be the best thing you could do, but you will not do it, so I have another plan. I have written in the first of my letter of a place on the Mediterranean called Kamus (it is pronounced as if spelt with a K, but I am half inclined to think it is C) to which I would quickly bend my steps if I was in your place. I know Joseph would be greatly disappointed to have us leave London in his absence, else I would go in about two weeks. It is not far from Nice, where many people go to be rid of neuralgia & rheumatism, and is I am told preferable to that City for many reasons. It is milder - it is cheaper because there are fewer invalids there. It is I conclude a place that has not yet got its name up so as to make it undesirable for common folks. If you would go there and take a room by yourself, I feel pretty sure you would draw us hither in a few weeks. You could tell your too kind friends at Geneva that you were to meet other friends there. Note: "Kamus" refers to "Camus" near the village of Lourmarin in the Luberon massif in central Provence.The house fronts one of the nicest little Parks I have seen in London, and several lines of stages pass the door. As I said our furnishing is shabby, but I have this comfort in it, that I am not afraid the children will do any harm, and I think you can well understand that this is a real comfort to me. We feel perfectly fine as far as the house and its inmates go, and have made ourselves quite comfortable. Except three or four days last week, we manage to keep warm. There are no stoves here - nothing but grates, but we furnish our own fuel, and keep as warm as we wish to most of the time. The last three days have been very mild, and this morning is as lovely as May. Now you are getting the rheumatisms & have long had a very inactive skin - for both of which difficulties there is nothing equal I think to the Turkish Bath. I wish you were here for a couple of months - I am confident it would be the best investment you ever made, and help you some to get so well as to try to some purpose the use of your brains. I know you will not listen to a word on this subject, but I will say what I think if it does "fall on strong ground" If you would retrace your steps to London you might have free of rent a room with two southern windows all to yourself if you would only permit Fanny to sleep with you, and I can assure you she is a desirable bed fellow in cold weather. [Now or How?] you could keep a fire [*Abby Sheldon Ansd 19 Nov 1869*] I feel sure it would be better for your future, for you to come here for two months as I have suggested, and I think by the end of that time we might be able to make some amends for the wild goose chase we have led you for the last year. But as I suppose you will not be persuaded to that plan, I do hope you will think favorably of the second. You could "rest" and keep warm" there, and I am told it is a "lovely spot" that might inspire your muse. Then as soon as I could bring it about we would all meet there, and as the proper season arrives, make some journeys in the regions round about. But do not I implore of you go to see Dorr this winter. It would be for you a hard rough journey for the winter, and for us, it would make our meeting & plan together forever impossible. I shall wait in fear and trembling till I hear this dreadful proposition is abandoned. What can you hope to do more or better for the coming winter than to Master French and how could you better [do] that than by living in a French Country. The only thing I [expect] have got so far, is returning health with a promise of more security in myself in future, and truly, I would rather go back home, having all my friends say "how well you look" (if I really was as well as I looked) than to see all the Cathedrals & pictures in Europe. And so I think you might properly feel - knowing that nothing else could give your friends so much pleasure, and moreover, that nothing else - no other preparation could make so full of hope, the remainder of your life. You would see all this and be very wise if it was any body else, - I wish I could help you to see it in your own case. As you say "life is short" - too short I all the time fret to waste much time on people that are not much to us. We find as we go along occasional souls that are of not use to us, and that make us happy. With such as these, I have never yet been satiated - I dont know but you in your favored position may have been. But I would gladly get in easy access to a few I have the good fortune to know, and spend my days, stimulated and aided by them. Among these you have long been reckoned and I shall never be quiet, until we have some good times together - some real true living, - unless I shall see that it is not desirable with you. Let us, who mean to be rational, be done with living in ways that give us no satisfaction, and go on our own way as if we were alone in the world. I feel as if I was created for this very work, and I hope yet to take it up where I left it on my Fathers farm several years ago.If I were you, I would not stay where you are for the winter - either with friends, or by yourself. It is very true people this side of the water know little of what we call comforts, and we shall at best I fancy suffer more from the cold here than we ever did in a N. E. winter. But to be your own Mistress - pay for your own fuel is the only way to be comfortable even a part of the time, and this I would advise you to be, somehow, somewhere. And let me suggest once more that you do not forget that you are here for your health - if you only get that and what by observation you will inevitably take in, it is enough. When you are able to work, you want to go back to America - have your own ordered home so that your mind need not be constantly distracted by the inconveniences you suffer. I wish I could persuade you to look at this as I do. I would not give a fig for all the lectures or books you can write while numb with cold - suffering from indigestion or from rheumatic pains. I wish I could take care if you - it is such a pity to have you wasted. You know I have expressed this wish most heartily before. I hope you will not have gone to Madagascar before this reaches Geneva, and that you will not go this winter. Let us have some pleasant travels together in the spring - then you can spend the summer in Geneva, and go to Dorr next winter. I rejoice very much that we have at last got into communication, and thank you over and over again for your two good letters. With Great love Abby [*Abby Sheldon Mrs Joseph*] [*[1869]*] Thurs. Morning Dear Clara. Joseph has been here and made a short visit. He said he had received a letter from you - but had not dared answer it. The truth is he has just been making some new arrangements about his machine and Patent business that have as he feels secured him safe beyond all question. These new plans have used up the summer - so I feel, and think regretfully of them on that account, but I have told him we would pass all that by if only he will go right off now. He promised that he would - that in a week he would announce the purchase of the tickets. I confess I have been put off so, so many times I do not feel entire confidenceconfidence, but I hope. You do not know as I do how full of new plans and new schemes his brain all the time is. He thinks, by so doing he makes his matters all the more finished and perfect. That may all be, but considering the shortness of human life, I think such things ought not to run over the time indefinitely. You have waited well for us so far. I have a hope - only a hope - not yet a belief that we shall meet in N.Y. harbor, bound for a distant shore. May be you have been reconciled to the delay so far, because the season has been so cool that your health has I trust been all the time improving, and it has given you unusual leisure to visit your friends, and that is not a bad thing to do in view of the long absence you contemplate. You asked me Clara if I intended to take some one to help about the children. Do you know of any such person to recommend me, in case I am disappointed in one I am now trying to get - My friend in Vineland has an excellent young woman that is very anxious to go with us, and we shall take her if she can leave my friend. But she agreed to stay where she is until after my friends confinement which has been daily expected for the last six weeks! So I look upon that as a little uncertain. Your way of mentioning it made me think you may have had some one in view. The half dozen that stood ready to go last spring have all made other disposition of themselves before now. And I suppose it will turn out that our uncertain way of moving will compel us to go without any one - and then again that seeming calamity may prove a blessing. So how little we know - how like folly is our wisdom. Mother has said she would be very glad to have you come up here and start with us. I know it would add so much to your journey. I have no idea you will think it judicious. I feel that I must now turn about and commend patience and good courage to you, as you as well did to me in your letter, for I cant conceive that you are not getting very uneasy. For my part as long has this suspense continued upon me, I really feel as if I should fly. My only hope and thought is, does the end draw nigh. Yours most heartily and in full sympathy Abby Barker [*12 illm? abroad*] [*[?1869-70]*] Fitzroy Square March 21st My Very Dear Friend . I must first ask you to pardon me for having allowed your letter to lie ten days in my drawer unanswered. Not that that would be a long time to pass a letter by if the writer was at the time well, happy & contented, but ten days, to one sick dispirited are almost terrible. Still I am not presuming that the words I shall write will be able to help or cheer you much - but they must at least assure you of my constant thought and sympathy, and a great wish to do something that should be a real benefit. I have more hope of seeing you now, than I have had in the two months past. For several weeks we have been taking lessons in French, for which we had paid in advance. But for this, I think I should have packed my trunk and come to find you in your loneliness and ill-health, very soon after getting your last letter which told so truly that you suffer much from both those causes. In three weeks more we shall finish our lessons, and by that time I hope to know enough French to be safely trusted to take care of myself on a journey of a couple of days - though of course I shall only be able to make out a few disconnected sentences. After that, I really feel if we are all as well and comfortable as now, that I shall make my way to the South of France. This is the best plan I have been able to think out. I go to Nice and meet you there - stay there and take Turkish baths with you a month, [and] at the end of which time . I should hope Joseph would be liberated from this place, and you would be so much benefitted as to be able to go to Paris and stay with us to see that City in the month of June which is said to be the month of all others for Paris. After that we would go to Switzerland, and early in the autumn we would all go home together!! Dont that plan and some of its points make your heart Jump? It does mine. As to Turkish Bath - almost daily I get new instances of good done by them. I feel very certain your salvation must come by them, and I should rejoice to hear you had gone at once to Nice to try them. I dont wonder you begin to feel that your coming to Europe has been a great mistake, and though I was one of those who urged it, I never meant you should go off so by yourself and live and do as you have done. So as you have carried out the plan very contrary to my (wise!) direction, I am not going to take much blame. If you had been with us all winter, I have the audacity to believe you would have turned out tolerably well this spring. The fact of your loneliness has helped on the nervous depression and physical exhaustion you were under. Turkish Baths steadily taken for one month, would I believe so relieve your body of the poison it every moment labors under. That you would feel as if you had truly been born again. I cant expect you to feel the enthusiasm I do about the Baths, for you have had nothing yet to make you enthusiastic; but I long[*Abby Sheldon at Cure*] to know as well as believe that they can do as much or more for you than they have for me. If you can afford the effort, please write me what you think of my course laid down, and write me any thing you happen think - no matter about the "scolding" - I had rather take it than that you should send it back into your own heart to canker there. And then, I have heard worse scolding. I do as you do about writing home - make it all "honey and pie", and I find it a relief to write of things as they are occasionally - as I have sometimes done to you. Josephs business seems to be getting along well, and looks as if it might come to an end in a few weeks, but we have so often been misled by it, we dare not promise ourselves any thing even now. The weather is getting mild here, but is is never bright or cheerful. I go about very little now a days - London is about as good as infinite, but I have seen a good many things, and now feel much more interested in getting away from it, than in going about it. Oh! how very much I do want to see you - how I wish I could know that by the 1st of May we could all meet you in Cannes or Nice. But as I suppose I must not even hope for Js work to be done here so soon as that, I really believe I shall leave him & the nurse & children here, and I shall seek you. I wish this letter might find you with better eyes and better cheer. I am most affectionately Abby.If there had seemed to be any other way possible to us. I should much regret our having brought all along. Now that we are here, I want to find some good place to settle down [for the] where we may live simply, healthfully - and inexpensively. If I could once get my girl and children settled in such a place, I would keep them there until we are ready to go home - and Joseph and I could go with you travelling about. I presume it will be near May before Joseph will have his business so settled as to be [liverated?] from this City or vicinity. But I still mean to get to you long before that. I suppose he must go to Paris as soon as he can after getting back, and I hope he will think with me that we had all better go to Corsica & remain till he is free to commence a little series of journeyings. Meantime if you should get enough of that Country, please let me know it at once. On the contrary every thing in its favor will help us to decide when our council meets. I wish more than I can possibly tell that I was with you tonight. I am thoroughly lonesome, and I am sure you must be. And should we not have volumes to talk over in the way of personal experience this side the waters. I send you a scrap that Mother sent me. I see by it that you have faithfully deceived people over there as to your enjoyment of Europe. My dear girl! How lonely you must find it to be all alone - none of your own near. [*Abby Sheldon Jany 5 - 1870 -*] Wed Eve - Jan 5" 1870 [*12 Corsica*] My Dearest Clara. Your most excellent and welcome letter of Dec 25" I received New Years morning - so it brought me not only the "Merry Christmas" with which it began, but a "Happy New Years" as well. I was at first rather "cast down" by your Post mark - felt for the moment another disappointment that you had gone still further beyond my reach. But on reflection I am very glad you have gone. In fact it was my own sugges- tion that you should go on in advance & find some desirable place - since you had no patients to bother you, and no husband to wait for. I have all the time hoped to be able to join you in case you should find some good place to live - some place where we could live cheap, have new things to see, and if possible mild climate and abundant fruit. Such a place you seem to have found. All you write of it interests me exceedingly. I would not have had one word left out it all interested me so much, and seems to point to an "Eden at last".I had sent off to Geneva only a few days before your letter came, a note inquiring after you, for I feared you were sick. And when I got yours from Corsica, I should have written you at once in reply, but I waited to hear once more from Joseph whom I was expecting would sail the 29" Dec. and be here the 10". Alas! the letter came this morning, and expresses a doubt about starting then. I know only too well what that means, and I have had to indulge in a good many tears today - had to let the sadness have vent in a few hard showers, which will be more likely to "clear up" in sunshine tomorrow. I had looked for Joseph Monday next - only five days hence, and now I am probably put off till the last of the month. At first I thought I would wait here no longer, but take my family and seek your quarters next week. But look for a moment at the objections that array themselves before me. First, Joseph would be sadly disappointed whenever he does arrive, not to find us here. I know I could make him understand it - that he would not blame me for "running away" still he would wish I could have waited patiently a little longer. Then my children are half sick with hard colds, which the weather seems likely to perpetuate indefinitely. The woman we brought has been unable to do any work, or wait upon herself for more than a week. and I know not what she will yet be before she is well. So you see my hands are pretty well tied. Then all the newspapers are giving accounts of the unusual rains of all southern Europe, and even in your letter you say you are there almost too early. So I will try once more "to possess my soul in patience" - try to hope it will all come out better even than I could have planned it, and try to believe in the "good time coming." I am very much pleased with all you write of the new country you have gone to - the fact that the people generally do not go there, is a strong reason for my wishing to go - especially if it is mild and has natural attractions. That it is a cheap place, is to us a very important consideration. Coming over here as we have with our whole family, is at best a very expensive undertaking. Or have you got so thoroughly tired of "visiting" that you find it delightful to be alone, and to be "let alone." I dont doubt you have in your visitings, many times wished for the quiet and rest you now have, but dont you now have a great deal too much of it? I know you are very brave and self centered and all that, but I still believe you are lonely like other folks some times, and my heart aches to night to think of you away off there so far from any who love you, and long to be a help to you wherever you may need help - as we all must some time. And does it not seem too bad that we might help one another to enjoy this journey, are now so separated, and each left alone and in uncommon need of each other. I shall try to be with you if you remain in Corsica - or indeed wherever you are, by the 1st of Feb. And then we will have two months or so of rambles and good talks and communions, and such things as make live worth living - and as we shall like to look back to. You write with exceeding modesty as to my wishing to come where you are and be with you, but you see I, knowing how very clamorous I have all the time been to find you, assume that you equally need and desire me. Oh how my heart sunk at the knowledge that you would precede us in this journey, and ever since we landed, it has been reaching after you with long arms of affection, with the feeling that all Europe was of little account until you were found. I will let you know as fast as anything new is revealed to me. If I can come there I do hope we may all be under the same roof - whatever else may or may not be. Many thanks for your proffer of hospitality. I hope you will find the climate to agree with you, and your health returning. I am now very well - thank fortune for that. With very best love to you, I am truly Abby. You gave me no direction - I hope I shall get it right. Please direct to me as before. [*12 Corsica*] [*Abby Sheldon*] 25 Fitzroy Square. London. Jan 19" 10 A.M. [*1870*] My Dearest Clara. Your letter of the 11" has just come to me - came even before I was out of bed this morning. I have read it all twice over - eaten my plain breakfast, and am now resolved to write to you, though I am all the time writing under the protest of the two chatter-boxes who would never allow me to write a word if they could help it. Really your letters - this one and one of the 9" that I was just about to answer, have given me more of a thrill of delight than any thing of late. Indeed, in this dull, depressing climate it is almost impossible to get anything that shall much exhilarate. I really believe if you had sent me your letter of the 9" three days earlier I should now be with you. I had found that I must change my lodgings and my heart pointed only to you - on this side of the ocean. A friend was going over to Paris, and would have taken charge of us so far - I had had unfavorable news from Joseph about his coming back, and my own judgement was to go.. If can I come the [trunk?] shall follow me. But I am not left here free to act just as I think. Mr Sheldon has here a partner in his business, and he bores me by seeming all the time to think I shall do something to hurt the chances of making the most money out of the matter. He all the time writes J- to remain there, and counsels me to stay "patiently" here. Now I am not willing to do anything to make it harder for J- to settle his business, or to get along with this same partner. He the partner says if I go away off there, J- will be so unsettled and anxious to get to me, that he will try to hurry matters, and that will bring defeat. - I got your letter Fri last - after I had bargained for these rooms, and the same day my friend had left London for Paris. It seemed almost as if I should fly - I so longed to go to you - but instead I put myself to work trying to get my family moved into better quarters, & trying to swallow my own desires. Sat the 15" we came in here, and not to put too fine a point upon it - we were as home sick that day and the next, as poor creatures need to be. I kept turning the matter over in my mind, and had so far resolved to take my fate in my own hands and go where I should have one warm true friend, as to begin to make enquiries how I could best go there. But Monday brought me letters from my Parents and from Joseph, - and I had a long talk with the partner, and some how I convinced myself that my time had not yet come, and since then I have been patient and happy. Now dont go to thinking that you have influenced me unduly. To spend a winter in a tropical climate - to be in a land of oranges - to live for one winter where such things grow, - to see that kind of climate - those people, as compared with our severe winters - hard work, and life that is always strung up to the highest pitch, has always been one of the fond dreams of my life. I hugged to my heart when I came here last fall, the hope that I could get as far as Nice this winter, and when Joseph went away I told him if he would only leave me there, I would not say one word against his going, but I was then under treatment, - could not well leave it, and he could not well wait, but was certain he should be back soon after I was through at the Cure. So things have gone much as they always do -Your letters have only given direction to my desires. To be with you, I would gladly go to Corsica - and happily al you tell me of the place helps me to feel that not only are you there to attract me, but that it is a place that would answer my dreams, better than any thing I have heard of. I should like it the better that Napoleon was born there - still better that it is not yet a famous resort. I would truly rather spend two months there, living cheaply - close to nature - upon the rocks - a careless - girlish life than see the Vatican, or the great picture Galleries outside that famous place. It would be infinitely more to my mind. Besides I shall not see Europe as most travellers do, and I would rather strike out some quite new path, and not be in competition with them all. Of course it will be said to us a thousand times after we return, "Why did'nt you see" so. & so No, I want a very different way - chose other fields of exploration I would be glad to say. Then I feel that I shall not give another winter to these things, and it grieves me to waste this. But I have thought it all over, and I will wait here for the present. I have however a strong hope that I shall us, and very wasteful. I never tried harder to be economical - nor wore such old clothes, and yet it never cost us so much to live. Economically speaking, we ought not to have come last fall, but should have waited till spring, then left nurse and children behind, and come only for the Summer and Autumn. And so we should have done if we could have know what a turn the business was to take. I have some friends here - all or nearly all American, for as you say it would take a lifetime "to bore through the crust" of this society, and I feel as if it would not pay for the boring. I go out some evenings with a young man from New Haven - the foreman on the machine. Went with him Sunday eve to the Great St Pauls Cathedral, and last evening to hear Dickens read. We know no one, and have no position to maintain, and so are as independent as possible. We went last night and took 1 shilling seats - got there early so as to get the best of the cheap lot, and were delighted with our bargain.After the reading we walked round into a street where the best dressed the highest class of street girls do vend their wares. It made my heart aches, but I wanted to see them for once. In fact, though London is boundless in its great attractions - in the desirable things to see, there is so much poverty here, that I suffer always quite as much as I enjoy when I go out to see. Cold days and rainy, the women and children hungry and ragged - the Mothers with babes in arm trying to sell oranges or matches or water cresses - the barefooted men that can get no work - oh it some times makes me feel sick. I was delighted with what you wrote of Mr Conway. I am so far away I do not seem them often, but when I go again I am going to read them from your letter what you wrote. We have had all this month what I should call if I was a follower and admirer of Byron "damnable" weather - not one pleasant day yet this year! Rain [of] or fog every day, and I have not so much as had a glimpse of the pale sun since we came to this place. It is truly a wonder to me that London is as healthy a place as it is reported to be. I wonder too that we strangers are not all sick. But we are on the contrary quite well. The children I think are not quite as vigorous as common, but I am in good health - all of which I attribute to my three months thorough treatment at the Water Cure. I feel sure you want just such a drubbing to start you in the right direction. I took near 200 baths in that time, & rather thought at the last I was clean. When you write again will you mention the best way to get to you, for I shall come I do believe. I have wondered if there was not a water passage - but dont know. I would like the cheapest - or shortest way. I shall let you know all as fast as I know, and if any thing takes you away from there, please keep me posted. I know you must find it lonely - monotonous - tiresome after the novelty wears off. You see that I stay here most unwillingly - only because I feel that I must. Joseph writes of his own hearts ache "to get to London" - and if he should find when he gets here that we are 1000 miles away, I know he would feel sad enough for a time. He is harassed almost to death, and I must try and not add to his burdens. He says "I will come back pussy just as soon as I possibly can, & you must be patient & wait like a good soldier" - and so I mean to. Most fondly & truly - Abby. Note: Regarding "Mr Conway," in her letter to Clara of December 27, 1869, when still living at 23 Paddington Green, Abby Sheldon mentioned having visited the home of Rev. Moncure Conway. Moncure Daniel Conway (1832-1907), an American born into a wealthy slave-owing family in Virginia, and descended on his mother's side from Thomas Stone of Maryland, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was a Unitarian minister and an abolitionist who spent the last forty years of his life mostly in England and France, where he wrote biographies of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Thomas Paine. As a London literary agent, he represented Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, Louisa May Alcott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. He was interested in transcendentalism, became a Freethinker, and supported woman's suffrage. Among his friends in London were Charles Dickens, Robert Browning, Thomas Carlyle, and Charles Darwin.5 be there before it is too late - I know I know I cant stay so long when I come as if I could be there now, but I will try and make the most of a month, if that is all the time I can have there. Dont fear you have painted it too bright - not that at all - you have been exceedingly [discrete?]. It is only because I always wanted to go, that now when it seems almost possible, I catch eagerly at every word of encouragement. And if I were there now, and should not find it as bright and lovely as I had expected, I should rejoice in that even more that if all my expectations were more than realised. The greatest good I hope to get out of this journey, is that it should make me more contented with home - and my ordinary life. And so far my experiences have admirably tended in that direction. If I did not find Corsica a Paradise, I could soon get enough of it, and never long for it any more. As to expenses - I fully realise all you say. At first I thought I bot things cheap, that since I have learned I find I paid quite as much for as at home. The premium on gold makes it hard for [*12*] 25 Fitzroy Square London Feb 22nd / 70 Dearest Clara. I shall never make you know half the delight I felt on Wednesday morning last, when I got your letter of the 12". That very morning I had been lying in bed worrying about you, resolving that I would write your landlord that very day and try to find out by him whether you were sick in Ajaccio, or had gone somewhere else. I was sure it must be one of these reasons that kept you from writing to me, and if I could have been sure you had not left the Island altogether, I should have been much disposed to set aside all hindrances and go to you at once. I heard the Postmans knock and thought instantly of you. When I saw that the letter was from you and in your own hand writing, I was truly too much rejoiced to read it at once. I am sad to find that your eyes are not good. Thru long winters in my life I have sat wretched - with closed eyes, and I know how hard it is. It is very hard even for those who do not hope to write lectures or books - I think it must be doubly hard for those who do. We never know how constantly we use our eyes, until they refuse to do duty. How difficult it is even to walk if the eyes are not strong and on the alert. Now Clara, I am full of sympathy for you in this new disappointment - believe that I am. Only of course neither I or any of your friends can feel with you that your life is to be a failure - that you have "hid your talents in a napkin" &c. The thing it seems to me that ought to give you comfort - day and night is the fact that you have already prevented the possibility of a failure in the many things you have accomplished. So long as you had health and strength, you gave them for the good of others as freely as water. When great opportunities came, you used them - instead of waiting till every thing should be to your mind as the rest of us do. And you cant help knowing that you have done a great deal that has most deservedly brought down many blessings upon your head, and will make you one of the stars of this generation. Of course you are not satisfied - nobody is - but you ought to have some comfort in thinking that you have done vastly more than most of your Sisters. With health, you ought not to be content with the past, but if invalidism should come upon you, it does seem to me you ought to cheerfully excuse yourself, on the ground that you gave your life freely just as long as you had it to give. I wish you could write that book and that lecture on Corsica - its a capital scheme, and I dont wonder you look fondly towards it. And then I fancy you have not had to give up such a proportion of cherished plans as I have and so cling to them longer. I cant help thinking that such a course of Turkish baths as I have taken would be invaluable to you - would remove the trouble from the eyes and not send it elsewhere. I have been trying ever since your letter came, to think of some plan to suggest - some way to put you under the treatment that we might reasonably hope would make you well. You know I have little faith in "travelling" to restore health. Rather do I think the traveller needs good health to begin with. If I could bring you here with a wish, you would find yourself leaving Corsica in a most summary manner. Not for the climate! (For heavens sake no!!) would I have you here, but chiefly that I might take care of you, and undertake to get you well. My main reliance would be upon Turkish Baths - depurating the blood throwing off all the impurities through perspiration - all that Southern Miasma - and I have perfect faith that it would completely restore you. But of course you cannot come here - it would be a long and expensive journey, and we have to count these things. You mentioned a thought of accompanying your friends to Nice. I wish I could know you did so. I am told by a friend here who assumes to 5 know all about Camus and Nice, that there is a nice Turkish Bath at Nice, and that the prices are not more than here. I suppose the fashionable season must be almost over there - so it would be more desirable for you or me. I am told you can get rooms out of the City on reasonable terms - as cheap I am inclined to think as where you are. Perhaps - maybe - likely enough! I could persuade my family to let me spend a month with you there. [if you are there.] I am very glad you have had a visit from some old friends. I know you must be very lonely - especially when too unwell to study - write and amuse yourself. I would gladly keep you company - I do not feel that we two should be at all lonely. But you may find yourself with too many friends since you have dined with the Governor. I did'nt think you could remain incog - very long. Great people will be found out! I dont know what to write about the place in Switzerland. I should like to spend two months there - should like it as a home for the children. But I rather expect we shall be kept here so long as only to be allowed to scramble across the Continent if we go at all. I find it so inconvenient to be away from home with children that I dont think I can be persuaded to remain over the year - even if I dont so much. Dear Clara; I started for Paris the 8th February - was gone a week - But it was so miserably cold uncomfortable and every way unsatisfactory that I was not sorry Abby had declined to go with me as I had desired her to do. The cold increased as I went towards Paris and the South! Decreased when I turned to the north and to London! I was weather turned 3 days I thought at Nice and Corsica the cold must be very intense! if kept on increasing in proportion to its distance! As to your and Abbys plans I only say this - When the weather gets so that it is tolerable to travel, I shall be anxious to have Abby go to you taking such part of the family as she chooses to take or take none but herself which seems to me would be best & go off and see you and have a visit of as long as shall seem agreeable to her - In the mean time I must stay here so long as business shall call me here. After I have done that I shall be at a point of my life distinctly different from any I ever have [had] seen - a point when I can do what would be agreeable for a few months - when that time comes if it does you shall see me - As Ever Yours Joseph - 7 Here, Joseph came in and I asked him to write to you - and what should he do but scribble a little on my letter. he has'nt written the good sympathetic letter he ought just because he has not tried - thats the truth of the matter. I ought not to have asked him to write so soon after dinner. I really felt guilty to have so long a letter from you - and you with weak eyes. I insist that you must not write so much any more while it costs you so much, and I can assure you that so full of interest in every word you write that it takes a good deal of self-denial to make such a request of you. But promise me faithfully that if you get sick you will telegraph us - and that if you go away from Ajaccio you will write enough to let us know, and I will not ask any more until you have stronger eyes. We hear Mr Conway preach every Sunday. Last time his subject was "The Poor Mans Sunday". he spoke of the limitations of the poor man on that day - the only day he was at all relieved from his drudgery - He had no comfortable or cheerful home to stay in - his only resource was the beer shop. He said it was a shame that all the Museums and picture Galleries were not open to him on that day - the only day he had time to see them.Mr Conway is no Sabbath worshipper, and he dont hesitate to speak out boldly about it here where every thing is under Church administration - just as if he was in Free America. We like his preaching very much indeed. Of course we see but little of his family. They evidently have a large circle of friends, and not much time for new ones. Our friends are on the other side of the great ocean Thank God! and I hope they will stay there. I do earnestly hope you will be better when you get this - I could wish you had gone with your friends - I dont like to think of you so much alone. When you feel that you may safely write just a few lines please do so. Most fondly yours Abby [*Abby Sheldon -*] Dear Clara; Abby has read me your excellent letters and I want to go and join you almost as much as she does. But I find my business in such shape as to call for very definite attention from me. I must not leave it till it can go alone. I feel however all the time that I ought to contrive some way for you and Abby to have something of the good times that I see would be within your reach if I were also free and could go along with you both as I should be so happy to to be able to do - Perhaps I may soon be able to put my affairs in such shape as to leave me quite free to go to your little Island with my little crowd - I join very heartily in all Abby has said about your letting us know in case you may be sick or in real need of what Abby or I could do for you. I know not how to tell you sufficiently of my desire to accompany Abby and you in your rambles in the unfrequented paths of your mountain surroundings and how much When if ever are you thinking of planning to return to America? What scope to your wanderings next Summer - We are liable to be suddenly let loose almost any time - we shall within three days thereafter be making a Beeline for you -I regret to find myself in Slavery to business - a slavery I mean that this year of grace shall free me from if possible - I too, as well as you and Abby have my plans of usefulness (I hope) which this business continually postpones - my dream which like yours and hers continually haunts me as if the great duty and purpose of life were being left undone and I too feel like you both as I were drifting to the Great Unknown with none of the things done that I meant to have attempted at least. But "they too serve who only stand and wait" - The soldiers in the hospital still belong to the Army and are not discharged - You have already done so great and so satisfying things that you ought to be a little merciful towards yourself - Think of us laggard and be cheered that your past life has not been slothful like [the] ours - not exactly slothful but busily idle - the main points neglected - I hope some time we may work side by side at our self appointed tasks and be cheered by the consciousness of duty largely done - Enough - I want to see you "bushels" and while I greatly desire to have Abby & the children with me here till I can go with them - and know I should be full of anxiety in regards to them if they were away from me Still I cant find it in my heart to make any opposition to Abby & the children going to you if on the whole she thinks it best - So implicitly is my confidence in her good sense & good capacity to take care of herself & the children either there or here - I am sorry to have been so long in getting this off - I waited for J to make enquiries in various places. 25 Fitzroy Sq March 4" Fri Morning [*12 Sheldon Clara*] Dearest Clara. It is now nearly a week since we rec'd your letter of the 17". Joseph has tried in all directions to get the information you asked respecting Englands communication with the Seychelles Islands. He does not find that English Steamers go there at all. He has got a plenty of information about the French lines - all of which you have already doubt. But Clara, why should you go off there? Especially now that warm weather is coming on. You are already sick - got sick by living in warm malarious countries, how dare you go into the torrid zone to pass a summer. I have never begun a letter to you with such doubt as to what I ought to write, as I have this morning - but I think I must stand by my old plan of saying just what I think - or nothing. You were very much afraid you should unduly influence me about leaving London this winter - I suppose I ought to be equally careful about what I mayinfluence you to do - but I shall not be so. You are a great way from me, and on that account have a pretty good chance to do as you please, but if I was only near, I feel as if I should appoint myself your guardian, and just put you through a two months course, whether you would or no. But seriously my dear friend - I feel that you are not half so wise and judicious about yourself as you would be about a sick soldier. I remember that you came from home an invalid - that you only got strength to come, by taking quinine, which gave you no new life - the only thing it could do was to stimulate the over worked body to a little more work. Since you came to Europe you have "rested" as we say - that is not tied yourself down to constant work. You think this suspense of effort ought to make you well. I think it will take a great many years of that course to renew nature to remove the obstacles in her way and your own impatience will but make it take longer. Now to my mind, you must do some thing to lighten the load that weighs down your much abused body. That poison from Southern swamps that flows through your veins, that torpid condition of the liver that shows itself in the hue of the skin, and that causes the general lassitude you feel - the weak eyes that are but another expression of mucus irritation - all show to me that there is an enemy within that needs needs to be thoroughly routed before you can hope to be well and make your body once more the faithful servant it has been so many years. You are much in the condition of the very Country you almost gave your life for - and trifling and compromising with the difficulty as she so long did, but make the struggle harder and more expensive at last. You see I think you need a thorough system of renovation. Before my last falls experience, I should have known of nothing that to my mind would accomplish this for you, but a long course of Water-treatment. Thanks to the new light! - there is a shorter cheaper - better way - and it is by natures now process of perspiration. I shall not be able to tell you half the evidence I have on this point - my own case and others I have observed, but when you think of it you will see what a depurating - purifying process it is, and it accords with the old injunction that man should live by the sweat of his brow. In all soberness and conscienciousness, the way you ought to go, seems to me so clear, I cannot refrain from writing you as I do. Pardon the assumption. But while I feel so clear as to what you ought to do to get well - it is beyond my province to say what you must finally conclude upon. I know you are restrained by pecuniary considerations, and I know as well as any one what that restraint means - in fact were I free from that same tyranny, I would gladly put you at rest on that point until health and strength were regained. I have thought much of it the last week, and hoped to think out some thing to propose. I have however got no farther than in my last letter when I suggested that you return to Nice for the Spring - until Switzerland shall be warm enough - and getting some retired spot there - not fashionable or very expensive - commence taking Turkish Baths - one every evening if it is convenient to do so, - then go to bed after it, and see if you would not sleep sound and sweet. I am sure you would feel a change in favor of them by the time you have taken three. You should never go in soon after eating, and should never stay in to become faint. To lie down afterward is excellent - to be able to retire for the night is best. Here, you can buy tickets by the dozen at a less rate than singly, but they are a rather expensive bath when compared with an ordinary bath, but when you find how much more is accomplished by it than by other baths, it is found to be cheaper than others. I pay a guinea a dozen, and continue to take one a week to keep the good health that through them I have got. If I go more than a week I can feel my skin asking for the neglected bath, and you need not laugh at this idea till you have tried it.. I wish I could say I would go to Nice and be with you a month. It would suit me exactly to go to Nice for a month to six weeks - keep a friendly eye on your treatment and progress - and then with you much improved, go to Paris for a little, and then to Geneva for the warm weather. I shall feel relieved if I find you are disposed to go yourself to Nice and try the effect of the baths - which I am told they have in good shape there. I know how your heart is set upon some plans & purposes of further usefulness, and I long to see you gratified in them. But I realise that you must get well first - and I do believe if you could look so at the matter, you would give up all other schemes, and go about it as a matter of business. The move coming to Europe will not cure you - but it may help if it is supplemented by other renovating processes. Now if you will but go to work in this direction for a couple of months, I am full of hope that you would feel as if you had been "born again", consider it the best investment you had made. I wish you were here with us - wish oh so much you could be here - I should so like to play the doctor and nurse for you. But I do not wonder you are not willing to retrace your steps more especially since coming here means leaving a lovely climate and taking to one of the meanest under the heavens. You see I dont admire England at all - the only thing I am really greatly pleased with, you will laugh to hear me name it is their railroad stations! Joseph, as I said can get no clue to any line of Steamers running to the islands. As to sailing vessels - they are not to be counted on - he has not looked them up, for we think it would be awful for you to undertake such a journey in a ship. Indeed, we earnestly hope you will not go there now if ever. Wait till another fall - Get well - see something of Europe in the summer and go there next winter, and from there to America when you get enough of it. Perhaps I ought not to advise you so much - it does'nt sound right even to myself, but truly Clara I feel it so thoroughly I cant well help it. (Wife is all right on the Bath Question!! J.S.) And for another reason I ought to say little. We promised to stand by you in this journey and experiment after health. I realise how we have left you alone, - giving neither "aid nor comfort", and if you chose to go away still farther from us, it would be serving us right. So it is for yourself that I hope that plan will not find favor with you. I am glad you have got better a rooms, and are in better cheer. How much I do wish I could be with you for a month. With great love Abby. I wrote you in answer to yours of the 12". I always feel when I post a letter to you that it can never get to you, and so feel until I hear. I hope your eyes are better. [*Abby Sheldon Ansd March 19 / 70*] [*Abbie Sheldon Aug. lost in the War recd Nov - 11 -70*] Grunau Aug 8" 1870 Dearest Clara. Saturday P.M. while in town with Miss Hopkins, Mr Rhyner gave me your letter of Aug 3rd, which I was only too glad to get. Miss Hopkins had watched the mail all the week, thinking every day I would hear from you - said she did not expect to. But I knew so well your busy ways, I was almost surprised to hear so soon. May I here suggest that you write next time to her. I trust you can understand that I ask this to make her happy - that I am willing to forego the pleasure of getting a letter (which in a quiet home like this is no trifle) only that she may have the pleasure of it. I think for you to write us alternately will make the best feeling. She misses you very much - more I doubt not than I do, with my children to care for and the arrival of a husband to look forward to. I dont know that I ever felt more sensibly what good things husbands and children are - dear ones that won't forsake one - than since you went away. So you may consider yourself as having helped me in this. Miss Hopkins continues to make two calls a day - though I know she only comesbecause she dont know what else to do. But it is much better for us, and probably for her too. We have no other calls - no other breaks in the monotony of our life - excepting that she and I walk into town quite often. We always have pleasant talks together both when walking and here at home, but of course we touch on few points, and so our talk is mostly personal. I often fear she will misconstrue some thing I say or repeat it without its proper connection, and so make mischief, but I try to be guarded, and must trust much to the better understanding of me that her hearers may have, if perchance she ever thinks the second time of anything I say - which is not likely. Miss Kupfer came out to see us Friday P.M. Excepting her coming, no one has been inside the door since you went away, but Miss H -. Maggie is better - the children are pretty well. They talk much of "Aunt Clara" - and still amuse themselves with the treasures you left. - Josephs last gives me no reason to expect him before the last of the month. I care very little whether we stay here or go to London. We have more room and much more physical comfort here than we can have there, but we should like to be all together somewhere - especially now that our "leading star" has left us. I am wondering if you will go to Tahiti the coming winter if the war should end. It is one of the Society Islands, and I know that one of Joseph's brothers was sent there from San Francisco by a physician - as the last hope for him. But poor fellow! nothing could save him, and he died of consumption. If you go there, would you not go by way of the U S? But of course you have now no time or heart to be making plans for next winter. With the uncertain events of a war before you, you can only plan from day to day - or rather do every hour, what is best for that time. Even now that I write, I suppose you must have gone on beyond Bale, and must be over the suffering. When you wrote, there had been no fighting - but we hear of battles nearly every day of late, and we know not what important service you may have been rendering even before your letter had reached me. - Miss Hopkins wishes me to send much love from her and to tell you she sees her soldiers have been in battle, and she hopes you are with them. 1. P. M. Miss Hopkins has just been in with news of another battle yesterday (Sunday) and another defeat of the French. How dreadful it all is I know I can but poorly imagine, but my blood runs cold even with the little I know. I hardly expect you can ever get this letter, but I am impelled to send it on its dubious way. I hope your health will hold out for any thing you may undertake, & hope too that this [rapid?] fighting will soon end the war. I feel so saddened now by the news that has just come, I cannot write anything pleasant. Know that I think of you every hour - that I dream of you at night, and that my hearts desire is for your safety. Maybe after all that you will be released from your duties while the good weather lasts, so that Grunau will be a good home to come to. Mrs Looser went away the Monday after you left - to stay a few weeks with her relatives. When I found she was going I gave her 5 francs as from you & me and the children gave the baby cloth for a dress. Mr Looser was quite inclined to have her refuse it, but I told him if she wouldn't accept that, I could not permit them to do any more errands for us. I shall also give 2 or 3 francs to each of the two Amer boys who so often bring us a piece of meat & a couple of francs to the boy that brings cream & butter, and so square up my acct here at no future day - unless indeed we are hemmed in by this war. Louise was pleased with her money you sent & Maggie ditto. Our family all are making up messages of love as I write. The childrens are so long I cant repeat them. They pick up apples every day, & wish "Aunt Clara" would come for some apple sauce. Nor do we ever eat the sauce, without wishing to share it with you. Wherever you may be, may the blessing of God be there. Your true friend Abby. [*Abby Sheldon 1870*] Dudley House. London Sept 25" 1870 My Very Dear Friend. I am quite ashamed to remember that it is nearly two weeks since I received your letter. I was heartily rejoiced to know you were safely out of this most dreadful war - I felt like thanking God for your deliverance, and I wished very much I could see you and rejoice and visit with you. Only to think that you were in Grunau in less than a week after we left it - but if we had stayed there only another week, we may have been kept until this time. Sad enough was our view of Paris - poor poor Paris - under the darkest cloud ever passed over it. The first thing after getting to London I wrote Miss Hopkins a long letter detailing our journey, and if it ever reached her, (of which I have had Please direct as before at 8 Southampton Building Chancery Lane. London. many doubts) you will know how we got on. Because of my head trouble, we went to Mr Metcalf's Hydropatic House and all stayed there three weeks. All that time I took three baths daily - most of the time only Turkish Baths - though they were occasionally varied by a vapor bath or pack. I really wish you could know just how well this treatment works in my case. I dont mean to say that I grew better at the very first - When I rec'd your letter I was quite sick & Joseph read it to me as I lay in bed. But for a week past I have gained very fast - marking my progress day by day, and I now know that I shall get very well right away. My treatment and the disease have had a pitched battle - the disease has been out generated, and I am to have a good time again. Henceforth I mean to keep to Mr Metcalfs suggestions, and thus I hope to keep rid of this plague in future. I wish I could know just how you are in health since your hard life among the Prussians. And I wish too I could know how you are mentally - if you have not now earned the right to go home and enjoy the many priviledges of that dear Country that owes you so much. I should be so glad for one of those visits we used to have when I stole away from the children into your room - which room was a kind of refuge to me so long as you were there. But I know you wont write me much about the condition of either your body or mind and I shall be left to guess how you are in health - how you are in feeling, and what you are proposing to do. I wonder if you and Miss Hopkins will remain much longer in that little Cottage, which I remember with real affection. Have you still any hope of spending the winter in Paris & Rome? We still believe we shall be in America before winter sets in - Joseph says we must be there before long. I am only too willing to go if he can get ready. Three days ago we left the Cure and came into lodgings nearby. The Cure was too expensive a place to remain [in] with a whole family. I continue to take treatment, but have now only two baths daily. While at the Cure, we all took baths and with marked benefit. The children are very well now - rosy and uncomplaining. Maggie is in better health than I have ever before known her. It is queer that we should all have behaved so poorly in Switzerland. I felt very well there, but I am sure that the cold raw winds irritated my very sensitive skin. The three days that Joseph and I went to Interlaken I grew worse very fast - even my face and lips grew sore as they ever were at home in the roughest March weather. All physicians tell me that windy weather is bad for me. So now we are half house keeping again. I wish we could get the good cream and the cheap fruit we had last month at Grunau, but those things are not to be had in London except at very high prices. The children want to send "a great many kisses to Aunt Clara" and they "want her to come to London" And there is Miss Kupfer - how she must feel that I have shamefully treated her. I was so sorry to leave Berne without seeing her - but Fate would have it so. Then I said I would write her as soon as I reached London, but I felt so ill that when I had finished my letter to Miss Hopkins, I said I would write no more till I should be better. Now, I have another object in putting it off a little longer. Do please tell her how much I regret to have done what must seem to her like inexcusable neglect - give her great love, and ask her to believe me still a true and fond friend. Give my love to Miss Hopkins. I hope soon to hear from her all about your life at the Cottage Most truly Abby [*[Abby Sheldon]*] 204 Euston Road Mon Mar 11" 1872 Dearest Clara. Sat eve - near 10 o clock Your letter in reply to mine of last Monday reached us. It is with inexpressible delight that we receive the news that you are at last coming here. I could not write you by the first mail - (that was this morning), because ever since we got yours of more than a week ago, we have been secretly plotting to go and meet you, & Joseph had to go to his place of business this morning & see about things before we could safely say what we would do. - I am now to say that we will meet you in Paris Tues or Wed March the 19" or 20", and be your companions back to London. We are both full of regret not to come right to Carlsruhe & take you up as if you were a little girl, and if possible save you somewhat from the worry of the journey you may well dread in your present condition. We try to reconcile ourselves to what Joseph calls "rather poor" - that is to meeting you half way instead of going on straight on to you, by the thought that you have journeyed over that part of the Country till you are very familiar with it. We feel that we may safely be gone from the business a few days, and that a little trip like that would be no detriment to me, & so as I said we have narrowed ourselves down to the safe & judicious. We always wanted to go to Antwerp & to Brussels - and we want also to see Paris in [ruins?] So also do we want to see the Rhine & German towns & Cities; but we fear it is not best now. So our plan is, to leave London next Tuesday at noon - go to Antwerp & Brussels & as I said be in Paris Tues or Wed. Should you like to return by those two Cities instead of coming by Calias - the nearest way? If you should like to enough to drop us a telegram when you get this, we should be glad to leave that route for our return. We thought as you were not well, you might dread to add to the journey, but I am not at all sure how you would feel about it. So I leave it that if you should like to go that way, you will inform us before we leave, & I suggest the wires, because I think the one chance of getting a letter at 10 pm Sat, as the last was, most to slim to rest on. And alas, if you have got your Boston Money, or for any reason have decided to remain longer there, or come quicker here, please let us know. If you come on here before we get started, we shall be only too glad, & not disappointed, so dont fear to go on with any plan you have matured. You may have found some travelling companion, & if so, we want you to come by all means only, let us know in time to keep us here, now dont be nervous & think we are putting ourselves to much inconvenience & coming for you and all that. We want to come, & if you are thereand coming alone, it gives us such a capital excuse. Cant you see that even with sore eyes - Yes, I know you can, and I know too that you wont feel as J- says that it is "poor" that we dont try to do more in the matter than we can easily. I only hope you will be able to get to Paris without great trouble - but those tender eyes - how will they bear it. We shall inquire for you at No. 3 & No 5 Rue Scribe, not knowing whether Tucker or Monroe are your Bankers. We will see about a room for you. "Lodgings" is the way we all live here - it is very easy, & moderate for a big town. The landlady cooks for you & serves in your own room any food you buy. I do many little things by my own fire in addition to what is done down stairs. But you dont need bring housekeeping furniture - unless you mean by that some little convenient things. Oh! we will have joyous times. I am improving, & I believe you can be - soon. Now, dont let our proposition embarrass you in any way. I have provided for going or not going, & shall be perfectly content with either. With Great love Abby [*24 [Doz?] 7 -------- 2/16 8 8- 8*] Geddes June 26" 72 Dearest Clara. Your delightful letter found us here two days ago, and though I remembered how long to would take for a reply to reach you, and how glad you would probably be to get it, I have not until this moment seen a time to write you. Oh! we have been all the time so busy doing nothing ever since we got back. We found the chicks in excellent health, and Parents not greatly changed - for all of which God be praised continually. I do feel that I can not possibly over express the thanks giving I do and ought to feel. Joseph stayed here the best part of a week, but is in New Haven now. As the warm weather is [now] coming on, I presume I shall stay here with the children two months or so. I am now so contented & happy I dont want to go out-side the gate, - much less think of going off on any conceivable car or Boat - or other travelling conveyance.I have expressed a wish to not step into any of these "creturs" again in five years. I help Mother wash dishes and sweep, and we all the time talk quite as much as we work. We have strawberries and green peas to pick - all of which seems good fun to me. My old appetite has [all] come back - as I all the time knew it would when I got within the smell of Mother's kitchen. I cant help wishing you were here with us, and when Joseph read your letter loud to Mother & me, Mother expressed a sincere wish that you would come here, as you hinted in your letter you might do. But you never will I know - though I did not tell her so. We have written a note to Dr & Mrs C - to tel them of our defeat in the ice for sea- sickness. I imagine our disgust when after leaving Queenstown we began to be sick, and found it impossible to get the ice we needed. It was brot us in most stinted amounts - we complained - promised fees - tried other attendants, & finally it leaked out that there was very little ice on board. We never at any time had enough to completely fill the bags, but what we did get, gave us decided comfort, and convinced us that a proper amount would do all we had hoped for us. When you come, dont try the Steam ship Atlantic, although there was such a howl made about the lack of ice, that I presume that will not occur again. But she carries too many emmigrants to suit us. The Adriatic of the same line is said to be a beautiful Boat. But we were never so altogether uncomfortable on any boat before. The passage at best is bad enough, but as we last made it, it seemed almost intolerable. And now about clothes - of which I promised to write you. I see none of those three story bonnets here that were worn in London. Your Carlsruhe bonnet is a good average shape, & there are innumerable variations upon it. You thought I had laid in pretty well for laces, [*now Abby Sheldon*] but I now wish I had bot two or three times as many laces by the yard - fringe and velvets. On the black French lace, I find a saving of more than half - and other trimmings [....] a large margin of gain. We talked of the woven & hand made Valenciennes - I am told the woven wasnt better than the hand made. I did not get any of it I am now sorry to say. Mothers silk is very much admired. I am all the time so glad I had your help about getting that - that and the poplins give me more comfort. I still feel as I did there, that it is the place to buy nice goods like silk or poplin, but of cheap worsted & summer goods, we have prettier assortments and at prices quite as good. I have just bot me a pretty calico at an English 6 pence per yd, and a nice hoop skirt for '50. The skirt I must have paid 4 or 5 shillings for in London. But for all kinds of trimmings, ribbons &c - you have to pay a sweating price here. But I dont grumble over the prices. That is what makes us all so comparatively well off. And though I am glad of the few things I got, and wish I had a few more, it frets me half to death to see the awful rush there is for Europe this summer and to realise how many millions of hard (5) earned American money is to be left there this year. All the ladies on our Boat were boasting of the new clothes they were bringing back, till I was quite disgusted with the whole practice. Never before was there such a rush for Europe as now. The Tribune gives the lists of passengers departing from day to day, and heads it "the Summer Exodus." I advise you to return before the tide sets back this way. I have no doubt it was much wiser for you to remain. I can see already that you would have regretted coming without more preparation for it. Even so soon, and feeling when I left so tired of London, I sometimes wish I could be back there for a week, and am sorry to think I shall never be there again. So easily do the disagreeable things fade out of memory. So I am glad for your sake you did not rush off with us. I may say for your comfort that getting through the Custom House was a mere farce. We might have had a dozen patterns of silk for dresses, put in ever so carelessly and they would not have been seen or looked for. Some of our passengers had 12 others 23!! trunks - and yet all came on. But this mornings paper reports that 3000 yds of lace were hid in a milk can on the Russia a few days since, & found by the officers. I am only sorry since I see how our Country is bled to buy extravagant quantities of luxuries abroad, that the Custom House is not just as strict as it pretends to be. It would I believe be much better for us all. Th extravagance in dress over here is really appaling - nothing I see troubles me so much. Joseph was more timid about bringing things because on that light silk he brought me from Paris in '67 he paid $16.00 duty - and on a Music Box we brot Father two years ago, $100.00. These things made us careful. But I judge by the careless way we were all examined that Grant has been Pres long enough. We find much excitement on political matters. There are many Greeley men, Father among them. & I expect his son will soon hoist the same flag. There are Greeley hats - white of course, and the campaign contest promises to be a hot one. It is thought that the Democrats will have to nominate Greeley. They will decide July 9" at Baltimore. The splits among the old Abolitionists is most amasing. Gerrit Smith & Garrison are for Grant. Sumner for Greeley. N. W. Beecher, G. W. Curtis & W. C. Bryant are all for Grant, and they are a power, but the Greeleyites are not few or weak. I wish with all my heart the old man might go to the White House. Things seem to go at pretty loose ends here, and I wonder we dont go to pieces. But its a dear good Country, and I want it to prosper in every way, and be a model for the world. Some things seem pretty crude after coming from the old world. But the spirit of things here is for the most part admirable - so much more soul - so much more generous - so much more common intelligence. All we want here is time - a little ripeness, and if with age we can keep out caste, what a delightful land we can have. I am every day and hour drawing contrasts between things here & there. It is a good study, but I can see that to an English mind - where the sympathies were not for this country to begin with, there would be a great many hard pills to swallow. We dont get much serving here or servile attention, at the end of which a fee is expected. This morning I went with my grenadine to a dress-maker. When I came away she told me I could send for it Saturday P.M. It seemed to me a little odd that it was not to be sent to me rather than I send for it, and things are constantly coming up in that way. But I am surprised to realise how many ingenious and pretty things we have, both for use and ornament. So many convenient & labor-saving contrivances, & so many tasty decorations & devices. I wonder how it will look to you & the friends at Vowler street - all of you who have been gone so long. I hope you will all come in Sept, & that you will go straight to New Haven. Then we will have such a reunion. I can hardly sit still with thinking of it. I dont remember whether or not I promised to write those dear friends across the Thames. If they had not planned to come this fall (9) I should write them any way, & I may as it is if I can get good time. You might tell Mrs Taylor all I write on the subject of clothes, as I should have been glad to have known when I was there. Its very little though that I am able to say after all on that subject Polonaise are worn as much as in London & the styles are much the same. The under skirt plain with no trimming is admissible here as it was in Carlsruhe, but is not in London. The lace ties & barbs white & black are thought exceedingly pretty. Wish I had more to give away. Thursday morning Only think! It is four weeks this very day since we parted at 204. Now many months if not years it seem to me, I have lived since then. I cannot realise it all. Was I there then, & am I here now, I continually ask myself - or am I dreaming. I have not yet fully straightened out from under the pressure of my London life, but every day help me, and I grow so happy the more I come to myself & the pressure is removed. And everything is so beautiful - Sunsets, sun-rises - clear clean air - birds all the time singing - freedom all around. Oh! it is such a dear land. I wonder where you are now. I dont suppose you are at the Doctors, but I wish you two parties could some way harmonise the excessive conscience there seems to be on both sides. I wish so much you could try to let them make you well. I wish every hour I could have learned more of their system. I wear the ice with benefit but long to know more about it. Dont fail to get it - all of you for the sea & get a boat that has ice. Give great love to the dear friends at Vowler st Tell "Papa Holmes" my Genoa pin is called very pretty & I rejoice in it. I must tell you too that my Lava jewelry is much admired. I wear the pin every day. Nobody guesses it is not gold, but praises it, & it has come to be a necessity to me. Bracelet I have worn also. & like very much. Will you give my love to Mrs Heffer & Mr. Father & Mother send love to you, and I desire a whole heartful for you. Ever the same Abby. Friday Morning [*Abby Sheldon Queenstown June - 1872 Ansd June*] Dearest Clara. While I wait for the the breakfast bell, I must tell you a bit about ourselves thus far. You little know how many times in the 24 hours, we have spoken of you & wished you had been ready to come with us. Having each our definite business, I dont suppose we can ever expect to do any thing together. When people can work & go the same way, I find one leads and the other follows - we can neither of us follow - that is you or Joseph - and that means "we." But never mind all that. I only hope you will make much of your stay there, and I am sure you will if you go to Dr Chapmans. We talked much of that yesterday and both had only one thought about it, and that was that to go there was altogether the best thing to do. We feel that we have got far more out of our three months acquaintance with them than all else in London. I wouldn't mind your being there in England all summer - since you have not seen much of it, and are not weary of it as I am, but I dread the journey for you alone - as I fear you will at last make it. I really hope now that Joseph could not do some of the rough work for you, you will wait for the Holmes - or rather I hope you will begin now to be ready to come with them. I think I ought not to have let you do all thosethings for me the last two days; but you should have repacked two of your trunks for us to bring. But it seemed so utterly impossible for us to get any plans or conclusions. I believe it was but best for you to stay as the future will reveal. You know from the first of your getting to Eng - I had only one mind about your coming until Tues night when it seemed to come clearly to me that you could not go. Time will tell, but I fancy some thing important awaits you. We did not think to arrange about letters - I wish you would write just a little when you get this, & tell us where to direct you. Send to me at Geddes, N. Y. Care of S. E. Barker. So far we have had the best of luck. J- had ice last night with the best results - I have not yet needed it. After we leave Queenstown we shall have surrer tests of it - as so far the water is comparatively smooth. 11. a. m. | We have breakfasted - had a better meal than on the Cunard, & in many ways we are more pleased with this Line than that. The only thing against this so far, is the large number of Steerage passengers. Of this I should say nothing if you were not proposing to come soon. But this may be lost sight of in the many other comforts. Now I wish I could see you this morning - & at least hear from you. Twice on that side the ocean we have tried to have a long nice visit - in Switzerland & London, & have failed. Shall we be so persistent as to hope for anything more or better in our own country, and in the future? It seems like blind and stubborn hopelessness to do so - and yet I look a little for it - for I mean to have a quiet Country home where time is not all wasted and when I can control some hours each day, and consecrate them to friends that I love, as well as some other hours to persons I may perhaps assist. So lets still look forward - Since we have finally got this new release from our business, I can look with more courage for all the things I earnestly desire. The "Going home" fills me all the time with a joy I cannot express - only one thing is wanting more - the dear friend at 192. But when I shall hear of you at Somerset st - or in any better place you may find, I shall be comparatively reconciled. I hope ere this your next move has been made plain to you and that the "thing to do" which seemed such an inextricable puzzle, will now become clear, & will bring satisfactory results. We have been [on horizon?] deck - our ship moves very steadily, and we are getting on towards the west - - towards which I have looked with such longing for months past. I will write you as soon as I hear where you are, & tell you of things in the dear Country. Please give my love to the little girls, & ask them to forgive us, if our course to them seems unkind. With truest love, I am ever sister Abby. Geddes, July 29" 1872 Dearest Clara. Your letter of the 13" & 14 reached me about two hours ago. I had a good quiet read of it to myself, and then found it so full of interesting things I read it again to Mother. I will now put it by for a week & then it will be quite fresh for a third perusal. You have done splendidly about writing me - I dont see how you could possibly spare so much time to me, for I perhaps know better than many of your friends how large your correspondence is. & I feel that I appreciate better than most of them how many demands are made upon you in various ways. I was glad to learn by your second letter that you were comfortably situated as for lodgings. & I know of course if you were near Vowler street you would be among the kindest of friends. But I am sorry enough to hear Mrs Taylor is ill. Now I wish she could want to try Dr Chapman. He certainly has made discoveries about the control of the nervous system that ought to put him above all want or thought of anxiety about money. We do find over here a terrible prevalence of nervous diseases. You know I told the Dr I had a "whole room full" of friends I wanted him to treat. So many more have I added since then that it begins to seem to me there is a world full rather than any less. You have probably heard of the unprecedented heat here this summer. & of the alarming number of sun- strokes - one day more than 70 in N.Y. City. I wondered how the ice bag could be applied to prevent & to [restore?] in those cases, but I dont feel clear enough about the theory yet to knowvery much, but I do have just unbounded faith that Dr C - could manage it, & confer in that as in many other ills that visit us, blessings of inestimable value. If things were in their right places, Dr Chapman would be in this Country, where nervous diseases abound & where people grasp eagerly after new things & where ice is plenty & cheap! Joseph has been practicing a good deal in New Haven, but I only know of it the bits he has written. He writes of curing one case of bad diarreah. & one of chills & fever, & says he has put one of the physicians up to trying ice on a dozen patients for diarreah - all doing well. I see & hear of people every day that I am sure are dying for want of Dr C - One lovely woman - a near neighbor to us here - one of those sweet souls that seems to have just the use in the world that a beautiful flower has, passed away a day since - leaving a Father, Mother & husband that have for years had no thought but to love & pet her. I had hoped you would stay with the Chapmans for a time, for I feel that your health would be improved by it, & then I know how when you get back here, you will wish you knew more of his system & discoveries. If the death of his son brings sorrow to the good mans heart, I am only very very sorry it has occurred. But he was an undutiful son - abused his Father because of his marriage, & I should have said he could be well spared. - . I dont think you know half how interesting all London news is to me. I find I do love London a little after all, & would often come back for a day if I could. There are a number of people there very dear to me & that I should be very glad to have near me always. You know well enough what place you hold among them, & so it was without any thrill of joy that I read what you say about not coming back this fall. But I do not wonder that you stay. I wait with interest to know the result of your prison visits with the Frenchmen. That may open the way to other things to be done, & new spheres for you. You cant work with the other women - its of no use for you to try. You are "a team by yourself", & must do your own work in your own way. You seemed to fear you should never have any more work, but it strikes me that the Providence that has always been so prompt to furnish you with big jobs to do, may be safely trusted to bring on more. I was exceedingly glad you wrote about Mrs Howes meetings & the Prison Congress. The latter was written about in the Tribune by Smalley, but the former I dont think got a mention over here. I thought if Mrs Howe didnt find her hands full, she would meet a different breed of English from any I ever saw. Aaron M. Powell was reported to be at the Congress. Why didnt you speak to some of them. You needed me as a little tug boat then. As to you as a delegate - of course it would have been just the thing, but may be not a person of your acquaintance knew the two facts that you were in London & that there was to be any such meetings. But Clara you can get along without them all - can "hoe your own row" and come out splendidly - and I rejoice for you & in you that you can. As to politics here, we are having & are to have a most exciting campaign. The old Repubs are taking the place formerly used by the Democrats - are using money & lies in profusion. You must not be deluded into the notion that "Greeley has gone over to the Democrats". Greeley has been nominated as a man - an independent candidate, which you know is on a principal the Tribune has advocated for years. The hardest thing in it all is that Garrison, Gerrit Smith Note: "Mrs Howes meetings & the Prison Congress" refers to Julia Ward Howe (1819-1901), poet and author of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," abolitionist and suffragist, who was a delegate to the World's Prison Reform Congress in London in 1872. Note: Aaron M. Powell (1832-1899) was a Quaker social reformer who was anti-slavery, and an advocate for temperance, and women's suffrage. Note: "Greeley" refers to Horace Greeley (1811-1872), founder and editor of the New York Tribune, and a candidate of the Liberal Republican party in the presidential election of 1872, which was won by Ulysses S. Grant. Note: "Gerrit Smith" (1797-1874), was a social reformer, abolitionist and philanthropist. Note: "Garrison" refers to William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879), an abolitionist, journalist, suffragist and social reformer.Frederic Douglas & G. W. Curtis are for the administration, & say & do things more contradictory & inconsistent with their past lives. We all know they must consider Greeley a better man & far better educated in Statesmanship than Grant, & we should not expect them to go blindly for a party. Their conduct is quite unaccountable to us, & of course they hurt Greeley a good deal. Greeleys record on the Woman Question is much the worst he has ever made, but while he has denounced suffrage for women, he has advocated so well better work & more pay for them that I feel he has indirectly worked well for us. And I feel that the better moral tone he would give our nation as its chief ruler, would also help on the woman cause. Gen Grant is all for races & watering - places & such life of fast & unprofitable ways that we tend too much towards if not lead on by our President. Greeley would be Greeley still - sensible, sober, prudent, and I wish I could vote for him. I begin to fear he will need the womens votes he fought against. Miss Anthony is a rantankerous Grantite. The Grant Convention did not treat her so shabbily as the Baltimore - so she joins Grant & has come out in a manifesto. I have not seen a Womans Journal since I left England, & so dont know how the best women talk of the times. We shall surely take the paper when we get to living in our own home. I am glad you speak of papers. I have laid one aside from time to time to send you & then have forgotten to send them till they are so old I let them go to the waste basket. Now that I know you would be glad of them, I shall be more thoughtful. Indeed a Tribune is now on its way, & this letter awaits to receive accessions at odd times. I wish I could be there with you a fortnight & do up lots of talking and other things. (5) Joseph is still in New Haven, but I have been daily looking for him for two weeks. He mentioned in a letter that he had recd a paper from you. I too have one to acknowledge. I was glad to see what "The News" says of Greeley. English people ought to like Grant. He is very English in his tastes, while Greeley is thoroughly the product of American institutions. I will send you Sumners letter to the colored people that is in todays paper. It will answer all the questions & arguments used against Greeley. I told you we were having a very hot summer - We did have four weeks of excessive heat they all said, but I enjoyed it. Fathers house is cool or warm as we choose, and we lived much upon fruit, & avoided all hot & heating things. I could have my Turkish Bath every day then & not pay a half crown for it either. But the past two weeks have seemed more like Sept than like summer. Strawberries, raspberries, & cherries & currants have been picked, eaten, dried canned & made into jelly. How we are revelling in ripe apples, delicious apple-sauce & apple dumplings. Very soon we shall have pears & plums, & then Grapes. I tell you this is the country for good living. I wish Mrs Taylor could be here. I have a hope that her appetite would come to her as mine came to me. Oh! how I am stowing away food these days. I have already begun to wonder how I could have felt so poorly last spring - so soon do we forget discomforts when they pass by. Please tell Mrs Holmes I put up some currants especially for her for it seemed to me I had heard her say she was fond of them. I had really counted a good deal on having you all come to New Haven when you should first land in September - and must I give it all up and not see you? If Papa Holmes dont come home this fall, he wont come in a long time, & I am not at all willing to give him up to John Bull. We have a wonderful landover here, but we cant afford to let the Papa Holmeses families abscond. And you too my dear sister - the same applies to you. I often think how very odd things here will seem to you travellers if ever you come back, & I want to see your surprise - and many times I shall expect to see disgust - though you are all good Republicans, & dont want class distinctions - dont need to see the classes below to make you feel that you are some body. Even though I had been gone less than one year, I had forgotten there was quite so much of the I'm-as-good- as-you-are over here. No wonder we dont call servants much here, for we have no one to whom it is applicable - no one serves in any such sense as in the old Country. It must strike foreigners very strangely, and often shock them to see the utter absence of servility, and often of civility on the part of attendants. But for enterprise we can beat the world. Nor are we slow on the good impulses of the heart, and as for the comforts of life we not only beat the world but beat it hollow. I have shopped a little. The market is supplied this season with the prettiest calicos I ever saw & at only '/2 1/2 per yd. All common cotton goods are quite as cheap here as in London. Father today bot English socks as cheap as I could get them there. & a cotton umbrella as cheap. But silks, poplins, laces & all trimmings are much more. It is well to get a good outfit there & have dresses made if they can be made to suit. You pay twice as much here to have dresses made - but they are made prettier & better I think. One thing seems so delightful in shopping - you can get out of a store & not buy unless you want to! Just fancy that! It is of itself to make us deserve to be called a free Country. But in dealing with the clerk you dont hear - "yes Madame" - "Will you take this Madam" - "its very cheap Madam" and "thank you Madame". I dont like politeness put on thick any better than I do paint, but I think we could use a little more over here to advantage. I do congratulate you on your progress in going about London if you can travel underground at 11 o'clock at night. Am glad you have broken ground with such people as the Hyatts. And it was infinitely better you should go alone. I became satisfied when you went with us to Mr Conways & the Drs, that that was not your place - your strength comes out on playing "lone hands". You dont mention the Conways - dont you either call on Mrs C- (Tues afternoon is her day) or go to South Place Sundays? Oh how natural it seems to write these names & think of these places and people. I half wish I was there again. But then I am so happy here, so content, so full of faith in this Country & these people, & should be so sorry to find in any other land my real home. But the little experiences I have had abroad, make my life here immensely more interesting - it makes so many more things to think & talk about - such differences to notice and find a reason for, and encourages so much ones hope and pride in this child of Democracy - which is "the best land the sun ever shone on". So I am already getting to see the "Divinity" that took us twice away over there, & which seemed to us sometimes to be another individual whose name also begins with D. And to your people there who have had so much wider experience than I have, how much more true will these things be, but you must come here to know it.[*Abby Sheldon A Aug 24/72*] Mon. Aug 5". Here it is one week since I recd your good letter & began a reply. There is so seldom an hour when I can get off by myself to write that I make sad work at it. Yesterday morning Joseph came & we had a very happy day and house hold over his arrival. But now to day that the first joy of his coming is over, & I begin to think that I am to leave here when he goes back - here where I have been quite free & like years ago - to go there where I always live like a caged bird - I cant help looking to it with great dread. Not that I have not good friends there, but I never can or did draw a full deep breath in New Haven, or feel at all free and natural. And then the hardest part of it is that no one understands Why I cant. You ask about the home, but it cant come yet, and we should be at a terrible loss to know when to have it if it could. We are not yet at liberty to chose - and perhaps it is just as well, Joseph tells me that the Womans Journal is against Greeley, but Anna Dickinson is for him. I have got fully back to good health & have had a happy summer. When green corn comes (I have had some once) I am resolved to get fat. Arent you coming back to this land of plenty this fall? You kindly offer to buy for me any thing I wish over there. I should be glad of another Killarney unmounted, but put up handsomely like the one I have. Or perhaps the Artist has now some other as well done. I believe he intended to take Melrose. Of course I should greatly prefer that. I gave half a guinea. I do not want to give you much trouble to get it, but I should like it well if you could easily get it. The children remember you well & send love to "Auntie Clara" & say tell her they use their little plates every day. Father & Mother send love to you, while I wish to be most kindly remembered to all the dear people at No 7 - to Hannah & Antoinette & to Mr Erbach. Tell him I am surely going to write by & by. To yourself the love of Abby. Clara, Dont neglect to learn of Dr. C. some of the secrets of his place of treating nervous Disorders - I read his book with the greatest interest but often wish I could have his comment on a particular case - Abby looks immensely better than she did in London - I learn that Mrs Howe was scrubbed by that Mrs Brooks who had the chance at the [Sumners ... business?] [*[p.m. Mar. 28]*] [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven March 29/74 Dear Clara: Maggie Fanny & I have just come down from Syracuse after having been gone 4 weeks - during which time your letter to Abby has come - Fanny & I concluded to open your letter before sending it on to Abby and await the action of the Grand Jury for breaking open other peoples letters - A remains with Lizzie with her father & mother - They will remain there 3 or 4 weeks longer - Mr Barker is quite poorly and we not expecting he can survive very long - He has softening of the brain with symptoms of paralysis If you go to New England remember all the other ways are closed by order of the Government till this visit is made Yours Joseph Note: "Killarney" may refer to a location, Killarney Lakes near Killarney, County Kerry, Ireland, scenes of which were painted by John Claude Bosanquet, an Irish watercolorist and photographer, about 1872. Perhaps "Melrose" refers to the ruins of Melrose Abbey in Roxburghshire in Scotland?wearing when I arrived - I found the silk all right & it is in the hands of the same - All thanks to you - I brought from Mr Heffer your shoes - Abby I guess knows where they are - I dont at this minute - Now I do think if we keep the shoes and you have to get away from the miasma of Washington perhaps we can get your feet here to put into them - Then we will have a visit - Although Abby would have been glad to see you last fall or early winter that she could not have well held together I think I can help do the [9?] of when you do come at a [sat?] that will partially make amends for her grievous loss of your visit then - paralysis - The Drs do not give us much hope that he can live a year - We want to do every thing we possibly can for him I invented & applied some [spearmint?] cure treatment that helped him considerably - That and the presence of the tender sweet face of his only child and the prattle of the Grandchildren seem to cheer him up very perceptibly & we left him much better yesterday - Yes Clara we have had a very rare sweet visit since I arrived five weeks ago last night - I expected to find A- - a bed and nearly gone - She was about as near it as could be but She did not give up altogether and has gone on with much better looks than she was wearingI am truly afflicted to learn of the recurrence of that sickness which seems to be the torment of your life - If you could come here and live in our warm bath I think you would find it "Larks-" I am not at all sure that your sickness does not come from the awful "corruption" we hear of in Washington! Think of that and flee - Turn up this way for I should think about all the March winds and all the other winds had been like John Brown's Soul marching on - and Got by by this time - Maggie & Fanny and I are all stark alone - Do call & be our Mama a few days - our Guide Philosopher & friend - New Haven. May 11" 74 Dearest Clara. Every day since I came home - now three weeks since - I have hoped to write to you. Joseph sent me your letter written in March, and wrote me he had written to you - so I waited as I thought for a few days only, but it turns out to have been weeks! When I came from Geddes, I left my Father better than we had found him when we went up in February, but he is a confirmed invalid, and we have no hope that he will ever be any thing else. I came down here to fix up the family a little for the changing season, and to try and doctor myself a little - for sad to say, the worry of the past year has left me a touch of my old disease - "Inflammation of the nerves of the skin" Dr Chapman calls it. I am now resting properly and dont mean to get very bad. I also use salt baths according to Dr Kruiger of Berne and the ice - bag after Dr Chapman. All the other medical advice I have is fromDr J Sheldon. Between them all shall I be killed do you think? Probably not - I think the Fates have other designs upon me. I dont think any thing would do me half so much good, as a long visit from you. No one makes me laugh as you do, and laughing would surely be the best off set to all the crying I did last winter. Do you not intend coming North this spring or summer? I cant think you would come without stopping at New Haven. The whole house-hold wants to see you - particularly the "Master" & "Mistress". I wish you would come up and stay a month. We would have walks & talks and drives, and both take our summer va- cation now. I have been very sorry I did not go to Worcester to see you and your sister last winter - now you have been home so long I shall never hear any of your "yarns" - they are all spun off so long ago. But talk or no talk - I just wish you would come to 40 York Square, and then see if we have any thing to say. Joseph wants me to say that we are storing a pair of boots for you and cant afford it much longer. The silk for a dress was a perfect suc- cess so far as we were concerned - and a perfect beauty too. I never knew till a few days ago that you made it into a mock dress. I thought it had never been unfolded. What a genius you are. We have just commenced reading Middle March together - I think it a great book - am glad for so good an understanding of an earnest, self- sacrificing girl. We have finished Other Girls and I am sorry to say it does not seem to me so great a book as it did last year. Still it is very worthy, and I should be glad to see its Author. We dont hear any thing at all from London. We wrote to Mr & Mrs Heffer a long letter, but are not surprised that we get no answer. Mr Bradley no longer has to write of the business (thank Heaven) and so does not write at all, and Dr Chapman of course has no time, so we are more cut off from London now than we have at any time been in 5 years. Note: Middlemarch, first published in installments in 1871-1872, Dorothea Brooke being its noble-minded heroine, was written by George Eliot (1819-1880). Note: The Other Girls, published in 1873, was by Adeline Dutton Train (A. D. T.) Whitney (1824-1906), an American poet and writer of 20 books for girls.[*Ansd 13, May*] NEW HAVEN MAY 12 [*33 Sheldon*] Miss Clara Barton. Cor. Penna Ave & 5th St. Capitol Hill Washington D. C. Mr Joy at [....?] has become a hopeless invalid - worse than Father, but with similar disease. Do you hear or know any thing of Mr [Kuratlie?]? You always said you would find him - I hope you will - we have tried by writing that Massachusetts boy who was at the school, but we get no response. Oh! there are so many things we want to talk up. I am not patient with trying to write. Dont you think you will come and see us before long? I hope I shall be able to stay here till the 1st of July - then the long vacation in the schools begins, and if Father wants me up there with the children for the rest of the summer, very likely I shall go. Meanwhile there are nearly two months intervening - can we have you with us a part of the time? How is your health and how your sisters? I fear you will be obliged to be altogether with her. If it were not for sickness what a "kinder comfortable" world this would be. The chicks are well & in school. Joseph is more quiet and orderly than I ever knew him before - thanks to the riddance from the "Dog". Cant you have mercy on me & come & see me? Abby [*15*] [*Sheldon 1874*] Fri Eve. May 15 My Dear Clara. At noon today Joseph rec'd a Washington paper containing a notice of your illness. A feeling of deep regret ran through the house, and I was busying my brain thinking what could be done for you, when along came your letter. Then I felt that I knew a little more definitely about you than I could by the news paper notice, and my thoughts took shape at once. Of course you greatly desire to go to Worcester - I grieve at the news from your sister - but you cannot go there until you are better, half so well as you can come here. You say you cannot come here until you are well, but exactly the reverse is true. This is just the place for you to be, CARRIER 13 MAY 8 AM just as soon as you are able to get here - and I remember you made several journeys in Europe when any body else would have died on the road. So if you can get to N.Y. next week, I beg you will only remain there so long as you desire for rest and to see the Dr if you wish, and then let Joseph come for you. So far as we are concerned, it would make us all very happy to see you at the door - even if you did come as an invalid. - I am better much than when I wrote before, but not so well but we could both be patients, and "Dr Joe" rejoices in subjects. Seriously, I think if you were here you might safely use the ice under our combined knowledge of its use. I know about that hot feeling in the spine, and how agreeable I find the ice to be. And it is so splendid to produce sleep, and sleep is the greatest need of prostrate nerves. We wont annoy you with our notions if you will come - but you have your own sense, and here shall have freedom to exercise it. I think you would find a full warm bath very quieting and comfortable occasionally - and that we have also. You cannot work now any way, and might as well be here as there for that. Unless you have objections to the plan that I know not of, I urge you in all sincerity to come up here and let us try if just the change in conditions that will come to us all, will not be a benefit to all. I have great faith that it would. And then there are some things as ice-bags warm baths - simple food &c that we will join to our cheerfulness and I believe the result would be encouragement for us both. I can only say, if you hesitate to come in your thought of us, please ask yourself if we may not be as sincere in desiring it as you have often been in plans you have made for and about other people. We have never been so free from company as we have been since last January - The coast is clear, and come and try it. Maybe we can croon together to our mutual advantage. Mrs Vassals illness was a great surprise to me - I feel very sorry for both you and her if she must really be taken. I think I never knew of so much illness as there seems to be all over the Country this spring. I am encouraging a faint hope of seeing you after all - even perhaps by a week from this very night - may it be so? In Trust Sympathy & love Abby. New Haven May 15 1874 Dear Clara; Your letter to Abby came this afternoon & also a newspaper addressed to me from which we have learned of your illness - We were of one accord instantly as to just what ought to be done - to wit for me to go and get you vi et armis with a writ of Habeas Corpus to have the Body as well where it is not as where it is and bring you straight here. That is what ought to be and should be. Only one individual could successfully interpose a veto - and Note: "vi et armis" means "by force and arms" [veto] we could easily pass it over by a two thirds vote - but you backed by several chaps and steamboats might be "jest a little" too much for us - Now soberly, righteously, & truly "Dr Joe" orders you to New Haven to report for duty - You say Judge Hale's folks are coming in to N.Y. next week - Now a thought just strikes me - I have got a small stove in the Shape of a pair of Shoes that I might carry down to N.Y on a pole and hold them a trifle ahead all the time - dont you think we should get round you this way - I would so gladly go to meet you in N.Y. and convey you through all the perils of admiring admiring friends and lion hunters and bring you triumphantly home and give you all the benefit of my skill after you have tried the unfledged skill of Dr [Brown?] [Lequaid?]. He knows something of nerves but I am the nerves themselves and so I guess I know - Ask Mrs Heffer if there should happen to be the slightest doubt about my skill and disposition - Abby would be so glad to have you here - She is hankering to see you. And I think you will be liable to prosecution under the Statute against cruelty to animals if you decline to come - If you are sick as I know you have a capacity to be And as I so definitely remember to have seen you - and as I so greatly fear you are again I should like to have you with us at least for a few weeks till we could see what we could do to cheer you and you do to cheer us & talk with us over the whole Continent of Europe and the last few years - I am sad to hear of Mrs Vassall's poor health - I did hope to know her on this side of the silent river but if she goes before to join the great company of the nobly great & good we will hope sometime to be there also - I would like you to talk with us as in the olden time Could you just telegraph me when you will be in N.Y. I will be there also if you can think of coming home with me - We will do our best to have as good a time as circumstances will admit. New Haven. June 6" 1874 Dearest Clara. Ever since that hasty meeting and parting on the cars two weeks ago. I have longed uncommonly to know of you and what you were being called to endure. But knowing nothing and fearing much, I have felt it would be almost an impertinence to write. This mornings Woman's Journal brings news of the death of your sister and of your own nervous prostration, and I feel now that I must write to say how deeply I sympathise with you in all you are made to bear. Because I do not elaborate the matter of sympathy, you will not doubt that my heart is full of it, but it is so impossible alike to effectually speak sympathy and comfort to a sorrowing heart, that I can attempt neither. You are only too familiar with all that can be said, and know only too well that nothing outside ourselves can much help us in the emergencies of life. I am sure every year we add to our own lives, makes us more willing to step out from all its perplexities, and less reluctant to part with the friends that go before, - and still the great love of life God seems to have given us makes us shrink not a little from death. Verily, "how fearfully and wonderfully we are made." I wish I could know if you are more prostrated now than you were in Washington - there has been enough I know to make you so - but I hope you are not decidedly worse. I know it is very presumptuous of me to think it could help you any, but I cant help wishing you were right here with us. You know and I do not if you are able to get here, and if you would wish to get here. You ought to be away from all your relations who will keep fresh your regret over your sister, and you ought to be away from the troop of friends that must hunt you down in Washington. I think we could secure for you as much quiet and rest as you can easily find, and perhaps further some of your wishes in regard to ice- bags &c. Do not be annoyed by my constant reference to this, and do not misunderstand it, but if it has any attractions for you to do so, come down here as soon as you can, and if you find it to agree with you, you are more than welcome to the use of our house even after we go up to Fathers for the summer visit. I am better of my difficulty, but not yet disposed to enter very hard service. I think some good company would help me to get up. We have a very sunny chamber that shall be yours if ever you come here - I am not inviting any one else this summer - dont want any one else but you. You must not tax yourself to write us. I have not written for a reply except your answer in the body. Most truly & lovingly yours Abby. New Haven Friday Morning Dearest Clara. Your sweet-sad letter of Wednesday came to us yesterday. My only feeling was and is to go at once to see you if you desire me one half as much as you say. But the "buts & "ifs" rose up thick and fast to hold me back - so I could not get off last night or this morning - nor could I see what to write. We have now decided that Joseph shall first go up and after he returns I shall come for a week if it seems best. He has received a letter from your Dr asking about the Ice & Dr Chapman, and I think he can give more information upon the subject than I can. Besides he is well, and so can carry a better influence to a sick room. He will go up tomorrow afternoon and stay over Sunday. It is in vain to try to write half how sorry [and] I feel to hear of you so ill, or how gladly I would give you help or comfort in any way possible to me. I wish most heartily you were here, unless you are to be in some good Hydropathic Establishment where all the appliances of water are at hand, and the physician has constant watch & care over you. That seems to me the very best place - if only you can find the good place and be able to get to it. We have a splendid bath-room, but you need the wisdom of a really good Dr to go with it. If I did not fear that you do, I should bend every energy toward getting you to us. Cheer up dear sister if you can. All we can do in any and every way shall be done with all the readiness our great love and admiration for you prompt, and if it may avail in any way to your comfort, we shall be abundantly glad of it. I know how dark every thing looks when we are sick - I know how idle it is to recommend more cheerful views - so I will only say accept our love and believe that we both mean to try to get you again to something pleasant in this world. Most fondly yours Abby. Abby Sheldon 1874 1712 Norris Street Philadelphia Pa May 21st 1876 Dear friends - Mrs Holmes & myself reached New York about the first of this month expecting Mr & Mrs Taylor to follow in a week They have been delayed. but if they Did not sail on the 17th inst they assure us they will on the 24th so in a little over a fortnight we shall certainly expect them here. Mrs H has been to see her friends in the western part of this state & has just returned here. She had a good visit. We have clubbed together here with Mr & Mrs Lee Mr & Mrs Charles [T?] Porter, Mrs & Miss Taylor & Mrs Holmes & Jos so we have the basis of a jolly Party. & room for some friends where they come & where our beds are all filled there are neighbors enough to accommodate as jolly a reunion of old long separated friends as can well be imagined and we really hope that a score or two of the loved & trusted will Seek a (corner round about here) where the twilights of evening & the gray of morning & even sultry noon will be made glad with merry laughter. I know three that should belong to such scores yea four & their names are Clara & Mary Barton & Mr & Mrs Sheldon, & I shall be much Disappointed if bad health, previous engagements, or the hard times shall interfere with the consumation of OUR wishes & hopes, Dear, Dear, beloved Clara, we must see her & if yet in low health and yet able to receive visits we must go to her. but if she is so recovered as to be possibly able to be here awhile it seems as if that would be best for all, for while she lives she will appreciate the beauties of art so grandly shown here and the loves of friends that worship her should add some thing to so good & worthy a life. And Mary too It would be worth two or three years of common life if she could [studdy?] this gathering from all the best the world has yet done to advance civilization and the arts of peace, yes & in the art of [kiling?] so fast & sure that men will dread to trust the weal of nations in reckless hands. You & Mrs Sheldon & the children will come I am sure, & Clara & Mary if they can & I offer to Do the best I can to arrange for such stay as you can make in good comfortable quarters at the most reasonable rates possible & close to us in a [subberban?] quarter of the city & will advise how to arrive & rest & if notified, to meet any or all at the station & play the conductor. I leave Details for looked for interviews on later letters. I do not know Clara's address & cannot wait for Fidelia to tell me, so Dear friends [start or shoot?] this off to Clara when you have read it & tell her Pa.Pa is here. & that he has brought an ocean of love & good will to all his friends. yea [verily?]and another ocean of it for her. Very Truly yours Joseph E Holmes Dear Clara. I think you must enjoy this hearty letter - as we have done. I wish I could know whether or not you are well enough to go to Philadelphia this summer. I very much want to see you and Miss Kupfer, and should be glad beyond what I can express to hear that you both were coming here to stay a week or more. The weather is charming now - What is your reply. My old friend & neighbor who had had prostration and of whose case I used to tell you so much & often, is again sick & I have to tell her of you. I hope to hear some thing good about you and that soon. Yours most truly Abby Barker. [*Joseph E Holmes Ansd. May 21 June 1.*] [*Abby Sheldon Geddes Ansd - July 23. 1876*] Geddes. July 23rd '76 Dearest Clara. I was much surprised and still more pleased to get again a letter from you, all in your own hand, and looking as of old. But that was two months ago. I am wishing very much to know how you are now that you have tried the treatment these eight weeks. Of course it must [in] each time be in some sense an experiment, and while I should like nothing so much for myself as a chance to spend the summer on that delightful hill- side, I realise that it would not be as kindly adapted to every one else. I wait with great interest to know how it will be to you. Does it not seem too bad that humanbeings can be brought to such suf- fering as they are continually. At the time I rec'd your letter I had staying with me that poor sick woman that I so often told you of. She has now for the third time nervous prostration, and in her illness reminds me much of you. - I kept her in my home four weeks, and took the entire care of her. She improved considerably, but duty to my own family forbade that I should keep her longer, and she has not gone on improving. I always tell her of you, & your letter she was very glad to hear. Two weeks ago I came up here to my Fathers to stay a month or so. Father is gradually failing and if he lives much longer will become so as not to know much of my coming or going and not to care much for either. It makes me very sad to see him in this condition. - still I am anxious to come as often as I can while it gives him any pleasure. Fanny & Lizzy came with me. He loves them very much, and they perfectly idolise him. Joseph will be up in another week I suppose, and soon after we shall all return to New-Haven. Mother seems not so feeble as she was last summer. I am surprised that she keeps up so well, but she has never been known to fail in an emergency. Much like you - she holds out till the battle is over and then! - perhaps like you there will be a long day of reckoning. I dont see how the world could get on without such women, but it is hard on the women. Just before coming up here I had a pretty letter from Mrs Taylor. "Papa Holmes" has been very sick for along time with rheumatic fever. She said the Dr had recommended some Sulphur Springs for him as soon as he was able to be moved. I wrote at once advising them to go to Dansville - where as I told them they could get infinitely more benefit than at any Sulphur Springs known or unknown, and besides that have a long visit with you. Possibly you may know more of them than I do, but I fear they will not have heeded my advice. I have hoped to see them all at our house this fall. How gay it would be if you could get well enough to be there too. We have not yet been to Phil. We may go yet - have not wanted to go during the hot weather. I had a nice letter from Minnie after you left. Dear good soul! How well I should like to see her too. Very likely your Physicians do not allow you to write letters, but if you are able to do so, I hope for a few lines, just to let me know how you yourself are. I used to know Dr Jackson & his family very well - it is now many years since I have seen any of them. If they remember Abby Barker, please remember me very kindly to them. I cannot tell how much hope you find yourself improving, & that you are to be well again Most Truly yours Abby. New Haven Sept 24 1876 Dear Sister Clara; Yours came - I knew Lott Fenn well. He made only one chief mistake and that was that he did not consult me! in all his troubles - to be sure I was in Europe most of the time when his troubles began but I did return and that was when the above mistake was made - 1. By the Law of this state the Petitioner for a Divorce must bring his Petition in the county of this state in which one of the parties lives - He must as Mr Watrous says establish a residence here (for his wife is in Hartford Co.) if he is to bring his Petition in this County -I presume [Watrous?] will return his money (if) or part of it he decides not to bring the Petition or to bring it Hartford County - [Watrous?] is a good fair aver- age selfish Lawyer but will not treat the matter dishonestly but he is said to "charge" like "Chester" - 2. The law is that a Divorce may be granted for "such conduct" on the part if a Respondent "as de stroys the happiness of the Petitioner and defeats the purpose of the marriage relation" - The Judge construes these more liberally and the she-tiger you describe would probably find her "conduct" adjudged to be such as [it?] statute provides shall be [cause] cause for a Divorce - But in all this there would doubtless be labor and worry and expense But a Divorce is a Divorce entire and complete in this state It is therefore a matter in re- gard to which uncle Lott's feelings are a prime factor. He might of course lose his case and with and in it his time and his money - He must I suspect prepare for a sharp hard battle in case he does decide to prevail; - in which case the mistake I allude to in the be- ginning is the more deplorable - But since he has paid out his money already I suppose he will have to endure it I am glad to see your handwrit- ing clear and large - and hope the Water Cure is doing you essential service - I will persuade Abby to write a bit just to make this letter have a respectable appearance A thousand thanks for your letter -[*Joseph Sheldon Sept 24. 1876 required no answer*] Dear Clara. You may well guess how glad I am to think you are gradually getting back to health. I saw Mrs Carpenter last night & heard from her of you, and of other good people in Dansville. Are you expecting to remain there for the Winter? I think often of Minnie - wondering if she succeeds in her new occupation and if she is happy there. We neither see nor hear from the Holmes, & I fear shall not at all. If it happens that you come East this fall do make us in your route. Good love & Good night Abby. [*Sheldon 33*] New Haven. Apr 19" 77 Dearest Clara. I have not heard one word from you since Miss Fanny Atwater kindly spent an hour with me last October. - As I look back upon it, it is a long time, and I know not what may have happened to you. But my great hope is that you have been going on the highway to health - the surest way to usefulness and happiness. I am wondering if you will not for some reason or reasons, be coming East this spring? Now if it should happen that you are coming this way, can't you give us the pleasure of a nice visit with you? I have quite persuaded myself that you will do so, and I hope I have not too long delayed writing to know about it. Almost endless are the things we should find to talk over, and I should look to such a visit with great enthusiasm. I very much wanted to go to Dansville at your invitation last August, but it could not be brought about. Miss Atwaters brief visit was a great comfort to me, and was the next best thing to seeing your good old self. I was greatly pleased with her, and have felt better about you ever since I had the opportunity to know what good hands you were in. I was sorry not to have seen her more. How many years ago is it that you came home from Italy to us in London. Do you remember the day you went with me in a Cab from Mr Holmes to 204 Euston Road. It was a wet dull day like this, and just about this time of the year. All those days and months seem unreal to me and very far back in the past. I was out in a pretty brisk shower today, and I kept thinking of the time you and I stood under a tree between Berne & Wa-berne while a heavy rain fell, and finally pursued our way home through the rain. Oh! Come and see us, and let us live over some of the good times - wisely skipping the others. You cannot well imagine how much your two little girls of Grunau memory have grown. I will send a Photograph of Fanny, to prepare you some what to see her. Lizzy's last picture does not please us - will send hers another time. Mrs Fanny Johnson may like to see the picture, as our Fanny is a sort of namesake of hers. And perhaps Mother Jackson and Miss Austin will feel enough interest in the childs Mother, to like to see her picture. As I write, both the children are sitting by the table, studying for examination and I wish I knew how many times I have had to stop and answer questions. Note: 'Wa-berne' refers to Wabern Baths near Berne. Clara Barton and Minna Kupfer took a house there after Mr. and Mrs John Hitz returned to the U.S. Clara and Minna were joined at Wabern Baths by Judge Joseph Sheldon and his wife, Abby Sheldon, in June 1870. Note: Abby Sheldon and her two daughters were in Grunau, Germany, as of August 8, 1870 awaiting Clara's return from her aid work during the Franco-Prussian War. Abby and the girls returned to London by September 25, 1870, missing Clara's return to Grunau by a week. Note: The Sheldons returned to London to live at 204 Euston Road as of March 11, 1872; they returned to the U.S. about May 27, 1872. Since April 19, 1877 is the date of this letter, Abby's memory of getting a cab with Clara from Mr Holmes to 204 Euston Road must date to about mid-April 1872. While staying in London, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Holmes lived at 7 Vowler Street; they returned to the U.S. in May 1876.since I have been writing the foregoing. You will be glad to know that Father is still living, and though a hopeless invalid, he does not suffer so much as to lose all pleasure in life. He has astonished every body by so long resisting the utter helplessness that seems certain to come upon him some day. And Mother goes on apparently unchanged. We, in our own family, have been remarkably well this past winter. I attribute it to the fact that we have been strictly without meat, and have lived ideally simple lives. "Brother Joseph" keeps well & young. He has grown to be so fond of studying finance and Political Economy, that the old reforms get less attention. But he goes cheerfully once a week to Suffrage Club meeting with me, & is a most useful member. I think often of Dr Jackson & all his family whom I know. Please give my love to him and to them. Remember me most kindly to your good nurse & care-taker, and let me know if only by Post-card, if you are coming this way. We do want to see you "awful bad." Most sincerely Abby Barker. [*Mrs Johnson is greatly interested. Does hope Mrs Sheldon can come here.*] Newhaven Ct Teus. Jan 22nd. 1878 Dearest Clara. I have rec'd two nice letters from you during the fall & winter, but I shall not even attempt to reply to them. This morning at the breakfast table your name was mentioned & we all began again to think & to say that we must keep on trying to get you to come & see us. You wont stay in Washington always, & when you go from there that is - come North cant you make some excuse that will be to yourself sufficient to bring you to New England & so to us. Joseph wants to talk money with you - no - not money, but the financial interests of the Country. It was Ben Butlers talk in Congress yesterday that finally brought us to you this morning. Lottie wants to see you awfully, and says tell you there are so many here that would be glad to wait on you, that "you could ring the bell as often as you liked." The fact is we should be more pleased to see you at our door, than any body in the world, and I dont see how we can make it more emphatic. But then I dont forget that we have no [other] inducement to offer except that it would be a happiness to us. And now that I cant make that more emphatic by more words, I shall only add that we are all well & doing as well as we can these hard times. Lottie is here, & is a treasure in any home I think I never saw any one who could do so many different things all very well. She was going to a lady in Fishkill but when the time came to go she was quite sick and so lost the place. She would accept any good situation I presume but seems to like to stay in New Haven & we are glad to have her. Now I rejoice for you that you are once more able to go from home & enter into the common enjoyments of life. I used to tell you it would be so, & you were too ill to believe me. I should be delighted to see you even partially your old self. Do you not think we could talk steadily many months & not say all we should have to say even about things in the past? When will you bring about the opportunity? You see I could not write a letter this morning so I have taken a half sheet to make it doubly impossible. Please give our love to all four of those dear friends - you know who, appropriating all you can for yourself. Most heartily yours Abby Barker New Haven Feb 2nd 1880 Dearest Clara. Shall we ever see your face again? For months I have been meaning to write asking if you never are coming East any more, and begging if you should come, you would not pass us by on the other side. I cannot be reconciled to having the years go on so - hurrying us both to the certain end, and we see nothing of you. You must know that you are a household God in this family, but you are getting to be to the girls at least, almost as unreal as are the Gods of the Greeks. Have you noticed how well our Ct Gov advocated thethe Woman's Cause in his last message? By it we feel particularly encouraged to continue our hearings before the Legislature this year. I was thinking today how delighted - how absolutely happy I should be if I could get you to come and help us this year. Joseph will speak as he does every year, and Mr Hooker also, but we want some women, I cant think of any woman living I should prefer to your solid old self, for this work, and if it could happen that you were not unwilling to visit New England this Spring, and could come a little earlier than you otherwise would, - thus making us the longer visit and going with us to Hartford, I should have no further anxiety about our hearing. We expect and hope that Mrs Hooker will take no part in the work this year - will not even be in the State while the work is being done. If we had only got safely out of our great land struggle, we should make a great individual effort to have as many speakers from all parts of the Country as we could persuade the Com to listen to. Even then my first choice would be the friend I am now addressing. I do not know that you have ever taken part in this Legislative work, but if not then you are the one to be heard from as having in all probability a new presentation of an old case. Besides it is just the kind of work you are eminently fitted for. Of course I am ignoring any condition of ill health that you may be enduring. I hope with all my heart that you are not so suffering. I so much wish you could gratify me in this, and add new laurels to your well earned crown, that I shall perhaps say more than it is decent to say in the [*Answered Feby. 6. 1880 Abby Sheldon*] NEW HAVEN FEB [*5*] 4 10AM CONN. Miss Clara Barton Dansville Livingston County N. Y. way of urging my project. But I must trust you to understand me aright - as I think you know how to do. A few weeks visit with you here in our very humble home, would be a great joy to us all - can we ever have it? I know you will want to hear of my Parents whom you have seen. Both are still living - though my Fathers condition grows more & more pitiful all the time. He is still able to walk about the house with the help of a strong man, but it is two years since he has fed himself. Mother bears the over-whelming burdens put upon her in a way human understanding cannot comprehend. I am glad to say of ourselves that we keep on in good health and "in the even tenor of our ways." The girls are getting to be almost young ladies - a fact I am slow to admit. If this note finds you in Dansville, please give my love to my friends at the Cure - if in Washington - to our mutual friends the Holmes & Taylors. With great good love from us all for your own dear self. I am most truly as ever yours. Abby Barker New Haven Feb 11" 1880 How welcome was the sight once more of your good round hand writing on the letter rec'd Monday. Im so sorry you dont think you can come. You could find enough to say - no danger about that & I would rather have you stand before the Com - just your name & your solid old head on your shoulders, than all the women of now-a-days put together I cant bear to give you up. & you dont clearly say that you are not able to come. But that you must come here between now & July - and talk many important matters over with your brother & sister here, is to me a fixed fact. Life is too short to let the time go on so. I would take such care of you that it should do you good rather than harm. Think of it. Brother J- is very grateful for the nice compliments you give him. He wants to talk Political Economy with you & many other things. Do try & come in the spring if it is impossible now. ABS New Haven. May 5" Dear Friend. Are not you coming East this spring or early summer? You cant guess how much we want to see you. Now that the warm weather has come I should think you might venture out from your retreat - Dont you ever have any hankering to see Yankee land again - even in in spite of all her faults? I would not let any-thing be done to endanger your health & would take good care of you. We are all very well, and for a wonder all alone - we four - & expect to be all this month & next - a condition of things that seldom occurs & we want you to save us from it now. Love of all. A B S. [*Answered Jany 1881 . Abbey Sheldon*] US POSTAL CARD. WRITE THE ADDRESS ON THIS SIDE - THE MESSAGE ON THE OTHER NEW HAVEN [FEB?] [12?] 11AM Miss Clara Barton Dansville Livingston Co N. Y. [*Answered Jany 1881 Abby Sheldon*] US POSTAL CARD. WRITE THE ADDRESS ON THIS SIDE - THE MESSAGE ON THE OTHER NEW HAVEN MAY 6 [10AM?] CONN. Miss Clara Barton Dansville Livingston Co N. Y. New Haven. Jan 21st. [1881] Dearest Clara. I can in no wise tell the mingled surprise and joy I felt a bright sunny morning of the present week, when the Postman brought me your beautiful letter and photograph. I had wanted most desperately to hear from you, but I knew you would write me if you could without too great a cost of time and strength, and I did not want you to do it otherwise - so I held still my uneasy pen, that was disposed to pursue you with letters and postals until you had to reply in very self defense. And now comes this delightful letter - so full of the very things I wanted to know, and I have the satisfaction of thinking that I did not teare it out of you. You have replied with great care and most satisfactorily to all my questions save one - when are you coming east again. Now dear friend believe me when I say I want to see you more than any body else in my acquaintance. I fully appreciate that that is not a strong reason why you should hasten to New Haven - since you cannot spend your life running after the friends that would fancy seeing you, but it is a reason for my persistently trying to find out if possibly I shall not have an opportunity of meeting you again. You were a poor helpless sufferer when I saw you last - you wanted me to stay with you, and I was compelled to be hard and cruel to you whom I so much pitied and so much loved, and I have ever since longed intensely to see you and tell you all about it. Oh! there is no end of things I want to see you for, and want to talk over with you. We have never met in any quiet self poised way, unless it was in those first blessed days when [half] shivering with cold we used to talk around the register in the Seminary at Clinton. The tamed and unaspiring woman that is just now writing you - seems little enough like the ambitious and enthusiastic girl of those days, but this is what remains of her. I was very glad indeed to get such good news of Miss Kupfer. How I wish she was near us or we near her. Fanny is studying French and I go along a little with her, and I greatly wish we had dear Miss Kupfer for teacher and to talk with us. Please give her my love. Will not she want to come east for the long summer vacation. You see my head is full of projects for trying to get some body to help me along this rather hard journey of life. I was interested in all you wrote about your brother David. Dear soul! how fortunate for him to have had such a sister. The whole affair was so characteristic of you, that I have already read it several times to friends, as a good introduction to you. Of course you knew that Lottie Craddock was married and lived less than 40 miles from us. Did you know that the poor creature is so soon a widow? She married one of the kindest and most upright of men, and she had one year of real happiness with him. At the beginning of the second year he began to be ill, and though patient almost to a fault, there can be no happiness where there is anxiety about a member of the family. From month to month the anxiety deepened, and for four months he was a very sick man. He died the 2nd day of Jan - they were married the 29" day of Dec - two years before. Note: "Seminary at Clinton" may refer to White Seminary, a separate building for women students at the Clinton Liberal Institute of New York, where Clara studied writing and languages about 1851. With Joseph to fight for her, I hope she will have ten or twelve hundred dollars to herself, but the relatives of the first wife are perfect misers, and will try every way to save all for the son. And even if she does have this little sum of money, she must leave the home which her own hands have made pretty & attractive, and go out again to work for a living. I feel very sorry for her, and we do all we can to mitigate the circumstances. She came in day before yesterday to get some advice from Joseph and sympathy from me. She stayed all night, had a good bath and good sleep, and seemed greatly benefitted by all. Thanks too for copies of speeches. We heard of you by a lady from Dansville - heard you had taken the "stump" and we did rejoice. There was much to work for in the last campaign, and the result of the election was such as to make us truly glad. I hope henceforth you will keep speaking and talking and the lectures of the "Franco Prussian War", I am so interested in that I shall try to hear you give them here next fall or winter. And then You have the heart of all the fellows of the Grand Army, and can say to them what you will and when you will. Keep on dear sister, only be too wise to peril your health, and so bring yourself again to that awful agony which is inseparable from Nervous Prostration. How fast the old women workers are passing on. Lucretia Mott & Lydia Maria Child so lately gone. You and a half dozen more have a fair field and full ability to keep the most important matters in the public mind until they touch the public conscience. The greatest pleasure I have is in seeing you capable women doing your splendid work. I sometimes hope to live to see much of the work of today finished, but then if I do not I know that there is just as much pleasure in the doing as in the completed work. Monday Morning. Last evening "my Jo" and I sat by our bright open fire and read with great pleasure your speeches. Well done, good and faithful Sister, and may you long live to speak your good words. I had prudently laid the speeches away, saving them for the quiet of Sunday evening. The girls were at church - there was a partial suspense from the worry of business, and we had a cozy comfortable evening - talking much of you along with the reading. Note: Lucretia Mott (1793-1880), was an abolitionist who died November 11, 1880. Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880), also an abolitionist and activist for women's rights and Native American rights, was a journalist and novelist who died October 20, 1880.[*Answered by card it being an answer itself to another sent at New Years Jany 28, 1881 Abby Barker Sheldon*] [NEW HAVEN] Miss Clara Barton Dansville Livingston Co N. Y. The girls are both in school, and are in very good health. We have no longer any little folks - for which I am sometimes sorry, but not unfrequently I am glad. Joseph keeps very well - I wonder if you would discover the work of time upon him - I do not see it much. Real estate is looking a little since election, and he is hopeful of the Spring. He keeps all the time very busy with Law and land and rents, besides all his labor of love and the service he renders the City as one of the Alderman - this is his third year in that capacity. My Father and Mother go on as invalid and nurse. Seven years ago two quite prominent physicians gave it as their opinion that Father could live but a short time - a few months at most - perhaps but a few days! But that my delicate Mother should keep able to attend him day & night - is most wonderful. The news you give me of all the good old friends at Dansville The Cure, and of the young Mother at Oxford & the artist friend at Lyons - all gives me great satisfaction. As you see them, please give my love to all the Jacksons & Johnsons & Miss Austin. Dansville is I think the first place I shall visit if I ever do any more visiting. As it is now I give all the time I can spare to my parents - I was with them all summer - went up again for the holidays & shall probably go again before summer. With dearest love to you now & ever, Joseph & the daughters send love also. Abby Barker. [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven. Apr 13" / 1881 My Very Dear Clara. I have just rec'd a bundle of papers from Washington containing an account of your reception by the Grand Army - all exceedingly interesting and gratifying to me, as to all your many friends. But the one thought that takes possession of me tonight is how can I induce you to come here before you go back to Dansville. Dear Clara! dont be out of patience with me, but I want to see you infinitely more than words can tell. It has come to be such a passion with me, such a longing that I am trying day by day to think what I can do or say to bring it about. There are many matters I want to talk over with you, to say nothing of the hungry old love in my heart that hasbeen so long unappeased. And now that I find you have left your snug nest in Dansville, and got out once more into the wicked world, I am resolved to do every thing I can decent and indecent to get you here. Can you not? Will you not come? Surely, nothing could happen to make us all so glad as to see your face once more within our walls. I wish I knew what I could say that should fairly compel you to come. I know not that this naughty note will ever reach you, but if it does, beware of the awful consequences not only in this world, but the world to come, if you fail to put in an appearance. Indeed, I think I am growing desperate in my too long deferred wish for only a visit with your own dear self. Yours in distress Abby Barker. DANSVILLE JAN 26 12 M N . Y . Dansville N.Y. Oct 15th 1881 Dear M - M- says, in reference to the work on the report of D. Society, - "that the time is not lost" - Mr. Bunnell will not be back till this evening Secty Johnson has taken M-'s statement to make additions. and will give it to him this Evening [when] a conference will be held with him - tomorrow Mrs J.- thinks best to let Bunnell prepare it for final press work rather than that it be prepared by any one else here - It will be sent to you as soon as possible M- is canning grapes picked before you left - rained hard last night - warmer today - I am now reworking our written report to send to R.- of observations in Mich. -- Miss C.C. Mc.Nast from near Honnellsville called to see you today. She was in the war - was disappointed that you were away - Very truly J.B. Note: A. O. Bunnell was the editor of the local newspaper, the Advertiser, in Dansville, New York, where the first local chapter of the Red Cross was established on August 22, 1881, thus "D. Society" probably refers to the "Dansville Society" of the Red Cross. As an early supporter of Clara Barton and the Red Cross, Bunnell reported on all of Clara's activities regarding the Red Cross, and printed the first booklets and flyers about its purposes and its works.[*Ansd Oct 81*] US POSTAL CARD. WRITE THE ADDRESS ON THIS SIDE - THE MESSAGE ON THE OTHER [DANSVILLE?] [?] 10AM N.Y. Miss Clara Barton New Haven Connecticut Care Judge Joseph Sheldon [*Answered Nov. 14: 1881 - Judge Sheldon*] [*19*] NEW HAVEN NOV 12 11PM CONN. Miss Clara Barton - Dansville. Livingston Co. N.Y. [*19*] [*19*] New Haven Nov. 12 1881. Dear Clara; Yours about the Appendix and "Portico" came this after noon. I am a little at a loss what would be exactly pertinent and would fit the Place. But at a venture I have set down what may be of service to you possibly - You can fit it on to the Building. I am going to put it in the office without showing it to Abby - a course I greatly regret - but I am at the office and it rains & rains - The Methodists have during the drouth evidently beenDANSVILLE NOV 14 12 M been praying for rain - And as usual have a little over done the matter - I regret to send it from here for I cant get her (A's) fine ear's last touch on my rolling phraseology - We are all well and I am glad to know that - You are as well as could be expected under the circumstances - child almost born! You will of course send me a lock of its hair - for I shall be in anxiety to see how it looks - But I am a bit tired tonight - You will give my regards to all interested in the child - Yours truly J. Sheldon. It must have been a good touch to have had Dr Bellows name & others - js We append the approving words of Dr Woolsey Ex-President of Yale College, and the Leading Authority on International Law in the United States; of Prof. Wayland, Dean of the Faculty of the Yale Law School and President of The American Social Science Association; and of other gentlemen eminent as Lawyers and Doctors of Divinity recommending to the President of the United States the adoption by the government of The United states of the principles of the international Convention of Geneva - Note: There is a framed quotation from Clara Barton at Chapter No. 1 of the American Red Cross in Dansville, which was established on August 22, 1881: "It must never be forgotten that Dansville was the first child of the American Red Cross." Thus, "child almost born" and "give my regards to all interested in the child" refer to the Red Cross but, in the context of this letter, refer more probably to the anticipated United States Senate ratification of the Treaty of the Geneva Convention on March 16, 1882.[*Sheldon 33*] US POSTAL CARD. WRITE THE ADRESS IN THIS SIDE - THE MESSAGE ON THE OTHER NEW HAVEN MAY 29 10AM CONN. 82 WASHINGTON, D.C. MAY 30 4AM 1882 RECD. Miss Clara Barton 1326. I. St N.W. Washington D. C. [*33 Sheldon*] Geddes Aug 16 1882 Dear Clara; I did not get yours written to me at New Haven but have yours to Abby. I am deep in the yearly repairs and reforms about this place, being full of hedge thorns and occupied with drains and dilapidated gates and leaning fences and trees needing trimming. I had expected you would be here but Washington, Hannah and the Devil generally have taken your time, and carried you far away from your design - You ought not to let Saratoga go by - It will be the great advertizing card of the year and ought not to be neglected -New Haven. Sunday. Dearest Clara - I am very glad the Photos at last got to their destination & that they came when they were wanted. Very few things come at that time. I did give one to Mrs Richardson - one to Mother & one to Miss Leonard whom you met here. All these three were very appreciative of them. I had supposed there was 1 doz in the package but did not count them when first opened, & found only 11 when I came to give them away. Whether some one helped himself or herself to one or not I probably shall never know. Yes. I am getting better. I heard you were coming to Orange N.J. to organize a Red + society. If you come there why not come up here for a week & talk up if not begin the Saratoga matter. No! we did not see the Herald & it was too late to get it but we rejoice as if it was one of our own triumphs. If you can only hold on & live & keep well enough to work & direct work you will come out all right - just as I say to Joseph it is with us the worst enemy to us is the uncertainty of health. Most truly ABS Cant you - will you - wont you come - you will pardon my bold speech in this regard. Abby and Mama Barker the Commander in Chief (the Spirit & the Bride) say come and all who will [see?] after the manner of the revival preachers - They commission me to say that now is the accepted time; now is the day of Salvation - I must return to New Haven next Saturday week and should be glad to see you myself and to learn from yourself how Hannah and the "ladies" and their chief adviser of the cloven hoof get along obstructing the work of the Lord and his Saints of whom we are some. I am truly glad to hear so good news of your health - That is literally everything in your campaign it is victory triumph and joy in the Holy Ghost! Come on before it is yet night when no man (except some) can work I too am feeling pretty well; stronger than I was last fall. Abby is really better than she was last Spring & yet she is far from well Mrs Mann is here and a few days would not be ill spent here with the family as it is - Fanny is in New Haven & Lizzie is here I think it will be very well for Lottie to follow the bent of her inclination and try her Wisconsin scheme - There will (seem) come a time perhaps when she will prefer also to come East. It seems very strange for people to go West to Escape Malaria - Yours Joseph -[*203?*] New Haven Sept 12 1882. Dear Clara; Yours came while I was pretty deep in cases before me; pretty well occupied with my "Hannah" - Well I whipped out the old lady in most ample style after a most vigorous contest and I feel decidedly better. I did not find that your appearance was published this way - I saw nothing of the business - Please send me a copy of some paper that published the abstract or some part of the part abstracted. I have seen not one syllable that you were even there at all. [*Ansd "very large" Oct. 22. 1882 Joseph - Sheldon Sent Dorrs letters*] [*20 23?*] NEW HAVEN SEP 12 10AM CONN. Miss Clara Barton. Dansville. N. Y. Tell how the people of Rochester behaved on the Comm of Ways & Means affair, also of Prof H. and the Secretary of the State Mr Phillips - Saw John McCarthy of the Grand Army. He said if you came down here this fall he would arrange for a meeting and a greeting by the Grand Army here - We might arrange also for a State and local society of the Red Cross. Let us know when you can come and we shall be delighted to help the cause of the Lord - Indeed we are quite aware that your cause and that of the Lord have long been identical Keep me posted from time to time as to the facts and we will tip your "Hannah" into the sea blue anchors and all. I suppose Minnie has been and gone and got married Give her and all my regards Yours. Joseph DANSVILLE SEP 13 12 M N.Y. I have just come into the office in time to catch this letter before it got off - and to say that I had supposed I was a good deal better than I was last summer. And morever I want to say definitely that there will be room in our house for you when you come. There - I will not say more till I see you at the door. Yours truly Abby [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven Nov. 3. 1882. Friend Clara; Yours came duly I was glad to hear about all the facts in relation to the business and as to the matters personally important to you - I can "lend a hand" at almost any time - I have forgotten or never knew what ought to go in - in detail - Get all the matters together that you will need in this work and come down and I think we can make room in the house for all concerned and work out something that will help and use to advantage the money already appropriated - I weep over Hannah's[*Ansd Dec 16. 1882 33 Abby Shelden*] US POSTAL CARD. NOTHING BUT THE ADDRESS CAN BE PLACED IN THIS SIDE. NEW HAVEN DEC 12 4 PM CONN. 82 Miss Clara Barton Dansville Livingston Co N. Y DANSVILLE, N.Y. DEC 14 11 AM REC'D. Calamities. They are dreadful You must bring down some of those gracious tears - petrified in print! Abby is a little better than she was last Summer but she is not at all strong yet - I hope she will be in better health soon - Mrs Barker has a bad side that troubles her very much. But she is the same uncomplaining party that you have always known her to be - a rare and beautiful spirit I am pretty well and so are the children [..] Lizzie is doing well in School and Fanny is doing well out of School - Come when you can: we shall be glad to see you. Yours Truly Joseph - New Haven Dec 12" Yours of the 7" only came yesterday We have been looking for you every day or any day for long. & no one has been here to occupy your place. But now since you so thoughtfully ask the question, I will suggest that you come on or about Christmas day, and for these reasons. Mother & the girls are going on Christmas day to Salem for a week & Joseph will not be on the bench so we could have a quiet time to talk over many things & get the work begun - "well begun" you know "is half done". Up to that time we shall be rather busy getting them ready. & J- will be for these two weeks every day in Court. Still if it will be too long to put off the beginning - why come right on - I should not have mentioned any delay if you had not so plainly asked about it. All as usual - love as ever Abby Telegram Washington DC. [Feb?] 25 18[83?] Judge Joseph Sheldon New Haven . Connecticut Secretary Folger entirely willing to transmit. I will see State Department about exchange. Clara Barton Washingtion D.C. Feb 25 1883 Judge Sheldon [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] [.....................................?] Clara Barton [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven March 26 1883 Dear Clara; Yours with the clippings came duly I gave the matter to one of our papers and it will be soon be all over the city & I shall get the facts in regard to [Harrigan?] and will write something for you in response to the Resolutions of the Memphis Society - Abby is quite poorly - Her head is bad and her trouble is all upon her again - She is somewhat encouraged by a new plan of treatingas I got on the bench. That is one solace anyway - When are you coming this way? I got a letter in regard to you from Bunnell in Dansville - in reply to mine last fall - He invited me to come out there [&c?] Yours truly Joseph I return the clippings as requested - [No-?] Kindly I keep them till I send you my screed - the difficulty of lying in a moderately warm bath for a long time - It allays the inflammation & soothes the irritation and enables her to sleep - I am happy to say I have been invited to speak before one literary society since my return here, and now + the boys in the law school & all the College have invited me to address them on their return from their Easter vacation - about April 16 or 18th. on "Protection" - So I am not dead yet and I have certainly earned twice as much since I came off the bench Note: A. O. Bunnell was the editor of the local newspaper, the Advertiser, in Dansville, New York, where the first local chapter of the Red Cross was established on August 22, 1881. As an early supporter of Clara Barton and the Red Cross, Bunnell reported on all of Clara's activities regarding the Red Cross, and printed the first booklets and flyers about its purposes and its works.Thursday Midday We are all anxious to hear when you have nothing in the world to do! but write gossipy letters to your friends - When is the book coming out and who looks after that? The Red Cross is flourishing and the Blue Devils or Blue Something or other are supposed to be buried - "Hannah" in tears and her late comrade after her with tongues of sharpness afire. Fanny, first assistant, I grieve over - Our people are better A. rides out a good deal And the girls are in pretty good care - Mama will go to Geddes next week - Yours Truly J Sheldon [*33 Sheldon*] NEW HAVEN MAY 4 4 P.M. CON NEW HAVEN MAY 83 4 PM CONN. Miss Clara Barton. Superintendent of the Women's Prison. Sherborne. Mass.NEW YORK MAY 4 10PM 83 TRANSIT asked me for the moon to be hung up as a Chinese lantern for a special festival night, you know I could n't refuse her request, but how to manage the rest of it! I might be driven to declare I never saw any such thing as the moon and did n't know where it is - that the last I saw of it it was tied to the tail of a small dog and he was scampering down the street with it dangling after him! So on the whole I think I never hearn tell of you until Gen. Butler put you in jail - that since then you have been pretty safe I guess. I should like to see you though for all that. I should like to see Miss Larcom, but you must tell what a scrape I'm in about the paragraph and get me out New Haven May 25th 1883 Dear Clara: I have received a letter from Miss Lucy Larcom who seems to be just now an inmate of your institution, threatening your "life"! What can I do to rescue you from this peril I hardly know. It is alas now more than 30 years since I first heard of this culprit, and whether her lines have fallen in pleasant places since then [but I do] I can't say, but I do know that her pleasant lines have fallen in many places and have delighted many weary hearts and lightened the load of many a footsoresome how. Yours as of old, Joseph. Miss L said in her letter that I might write to you for her - . footsore pilgrim on the wastes of time. But she asks me for a paragraph about you. Now a Yankee is always equal to Vesuvius in its wildest moods or Niagara at its best with one word "Pro-digous"! But what can I do with you in a paragraph! The thing is preposterous. To put Jumbo into Tom Thumb's waistcoat pocket would be easy compared to that! But the mischief is to say to Miss Larcom "the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God" about it and not seem a bit rude or disobliging. If she had[*33 Sheldon*] US POSTAL CARD. NOTHING BUT THE ADDRESS CAN BE PLACED ON THIS SIDE. [GED]DES [JUL] 13 [1883] N. Y. Miss Clara Barton Womans Prison South Framingham Mass New Haven July 14 1883. Dear Clara; The Denver matter was transmitted personally and immediately to the head quarters of our friend McCarthy who replied he'd "go right off and arrange all that" - He will do it all satisfactorily I do not doubt. "Oh! How I'd like to go my self" said he. A. and L. went to Geddes about 2 July. leaving F. and "yours truly" to buffet the wild waves of the Summer heat in N.H. Abby was much better than when you saw her last. She looked as if she might yet get well. I have thought of Miss Larcoms letter that I answered to you. [*Ans Abbie Sheldon-*] Geddes. Onondaga Co. N.Y. July 12" When last I saw you, it was your intention to have a vacation this summer and go to Dansville and attend to matters there. If you do that you must pass through Syracuse, and could'nt you spare a little time to run up to Geddes and see us? You know Mother would be just as glad as possible to see you, & so would Lizzy and I. We three make all the family this summer & how quiet it is and how rested we are getting. We have been here just 10 days - left Fanny at home to keep house for her father I have'nt seen you or heard from you for so long I dont at all know what has happened - but often and often wonder what strange new experiences you are adding to the many old ones. Love and God bless you from us all. Abby. a good many times in doubt whether she would quite understand such a mad prank of a letter as that turned out to be before it got finished. If she had given some clue to what she was doing and so as to show how I could fit in a paragraph I would have been glad to do it but to grapple such a subject as you are, at arms end, and put you into a paragraph right out in space was more than a match for me - A paragraph on the Universe in three lines would be easy - You dont say how you like being in Jail and how long your sentence is for and whether there is any hope of a commutation of the sentence. And most of all whether there is any hope of saving the Institution & whether it ought to be saved. Above all, you did not write about that Vienna conference if there is to be any this year - And about the Red Cross & how it goes on. Of course I did not expect you'd "bile over" on any of them but a word - being to the wise would be sufficient. Give my great regards to your unhappy children and believe me as Ever Yours Truly J. Sheldon[*33*] Mr. & Mrs. Joseph Sheldon invite your presence at the marriage of their daughter Frances and James R. Bolton. Wednesday May fourteenth. at Four o'clock P.M. Church of the Messiah. New Haven, Ct. 1884 [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven July 22 1883. Dear Clara; Got home abt 1 30 last night - glad I came if nothing goes wrong there - if there does please inform if I can do something and I will come back as I said when I left - Return some letters sent two or 3 of which I have heard & seen nothing all well - Yours Joseph I return Key & some tickets I found in my pockets - [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven July 5 1884. Dear Clara; I have this day received yours and was greatly interested in it and in the letters enclosed - I am just able to get my tax matters and other affairs cleared up in time. I was so uneasy, for the affairs were such as needed all my time and strength and nothing else than your call could have got me away from them for a day - I am sorry enough I could not see how I could stay longer - even till Congress adjourns. I send you a copy of a letter The news from the river was particularly interesting and pleasant to me. Abby is well and more cheery than she has been for months if not years - Give my regards to the Doctor and believe me Most Cordially as Ever Joseph. I have just written to one Senator Platt. He will say a good word for me I have no doubt unless it is already too late to say anything. If it is, it can go into the waste basket with a good many "illustrious predecessors". I should have been glad of all things to have been present at those meetings of the Society at which Philadelphia and St Louis were discussed - I really wish I were a member of that National Society and I could then speak by authority for you and not as their scribes If it comes right; please propose me and have me elected and I will pay whatever I ought - I will pay - attention at any rate. [*20 G Conv 84*] New Haven July 15 1884. Friend Clara; Yours came announcing that the Special appropriation to the Sunday Civil bill had failed at the last. For this I am exceedingly sorry but I do not see how we could have done more. The State Department has a contingent out of which the expenses of delegates to just such meetings as this can be paid if the Secretary of State and the President should choose that I can do shall and will be done to forward your views - Yours truly Joseph. I am unwilling to be a burden to anyone and particularly could not be a burden to you. to use it in this way - I dont know whether my presence there would help or hinder those gentlemen in coming to a determination to so use a part of said fund. I might [have] be able to go there for a few days after this week if it were at all worth while or it would seem to be so - I should be glad to do any thing I can but I am in such a pecuniary straight jacket that I am not master of myself. One thing gratifies me that land seems to be a little more in demand than before - If I can sell that I too shall be free. You know that all Association guarantees any deficiency in the appropriation - that it will be more satisfactory to all concerned if [the] a third delegate be also authenticated [by] and appointed by the Government itself - Say what you like of my special qualifications - This could not well be refused if you both suggest it - or you alone should urge it now. This would make the matter of some higher use to me Now if there is any reason why you do not want to do this of course never mind - It is only a reiteration to them of your former statement - after the association has acted - The appropriation may (see 2d page) I write this hastily that you may act promptly if you think good to act at all - J.S. [*20 Gen Conv 84*] New Haven July 18 1884. Dear Clara; Yours of yesterday has duly come - Although the most peaceful of men I cheerfully accept the position of "A Man of War" if such a craft is needed to sail with you the seas. As to the position to which the National Association has so unanimously appointed me - as a delegate to Geneva - I have to say that I cordially thank the Association individually and collectively for(4th page) be as you say nearly enough to defray the expenses of reasonable persons; if the appropriation is not sufficient I had rather pay my own expenses and be appointed and authenticated by the Government than to have my expenses paid and seem to the public as a sort of fifth wheel to the coach so far as the real business is concerned - As I said if there is any reason why you dont wish to ask this let it all go but I thought it would be all right to let you know just how I feel about it. Give my regards to the Dr and believe me Yours truly Joseph - (2d) the compliment and you as the originator of the suggestion - Now [this] it will be ever so much more valuable to me if this in addition can now be done; Why cant it be done? That you and Solomons together go to the State Department and ask that in as much as three Delegates are usual in such cases - (Three were appointed in each of the monetary commissions - three [to] in the San Domingo affair that a delegate suggested by the unanimous choice and election of the National Association be likewise authenticated by appointment by the Government - that it will cost the government nothing - that the Association yourself might make a fortune on the lecture platform. Nothing could be more easy if you had the health and you felt it would be worth your while. I cant do it. You are you and I am I. I can deliver the lecture I cant draw the people - It is a matter for real sorrow that some how I am so often defeated by a hair's breadth "It is not as deep as a well or as wide as a barn door but it is enough"! I am a bit blue to-day and have no way to cheer up anyone even a sick and worn out Campaigner. Yours J. Sheldon [*20 Gen. Conv*] New Haven July 23 1884 Dear Clara; I suppose you are in Dansville and I shall send this to you there - Yours of Sunday last came duly. I was sorry to learn that you continue ill and so much so that you may not be able to go to Geneva at all. I shall be doubly sorry for that. It would be just splendid for you to go back authenticated by the Government of the Great Republic as its Representative to that meeting - It would have been a great honor "Mum is the word" Note: From Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, scene 1, fatally injured Mercutio says to his friend, Romeo: "No, 'tis not so deep as a well nor so wide as a church-door, but 'tis enough...."for me to be an assistant Representative there and I should have been willing to give some time and work to making our part in that meeting memorable. But I have concluded not to try to go at all for two reasons. 1. It is a little distasteful to me [to me] to go in a subordinate and not in an equal capacity with the other delegates. 2. I know that my creditors would certainly think me trifling with them if I should seem to go off on a private "toot" of my own; They might tolerate my going off for a couple of months under a public and honorable appointment by, and presumably in [the] pay of, the Government - But this would seem to be a matter I ought not to afford to do. Whether I pay or not my own expenses it would be believed by my creditors [to be] that they were contributing [by] them in fact. I hope to make some progress if I stay home; It will not be a matter for wise remark and censure if I do stay at my port here - Any thing I can do here to help I shall be most happy to do. I have thought over the scheme of the lecture and I really cannot see my way through the business - I can readily see that you [*20 Gen Conv 84*] New Haven August 7th 1884 Dear Clara; The managing Clerk announced to me to day the decision that my note must be paid I have promptly moved in the matter and must see the end before I can say any thing more. Their atty told me a different story last week. I cannot afford to be in such hands - I was sorry and ashamed not to know any thing of the excursions which made the street cars so full and uncomfortable to- day - I ought to have sent for a carriage but I knew nothing of the stampede till we were in the midst of it all - It has rained pitilessly all day here - I hope it has been better in New York. I really dont see my way to leave as yet - Dont bother the State Department on such an uncertainty as I am. Yours Cordially Joseph -[*293 ------ 935P*] Form No. 1. THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY. This Company TRANSMITS and DELIVERS messages only on conditions limiting its liability, which have been assented to by the sender of the following message. Errors can be guarded against only by repeating a message back to the sending station for comparison, and the company will not hold itself liable for errors or delays in transmission or delivery of Unrepeated Messages, beyond the amount of tolls paid thereon, nor in any case where the claim is not presented in writing within sixty days after sending the message. This is an UNREPEATED MESSAGE, and is delivered by request of the sender, under the conditions named above. THOS. T. ECKERT, General Manager. NORVIN GREEN, President. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ NUMBER SENT BY REC'D BY CHECK 511 [..?] s fs 15 Paid _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Received at ________________ 9 30 ________ Augt 2 ________1884. Dated _________ New Haven Conn 2 _______________________________ [*20 Gen Conv 84*] To _____________ Clara Barton ______________________________________ _____________ Wash ______________________________________________ _________ Got your dispatch am working _________________________ _________ hard hope to be ready _________________________________ _________ Saturday but cant yet tell ______________________________ _________________ Joseph _________________________________________ [*20 Geneva Conv '84*] [*Sheldon*] New Haven Aug 13 1884. Dear Clara; Your dispatch came last Evening. I do not know how properly to express the thanks due from me to the President and Secretary of State for the appointment which your despatch informs me I shall receive or have had sent to me. It has not yet come. I can well understand your part in it all - & for that I have no words - I have so far presumed upon the fact that I may reckon upon having for expenses my "widder's thirds" of the $2000 appropriation if I go as to make calculations to take Lizzie along with me and pay her additionaladditional expense out of my own pocket of course if I shall need to spend for myself or for her more than the $666.66 - She is eager to go & I want to have her go - She is bright - Your offer to help me if you could is very gratefully received but I could not on any consideration borrow money from you. The fear that something might happen to me that would add to your work or worry on my acct would be insupportable - I think I am getting out of my old wits some. I have not yet (4. P.M.) got my money matters straightened out - but I am pretty faithfully promised that they will be tomorrow I am trying to get ready and now believe that I shall be on hand at 1 PM [Sat] Saturday - The City of Chester starts at 1. P.M. Saturday - It would be good to know when I shall be able to meet you Saturday forenoon - Yours Joseph -[*20 Gen Conv 84*] New Haven August 14 1884 Dear Clara; The announcement of the appointment acted as I thought it would. It help me immensely in some ways. The newspapers made some ado over it - The Document for me has not arrived - I wish you would bring it - if it is not being sent - I shall be on hand Saturday in New York - The Cash out of the Treasury I do not know when we are expected to draw - Please notify me by telegraphtelegraph where I can meet you in New York - My affairs are turning round I guess so I can get away without great friction - Lizzie I expect to have with me - I shall depend on the money appropriated for my expenses - I send a plan of the "City of Chester" - The agent here says that at this time of year and in this year of cholera scare there will be no lack of good rooms. I am in doubt whether to select rooms till I see you - On the whole I will not - Yours truly Joseph - INMAN LINE ESTABLISHED 1850 UNITED STATES & ROYAL MAIL STEAMERS. ----------------------------------- TONS. TONS. CITY OF CHICAGO, 6,000 CITY OF CHESTER, 4,770 CITY OF BERLIN, 5,491 CITY OF MONTREAL, 4,495 CITY OF RICHMOND, 4,780 CITY OF PARIS, 3,085 Sailing from Pier 36, (New Number) North River. ---------------- PROPOSED SAILINGS From NEW YORK. STEAMERS. From LIVERPOOL. Saturday, Mar. 22 1 p m. CITY OF CHESTER Thursday, Mar. 6 Saturday, Mar. 29 3 p m. CITY OF CHICAGO Thursday, Mar. 13 Thursday, April 3 11 a.m. CITY OF RICHMOND Tuesday, Mar. 18 Saturday, April 12 3 p.m. CITY OF BERLIN Thursday, Mar. 27 Thursday, April 17 9.30 a.m. CITY OF MONTREAL Tuesday, April 1 Saturday, April 26 3 p.m. CITY OF CHESTER Thursday, April 10 Thursday, May 1 9.30 a.m. CITY OF CHICAGO Tuesday, April 15 Thursday, May 8 3 p.m. CITY OF RICHMOND Tuesday, April 22 Saturday, May 17 10 a.m. CITY OF BERLIN Thursday, May 1 Thursday, May 22 2 p.m. CITY OF MONTREAL Tuesday, May 6 Saturday, May 31 10 a.m. CITY OF CHICAGO Thursday, May 15 Saturday, June 7 3 p.m. CITY OF CHESTER Thursday, May 22 Thursday, June 12 4 p.m. CITY OF RICHMOND Tuesday, May 27 Saturday, June 21 3 p.m. CITY OF BERLIN Thursday, June 5 Thursday, June 26 7 a.m. CITY OF MONTREAL Tuesday, June 10 Saturday, July 5 2 p.m. CITY OF CHICAGO Thursday, June 19 Thursday, July 10 3 p.m. CITY OF CHESTER Tuesday, June 24 Thursday, July 17 Noon. CITY OF RICHMOND Tuesday, July 1 Saturday, July 26 4 p.m. CITY OF BERLIN Thursday, July 10 Thursday, July 31 11.30 a.m. CITY OF MONTREAL Tuesday, July 15 EDWARD DOWNES, Agent, 309 Chapel Street. NEW HAVEN, CONN. March, 1884. PLAN OF CITY OF CHICAGO. OPENING DRAWING UPPER DECK. OVER LIGHT TO SALOON ROOM 120 feet from Stern. Fore. PLAN OF CITY OF BERLIN. PLAN OF CITY OF RICHMOND. 90 feet from Stern PLAN OF CITY OF CHESTER. 90 feet from Stern PLAN OF CITY OF MONTREAL. SAIL FORE ROOM Odd Numbers are Upper Berths. RATES OF PASSAGE - $80 and $100, according to accommodation, all having equal saloon privileges. Children between two and twelve years of age, half fare. Servants, $50. ROUND TRIP TICKETS - $144 and $180. TICKETS TO LONDON, $7, and to PARIS $15 and $20 additional, according to the route selected. THE STEAMERS of this Line, built in watertight compartments, are among the strongest, largest and fastest on the Atlantic. THE SALOONS are luxuriously furnished, having revolving chairs, are especially well lighted and ventilated, and take up the whole width of the ship. THE PRINCIPAL STATEROOMS are amidships, forward of the engines, where least noise and motion is felt, and all replete with every comfort, having double berths, electric bells, and all the latest improvements. THE BRUNSWICK PATENT SELF-LEVELING BERTHS are in use on these Steamers. LADIES' CABINS and bath rooms, Gentlemen's smoking and bath rooms, Barbers' shops, pianos, libraries, &c., provided. MEALS SERVED a la carte. THESE STEAMERS DO NOT CARRY HORSES, CATTLE, SHEEP OR PIGS. __________________________ AMERICAN OFFICES. INMAN S.S. CO., Limited, 31 & 33 Broadway, - - New York. GEO. A. FAULK, - - 105 South Fourth Street. - - Philadelphia. L. H. PALMER, - - 3 Old State House, - - Boston. F. C. BROWN, - - - 32 South Clark Street, - - Chicago. J. J. McCORMICK, - - Cor. 4th & Smithfield Streets, Pittsburg. EUROPEAN AGENCIES. R. H. GRAEFE, - - 9 Rue Scribe, - - - Paris. ZIMMERMAN FRERES - 57 Rue de la Bourse - Havre. E. M. DADELSZEN, - 22 Rue Boudet, - - Bordeaux. W. RAYDT & CO., - - Place Ste, Walburge, 9 - Antwerp. FISCHER & BEHMER, Schüsselkorb, 8. - Bremen. FALCK & O., - - 38 Admiralitats Strasse, - Hamburg. C. J. GILDEMEESTER, Boompjes 10, - - Rotterdam. BRASCH & ROTHENSTEIN, Friedrichstrasse 78, - Berlin, W. ROBERT THODE & CO., U. S. Bankers, - - Dresden. W. E. ABBOTT, - 74 Boulevard du Nord, Brussels. J H SMITH, - - Hotel des Etrangers, - Naples. D. G. PAINE, - 20 Avenue de la Gare - Nice. C W REDFERN, - - 30 Piazza di Spagna, - - Rome. MAQUAY, HOOKER & CO., 20 Piazza di Spagna, - Rome. MAQUAY, HOOKER & CO., 5 Via Tournabuoni, - Florence. JOHN ODELL - - Kopmangatan, 23, - - Gothenburg. JOACHIM PRAHL, - - - Copenhagen. EIVES & ALLEN - - 99 Canon Street, - - London, E. C. A. W. WILSON, - - 38 Fountain Street, - - Manchester. R. JOHNSTON, - - 16 Hall Ings, - - Bradford. A. MALCOLM, - 40 St. Enoch Square. Glasgow. ALEXANDER SHANKS, 1 Albert Square, Donegal Quay, Belfast. C. & W. D. SEYMOUR & CO., - - - - Queenstown. INMAN S. S. CO., Limited, 22 Water Street, - - Liverpool. FROM WHOM TICKETS CAN BE PURCHASED AND EVERY INFORMATION OBTAINED. CLARA BARTON GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE Sheldon, Joseph & Abby Sept. 1884 - Feb 1904Paris - Sunday - Sept 14- 1884 Dear Clara; Most luckily I was with Dr Chapman when your postal arrived - Now I have not an exact copy of what I wrote but your thoughtfulness in sending me one and of the [..?] as well as the other will enable me I think [I] [can] to recall it sufficiently to fill the space - If this should repeat here what had been said other [...?] you can strike out what ought not to be repeated or send the whole matter if it is worth while (and I cant see that it is), to me care of Maison Durand - corner Rue Royale & Boulevard de Capucines - I shall be here for three days more certain - I will fit it together [....?]We have taken passage home by the Inman Line Steamer City of Chicago sailing Oct 2 from Liverpool - We shall go on board at Queenstown Oct 3d - It is a good boat and will probably get us home by the 13th or 14th October - I wish we could have gone together - Your need to call on the Grand Duchess and the Queen and my needing to see to my money matters at home made it impossible for us to go home together - Now the work on the new book will be a [.... ....?] and we must set about it [each?] - You ought to come up to New Haven and we will make it safe & sure - Oh the dear good little woman whom you have with you, our Antoinette, what loving good [....?] and can I say fits for her good heart - If Mr Hepke is still there - give him my most cordial regards - I wish he could see across the Atlantic - and that we had a telephone to talk across it - We have been in the Country Sat - eve - & Sunday with Dr Chapman - Lizzie was [in] greatly satisfied - It was a county seat of a Marquis formerly occupied by the Prince de Joinville - We stopped at Fontainbleau and made a good visit there. We shall leave about Thursday for London - Stop there at [the St. Avenel?] Hotel [H....?]up early to New Haven and we will take "the report" for Congress severely in hand I cannot do it - my part of it - any where but at home - Give my love to Antoinette and my best Regards to Mr Hepke - How much I enjoyed the long talks with him. Yours Joseph - Edward's Hotel London Sept 20 1884 Dear Clara; Yours came duly stating that what I sent would fill the gap in the speech. I cannot at all understand why I could have made so serious a blunder - I was conscious that Antoinette was doing very much work, I did not see quite "the" nice way to pay her - If you will find out and do the handsome thing I willIt has been such a [prank?] & a godsend for her; it has been very pleasant to me and I have no doubt I shall find every thing has gone on pretty well in my absence - When you get back across the stormy waters you must come make it all right, in the meeting in America which I hope may not be too far off - Lizzie is not very well but she turns with evident and unfeigned reluctance towards home - If she had been willing I should have gone some what sooner but considering the whole [....?] [...?] as well as I can, I have delayed my return - [*R Sept 16 - Geneva (Sheldon) " 17 = at London Geneve missing article - a page*] [PA]RIS [...?] SEPT. 84 DE LA [NA.....LAINE?] Miss Clara Barton Hotel de la Poste Genevé Suisse, [*33 Sheldon*] At Home in the Kitchen Sunday Nov 6" [1884?] Dearest Clara Here I am sitting at the very table where you and I sat two weeks ago this very hour - finishing off there our sewing jobs with our fingers and our dear little visit in our talk. I am alone in the house - you can imagine how it all is - all at church but me - the dinner slowly cooking on the stove and I with my writing at the table by the window. It is a very bright and charming day - all the pleasanter because of a week of rain we have just passed through. I had a special invitation from the Chief of the Bible Class to attend its services today and listen to if not help to discuss the question which is as usual the Pastors morning subject - "Who owns the world". If you were here now as you were Please give my love to Miss Kupfer. I hope yet to see her here. Every day & every hour I am thankful for your visit - so much secured. Yours more truly Abby Note: This letter from Abby Sheldon to Clara Barton must be dated November 6, 1881, a Sunday. At the top of the letter, Abby asks Clara to give her love to Miss Kupfer. Minna Kupfer married Abram Golay on September 11, 1882, and after their marriage, they lived in Chicago. Until her marriage, Minna lived in Clara's household in Dansville, New York, and taught French and German at the Seminary in Dansville. Abram Golay, a widower, also lived in Clara's household in Dansville before his marriage to Minna Kupfer. Note: "At Home in the Kitchen" is Abby's humorous reference to the name of the sanitarium in Dansville, New York, "Our Home on the Hillside," administered by a Dr. Jackson and his family, where Clara spent several years recovering from "nervous prostration" after her return from Europe in the fall of 1873 to about 1877. Clara also purchased a home in Dansville in 1876, and maintained a residence in Dansville until March of 1886.AMBULANT 15. IX. 84. 51 No 2 GENEVE 16IX84 that other Sunday, and we had no more to hurry us than I now have. we would slip down there all unannounced and see what is going on - as it is I shall write this letter, and you I doubt not will also write something for some body. I think of you as in your own home now, and I know it must seem very good to you to be there again. Home is the best place in the world, but it makes it better to leave it occasionally, and it makes us better related to it to have left it. We keep wondering and wishing to know how the "Red Cross" was received by Pres Arthur, and what Hannah is doing this fall, and how the "Blue Anchor" people act, and if Miss Willard was able to scatter any fleas in the direction of their cars &c &c. You see we want already to know ten times more than it is fit any one should take time to write, so it is even so soon getting to be necessary that you come here again, which I hope you will really be able to do. How did the bonnet and dress garments seem when you came to wear them at the Capitol? I see the reporter called your pretty bright wing a "red flower". As I indorsed the bonnet, I want to know what other friends think of it - whether or not it is the proper thing for you. Since you went away I have made for Lizzy a pretty dark plaid school- dress - made Princess fashion, so trimmed as to look like a trimmed skirt and basque. She look very much better in it than she did in either of the dresses she wore when you saw her. Her lessons seem easier of late and she not over tired. Last Monday morning when the Principal of the School came in to read the ranks he read her name three times - Lizzy Sheldon 1st rank in Monthly examination - Lizzy Sheldon 1s rank in [weekly examination] the lessons of the past week, and Lizzy Sheldon 1st on the Roll of Honor.[*33 Shelden*] She told me of it when she came home at noon, and simply added "it sounded good when he read it" and passed on up stairs. Fanny too is feeling in much better health and said the past week she was getting hold of German enough now to begin to enjoy it - Lottie came in from Birmingham just a week after you went away. She seemed some what better & claimed that the last week there she had felt a good deal better. But Mrs Blanchard had written urging her to come right away to Concord, before cold weather set in - so she went on Wednesday last only staying here two nights. She did not know when she should return. I am glad fine weather has come on again for her sake. Our nephew so much looked for, will not come before the middle of this month. Joseph has not sent you the paper because Judge Wayland has been out of town on account of sickness and death of some relative. He expects to be able to send it with this letter. Thanks for the three Postals which kept us informed of your whereabouts. Certainly - Print it if you like - Good Luck to the pamphlet [sto yours?] - J. Monday Morning. Your Postal from Dansville rec'd - very glad of such cheerful news of your journey & of your safe return home. A thousand times glad for your championing my cause at the Cure. I am willing to trust all that to you now. Since you went from here, a package of photographs has even received - Shall we send them to Dansville now we know you are there, or did you want them hereabouts & so wish us to keep them safely till you come in January. More & more love from all AB [*33 Sheldon*] Geddes Nov 19" [1884?] Dear Clara, I am spending a few days at my Fathers, and we see by the paper you are to speak in Syracuse the 26" of this month - or one week from today. My Parents not less than I want to see you at that time if we can. Besides you know you long ago promised to come here if ever you spoke in our City. Now I want to propose if you can you give us a visit either before or after the evening of the lecture as is most to your mind or convenience. Weather permitting we shall be at the Hull - as many of us as can leave the children, and will bring you up there if that suits you. We live two miles from the City, in the village of Geddes, and my Fathers name is Elbridge Barker. The horse cars run from this place Note: This letter is probably dated November 19, 1881. The third local chapter of the Red Cross was established in Syracuse, New York, October 11, 1881, the first chapter being established in Dansville, August 22, 1881, and the second chapter at Rochester, October 3, 1881. Thus, Clara was probably giving a lecture to the newly formed Red Cross chapter in Syracuse on November 26, 1881. every twenty minutes, stopping quite near the Central RailRoad Depot. I know there is not now time for us to hear from you and make any arrangements - very likely you will not even get this - but I hope if not by a plan, why then by some blunder I shall see you long enough to learn somewhat of yourself during the past summer - of which I must say you have been quite too silent. Father & Mother desire to be remembered to you. Most truly yours Abby Sheldon. Abby Sheldon Met her at Syracuse [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven Nov. 22 1884 Dear Clara; I received your postal and although it clearly said you would start Nov. 11. yet as that was Tuesday I thought there must be some mistake as one boat started on Thursday - and I thought yours must have started the same day of the week. I see just this minute by the Tribune that the City of Chester got in yesterday and you probably landed before night. I really wish you were to come up here as early as possible - indeed right away - Note: Clara Barton's note on the verso of Abby's letter of November 19 [1881] - "Abby Sheldon / Met her at Syracuse" - probably refers to their meeting in Syracuse for Clara's lecture there November 26, 1881, not long after a Syracuse chapter for the Red Cross was established on October 11, 1881. Syracuse was the third local chapter of the Red Cross to be established, the first being in Dansville, New York, on August 22, 1881; the second being in Rochester, New York, on October 3, 1881. I should be glad to see and talk over a plan of campaign for the next year for the spread of the Societies of The Red Cross. Just here before I forget it Lizzie got her things you sent all right and was very much pleased and full of thanks, but we were so full of all kinds of work that I suspect the girl forgot to write in reply - I hope you will write & let us know whether you can come up and if so whether you propose to come to make up our report - I would have come down to meet you in New York if I knew where to meet you; I could not learn beforehand when to expect the Steamer - I am glad you are safe ashore and we will now look about us - Doctor will tell you of my ill success at the Redpath Bureau; I have some hope in another direction. I rather suspect that if the Eastern Bureaux do not arrange - possibly the western ones might do so - Oh! how splendid a success you could achieve - right off - my luck in speaking in the campaign was really very good - I can do it if I can get my audiences - Give my regards to the Note: The Redpath Bureau, originally named the Boston Lyceum Bureau, was established in 1868 by James Redpath (1833-1891), a journalist and antislavery activist. It was a professional agency that represented writers and important figures such as Mark Twain, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Charles Sumner, Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass and arranged for them to speak on a lecture circuit all over the country.Doctor and all other in authority - Fanny has moved into her new house and we are more [full of] able to give you a fair chance than when you were here before - Abby and Lizzie and all send regards Welcome home! Yours J Sheldon [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven Nov. 29 1884 My Dear Clara; I have got Mr Hitz' letter written for you and am very sorry to hear of your ill health - more sorry than surprised at the fact - I was in hopes you could come up here for a bit of rest and talk of the Report and of a good many other things. I have had a great wish to see you early after your arrival and should have come down to meet you in New York if I had known when you would be there - I very deeply wish I was so far free that I could leave this load that bears me down so that I cannot do the work I want to do. Another Lyceum Bureau other than Redpaths speaks to me words more en- couraging than Redpath That Bureau put a stone on my head; this puts a stone beneath my feet; I may get some furtherance from this latter but I do not know. We should now be able to get you better rooms than when you were here before; at least we should have Fanny out and in her own house. Abby will go to see her mother early this next month perhaps [by the 10?] and I hoped you could come here before she left - Give my kindest regards to Doctor and believe me Yours Very Cordially J Sheldon -[*Dec 1/84 - Judge Joseph Sheldon No Reply required -*] NEW HAVEN NOV 29 11 M 84 CONN. Miss Clara Barton President American Association Red Cross Washington, D. C. CARRIER NOV 30 6PM 5 WASHINGTON REC'D NOV 30 12 M 1884 1 To Judge Joseph Sheldon, New Haven, Conn. Copy. Washington, D. C.. Feb. 7, 1885. Dear Joseph, I have your letter of yesterday, and appreciate the situation but could do no better. This administration is near its close, crowded and hurried. We three persons had, six months ago, accepted a government appointment from the President, and a public appropriation of money by Congress to go and do something, and none of us had admitted to either the expiring administration, closing Congress, or retiring Executive, that we had ever been, or ever come back, that we had done anything, or that any Convention had been held, but the appropriation stood charged to us all the same. In the crush of work that came to me, I had all along hoped to hear something from one or both of my associate delegates in regard to this; they having been the elected actors and speakers at the Convention would feel it to be their right. Nothing coming, on my return from New Orleans, where I had [been] to go almost as soon as I was home from Europe, on account of the exhibits to be sent in response to our invitations, I felt that I must set myself at least a little right on the record, especially as I had to acknowledge the monies used. I thought it only decent to do this, - and so hastily ddrew from the October Bulletin the bare official facts of the meeting of the Convention, the subjects discussed, a little account of Dr. Post, and asked Genl. Mussey, (our Councellor) to look it over and hand it to the State Department. Calling to bid good bye to President Arthur I told him I had arranged such a paper! He expressed a desire to have it. The State Department sent it to him, and when I found that he was so well pleased with it as to have sent it to Congress, and it had been presented in the Senate and ordered to be printed, I thought it a pity if it were really to come out with some credit- that my good brothers, Judge and Solomons, should not share it, so I sent dispatches almost at midnight to see if they could do it, and begged the stay of proceedings in the Senate till I could get word. I knew the pressure of time made the invitation irregular, and that it was not in accord with strict business methods but there was no more time to be had, and a document sent in by the President could not be withdrawn from the Senate to be sent away for signatures. It was indeed an irregularity based on personal favor, that the Senate would permit the addition of signatures to a document after it had passed their body. My earnest desire to exercise a friendly consideration, and do a sisterly act toward my brother delegates, led me to presume too far upon their confidence. I might have seen this in daylight, but I had only a few minutes of the darkness of night to act in, and failed to discern properly. I hope you will take it as it was meant, and for what it was worth, which was indeed very little. You will be glad to feel that there is neither "need" nor "emergency" in the case, and has not been at any time. The Report proper you well understand cannot be made until after the International is made up which may be several months. .... .. Yours, Clara Barton, Pres.US POSTAL CARD. WRITE THE ADDRESS ON THIS SIDE - THE MESSAGE ON THE OTHER Mrs. Abby Barker Shelden Care Joseph Shelden Esq New Haven Connecticut New Haven January 20 1887. My Dear Clara; I rather expected to be in Washington this week on the Silver question. The meeting of last Winter adjourned to meet Wednesday of this week. I wrote to sundry members of the Committee about the meeting and could hear of nothing likely to be done and so I did not go. I expected then to see you & talk over the meeting of this year at Carlsruhe; and also about the work of getting an appropriation. The representation of your Dansville. Jany. 28-1881 - My dearest Abby - I need not say how welcome, and appreciated was your letter. I felt that I knew all about you all, after I had read it - Delivered the messages at Brightside all delighted to hear, and hope to see you. I breakfast there every Thursday morning 1/4 8 - by special standing invitation; yesterday morning I had to break my path in the snow, but I went - It is our coldest time of all the winter I was out to a little literary party last evening and it seemed cold enough to overcome one, still our climate is milder than others I suspect - I am very very sorry for poor Lottie. Will you tell her so? And how often I shall think of her with love & sympathy - she is so capable she will always find a good home, and be appreciated, still how hard to have to leave her own - These second marriages call for wise & firm pecuniary arrangements before hand I am so glad she has Joseph to fight for her. - I hope real estate will rise to the moon, and Joseph go up on it & take a look at that other [man?] there - I am glad you enjoy stump speeches, they are so refined - Your loving sister - C.B. I have always thoroughly understood that this is Your Great Enterprize that must not be spoiled or dimmed in its lustre and that must be made to appear just what it is - as the noblest American work of intelligent [and] organized Charity. I am very proud of it as a Citizen of the Country and glad and proud to have helped it in even the small measure that has been possible for me. My pecuniary affairs are in somewhat better condition than they have been for some time past; if I could arrange with Mr D. and make myself useful to you and "the cause" I could arrange more easily to settle that deficit in my account with Uncle Sam that has not yet been settled so far as I am concerned - and do a congenial and gratifying work that I think I can do well work made in 1884 was very condensed and put the matter in such shape as to make all hands want to hear more; and us, in such shape that we could set forth the work done in the United States to people eager to hear details - We know the way to get a hearing now. I should like to tell the Story, but I stand just where I have always done anxious only to do what will be most pleasant and serviceable to you. Mr Ducker of Brooklyn has been speaking to me about representing his matter to the governments of Europe and I should like to do it for him if we can agree upon terms which I think there would be no doubt about. Note: "Brightside" is the name of the home of the family of Dr. James Caleb Jackson (1811-1895), proprietor of the sanitarium, "Our Home on the Hillside," in Dansville. Note: Lottie [Craddock] worked in the household of Abby and Joseph Sheldon. She is mentioned in this letter from Abby Sheldon to Clara, Tuesday, January 22, 1878, p 72, when Abby extended her usual invitation to Clara to visit them: "Lottie wants to see you awfully, and says tell you there are so many here that would be glad to wait on you, that 'you could ring the bell as often as you liked.'" Lottie is also mentioned in a letter of January 21, 1881, Abby Sheldon to Clara, pp 76-78: "Of course you knew that Lottie Craddock was married and lived less than 40 miles from us. Did you know that the poor creature is so soon a widow? She married one of the kindest and most upright of men, and she had one year of real happiness with him. At the beginning of the second year he began to be ill, and though patient almost to a fault, there can be no happiness where there is anxiety about a member of the family. From month to month the anxiety deepened, and for four months he was a very sick man. He died the 2nd day of Jan - they were married the 29" day of Dec - two years before. With Joseph to fight for her, I hope she will have ten or twelve hundred dollars to herself, but the relatives of the first wife are perfect misers, and will try every way to save all for the son. And even if she does have this little sum of money, she must leave the home which her own hands have made pretty & attractive, and go out again to work for a living. I feel very sorry for her, and we do all we can to mitigate the circumstances. She came in day before yesterday to get some advice from Joseph and sympathy from me. She stayed all night, had a good bath and good sleep, and seemed greatly benefitted by all." Abby added a note to this January 21, 1881 letter, regarding the reading of Clara's speeches she had sent to them: "Monday Morning [January 24, 1881]. "Last evening 'my Jo' and I sat by our bright open fire and read with great pleasure your speeches. Well done, good and faithful Sister, and may you long live to speak your good words. I had prudently laid the speeches away, saving them for the quiet of Sunday evening. The girls were at church - there was a partial suspense from the worry of business, and we had a cozy comfortable evening - talking much of you along with the reading."But notwithstanding all this, dont let me stand in the way of any plans of your own looking in other ways and for different help if you have any such in mind. You can count upon me any way - The family are all in usual health except Fanny who has been quite miserable for the last year; but nevertheless able to go to N.Y. to see her woman Doctor occasionally - Yours truly Joseph - Regards to Antoinette and the Dr We should enjoy seeing you all here - My California brother & his family are to be with us over Sunday - [*Jos. Sheldon - Ans. by dictation to Mr Boyle Feb 2-1887 - Albany Texas*] [*18 / [Frond?]*] NEW HAVEN JAN 20 9 38 PM WASH. D. C. FORWARDED JAN 21 11 AM 87 Miss Clara Barton. President National Red Cross Association - [Washington D.C.] Albany Shackelford Co Tex [*Shelden*] New Haven May 18 1887 My Dear Clara; Now is the time when I am most of all grieved that I cannot lay down the burden that is always upon me and go to Washington. It seems altogether too bad. But we are in fact building the new house that Abby has been waiting for so long. The ordinary business that fills my days and nights might be set aside but they need me for half an hour every morning these days to answer a dozen questions about the house. So I must decline to start - but goodness how I sweat to write it down that like to write it - I fear that autobiography is not getting written! Is it? - and what shall we say to John Hooker and the rest who have urged you so much to write it - Abby is in pretty good health - much better than at any time within the last six or eight years; she sends regards. We have some young travelers about your town whom I am getting ready to welcome home again. Give my regards to the Dr and to Antoinette and all others in authority and believe me Yours to command! Joseph. I cant go. A plenty of reasons exist why I ought to be with you and any one of which would send me off but here I am - fettered. It will perhaps interest you to know that a very small movement in my land appears this month and that possibly I may sometime see day light through it all - What month does the meeting at Carlsruhe take place? It was to be this year if it was not last year. Your work in this Country ought to be set forth at that meeting. It would make a better show than was made in any report submitted in 1884. I should abundantly [*Albany Texas Jan 25-1887 Jos. Sheldon - Suggests going to Red Cross Conference*] CARRIER JAN 21 8 AM 1 WASHINGTON . REC'D JAN 21 7 AM 1887 1 ALBANY JAN 25 [1887?] TEX[AS] When do you start? I suppose it must be the last of this month - You will take abundant time I presume and so not be hurried or [...ried?] Give my regards to all and every one of the old delegates if any of them appear & any one should be able to remember me casually in the interviews - especially to Dr Post Mr Moynier Dr. Appia and the rest - I am going to rewrite the work in the Ohio River for a Lecture this fall and Winter I donot hope to get any wide hearing for it. If I had your hold in the popular imagination I could make it ring through the Country - I think I see in the near future some emancipation from the bondage I have so long and so patiently borne and with it a clear course to do some of the things I have so long needed to do. Yours most cordially J. Sheldon. [*Judge Sheldon*] New Haven August 9 1887 Dear Clara; I see by a dispatch to the Associated press that you and Dr Hubbell are going, by appointment of the President, to Carlsruhe. I am very glad the Doctor is to go and shall be glad to hear [of] the Report you will make of the doings of the Red Cross Association - of the United States - I was very glad to get a Copy of the Bulletin in which Mr Moynier has taken some notice of my article in The New Englander. It was a surprize and a gratification to me If I knew when you were going to start I would certainly go down to New York and see you off & wish you Bon Voyage - Indeed I had not quite been certain whether he was well pleased with me; He never gave much demonstration as Dr Appia did that we were likely ever to get very near each other. I hope that Vice Presidency will not this time go so far astray [this time] as it did before. It so abundantly belonged to you & did not belong where it went that I never was quite easy about it. Indeed I felt outraged about it But after my speech I was glad to see one brother falling into line and carrying out the same general trend of thought in regard to you and your position - Lizzie has gone with her aunt to Marblehead where she will be near Mrs Taylor at Salem and I hope she will see Mr Turner as well as Mrs Taylor. She did not want to go for she was just beginning some rather large carving to be put into the new home we are building. By the way that new house must be "warmed" about the time you may be getting home and we shall be literally unable to take no for any kind of an answer to the invitation to you and the Dr to come up and help the warming. Now dont make any contrary engagement but come from the Steamer up this way to get fairly inland again - We shall want to hear all about it - Abby seems to be in better health than she has been in for some considerable time. She is delighted to find the house at last getting built = our dreams of a home materializing as the Spiritualists say - We are pretty much alone now & we picnic at housekeeping and are decidedly better in our situation in the pecuniary line - Nothing sells as yet but it does seem as if it were agoing to do so - We never have had so many rail road Schemes that seem sure to affect us favorably as we now have - Stephen has been here several times this Summer and has been as delightful as ever to us all. He has done us decided good turns in several particulars this summer[*Judge Shelden R Aug. 11 1887 No ans required as Appointment went on 10th inst.*] NEW HAVEN CONN AUG 10 3 30 PM 87 Miss Clara Barton. President National Association Red Cross Washington, D.C. New Haven August 12 1887 Dear Clara; Yours enclosing a certificate of the appointment by the National Association of the Red Cross of me as a delegate to the Fourth Conference of the delegates of the Red Cross Associations at Carlsruhe in September next has duly come to me. I am proud of the appointment and should be glad to accept it and perform all the agreeable duties that are involved in [it] the appointment 8 AM 5 [*Aug 11-1887 Judge Sheldon*] [CA]RRIER AUG 11 8 AM 5 WASHINGTON.REC'D. AUG 11 7 AM 1887 1 and acceptance. If I were pecuniarily able on the one side or could get away from the care of building my house on the other I should gladly accept it but under the circumstances that surround me I must decline the professed honor. I have the less reluctance to do so when I know how well your experience, ability and good standing at the Court of the Grand Duchess will enable you to do all the duties devolving upon the Representatives from this Country and that in Dr Hubbell you have an assistant that knows the details of the work of the Red Cross so well that he will be simply invaluable. No one else could half so well fill the place to which he has been appointed. I hope brother Solomon will be able to accept the position to which he has been appointed; I know he would find it agreeable to meet the old friends there to be assembled and sincerely hope he will so - Yours Joseph Sheldon [*Judge Sheldon Ackw. Apt. as Delegate 4 Conference. Invitation to House warming. Wants to know when we sail. for Europe.*] [*R Aug 13 - 1887.*] NEW [H]AVEN AUG [12?] 9 30 PM 87 Miss Clara Barton. President National Associn Red Cross. Washington, D.C. [*88 Conference*] New Haven August 25 1887 Dear Clara; The time is coming on when you will be thinking of starting for Europe. I shall be glad to know when you do expect to start from New York for I shall be glad to go down & see you off and bid you Good Speed. I am under special obligation for the little bit in the Associated press dispatches announcing my appointment by National Association as a Delegate. I am sorry I cannot go; I should be so glad to WASHINGTON. REC'D. AUG 13 12 M 1887 2 CARRIER AUG 13 12 M [9?] [*Aug 13 1887 Judge Sheldon Ackw. Delegates Certificate of Appointment -*] bear aloft with you and the rest of the delegation, [aloft] the Banner of the United States at that Central City of the cultivation of Europe but I am not able to spare the time or the money this time. Th weather has been so very bad for drying out the plaster in Our house that we have made but little progress this whole month - I am getting a lot of things done out that way - besides the house, getting a horse Rail Road & sewer and graded streets & side walks - getting James settled in a new business and getting the family moved - This must all get done or not done during the time I should be absent All the same I prize most highly the honor of the appointment and hope some other time to be more fortunate in my surroundings so that I might do myself and You the honor of giving my services in the great cause of The Red Cross. We are all in tolerable health - Abby & Lizzie are in better spirits than they have been in, in some time - especially Abby - Give my regards to the Dr. and both be sure to come & see us when you get back & we are settled in the new House. Yours truly Joseph -[*Jos. Sheldon*] New Haven January 19 1888. Dear Clara; Stevey has just called at the office and informs me that you have come home. I saw nothing of it in the papers and supposed you were still in the pleasant places that the captains of the nations and the great people you have met always [contrive?] for you in Europe - Welcome to the pleasant land of the fathers and the mothers - we were in hopes you could come up to see us on your return - Since you went on your mission we have the trials of the damned that she suffers from occasionally from Eczema Her mother is also with us now - a fine noble woman in very good health and a great comfort to us every one. Give my regards to the Doctor and remember me as of the olden time Yours Joseph Sheldon have taken a journey - a long one from our old home in York Square to our new one in Highland Park. There we are now not exactly settled but camped and settling in the pretty little place - I want to welcome you home and invite you to call & see us when you can possibly do so. Mr & Mrs Mann formerly of Washington are with us just now and also our Aunt Sarah Abby's Aunt - fathers unmarried sister. Elizabeth is in fine spirits & good health; Fanny is not at all well and Abby poor chicky is again under New Haven February 3 1888. My Dear Clara; Yours came duly and was duly read and rejoiced over by the whole family. Abby is really very poorly - with her old trouble of the head and skin - eczema - She ought to be in bed all the time I guess but she is about. Fanny is becoming a chronic invalid I fear. But the house pleased us all - invalids and all and Lizzie is full of a young girls delights in parties and sleigh rides and balls and Whist and Euchre & all other kinds of gambling! You speak of "topping out some Resolutions" - if I were there in Washington . I very much doubt whether any of us can arrange to go to Washington to Woman Suffrage Meeting - But I could fix up the Resolutions for you if you will send them on and let me "take the work in" and do it at home, as sewing women sometimes do. I should like to look over your volume of the Proceedings of the Conference at Carlsruhe when you receive it - Give my regards to the Doctor and the Holmeses when you happen to see them. Yours J Sheldon New Haven Apr 17" Dear Clara, We all felt sorry not to see you when you went to near us a week ago - and now I write to urge - nay insist that you give us a day or at least a night on your way to - jail!! We must see you before you are locked up - and dont you forget it . Joseph put a piece in the largest Sunday paper - we thought that would be most widely read. I am some what better, but still a perfect beauty to look at . Mrs Richardson told me yesterday to send her love to which we all add ours. In haste as ever Abby[*Answered Apr 19 .*] [*33 Sheldon*] US POSTAL CARD. NOTHING BUT THE ADDRESS CAN BE PLACED ON THIS SIDE. WASHINGTON, REC'D. APR 18 7 AM 1888 2 NEW HAV[EN] APR 17 2 AM CON[N.] Miss Clara Barton 1013 T St Washington D.C. [*Sheldon*] Dear Clara; Dr's postal received - we shall be glad to see you both either going to or returning from Boston or both. We happen to be filled so far as house room goes till Monday next. On that day and after we should particularly like to have both come before you can go on to Boston. If you have arranged it so as to start from Washington Monday it would fit our engagements well. But at any time after Monday morning either going or returning, it will be convenient and particularly pleasant to us to renew the old acquaintance. Joseph. [*Sheldon Insignia*] New Haven July 21 1888 Dear Clara; Yours with the enclosed papers came to me in due course of the mails - I agree with Senator Conger that the address is one you ought to read to the gentlemen who may be assembled. Certainly it is a scandal that the Government does not take up the Red Cross and treat it like any other Bureau of the Government[*May 1888 Judge Sheldon*] 1 UNITED STATES POSTAL CARD. NOTHING BUT THE ADDRESS TO BE ON THIS SIDE. WASHINGTON. D.C. MAY 29 10 PM 88 NEW HAVEN. CONN MAY 24 10 AM 4 Miss Clara Barton. President National Association of the Red Cross. [Washington] [D.C.] /o S. R. Barton, - Worcester, Mass. New Haven Apr 17" Dear Clara, We all felt sorry not to see you when you [.....?] to near us a week ago - and now I write to urge - nay insist that you give us a day or at least a night on your way to - jail!! We must see you before you are locked up - and dont you forget it . Joseph put a piece in the largest Sunday paper - we thought that would be most widely read. I am some what better, but still a perfect beauty to look at . Mrs Richardson told me yesterday to send her love to which we all add ours. In haste as ever Abby in no position to take a vacation - I am sorry you could not come to see us on your way to and from Boston - or one way - So we could then have talked over the matter you now have in hand. It has been on my mind for a long time as the thing that ought to be done. The time now is fully ripe to accomplish it. I ought to be able to help to do it but here I am. You ought to be in official relations with the government and the Congress ought to adopt the work and carry it on - It does seem to me as if they might be made to feel it to be so. treat it as all the other Governments within the treaty do their Associations. As to my ability to go down to the meeting, I am sorry to say that I am as much under stress of financial weather as I ever have been and have neither time nor money - particularly money - to do what I have so long and so ardently desired to do - not in the way of business at all but away from business and in the work of the Red Cross and other similar work. But for the present I am There are but few things I regret so much as not having been able to go to Carlsruhe last year but it was out of the question. The new house and the state of my finances then were a barrier [as] much more insurmountable than that which more mildly hinders my going to Washington now - Give my regards to the Doctor and to all others who may care to hear of me. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon. [*Insignia*] New Haven July 27th 1888. Dear Clara; Yours has arrived. Two suggestions additional to what I said the other day. There is a vast difference to be observed between the Government and a particular administration of it. If the appeal is made while this administration is in power will we not be exposed to a danger on the one hand of being disregarded altogether at the end of a session in hot weather in the midst of an opening Campaign; and on the other more anxious about the wisdom of drawing on this conflict at this time. My attention was drawn to this matter the more when I thought how I a republican of the Republicans could contrive to make much head way with this administration either on its Legislative or its Executive side. I thought if it were I, on whom the bulk of the fight must devolve I should prefer to have Harrison & Blaine and our friends to plead before, rather than this administration who might grant one request looking at some places under it as a Bureau of the Government but as you have no vote and if you had one it might not be always and often on the side of this administration if we are successful whether an administration that shamefully prates of public office being a public trust and at the same time grabs at every particle of patronage & office it can lay its hands on for its own not over clean partisans, will not lay hands upon the Red Cross and put some red nosed "patriot" in charge of the whole affair. With Harrison as President and Blaine as Secretary of State and principal adviser to the new administration this danger would be far less; you would be likely to be retained where you are as long as you live as you certainly ought to be and must be if any sense of decency shall prevail. Thinking of these two dangers since your first and my last letter I have been more andwould be almost certain to do in this case as they do in all others put their own men in charge of the Bureau. & Consider how many votes it could control. this has come upon me as a condition of things to be taken into serious consideration; not that it is a determining factor necessarily but as constituting a real peril to be guarded against and understood - intelligently. Suppose you put these two points to your advisors there on the ground - Senator Conger and others - I should be glad to be at your side and fight the good fight to victory or defeat; I seem fated to be too late; sometime I shall be able to have my time, possible to have money enough to do what I would like to do without asking leave of anyone. We are all fairly well - Lizzie is home from Plymouth; Fanny is a little better Abby is fairly well for her. I am well and able to do my duty when I get a chance Yours .Sheldon. New Haven Oct. 8 1888 Dear Clara; I have got home and found my office in possession of Elizabeth and my matters well cared for in my absence so far as any one but me could care for them. I should have been glad to hear from Mr Southmayd and hope you will let me know what face he puts upon the matters - I hope you will read before retiring Dr Porter's letter. I got the papers to see if any thing was said about you or the Red Cross. I have found nothing People are well but I have seen only E. Yours Joseph. Regards to all "insubordinates" and all who intend to become New Mexicans - Regards to the Doctor J.S. New Haven October 22 1888 Dear Clara; I have yours Postmarked Oct 21. I am engaged to-night and to-morrow Evening in speaking for Harrison & Morton - I should be so glad to see you What is the convention you are attending? I have heard nothing of it. Cant you come up and stay over night with us. We should be much obliged to see you and have a talk of the situation. I got through my month tolerably well.Abby & Mrs Mann would be very glad to have you come up & visit them as well as J.S. Have the [Cols or Cats?] come up with you? I have thought a good deal of the conversations we had in Washington and look forward with some hope to the day when I can be so far emancipated as to do what work I can in the very lines you suggest. But it is far ahead I fear. I should like to give away my land and be at peace. But I cannot be permitted to rest just yet because I have been trusted by women with their money and this I must return to them with its interest. Yours truly Joseph New Haven November 26 1888 Dear Clara; I have been expecting you every day since I got your letter or telegram rather. I replied to it immediately announcing that I would "most certainly" give you a day at New Haven. Since then I have not heard by letter or seen your ghost flitting this way - And now this week we are full of company from the Pacific coast but nevertheless if you will let me know when you would like to be here we can arrange it. The Election is over and I am glad Harrison is elected - It will give us all a chance. Give my regards to the Doctor We shall all be delighted to see you at anytime - Lizzie is an inhabitant of Boston at the Art Museum. And studying Architecture in the office of Cabott Everett & Mead - There is a Mrs Cabott who is in the office more or less. They seem to take to her very well - Yours truly J. Sheldon. [1888] Teus. 7. P. M. Dearest Clara. We have re'cd your letter & Joseph has gone to Syracuse to telegraph you that he can wait till Sunday eve. I sit hurriedly down to explain a little by letter. It is his Court business that makes it well nigh impossible for him to be absent from home even for two weeks. He expects to hold his Court next Monday morning, and has a case for 2.PM same day that he adjourned over the night he started for Geddes. Now if you could get here Thurs - even if not until night - you could have three whole days to work & I should think you might do much something in that time. After Joseph had gone you Note: Cabot, Everett & Mead, an architecture firm, was founded by Edward Clark Cabot (1818-1901), best known for his design of the Boston Atheneum in 1846-1847. In 1885, Cabot formed a partnership with Arthur Greene Everett (1855-1925), a Bostonian and graduate of MIT, and Samuel W. Mead, both of whom had been draughtsmen in Cabot's office. When Cabot retired from active practice in 1888, Everett took over the design responsibilities of the firm. He is credited for the design of "Beinn Bhreagh," the large Shingle-style home of Alexander Graham Bell in Baddeck, Nova Scotia, in 1892. could remain here & copy - having all the seclusion you want - & I would help any way I could. We should be exceedingly glad if this plan will seem to you as feasible as it does to us. Joseph you know would be glad to do more - do any thing for you if he was free, but he feels that he must be home Monday. The revision of this cant compare in amount of work with the compiling of the book, and I trust you will not feel heart sick over the [decission?], but as if it would be tolerably well this way. I am sorry every thing must be so hard for you - yes & for all who would do good things. Mr Mann waits for this - Know that I mean a hundred times more than I say - Abby [*Sheldon*] New Haven March 3 1889 Friend Clara; Now the Red Cross may well flame out in its liveliest hues - the day of Jubilee has come or will be along as soon as this letter reaches you - With Blaine and Windom and Harrison him self we can get any sensible thing done for the good of the cause. Then my old college classmate and friend John W. Noble as Secretary of the Interior will put the whole matter where we can do something to the purpose. I should have gone down to the Inauguration but for my business and my other matters here; The Red Cross is now My best regards to Dr and all others whom I know - Yours J Sheldon is in a good situation [now] to finally get adopted into the family by the government It has always been treated like Cinderilla in the kitchen, it is about time now it put on the glass slipper and show the world who she is that has been dutifully doing royal duties for nearly a whole [quarter or generation?] and now at last should gain[ing] its Royal rights and royal privileges - In short next winter and sooner if we have an Extra Session we can get something done - So it seems at least to me - Elizabeth is in the School of Design in Boston this winter winning new honors in her new work. Fanny is getting better Abby is pretty well for her - All send cordial regards - Hurrah for Spring and a new Administration! [*R Mar 5 89 Judge Sheldon duly - -- . -- Congratulations*] NEW HAVEN CONN MAR [3?] [10?] PM Miss Clara Barton President National association Red Cross Washington D.C. New Haven April 27 1889 Dear Clara; Yours came in due season after it got started. I am glad matters look so well for the Red Cross Enterprize. I want to say I should like [it] the meeting to be put off as long as possible for I find my self so perpetually in my toils and so constantly needing to stand at the pumps that I am not so much a free citizen and able to do what I should like to do, as I am bound to the handle of the pump on a life sentence. WASHINGTON, REC'D MAR 4 4 PM 89 4 March 5. 1889 Joseph Sheldon - congratulations on new Administration I begin to grow very tired of it all. Of all this say nothing - I only want you to know what it is that so perpetually restrains me from doing what I would be glad to do. I will try to get down there but put the time off as long as is consistent with your success. The time away from these things [has] makes me tremble. It is not, good sister, that the family are not with me but because the debts & notes and the perpetually recurring interest are with me - always - and they are like the old man of the sea astride the shoulders of Sinbad the Sailor they cannot be shaken off I have been struggling a long time with them and am never foot free. You must give the time and let me know; I will get there for a little time but must get to business promptly and get back to my talks. Give good respects to all the helpers. Yours cordially Joseph Abby send regards E. stood at the head of her class at the Examination and third in the whole School of whatever age in the School - she has been there six months - her 2 competitors have been about the full term of two years - The Boston Herald gives a special notice of her Great Great Grandmothers gown which wore to the ball - [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven May 30 1889 Dear Clara; Your two letters have duly come. A Bank explosion occurred here about a week ago in which I am greatly interested and may not be able to come at all. The time named (June 8th) will suit me as well as any. I will come if I can do so. I am happy to say that I am not interested so much as a victim - I dont figure in that way at all - but I suffer in common with the whole town and my friend is a victim Give my regards to the Doctor and believe me Yours to command J. Sheldon. New Haven February 13 1890 Dear Clara; I am planning to arrive in Washington Sunday prenoon. I am invited to deliver an Address before a Committee of Congress on Monday forenoon. After that is over I can look about and see what I can do for the Red Cross and other work of the Lord. I am not quite sure I can get there at the time - Sunday - I will come out with your permission to see you on my arrival. We can talk if it is Sunday - Yours truly Joseph - [*Shelden*] New Haven February 22 1890 10.30 A.M. Dear Clara; I arrived this moment all safe and sound and am glad of all the little successes of the trip - Unfortunately I left my overshoes and would be much obliged if you will send them to me by Express. C.O.D. Have not yet been to the house but I have received an invitation to dine at home to meet some friends - and as I have no fire in my office think I shall accept - Give cordial regards to Mrs [Bennett?] and admiring remembrance to the "Countess of Worcester" and regrets for the Doctor. With the old time Affection and Esteem Joseph - 1001 Golden Gate Ave May 26 1890 Dear Clara; Yours from Baltimore has duly come. It finds me in the midst of a tangle of a lawsuit and the Settlement of an Estate that fearfully uses up my time & money. When I can get clear of it and able to turn my face towards the East I cannot tell - not for a week certainly. I suggest that when Dr. Gardner arrives that you immediately set this matter at work by consultation with General Noble or any Washington and how certainly I cannot get away from my business here. I will write again the moment I can see day light through this business. Give my respects to Dr and "the Countess" and believe me ever most Truly yours J Sheldon Mark is making the visit here full of interest and doing all any one could to make my stay delightful. other party with whom you are in good relations and in whose good sense and fidelity you can rely So do all this without waiting for me. I have come so far and have invested so much money in this suit and settlement that I dont want to leave this coast with this matter unsettled. and my money and time all in the air. I regret the necessity and wish matters were so I could tell now when I can leave and that I could really leave at once - I am getting uneasy here when I know how much my affairs at home need me - how much I ought to be in Washingtonwhich to choose till he died of starvation in reach of most delicious hay. That unfortunate animal seems very suggestion of my own plight at present - You however are surrounded by good counsellors and good lawyers and official advisers only too anxious to share the honor of helping you. My clients - poor devils who have placed their business in my hands expecting me to attend to it and not to neglect it, are without any one to turn to in their distress and needs, but me, whom they have paid in part to do their work I suggest again that since the Bills are drawn, that you submit them - say to General Noble for suggestions first of all and then hand them to 1001 Golden Gate Ave June 10 1890 Dear Clara; Your two letters written about the first of the month reached me yesterday on my coming down out of the valley of the Yosemite where I have been gone since you wrote those letters. I am still held here for the letters and papers I sent home for on the 22d May and which came in my absence and were re-mailed to me in the valley in order to reach me at the Earliest moment possible! This error will delay my starting 2 or 3 days. was permanently settled or put in the way of such a settlement as should not require my presence here again on its account. I confess myself puzzled to know exactly at this moment how to manage, to the best advantage, the matters in Washington and those in New Haven. When two ride on one horse one must ride before, is a bit of ancient wisdom. When two things or setts of things both needing to be done with great promptness, which shall have precedence is a matter sometimes difficult to decide. You remember the other donkey in the old school man's puzzle of the equality of impulses towards opposite courses of conduct holding one unable to move at all - so that the donkey placed between two bales of hay equally attractive and could not decide which I had not requested or expected them to be sent to me there, but my good sister-in-law knowing my anxiety to get them sent them on to me in the valley where they arrived I suppose after we left. I left directions that any mail sent on to me there should be immediately remailed to me here. They may reach me to-day or to-morrow. Whenever they do come the business will be done [if possible] in short order and I shall set my face Eastward as soon as possible. Abby writes me that my business in the Courts is beginning to suffer by my absence prolonged now beyond all expectation. I can easily believe it. But this tangle was too far off and too important to leave it until it some friendly [hand] party to introduce and chase them through the two branches of Congress. I will come on again as soon as I set my own matters so they will not spoil in my absence - and try what I can do as an assistant. You can well understand how eager I am to come on to Washington where I could help also in determining the fate of the silver bill as well as of those in which we of the Red Cross are so much interested.untangle it before I leave it; but my! how it has eaten my time - and other mischances have destroyed more of it - Give my regards to that brace of Doctors whom I should like so much to confer with and to work with in the grand cause we all so much love. Remember me to the Countess! Yours truly Joseph. That bill certainly needs all the friends to help it be it ever so little that they could do individually; but my small - relatively small - personal interests are so obligatory that I must not neglect them - They dominate me as a master dominates a slave - I hope to be out of debt some time so that I could do what I feel needs so much to be done and which I can do perhaps as well as any one who has the desire to do it in any thing like the same degree as I do. This business, an ignorant well meaning fellow trying to do himself, has tangled almost inextricably and I shall untangle [*R July 15 90 " 24*] [*Joseph Sheldon about coming*] New Haven July 14 1890 My Dear Clara; Yours to Abby and me came duly and were most gratefully read over - A. did look very ill when I got home She had undertaken to do my business of collecting rents and arranging repairs and doing all the ten thousand details that pertain to this unfortunate class of property. The tenants had abused her and annoyed her - She was distressed and worried till she looked like a hunted creature. and must have gone to bed or an insane asylum before long - She did not say any thing of my prolonged stay in California - I had sent a telegram to say I was all right and on my way home - when I was passing through Spokane Falls at Midnight - They had expected me home that very night and A. came near giving out altogether when she learned I was so far away as that But she looked so thin and wan and hunted and all but insane when I arrived that no words were needed to emphasize my sense of guilt in staying in California so long - She had not known it seems that I had a round trip ticket home by way of the Northern Pacific Road - I could not when in California afford to leave undone the work I came to do even if it did take longer than I Expected it would take - It was unfortunate however - I am glad General Noble and Congressman Breckinridge are ready to do all they can do. If President Harrison sends the bills in with a recommendation that they pass I dont think I shall be needed - but My! what a chance it would be if I was in [the] Congress to set the Red Cross and you right and up before the Country! - Such an occasion - such a chance to speak weighty words of truth and soberness of one who has done so much and so well. But here am I - I shall be free some time. and then I can do what I will. Give my regards to the Dr and the Countess and remember me as desiring to do more than I can yet do. Joseph - New Haven July 16 1890 Dear Clara; Your letters to Abby and me and General Noble's letter and telegram have all come to me. It is a public misfortune that the President could not see his way to send to Congress those Bills with a word of commendation. It would have wonderfully helped out all who are working in the interest of the Red Cross and of the whole country and of the people reduced to want by unforeseen public calamities - such as the Red Cross has won its high place in ministering to. It is an individual misfortune to us all who are immediately engaged in placing this great cause where the Government can protect it. My Associates have thrown upon me the burden of constructing a Street Rail Road since my return or of getting it constructed right up to my unfortunate Real Estate. This with my ever present calamities requires every minute of my time at home unless I can earn more money away from home - If our Institution had $150 to pay for two weeks work I would throw that at my debts and run away from them for that time - I am truly ashamed to be in such a tight place but here am I. "God help me" said Luther "I can do no other" than tell it as it is. This of course is confidential and I would make no explanation to many people; but you, I know, have a full knowledge of the virtues of a close mouth. Give my regards to Dr and the Countess and believe me Yours truly Joseph - [*July 17 " 24 90*] [*Joseph Shelden offers to come for a consideration I reply that I will try it myself. -*] NEW HAVEN. CONN JUL 16 2 PM 90 Miss Clara Barton . President National Association Red Cross Washington. D. C. - WASHINGTON. REC'D. JULY 17 6 30 AM 90 New Haven July 30 1890 Dear Clara; Yours came yesterday, after I had got rid of the last of the visitants whose appearance ahead has troubled me since my return. I am therefore now a little more free than usual for a few days. I began immediately to block out something to be said to that Committee but it does not seem this hot morning as if I was going to be very enterprizing to day - Am glad you are to send in a Report and that you will send me a copy before hand - It does not really seem as if on the general topic any thing could be added after you have spoken your word. But there are points personal to yourself that can be brought in to a general support of the measure that you could not well say yourself and which I should be glad to set forth in a strong true light. In short I will try what I can do but am not very full of conceit about doing it very well. But we will see what can be done. Perhaps some word more lucky than the rest may serve a purpose and do some good. As to pay I am always ashamed to think of or to take it from the Association but my time is literally not my own but belongs as yet to those whose slave I am. Yours loyally as to the other [payments?] Joseph. Give my regards to the Dr and to General Noble if you see him New Haven Aug 4 1890 Dear Clara; I received the copy of the Senate Bill yesterday - Sunday. The other they could not then find at the office. This morning I have found the other enclosure at my office duly delivered. Really you have so well and with such characteristic thoroughness "covered the ground" that I cant see any need of another word so far as persuading that Committee to make a favorable Report is concerned, and no one can doubt that they will make such a Report. There is a point or two that more especially relates to the part you personally have taken in all this great work that might properly, and ought in fact, to be set forth on this occasion as an installment of recognition of what that work has been and how it has been done - It is a fit occasion for a good word but all need of such a word to procure the passage of the Bill has been fully met. The other need will not be met till a fit word be spoken I will try to be ready with such poor apology as I can bring within a very few days - say by next Monday - I shall need to remain here till then because James and Fanny are away on James' annual vacation for one week. They started Saturday night last. Let me know as early as may be whether if at all - and when it seems best for me to "render myself present" - in Washington. Of course I can "cut & run" before next Sunday Evening but Abby and Lizzie will be more than ever forlorn if I do leave this week. Yours truly Joseph. The two bills have been soldered together very well. It is better so if no objection is raised. New Haven [July] Aug 5 1890 Dear Clara; Does that "Boston" mean that you go to meet the Grand Army there? If so, you must stop over here on the way, either coming or going or both as will best suit your convenience. A little conference before we meet the committee or make final preparations would be very well. I shall be glad to see whatever you have in print on this matter. I did not exactly understand what you meant in one sentence of your note that came with the manuscript of your "Report." You say "the Bill went to the House without the change of a word." I could not quite decide whether you meant that the Bill went from the Senate to the House without the change of a word or whether it went to the Senate Senate without your changing a word in uniting the two bills in one. I concluded on the whole that this latter must be the sense you intended to convey. It seems to be about the language of the originals. My days are given to my office work and some bits of the night to this little speech or address or Report or whatever it may turn out to be. Only give me such notice as you can of the time these gentlemen choose to hear what we have to say. Regards to the Dr and to all the intending Corporators as you meet them Where was Mrs Hinton? I do not see her name nor Senator Palmers in the list of Corporators. I conclude they prefer to take the place of some person who may drop out. In any event it is all right. Yours. Joseph. New Haven Aug. 6 1890 Dear Clara; I am happy to report that I am now ready to speak my little piece at any time. It will not be long - not more than 15 minutes. I thought it better so. I have wound it up something like this subject to some modifications as they occur to me. "This measure then looked at from every side ought to pass into a law with entire unanimity. The Congress of the United States can ill afford to haggle over any [proposition] provision of this Bill. If you will pardon a suggestion outside of the strict line of business in hand this Government can very ill afford that these great interests now under consideration shall any longer rest for their sole pecuniary support on the Slender purse, the unpaid labor and the public spirit of one woman. Though I am forbidden on her account to say one word of this topic as an American [*Aug - 12 1890 Judge Sheldon Senator Sherman's decision concerning Oral Statements before Committee on Foreign Relations -*] Citizen I am ashamed that this Country should be willing that this great public Trust administered as it has been with such singular wisdom and brought as it has been to such magnificent results should be carried indefinitely forward and its ordinary Expenses borne as they have been for the last Eight years by her alone! Not even the expense of printing or telegraphing or postage has been borne by the Government which now reaps the rich rewards of this unpaid and triumphant toil. I believe that not one man or woman or child in this whole country would disapprove of action on the part of Congress looking to the full support of this work by the Government it has served so well and which will continue through all coming time to reap the vast [harvest] advantages of labor so highly consecrated and so richly blest - Gentlemen - I submit the whole matter to your most serious and thoughtful consideration" - That is about the style of it. I can now do my part one time as well as another - On consultation with you many more and better things may occur to us. Yours Joseph - James & Fanny will not return till Saturday night - After that almost any day will suit me. If you go to Boston you must stop here of course. JS New Haven Aug 11 1890 Dear Clara; I have got a reply from Senator Sherman who writes to inform me that the Com. on Foreign Relations of the Senate never permit any one to appear before them to make any oral statement. A communication in writing or print will be considered by them - I have written to Mr Hitt as if I had never heard of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs to ask if his Committee will name a time & place when & where they will hear a brief oral statement from me on one Bill. If he replies as Sherman has done it might be well for you to call here on your way home as I shall not need then to go to Washington to make the speech even if I should go to urge individual members of these committees to take up the[*20 Insignia*] Bill and pass it or at least report. and recommend its passage. I am not quite satisfied with the reply to Mrs Meyer and so have written another reply which I am to submit to Abby this Evening and will send it to you at Hotel Vendome. I wish you could come back this way so that we can contrive what might to be done in view of what bother Hitt may send to me & Sherman has sent. Give my regards to all the friends you happen to meet. Yours truly J. Sheldon. New Haven Aug 22 1890 Dear Clara; I have been to John McCarthy's house every day to inquire for him. To-day for the first time I learn that he put up a notice in the adjoining shop that he would be in Bernardston Mass to Aug 22 to-day. I had enquired three times of the same parties and they either did not know or care enough to say they had any notice of their coming. Have just now 2 P.M. been up to see if he had yet got home - and have just found the notice above mentioned but whether it means he will come home to-day or to-morrow I cant wellI had written Mr Hitt a second letter before I received the answer to my first, which I showed to you I have now the enclosed reply to my second - substantially like the first - only a little more emphasizing the opposition to the Act of Incorporation. I am in haste to get there but I want to see John before I leave He will be here at farthest to-morrow and I shall be there at farthest Sunday Morning I Enclose the 2d letter of Hitt Yours Joseph - New Haven Aug 29 1890 Dear Clara; Arrived home a few hours a go - found Every thing all right. Now it is not overshoes this time but it is a watch key - a longish cylindrical watch key that in my hurried change of clothing while the horses were at the door yesterday I took out of my pocket with my watch and laid with the watch on the Doctors bed - I think during the change of clothing it must have rolled off on the floor - I missed it but supposed I must have left in the pocket of my vest then strapped in the valise. If you would ask Dr to look and see if it is not some where about where such a rolling thing could easily go, I shall be very much obliged and if he will send it in case he should find I shall be more glad than I can well tell for it is not mine, but it was loaned to me and I am particularly in earnest to get it back as soon as I can in order to return the same with thanks. Yours truly J Sheldon. Will begin letter to Moynier to day - J.S. [*20 Insignia*] New Haven March 20 1892 Dear Clara; Yours received. Nothing would certainly go with my inclination so well as to run down to Washington and twist that O'Neil's neck. That Bill ought of all things to be put through. If it should fail, it would be a scandal to all of us who might possibly have dropped our work and have gone to the rescue. Abby and the girls say "go." I might go for a week but it needs to be set up with, to be watched with and never let go for an instant till it is safely in the hands of President Harrison; but that means weeks & months begin over again at my time of life at the bottom of the hill. Of course I should never do any thing more if I did in the way of business - Of course I should be glad to help that grand institution that you have so wonderfully carried on; should be glad to be identified with it but I really cant do it as I am situated. If some one with the instincts of [Mr or Mrs?] Mann and the pocket book of Mr Rockefeller would endow the institution and appoint me to work under your Presidency and direction at a moderate salary we could make it go with a vim that would mean success. if I were not so run down by the dogs of debt; if I could sell at any thing like decent terms any considerable amount of my land as I can sell an occasional lot, I could do such work as yours and would do it; or if the work could really pay in cash so it would not matter to me pecuniarily whether I worked here or there then I could get my foot loose - I have a chap who is organizing a little colony to settle on my land to occupy & build it up but it all goes very slow. I have had to drop my most valuable franchise for a street rail road because I was pressed so hard and it sometimes seems as if I should have to drop all toIt has never been any thing but my struggle here with this mountain of debt that has kept me from doing more with you and for you. A Salary might help but I'm so ashamed of needing it or of taking it or thinking of it even that I prefer to run away and think no more about it all or about the great Institution and its perils and its possible fate. It seems as if some one just over the pitch of the hill with his burdens turned to helps and rolling down the other side of the hill would step to the front and do with you this grand and stirring work; their hearts that might are perhaps less aglow than mine with the needs and inspiration such a work as this awakens and rewards. I am bothered entirely what to say except to tell the truth about it. Joseph. [*20 Insignia*] New Haven May 19 1892 My Dear Clara; Have just received Mr DeGraws letter in regard to my taking charge of the Bill now before Congress for the Reincorporation of the Red Cross and the Protection of the insignia. No one except yourself realizes the importance of the early passage of that Bill more than I do myself. I appreciate also the delicacy that seeks to eliminate at this point all considerations of my loyalty to you and to the great cause of organized international Relief and puts this matter upon a purely business basis. But the session is so far gone; summer and the Great Conventions are so near; the presidential Election is so close upon us that the Bill may have to go over till next session any way. I could guess this point off better after working a few days on it there. I should like to be able to leave my business here and go down and do this work as a gratuitous thank offering to human well being - but for the reasons which I explained to you privately and confidentially I really cannot do it. If there were some one on the spot who could give up his time and energy to doing it, it would be more economical than to call on me when I shall be compelled to leave my business not in the best condition in the world; he might save even the week just before us. However I am to be in Washington next Thursday and Friday and will then talk the matter over with you farther. Possibly we can hit upon something by which we can accomplish the end we seek to compass. In the mean time believe that I and all the family here are hoping and planning the best we know to help and not hinder but we cannot escape just yet from the invitations that environ us. Yours cordially Joseph. New Haven July 31 1892 Dear Clara; I have made a little progress with my speech but I find myself continually running up against my ignorance and want of recollection of the very text of the Bill itself - The Blind leading the Blind go to the d__ itch. If it wont be too much trouble I wish you would send me a copy of the proposed Bill as it has been presented to the Senate and on which I must make my speech. Also a copy of your Report when it is done. I expect next Sunday to give up the drafting of the speech and as far as possible making the final touches on the argument whatever rhetoric may be made useful to be afterwards [needed] worked in. Yours Joseph. Answd April 25 / 93 enclosed copy of letter of Dr Gardners to Mr Moynier - Also Copy of my letter to Dr. Gardner proposing Societies as a checkmate to Billeroths movement [*Copy of reply to this letter in Red cross Press Book - date April 25-1893*] JOSEPH SHELDON, Attorney & Counsellor, 17 Exchange Building. New Haven, Conn, April 22d 1893 Dear Clara; Yours with the enclosure of the proposal of Professor Billroth and Dr Prix has come to me. Some one ought to take these Gentlemen in hand in behalf of the Associated Societies of the Red Cross. It is Grand Larceny and Petit Larceny all in one - a clear case. Mr Monier ought in behalf of the International Committee to back up a strong, quiet, dignified and if possible, overwhelming statement of the facts about the American Amendment to the original plan of War Relief. You could put that yourself so as to leave only here and there a grease spot of those fellows. I am glad the case of surgery promises a Recovery of the patient. Yours truly J Sheldon Have just returned from a visit to Syracuse with wife. She will not return till Monday - She was taken suddenly - critically ill on Wednesday and could not do much and finally decides to rest a few days - [*May 3 Judge Sheldon " 5 93*] JOSEPH SHELDON, Attorney & Counsellor, 17 Exchange Building, New Haven, Conn, May 3d 1893 My Dear Clara; Enclosed with this I send a letter addressed to Mr Moynier in regard to the Billroth Matter - You can send it or withhold it as may seem best to you. I have also received your and brother DeGraw's invitation or notice to be present at a meeting of Association to be held to-morrow at 17th & F Street Washington - I really cannot come on account of engagements previously entered into. As to my letter to M. Moynier I have to guess off as well as I can what ought to be said - I really know very little of the facts - It will be a calamity to the Red Cross Societies to have this rival started - whether M. would or would not help or hinder the movement is a matter of conjecture & uncertainty to me. Respects to all Yours J. Sheldon. May 5, 1893. Dear Brother Joseph:- I have been trying for two days to tell you that your paper was excellent. I do not think I could suggest a change, and I recommend to send it. I return it to you, in order that it shall be addressed in your own handwriting, and go out from your home. I thank you very much for having written it, even if it should possibly prove merely a scare, there is no harm in letting the International know, that we are sufficiently alive to guard our interests, and that we hold these interests identical with theirs. I have no doubt he will get more of it before we are through. Of course we were sorry that you could not be with us at our meeting yesterday. We had a full meeting of those in town, and as unanimous, bright and successful for a meeting as our reception was for itself. Messrs. Degraw, Kennan, Conger, Kent and others with the ladies formed a splendid gathering. I read a little report of past work, which they want to have published; the charter was adopted, and a committee appointed to draft constitution and by-laws. While the meeting was most unanimous, it was by no means silent, or namby-pamby. One could have wished that some associate societies could have been present, and heard the opinion which the national entertained of them, to say nothing of their opinion of the national. Kennan is as brave with them as he ever was with Russia. I expect Mrs. Parker has gone a step too far for the future best welfare of her society. All goes lovely at the Park; they would be rejoiced by a line from you. With great love to all, Clara Barton [*Judge Joseph Sheldon -*]The American Association of the Red Cross, FOR THE RELIEF OF SUFFERING BY WAR, PESTILENCE, FAMINE, FIRE, AND OTHER NATIONAL CALAMITIES. Washington, D. C., March 27, 1882 To Dear Friend: Feeling assured that it will be your pleasure to co=operate in the good work which engages us, we herewith transmit to you an appeal in behalf of the sufferers from the floods of the Mississippi valley. You are aware how effectual in labors of love have been the methods of work pursued by our numerous associate Societies of the Red Cross abroad. Our organization will employ like instrumentalities in sending aid to the afflicted in the Southwest. The rations at present furnished by the Federal Government prevent, momentarily, a scene of starvation from blotting the annals of our land. There will yet be need of all the people can do. Their help will be wanted in those pestilent bayous long after appropriations have been exhausted and found an end. Medicine, wearing apparel, bedding, shelter, implements to work with, and seed to plant, must be supplied The Trustees named in our appeal, and who fully understand the scope and ability of the Red cross organizations, constitute an ample guaranty that whatever is contributed will be wisely applied. Will you please present the matter to our appeal to your friends, with such explanation of the subject and such effective words of commendation as your own heart shall dictate. We would respectfully suggest that you designate some suitable person or persons among your acquaintances to take the matter in charge, receive, and transmit contributions of money and material as indicated in our appeal. We remain, very respectfully yours, The Central Committee of the American Association of the Red Cross. Clara Barton, President. [*Sheldon*] New Haven June 9 1893 My Dear Clara; Enclosed I send M. Moynier's reply to my letter sent some time ago. He seems to have known very little about Dr Bilroth's movement; And the movement, if so it may be called, to head off Dr B. seem to me to be pretty good. He seems to reply chiefly on getting the Austrian and all other Red Cross Societies to simply ignore him and his plans He really cannot do muchwe literally had no time for half things we wanted to do and to see - We were sorry not to have seen you there - Elizabeth has gained some respectfull - even enthusiastic commendation for her work in The women's building. It is a pretty room - Respects to Dr Hubbell and all others in authority Yours truly J Sheldon more than this of course; but if he does this so that all Red Cross people will not help the movement it will die - I rather suspect that Dr Bilroth moves in Vienna at the suggestion of Philadelphia or some other American people. Of course it may be a genuine movement, but I doubt it. Your appeal to Moynier seems to have been well timed and effective - We, wife & I heard from you in Chicago when we were there - I could not find out exactly where your friend Dr Weeks Burnett lived - The Directory only gave an office and it was difficult to get there - we were so full of things to do and see that [*June 12 " 13 93*] [*Judge Sheldon Enclosing letter of M. Moynier -*] [*93*] Bedf[ord] In[diana] [*June 17 " 24 93*] [*Joseph Sheldon Enclosing the letter of M Moynier and its translation by Minna Golay -*] 334 c/o S H G Room New Haven June 17 1893 Dear Clara; Enclosed with this I send to you at Bedford, Ind. the letter of M. Moynier & the translation of it. which I received the other day. I send it to your present address because you may need it before you return to Washington. I quite agree with you that the new Society needs more decisive measures to kill it that mere abstention from actionWASHINGTON. D.C. REC'D JUN 9 30AM 1893 BE [JUN?] CHICAGO JUN 20 10AM But what to do and how to do it will require some special thought that you can give the matter better than any one else. Our people are expected home from Chicago this Evening We are all as well as [common?]. Yours J. Sheldon. COMITÉ INTERNATIONAL DE LA CROIX-ROUGE INTER ARMA CARITAS Genève, le 29 Mai 1893 Monsieur Sheldon New Haven Cher Monsieur Je viens répondre à votre importante lettre du 8 Mai. Si je ne l'ai pas fait plus tôt, c'est que j'ignorais complètement l'affaire dont vous m'entretienez et que j'ai dû prendre à son sujet des informations à Vienne. C'est aujourd'hui seulement que je les ai reçues et que je suis par conséquent en mesure de vous en parler Je partage tout à fait votre sentiment sur sujet des conséquences fâcheuses que la réalisation du plan de M. Billroth aurait pour la Croix Rouge, mais, jusqu'à présent du moins, le Comité international n'a pas eu d'avis officiel à émettre à cet égard. Nous savons que le Comité central autrichien partage aussi notremanière de voir et l'assemblée générale de la Croix Rouge autrichienne, qui a dû avoir lieu ces jours-ci, aura été appelée, par lui, à se prononcer dans le même sens. Je ne doute pas qu'elle ne le fasse. Nous serons en mesure [d'exprimer?], dans notre prochain Bulletin, les raisons qui militent en faveur de cette opinion, et nous ne manquerons pas d'ajouter qu'elle est aussi partagée par les Américains. Quant à une protestation, je ne peuve pas, et les autrichiens non plus, que, dans l'état actuel des choses, il convienne d'en formuler une. M. Billroth et ses amis sont dans leur droit en agissent comme ils le font, et la Croix Rouge ne peut protester qu'en s'abstenant de participer au Congrès des Samaritaines. C'est ce que [comptent?] faire les Autrichiens, et ce qu'il sera désirable que fassent [voutes?] les autres Sociétés de la Croix Rouge que M. Billroth invitera. Il est probable que l'exemple du Comité de Vienne sera suivi par elles. Si, comme je le souhaite, cette abstention est générale, elle rendra impossible l'exécution du programme de M. Billroth, car [*Translation Moynier May 29/1893*] [*Billroth*] Mr Sheldon New Haven. Dear Sir! I now reply to your important letter of May 8th, if I have not done it sooner, it is because I was completely ignorant of the affair with which you entertained me and therefore had first to get information upon the subject at Vienna. It is only to day that I received the answer and that I am consequently able to speak to you about it. I entirely share your opinion in regard to the fatal consequences, which the realizingof Mr. Billroth would have upon the Red Cross, but until now at least the international committee had no official report to put into circulation in this behalf. We know that the central committee also shares our view and the general assembly of the Austrian Red Cross which must have taken place lately will have been called upon to pronounce itself in the same way. I do not doubt that it will do it. We shall be able to explain in our new Bulletin the reasons which militate in favour of this opinion, and we shall not fail to add that it also is shared by the Americans. As to [the] a protest I do not think and neither do the Austrians that in the actual state of things it would be proper to advance one. Mr. Billroth and his friends are in their right to act as they do, and the Red Cross can only protest in abstaining from taking part in the Congress of the Samaritans. That is what the Austrians will do and which will be desirable that all the other societies of the Red Cross which Mr. Billroth will invite should do. It is probable that the example of the Committee at Vienna will be followed by them. If as I wish it, this abstention is general, it will make the execution of the programme of Mr. Billroth impossible.for it will prove that the Red Cross is not disposed to let itself unite in his new organization where he reserves to it an essential place. Such is, dear Sir, the opinion which I permit myself to give you. It is such as to calm your fears and I can only wish as well for you as far as that my foresight might be realized. Receive, dear Sir, the assurance of my kind regards. JOSEPH SHELDON, Attorney & Counsellor, 17 Exchange Building, New Haven, Conn, July 5 1893 My Dear Clara; Yours came in due time; I am glad to called at the Connecticut Room in the Woman's Building of the World's Fair. It is the more gratifying to us because Elizabeth took up the matter by herself and carried it through by herself in every detail. I could not help her nor could any one about the house. It is a personal triumphI might do more than I can now. What occurs to me is that no one can prepare such a paper as you speak of with so little Extra work and anxiety and [p]lease - do little original research as you can. The facts are all fresh and gathered up in your memory. I suggest that you prepare the paper and I will try to get it read at the meeting. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon. triumph for the artist herself Even to devising all her accessory tools and appliances and the method of boxing for transportation. What you say about the international character of the Red Cross is true altogether so far as I am informed. I am urged to go to Chicago to deliver another speech on the Silver Question Aug 1st, but I cannot go. I cannot spare the time or money to do even that. If I was more placid and less disturbed in this wild sea of financial unrest - now apparently more than ever [*re - Original Records of Andersonville.*] New Haven Decr 8 1894 Dear Clara; Stevie staid with us last night and we all had a delightful visit with him; he told us of his adventures in the west and intimated that he expected to go again to Washington - possibly to take hold with you of the business of the Red Cross. I hope it will be so. He left me a single copy of the paper about the Red Cross and Japan and requested me to get it printed in all concerned with the fact that they [are] will be handling an original document that next Century will be priceless - We are all well; our girl that Washington holds in its keeping gave us a short delightful visit at Thanksgiving and lightened and brightened us all up very much. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon - our local papers. Please send me four or five more copies - one for each paper and I will try to get them all to print it. He spoke to me of the original records of the Andersonville prisoners and that the authorities of the town were about to ask for the loan of them, and you suggested they be sent to me and I deliver them taking such Receipt for their good preservation and Careful return as seemed judicious. To this I cordially assent and will duly impress Stevie says General Schofield will take hold of the Bills and put them through Congress. It will make an enormous difference [whe] whether the head of the Army throws his whole personality boots spurs and sword into the scale in favor of the acts or lot of whipper snappers posing as representatives of Army opinion meanly and sneakingly belittle decry and oppose them underhand & and overhead. Now it will go - Laus Deo. Joseph [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven May no June 7 1897 My Dear Clara; When do you flit like the ducks to the cool clear northern waters? When you do go you must remember that there is an unwritten law that will be enforced by "Habeas Corpus" and "Corpus Christi" against you passing the latitude of New Haven going North or South without your calling and having a visit with us all. We are not expecting to pass many summers in this vicinity - many more at any rate and we must do something to save the few we have before us. A visit from you will save one summer at least - I can still hope to keep hold of Abby for a time but she looks as if she would blow away she line at random and afterwards find the true line - I got into town all right and went straight to my hotel and found the General there a few minutes before me. We came near dining at Chevy Chase Club house the next evening, but the rain fell in torrents and we all staid at home - I hope all is going well with you and that the house nears its completion - Give my regards to the philosopher of the house . and believe me Yours truly Joseph Sheldon is so thin - and looks so pail as she has done for some time past - How does the book come on? I guess I shall have to oversee the Job - set the plough straight in the furrow - see it start in and go about the field and then if it dont suit begin another furrow clean and clear as before and when when you at last strike the vein you will run it right on to the end - It is the beginning that is most difficult of all - But a great part of the difficulty will disappear if you dont regard the first ten pages as final In surveying we run a [*33 Sheldon*] New Haven, February 21 1899 - My Dear Clara; Yours have come, those addressed to me and that addressed to Abby; I will be in Washington at The Arlington Friday of this week - coming on with the rest of "The Executive Committee" of New York. I am rather occupied with an Address for Washingtons birthday and must be a bit brief. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon. Am glad to hear of the official call on The Red Cross to go to Cuba - for Hospital work -JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*20 White Cross Insignia*] EXCHANGE BUILDING 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS, 215 & 216. New Haven, Conn. Janry 29 1900. Dear Clara; I got a telegram this morning from Dr Hubbell asking me to meet him at Howards 75 Tribune Building - got it this morning as I came down town to office. I got a letter from Mr Boldt suggesting a meeting of all hands; an appointment inviting me to meer Howard Townsend at 32 Nassau Street to-day at one oclock to-day - came Saturday I think I could not go down to-day; wired Hubbell to come up here and have more time for talking and thinking over the whole situation in view of your wishes in the matter - finally came a telegram from Mr Boldt that the whole committee will; meet at the Waldorf on Thursday next at 4 30 P.M. I am expecting Dr Hubbell to-night - Indeed I have come back to the office to be here when he comes. I sent my telegram to 75 Tribune Building (Howards) for Dr Hubbell - And after all comes your official letter announcing a meeting of The American National Red Cross at The Arlington on Monday February 5 1900. I wish it were the 7th two days later - but I will talk it over with Hubbell if he comes - I hope to get a copy of Hawley's Bill providing for the employment of women nurses in the Hospitals of the Army - He introduced it last Glen Echo, Md. Feb 20, 1 Judge Joseph Sheldon, New Haven, Conn. Dear Brother Joseph:- I send you some enclosures which your legal mind might be interested in overlooking. I am also wondering if Inauguration will not bring you here. I hope before that time to be able to send you a half-rate B. & O. ticket, which makes you only $3. each way from New York. I hope to have some other friends here, as for instance - Stevy and I hope his wife, Mrs. Reed of Boston and I have a wee little hope of the Gardners. I think they would all like to discuss matters with you more than anyone else. You know my house is large and I can make you all plainly comfortable and any other friends one might like to bring. Let me hope to see you at our little coterie- it has been so long that I have not seen you. The winter has been very mild here and only for a kind of March wind, the days even now are springlike. I recall a fourth of March, I have forgotten if it were Buchanan or Lincoln, when it was so hot here in Washington that no wraps could be worn and all fires in the house were put out and not rekindled that season. I remember another which was a blizzard; but let us hope for the former and come and see if it is not so. [*over*] Note: This same typescript letter, on the Red Cross letterhead, was sent by Clara to Joseph Sheldon, and is dated simply 1901. It appears on p. 203.week. I have sent to the public printer for it This is the entire situation so far as I know it. I was not able to go down to-day and am glad of the delay. I want to be prepared to show the possibilities and probabilities and the certainties of the White Cross movement - I want to show that much depends on the spirit in which Relief work is done. That it cant be done as we throw fodder to Cattle and hogs; that the appeal to what is within the beneficiary is often more really useful to him [a person] to make him [really] able to help himself than the benumbing influence of an ungracious presence with Ever so much money - In the very spirit you see that I have often dwelt on the Red Cross in connection with "the New Civilization" - This settled first of all, the appointment of the President will be much more easy after that is settled upon firmly and clearly - I still cling to the idea that if any new person is to be made president it ought to be a man or woman like Moynier of independent fortune Eager and Able to give the Red Cross $10,000 a year rather than to take $10 000 or one cent from it - If one could find, out of hand, such a prodigy he or she would be the ideal - In all degrees less than that the soul of self sacrifice being placed at its immeasurable importance above money or even managing trains you can seek a substitute for the ideal [*You have time to write me before Thursday 4 30 P.M. just what you would like to say to me - before going before those men at the Waldorf - Have written Stephen but hear nothing Joseph - *] with parting or finishing salutations this is Copy of Letter to Judge SheldonI desire to see you lay it down with dignity and a becoming sense that you have done all the great work that has been put upon you faithfully and well and when it needs cash let those who have only the power of great money accumulations take it up and carry it on in their way which will not and cannot be your way - more's the pity - Abby keeps about the house doing a wonderful amount of work but with breath that is labored in coming up stairs or from Fanny's up the hill - Jamie is abed with the grippe - Elizabeth is occupied in her political studies; and I am only a "so so" - Give my regards to Stevie and Miss Coombs and to all who care for me Yours truly. Joseph - [*An. March 1901 - not ansd*] New Haven February 21 1901. My Dear Clara; Your letter and the enclosed papers came to me this morning. You suggest that you would like to have me come and consult in regard to the Red Cross and incidentally I presume to meet Stevie and the other tried and true friends that have stood by you in good and in evil days. I have never had but one impulse in regard to the Red Cross and to you - and that was to make friends for both [of you] as far as I could - I never madean enemy for either as I hope and believe - I may have sometimes erred but it was always with the design to help you in what seemed to me the wisest ways. But now I thank you heartily for the offer of the Rail Road tickets but I can not use them; I am not in health such as to warrant my taking up any thing what ever that is not literally forced upon me. I am as far as possible retiring from the work of the public affairs and must concentrate what little strength is left me in the care of the rather scattered private interests that intimately concern me and my family. I should be glad to see you one and all, and rejoice over your successes and pass over as lightly as might be what is less satisfactory if there are any such things. I was very much gratified to find you had called Stevie to your side; I am sure he is very energetic and capable and if he had the cash and supplies I should expect gratifying success from his management - At the risk of again being misunderstood I again suggest the value of men of wealth in the Management who might become interested by working for it and at last might Endow it. Those only can give money who have money - The time will at last come when you must lay down this great and glorious work Mr Sheldon wants to say - "Tell Clara to have drawn up a specific and definite waiver of all formal omissions and irregularities in the proceedings [and] for [making the] making & completing its organization and all working of the Corporation up to this time to be sent to and signed by every incorporator not present at the meeting for organization, and to be returned to her and filed and copied with the minutes of the proceedings of the Corporation. Only those incorporators who were absent and now refuse to sign this waiver, can take advantage of the flaws in the organization. I believe there is not one absentee who would now refuse to sign it. Those who were present at the meeting did waive them." This will go far to heal all defects I think it would completely block the game of the objectors - Judge Sheldon - [*Abby Sheldon 33*] [*Ansd May 26. 1901 from Meriden. -*] New Haven Ct May 24" 1901 Dear Clara. I was very much surprised by a note from you last night - dated at Meriden. You have come North like the birds and will come like them to see us. Do not fail to do so. Suit your own convenience as to the time of your coming. I judge from your note that you are quite likely to remain where you are during the week. We expect to be right here - all of us, and shall be most glad to see you. I said we are all here. I forgot for the moment that Fanny is in Columbus attending the National Mothers meeting but will be home Monday. James and I are Mothering her children in her absence. Joseph is so much better you would hardly believe how ill he was early in the spring. I leave all details until we meet Yours as ever Abby. [*Judge Sheldon*] 364 Mansfield St New Haven August 24 1901. Dear Clara; The Galveston Report has just come to me. It is very gratifying to hear of the successful Result of the last field on which you and The Red Cross continue to win laurels. The only draw back is the fear I have that it has cost you so much labor and pain that ought certainly to be spared you. I could not but hope that in some wise prudent and judicious way the worst and most wearingcame home at the end of the month feeling very much improved - The Institution is located in South [Manch] Lancaster and is under the direction of the 7th day Adventists - a branch of their great Central Establishment at Battle Creek Mich - They have 57 [affilated] affiliated institutions [and] scattered all over the world - This Institution is under the care of Dr C. C. [Picola?] and his very capable wife - Here almost at the door of your [South] North Oxford home is a place better than Dansville (Abby says) where you can go when you can get a chance to loaf Dear Clara. We looked for you for days and weeks in the early summer but you came not here. Why was it and will you never come? Yours as of old Abby wearing of the burdens might be transferred to others - I am not desirous of increasing in any direction my own burdens and could not but feel that you must be as tired and anxious for some quiet and rest as I have felt during the last year or two - I have been compelled for the first time in my life to take a month "off" for rest and recuperation - Abby went with me up into Worcester County to a Hydropathic Establishment there - one of the best in the Country to take the Rest Cure and we both and invite your soul [you] and can do so among the old familiar surroundings of Massachusetts - I am sorry to hear that Dr Hubbell is also broken down in health - Give him my cordial regards. Where is he? I hear nothing from Stephen I dont know any better good fortune than to have had him with you in Galveston except indeed the Great endowment of the Red Cross that some sensible Millionaire ought long since to have given for the human race - How did Mr Atwell succeed? I have never heard directly as to his work except that Mrs Muzzy that for some transactions she "called him down" a trifle. With the old regard I am Yours Joseph Sheldon We hoped to see you while you were in Meriden. Elizabeth reported meeting you in the cars - We thought surely we should see you here - [*25 [altiluce?]*] JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*Judge Sheldon -*] EXCHANGE BUILDING - 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS, 215 & 216. [*Ans. Jan - 16 - 1902*] New Haven, Conn. Dec 7 1901. My Dear Clara; The Postal inviting me to attend the meeting at Glen Echo on Sunday or Monday and at The Arlington on Tuesday Dec 10 at 3 P.M. has just this moment come to me. Abby and I have just returned from a ten days visit to Syracuse and Watertown and Carthage. We planned to be home a day sooner than we arrived so that I might arrange to be in N-Y- to-day and come on to-morrow Sunday - with Stephen. I could not get ready to go before Monday and will be in Glen Echo Monday Evening. Whatever will be most satisfactory to you will be satisfactory to me in regard to your connection with the Red Cross. I have been so good for nothing in my health that I have been glad to throw off every responsibility even in my private business but I am much better now and can help a trifle to carry out what you wish - Yours Joseph Sheldon BOARD OF CONSULTATION: PRESIDENT OF THE U.S. AND MEMBERS OF THE CABINET. EXECUTIVE OFFICERS: WASHINGTON, D.C. CLARA BARTON, PRESIDENT. BRAINARD N. WARNER, VICE-PRESIDENT. STEPHEN E. BARTON, 2ND VICE-PRESIDENT. ELLEN S. MUSSEY, 3RD VICE-PRESIDENT AND COUNSEL. WALTER P. PHILLIPS, GENERAL SECRETARY. WILLIAM J. FLATNER, TREASURER. THE AMERICAN NATIONAL RED CROSS. INCORPORATED UNDER THE LAWS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, OCTOBER 1, 1881, APRIL 17, 1893, AND BY SPECIAL ACT OF CONGRESS, JUNE 6, 1900. FOR THE RELIEF OF SUFFERING BY WAR, PESTILENCE, FAMINE, FLOOD, FIRES, AND OTHER CALAMITIES OF SUFFICIENT MAGNITUDE TO BE DEEMED NATIONAL IN EXTENT. THE ORGANIZATION ACTS UNDER THE GENEVA TREATY, THE PROVISIONS FOR WHICH WERE MADE IN INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION AT GENEVA, SWITZERLAND, AUGUST 22, 1864, AND SINCE SIGNED BY NEARLY ALL CIVILIZED NATIONS, INCLUDING THE UNITED STATES, WHICH GAVE ITS ADHESION MARCH 1, 1882. RATIFIED BY THE CONGRESS OF BERNE, JUNE 9, 1882. PROCLAIMED BY PRESIDENT ARTHUR JULY 26, 1882. ___________ 1901 190 [*Sheldon*] Dear Brother Joseph:- I send you some enclosures which your legal mind might be interested in overlooking. I am also wondering if Inauguration will not bring you here. I hope before that time to be able to send you a half-rate B. & O. ticket, which makes you only $3. each way from New York. I hope to have some other friends here, as for instance - Stevy and I hope his wife, Mrs. Reed of Boston and I have a wee little hope of the Gardners. I think they would all like to discuss matters with you more than anyone else. You know my house is large and I can make you all plainly comfortable and any other friends one might like to bring. Let me hope to see you at our little coterie- it has been so long that I have not seen you. The winter has been very mild here and only for a kind of March wind, the days even now are springlike. I recall a fourth of March, I have forgotten if it were Buchanan or Lincoln, when it was so hot here in Washington that no wraps could be worn and all fires in the house were put out and not rekindled that season. I remember another which was a blizzard; but let us hope for the former and come and see if it is not so. Note: This same typescript letter, without the Red Cross letterhead, was sent from Glen Echo by Clara to Joseph Sheldon, and is dated Feb 20 [190]1. It appears on p. 195. JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*25 ...*] [*Judge Sheldon*] EXCHANGE BUILDING 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS 215 & 216. New Haven, Conn. January [21?] 1902 Dear Clara; The Report you sent came some days ago but never came under my eyes till this morning. I remembered the substance of it as delivered to us last month. I am gratified both at to its substance and to its manner of statement. Both are excellent. It has been a source of pleasure to me to have helped "knock out" the attempt to rule out the proxy vote - I was sorry to have Stephen decline to go on. But perhaps it was well enough this year to quite annihilate all claim that the "trouble" was of his making. Next year he can be reinstated and he ought to be and I dont think the ambitious pretender will then object to such a [movement?] But whether she does or does not he ought to be voted in and be persuaded to stay as long as it will be agreeable to you. We are all well and going on after the old manner. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon Glen Echo, Maryland. January 16, 1902. Judge Joseph Sheldon, New Haven, Conn. My dear Judge: I have never written to thank you for the pains you took to come to the annual meeting when you were barely fit to be there. I was alarmed at the risk you took and held my breath until I heard that you had escaped pneumonia. I have wanted all the time to write and tell you how warmly your few words, uttered with such difficulty, were received and how important a point they carried. I thanked you over and over for that as well as the fact of your being there at all. So far as the extinction of the Board was concerned, the meeting was a success. Beyond that, I have nothing to say. It was a great grief to me that I was not better able to carry my part, but did not fail to give warning and begged to be excused. I have sent out my little report hasty and poor as it was, as a holiday greeting, wgich I hope you received. Dr. Hubbell is here and we are both very well this winter. Hoping the same for you and yours, I am, Very sincerely, Clara Barton JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*33 No ans required.*] EXCHANGE BUILDING 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS, 215 & 216. [*Judge Sheldon*] New Haven, Conn. July 17 1902. My dear Clara; I have just returned from a three months absence on the Pacific Coast. I find awaiting my return your letter written from Berlin Abby kept it here (not knowing exactly where to send it to me) for fear it might get lost as I was constantly moving from place to place - I send this to Glen Echo for you may in fact have returned and if not, they at the Head Quarters, will know better than any one else where to send it. It gives me great pleasure to know that two friends of mine in far off Berlin had a pleasant hour begun possibly by allusions to me. I should very much like to see you and compare notes in regard to the new recruits and their methods. I heard somethings that might interest you as they interest us all. You have had experience of the new attachés. I was particularly that Mr Tillinghast who did so much and so well in the days of the Russian famine and its relief could be with you this year. It was a fitting recognition of work well and worthily done. Abby tells me she wants to know if you can not come this way this Summer and make us [*Fanny B. Sheldon Ansd. Sept 5. 1902 33*] New Haven. Conn Sept 2nd 1902 My Dear Friend,; The papers say that you are in Meriden. While I do not believe much I see in them, I have a hope that you are some where in New England and that you mean to make us that long deferred visit before you go South again. Therefore I send out this "tracer" to see if it can find you. Joseph is away on a short trip this week, but I shall look for him back on Saturday. a good long visit after the fashion of the old days. I am really very grateful for all the days she is spared to us. They have been very many more than I could have expected. Her heart grows weaker and I am constantly in fear that it may suddenly fail altogether. You may not have heard that my brother Mark in San Francisco died on the first day of June this year of this same trouble of the heart. I was with him for three or four weeks before his death. During my absence it seems that Stephen and Myrtis have both called at our house. I should have been glad to see them. Now let us have one more at least good visit of the old sort before we go onward into the "Supreme Silence". Here is cool shade and all that makes the country seem made by God and the city made by man. Let us loaf and invite our souls and drive our good "Ned" to the neighboring hill tops and "enjoy religion". Give my cordial regards to the Doctor and to all who love and interest you. With great cordiality I remain Yours Joseph Sheldon. He was away in California when the beautiful letter you wrote him from Berlin came. I read and enjoyed it and then read it for him on his return. I think he has replied to it. How delightful it would be to have you spend a few days with us during this fine month of September. Can it not be that you will do so? Yours most truly Abby Barker [*25 proxy*] Glen Echo, Md. November 4th, 1902. Judge Joseph Sheldon, New Haven, Conn. Dear Brother Joseph:- Mr. Atwater sends me your proxy and your letter to him as well. I expected, of course, that you would be at the meeting, and I wanted you to be in working armor to say what should be said to such as it should be said to, without fear or favor, even if it be me. I have about seventy proxies and there are clearly ten or twelve more to come. I should like of all things, a few days with you and Abbie, but dear old New England is so generous to me, giving me always more than I ask for: I am now speaking just above a whisper for what she vouchsafed me last month; she is a blessed old but just a little hard on her progeny. Give a whole box of love to Abbie, and that includes all the bigger and lesser ones, that throng the beautiful home. Affectionately yours, Clara JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*25 proxy*] EXCHANGE BUILDING 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS 215 & 216. New Haven, Conn. Oct 30 1902 - My Dear Mr Atwater; Yours with a blank proxy came to me a day or two ago. I intend to be present at the next meeting (annual) of the Red Cross. It will be something decidedly out of the ordinary run of affairs if I am not present at that meeting - But for abundant caution I return the blank proxy with Clara Barton named as my proxy to act for me in case any unforeseen occurrence shall prevent my being there in person or any person she may designate. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*Came to meeting Dec 1902*] [*25 annual*] EXCHANGE BUILDING, 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS 215 & 216. New Haven, Conn. Dec 6 1902. Dear Clara; Yours has just come to me. I should be glad to be with you and the friends of the Red Cross over Sunday, but I have some important business engagements for Monday next in New York. After that interruption of my progress south I shall probably go on to Washington arriving Monday night or Tuesday morning - Whatever program is thought by the friends there to be best I shall certainly acquiesce in and possibly may be able to lend a helping hand to in the way of advocacy. I never have failed in that part of the work. Give my cordial regards to all the friends there assembled. Yours truly Joseph Sheldon [*Judge Shelden, - Ansd Feb. 28. 1903*] [*(Confidential) 25*] New Haven February 22 1903. My Dear Clara; Stephen wrote to me asking if I would accept an appointment as one of the Committee on Reorganization. I hastily expressed my wish and strong inclination to accept it. But on reflection I must decline it on account of my health that though somewhat restored is such that I find myself unable to endure any protracted work and therefore must decline the honor for which I thank you most abundantly. Yours as Ever. Joseph Sheldon JOSEPH SHELDON, COUNSELLOR AT LAW, REAL ESTATE. [*Joseph Shelden April 10 - 1903 I went to N. Haven*] [*25 bs*] EXCHANGE BUILDING, 121 CHURCH ST., ROOMS 215 & 216. New Haven, Conn. April 9 1903. My Dear Clara; I have just received a pamphlet from Miss Mabel Boardman with some "interesting addenda" - "very interesting" I see she puts it. Some of those are Mrs Logan's letters and the names of the old opponents - Mr Ogden, Spencer Trask and Mrs Whitlaw Reid and a lot of others. I have been thinking of the situation and of what you said on my last visit as to Mr Atwell and his suggestion. Think of it this way - The proposition of Mr Wardwell at the Annual Election is before the Red Cross national. The members may naturally expect some action under it. By and through that Committee which you were empowered to appoint and have in fact appointed in part or in whole the new extension can be accomplished along such lines as you through them can suggest. But there is no time to be lost as it seems to me now. I for one of that designated Committee do not know whether the members talked of when I was Glen Echo, Md. January 20, 1904. Judge Joseph Sheldon, New Haven, Connecticut. My dear Joseph:- Thanking you for your letter of last week, I enclose copy of letter from Senator Proctor, to Mr. Briggs, which letter makes all needed explanations. I need only recall to you the circumstance of Senator Proctor having to declined to serve as Trustee because Mr. John W. Foster refused. I had an informal meeting yesterday with some members of the Executive Committee, notably, Mr. Briggs, Mr. Degraw and Mr. Baker, the [...?] of whom are persons on whom I must rely for advice, although not of the Executive Committee. It was decided the Mr. Briggs call personally upon Mr. Proctor, and later members of the Executive Committee will hold a more formal meeting with him, getting from him the plans of procedure of the Committee of Investigation. I have named these little incidentals simply to induct you into the part which the committee desire you to take, viz., that you act as our counsel & advisor before and at the investigation. I think Steve will write you in regard to this also. He has greatly lightened and gladdened my heart by the action which he proposes to take - I only wish I could sendlast in New York and ready to undertake the talk they were expected to undertake to do - Mr Wardwell's illness - he was too ill to see on both occasions of my calling at his house - puts an obstruction in the way of any activity on the part of any one else on the Committee taking the responsibility of calling the committee together and of laying out the work to be done and beginning it. He protested at the annual meeting against being on the Committee at all and your statement that he intends to go to Europe as soon as he is well enough and so as to be unable to do anything about the business proposed seems to me to fairly compel you to substitute some one else who might act and call the Committee together and lay out the work as I have said and begin it - If that was known and it should be set forth as what was to be done by a committee the country [would?] have confidence in - and was in process of being done I think it would do much to put a quietus on the whole crowd and all their plottings - Now they have the President half or more committed to their side and [madd] irritated by the suspension or expulsion of their adherents I really think it is worth our while to use this committee and other active agents in the direction of actually providing for the extension or reorganization This will be your Committee and not Mr Atwell's hundred millionaires' Committee which may not be yours at at all. Think of it & let me know the result - Yours Joseph Sheldon Judge Sheldon. -2- you a copy of his letter, which through Mrs. Hines I may be able to do. The Committee will inform Mr. Proctor that we will provide our own [...] typewriter. You will be glad to know that Miss Halstead, with her usual alacrity, proposes a Red Cross exhibit, at St. Louis; and to day we appoint Gen. Noble, as chairman of the move - we also appoint Miss Halstead and the partner of the General, in St. Louis. This is done in the knowledge that the Red Cross has no money for this purpose, but Miss Halstead asks the privilege to raise it themselves. They will try to find space, while it is hoped that we can send some things of interest, to make a very passable exhibit. I hardly call this a letter - it is simply some random thoughts, to put you in line with what we are doing, and to let you know that nolens volens we are going to depend upon you as a main spoke. Therefore, dear Joseph, gird up your loins for the attack, and we will make one more strike - as in ye olden days. With dear love to all the household, I am, Affectionately yours, Clara Barton[*25 Her attitude..?*] Copy. Glen Echo, Md. February 22, 1904. Dear Brother Joseph:- Your good letter the 17th is with me, and I perfectly comprehend its import, and how earnestly you feel the truth of your suggestions - and realize how sympathetically I take in the fact that your physical strength does not admit of more than your own calls upon it. Who better than I can take this in. I, who twenty years ago could not wear my own weight nor carry a thought beyond my own. I have always known that those conditions were given me to compel me to feel the existence of them in others, and I do. I would not have burdened one day to your harm - for all this poor thing is worth. In fact it is worth nothing. I am not worrying about it. I do not care who "fights" so it is not I - and it will not be. I will submit everything to the Board of Trustees, and be most happy to abide by any decisxion they may make - I think they already know this. Concerning the great odds against me - they have left me little to fear from them. The so called "Government" - the "Newspapers" the "able" "rich" and "ambitious" can do no more than they have done; in the face of the American people they dare not: or if they can, I do not care for it any more. They have gone down to bed rock with me, Joseph; they have probed the grit in my nature - it will stand their drills. When I am too tired of it there are other countries; even though they may not be "God's country" they may be mine. -2- Concerning the great war about to come - or liable to; That should not trouble me; I am no stranger to wars, nor to the people making them; neither to the International Head - that gives me my laws to act under. They know I will hold to neutrality and to the honor of its flag, and do not fear to trust me. I shall not attempt to run a few nurses out to one side or the other, for a bit of notoriety, but will hold our Red Cross horse by the bits; till there is a load for him to draw. I shall immediately notify the States, through their Governors, and Treasurers, who are pledged to us, that they, the State, can raise money, if they desire, for equal relief - that their State Treasurer will receive it and transmit it to our National Treasurer, to be equally dispensed between Russia and Japan. If later, a call for nurses comes, we can provide all that transportation can be had for. They apply in scores and we hold them in readiness. Our regular work is going on steadily - self supporting and gaining. As for the investigation - we are ready for it, when it opens - let it result as it may. I feel that some one will be found to say the needful things, if not, and in all this wide- mouthed country not one will open for the poor little cause I am thought to represent, I should suppose I would be allowed to tell my own story; it will be true and straight forwarded, and the judges will decide and I abide. When I can with dignity and respectability step out from under my little load, I shall be glad to do so; I cannot dodge out under fire, I am not made up-3- My officers all know my position, when they want me to change it I am sure they will have the truth and the courage to tell me so, and I shall be glad to give them all the knowledge of the subject I have gained, and which they will need in order to conduct the affaire properly. I shall not come in conflict with the Government for I know my duties too well to give opportunity; And now Joseph, let us take courage - and God be with us to the end. With dear love to all the household, as always, Yours, [*Mrs Judge Sheldon Ansd - February 26 - 1904.*] New Haven. Conn Feb 24" 1904 My Dear Clara. Joseph has been for five days confined to the house - I might almost say confined to his bed with that prevailing scourge the Grip. We have feared pneumonia but while he coughs badly, he suffers more from a very distressed feeling in his head, which relieves us somewhat from the dread of pneumonia. His chief anxiety all thetime is about the Red Cross matter he had promised to help you about. It is now certain that he will be absolutely unable to do anything about it, and he feels that there ought to be no delay in letting you know this that you may have time to make other plans. I shall not try to tell you how sorry I am to be the bearer of a new burden to lay upon your already greatly over-burdened shoulders. I must trust you to believe in my sincerity and my sympathy Abby Barker. February 26, 1904. My dear, dear Abby Barker:- Your letter is just here, and I cannot tell you how sorry I am, both that Joseph is so poorly, and still more that he is worrying about me. I want to assure both him and you, that there is no need of it. I am not worrying about myself. I wrote this to Joseph a day or two ago, trying to make him feel that I was strong enough to meet the emergency without help - and that if I could not meet it well I could meet it ill, and that it did not make much difference to me which way. I meant to say moreover, that when the need comes, as I presume it will, I think a good lawyer will come to see it through. Such an offer has been made; the thought was of course to help Judge Sheldon; but if Joseph is not able to come I think the man will come and take the laboring oar. It was noble and kind - so kind of Joseph to offer to take up the defense, and no one could do it so well, for no one knows it as he does, or would be so watchful - but if a stranger knowing little of the Red Cross but more of law, will put hand to the plough, I will be satisfied only to receive, (if he feels like it) once in a while a word of warning from Joseph. Tell Joseph that the gentleman to whom I refer is of [*Abby Sheldon*] [*February 1904*] New Haven. Conn Feb 29" 1904 Dearest Clara. Your beautiful letter of the 26" came this morning. It is lovely of you to make it so comparatively easy for Joseph to drop out. He is sufficiently grieved and humiliated to be obliged to do so, but we all realize that he must and his Doctor emphatically enjoins it. The report today is that the fever has left him. The racking cough and the bad feeling in his head are not-yet-perceptibly better. It is without doubt a clear case of Grippe which is so prevalent this year. I have had it surely three times-2- of Kansas - not Mr. Ridgely but probably as good a legal man as he would be - and a friend of General Sears. Now about Joseph's illness; it must be a form of epidemic that is passing over the country. In our home it took three off their feet from two to three weeks; nearly the same symptoms in each case: sore throat, threatened pneumonia, aching bones and a terrible headache, fever, back ache, sometimes chills Dr. Hubbell, Mrs. Hines and Mrs. Colonel Hinton, who is staying here. Captain Houghton, our next neighbor had it first and could not be saved. Miss Adams, our housekeeper and myself, alone escaped. I have no doubt but Joseph is better by this time. If it were not so far, and if I had not so many little nothings on hand, I should run up and try to console him. Do, dear Abby, try to make him feel that it is all right, and that I don't care for the plight they put me in. They can't hurt me - life, limb or property. Why should I fear for anything else. Of course they can do their best towards pulling down a bit of reputation, but what of that? I shall have all that rightfully belongs to me - more I do not want - less they cannot give - "For Lo! my own shall come to me." I hope the epidemic does not go through your family and please let me know how Joseph is? Give my love to all, both great and small. Always lovingly, Clara Barton. within the past nine years, and I know how sick it makes one feel and how mentally depressed. It has to run a certain course. In the light of my own experience, I do not look for any rapid or speedy improvement in Joseph's condition. But with the good care I expect him to have we must bring out triumphantly by and by. It is very hard on you to loose just now any possible help. But how accustomed you are to hard - very hard positions. I can only hope you will triumph over all now, as you have done many times so gloriously in the past. In my great love now & always Abby Barker [*25 - ..?*] [*1904*] New Haven Conn Sat 3.P.M. Dearest Clara. Joseph started at 1 oclock for Washington. He fears he can do you no good, but will be on hand to try. As his nurse - perhaps as his physician also, I charged him not to try to write anything. Ever since the nervous break-downs he has had the past few years, nothing seems to undo him so certainly as writing. I believe he can be of use to the other Attorneys by talking with them and by suggestion. We never know in such cases just whose word or which word has been most helpful. I know of no way except for each to make our little contribution and then trust. These are dreadful days for you and I fear even you will not be able to bear them. But you say you "never retire under fire" and I hope this trial will be no exception. Yours in all sympathy Abby Barker.