Title: Two Autograph Letters Signed - 1856-57 Lonely woman emigrant in San Jose Author: Kelly, Mrs. Joseph Place: San Jose City Publisher: Date: May 18, 1856 Description: 2 Autograph Letters Signed to her brother, Atreus McCollum, an Illinois farmer. “Santeclary Co.”, San Jose City, May 18, 1856. 1 pg. “ I would give you a short history of my life in California. It has not been a very pleasant one so far though I have enjoyed good health. I have not seen much of the Country yet I am well pleased with what I have seen but when I arrived here I had only two dollars and had to go to work or go hungry so I have been serving in a milliner shop ever since…I left…now more than five months. I have had one letter from my husband, he told me he would be here by the first of May or be in his grave. O dear brother, you don’t know what trouble is, if Jo started the first of april, I have no hope of ever seeing him again, when that months passingers was crossing the Isthmus, there was a riot there and more than fifty of the passingers was killed. Dear brother…my courage fails, my heart is too full of grief, I cannot write, the tears will blind my eyes…god only knows how lonely I am…; and ALS, San Jose, Calif. Jan. 11, [1857]. 4pp. To her brother : “I have never received one scratch of a pen from you since I left home…more than a year…Father wrote to me that you had sold your farm, then I could not help kindling hope that you would come to California next spring…Cal. is the Eden of the world, it is the Isrealits promised land come and join us and live in the hope that you will never die and commune with the spirit of our savior and our dear mother…I entreat to you to search into the works of Spiritualism…I do sincerely believe that the time is near approaching when evil, sickness, sorrow will be removed and heaven and earth will be one…I am well at present and earning 30 dollars per month. I board with a very nice [?] in a private house. I… have more work engaged than I can possible do if I sew day and night for one year. I have herd from my husband he is coming a rouny the horn. I expect him every day…Tell my Father I am still his disobedient daughter… tell Ma to weep no more for me that I will soon be happy….” The lot also includes an unrelated 1855 legal document of her brother’s in McHenry, Illinois. The first letter refers to the riots which broke out in April 1856 in Panama, in which many American passengers bound for California across the Isthumus were killed by natives. Whether Mrs. Kelly was ever reunited with her husband in the “Eden of the world” is unknown. Lot Amendments Condition: Browned and yellowed; good to very good. Item number: 248865
Title: Two Autograph Letters Signed - 1856-57 Lonely woman emigrant in San Jose Author: Kelly, Mrs. Joseph Place: San Jose City Publisher: Date: May 18, 1856 Description: 2 Autograph Letters Signed to her brother, Atreus McCollum, an Illinois farmer. “Santeclary Co.”, San Jose City, May 18, 1856. 1 pg. “ I would give you a short history of my life in California. It has not been a very pleasant one so far though I have enjoyed good health. I have not seen much of the Country yet I am well pleased with what I have seen but when I arrived here I had only two dollars and had to go to work or go hungry so I have been serving in a milliner shop ever since…I left…now more than five months. I have had one letter from my husband, he told me he would be here by the first of May or be in his grave. O dear brother, you don’t know what trouble is, if Jo started the first of april, I have no hope of ever seeing him again, when that months passingers was crossing the Isthmus, there was a riot there and more than fifty of the passingers was killed. Dear brother…my courage fails, my heart is too full of grief, I cannot write, the tears will blind my eyes…god only knows how lonely I am…; and ALS, San Jose, Calif. Jan. 11, [1857]. 4pp. To her brother : “I have never received one scratch of a pen from you since I left home…more than a year…Father wrote to me that you had sold your farm, then I could not help kindling hope that you would come to California next spring…Cal. is the Eden of the world, it is the Isrealits promised land come and join us and live in the hope that you will never die and commune with the spirit of our savior and our dear mother…I entreat to you to search into the works of Spiritualism…I do sincerely believe that the time is near approaching when evil, sickness, sorrow will be removed and heaven and earth will be one…I am well at present and earning 30 dollars per month. I board with a very nice [?] in a private house. I… have more work engaged than I can possible do if I sew day and night for one year. I have herd from my husband he is coming a rouny the horn. I expect him every day…Tell my Father I am still his disobedient daughter… tell Ma to weep no more for me that I will soon be happy….” The lot also includes an unrelated 1855 legal document of her brother’s in McHenry, Illinois. The first letter refers to the riots which broke out in April 1856 in Panama, in which many American passengers bound for California across the Isthumus were killed by natives. Whether Mrs. Kelly was ever reunited with her husband in the “Eden of the world” is unknown. Lot Amendments Condition: Browned and yellowed; good to very good. Item number: 248865
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
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