Letter from Judge Henry C. Hammond to Amy, June 14, 1940 (page 3 — closing)

Closing page of Henry C. Hammond’s June 14, 1940 letter to Amy. Hammond mis-headed this ‘Page #2’ but content continuity (page 007 ends ‘men-’, this page begins ‘tion’) confirms it is actually page 3. The letter ends with Hammond’s autograph signature. He notes the gravestones of Christopher and Catherine FitzSimons in the abandoned ‘Cottage’ cemetery near his town (Augusta) and offers to copy the inscriptions if legible — the inscriptions Amy already had from W. Huger FitzSimons’s earlier memorandum, transcribed on page 003. The closing ‘Goodby’ is Hammond’s spelling without the trailing ‘e’ (the capital G appears overstruck, as if first typed wrong and corrected at the machine); the typist’s ‘hear this town’ is a typo for ‘near this town’. Ghosted bleed-through at the top edge of the scan is the back of the next leaf, not part of this page.

The opening fragment “tion Susy” continues from page 007’s closing “There was another worthy of men-” → “mention. Susy, clever as sin, but Oh, God, an uplifter.” “Susy” is most likely Susan Milliken Barker — page 007 introduces her as “Susan Barker, sister of Theo. Barker” — though Hammond does not make the identification explicit. The typewritten “hear this town” is almost certainly intended as “near this town”; Hammond writes from Augusta, Georgia, and the “Cottage” burial ground (where Christopher and Catherine FitzSimons are buried — see page 003) lies on the Sandersville road about seven miles outside the city. “C. and C. Fitzsimmons” are Christopher (the emigrant, 1762–1825) and his wife Catherine Pritchard FitzSimons (1772–1841); the inscriptions Hammond offers to copy are the same ones W. Huger FitzSimons had already recorded on page 003. The “HCH/r” notation is the standard secretarial mark — Henry C. Hammond’s letter, typed by an assistant whose initial was “r”.