Cross-written letter, 'Dear Sir,' Walhalla, 30 July (page 1)
Book 1, Page 91
Transcription
A handwritten letter, page 1, on light blue lined paper. Brown ink in a sloping cursive. The text is densely cross-written: a second layer of writing runs perpendicular to the primary lines, making nearly the entire body illegible.
Walhalla 30 July
Dear Sir
[The body of the letter is heavily cross-written and largely illegible. Scattered legible phrases include references to “Walhalla,” what may be “25 miles,” and “the Charleston [illegible].” A fragment near the foot reads: “cloak & umbrella kept him dry & he is only [illegible].”]
[The letter continues in cross-writing — perpendicular to the original direction. The page reads upright when rotated 90 degrees clockwise. The cross-writing appears to be a postscript or running continuation of the same letter, in the same brown ink and hand. Many words remain uncertain.]
I have found a basket of Peaches [illegible] which it will make some [winter?] preserve for you & to don’t use [brown?] sugar for that compote. Nell knows how you like them made. I had a pattern [illegible] they [illegible] I had hoped [for the?] three letters [illegible] for the last mail but failed — [illegible] father has gone to stay at Cashier’s Valley [uncertain] [illegible] elsewhere perhaps for the return. Charles & Smith[?], Kate & Miss Wigfall, [Susie?] [&] little Sunshine at the [Mill?]. [Miss?] [Misses] Adams & three Misses North from Pendleton & [illegible]. They send [Sandy?] [illegible] in [illegible] mountain at the [Sumner?] Hill left early this [30?]. [Emily?] Johnston came [illegible] same [time?]. [Visit?] her cousins [the Miss?] Bonneau — She returns tomorrow [illegible] Miss the boys [illegible] near all of us [yrs ever?] / love from / EB
AI Notes
Page 1 of a heavily cross-written letter in brown ink. Horizontal layer datelined ‘Walhalla 30 July,’ beginning ‘Dear Sir,’ and signed (in the cross-writing) ‘EB.’ The perpendicular cross-writing reads as a continuation of the same letter — chatty domestic news naming Charleston-area summer visitors at upcountry retreats (Pendleton, Cashier’s Valley) including the Misses Wigfall, Adams, North, and Bonneau, and someone called Emily Johnston. The writer also mentions a basket of peaches and giving instructions about making preserves or compote. Many words remain uncertain owing to the dense crossed strokes.
Cross-writing — filling a sheet horizontally, rotating it ninety degrees, and writing a second layer perpendicular to the first — was a common nineteenth-century device for economizing on paper and postage, used most intensively in the United States during the Civil War (1861–1865) when both were scarce. The dateline “Walhalla” places the writer at the German-colonization town in Oconee County that became a standard Lowcountry refuge during the Union blockade and bombardment of Charleston. The recovered cross-writing names of Pendleton (upcountry SC summer resort) and “Cashier’s Valley” (Cashiers Valley, NC — a long-standing Charleston mountain retreat) together with the cluster of Charleston surnames — Wigfall, Adams, North, Bonneau, Johnston — reinforce the picture of an extended Lowcountry family network displaced to the upcountry and western North Carolina mountains.
Letter likely continues on next page.