Letter from Edna Saunders, Fort George, Fla., Sept. 12, 1944 — sheet 1
Book 2, Page 176 ·1944
Transcription
A pencil-written letter on lined notebook paper, filling the page. Transcribed preserving the writer’s spelling and punctuation:
Fort George, Fla Sept. 12, 1944
My dear Mrs Walker — how are you and Famley well I hope. I am well but ailing. I havent felt well for some time altho I am not sick. just taking lots a tea [uncertain] all of the time. lazy. lies and cofel [uncertain] about what I eat on account of gas all of the time I think of yo[u] all all of the time just as if I was one of yo[u]. Please write and tell me how Miss Dee on Miss Mandy is. how is lovely Little Robert is and chubby little Chris’s. they are so sweet. I cant express just what I think about them. I can see Chris’s little old chubby hand eating supper or dinner that day. and little Robert told me his name so sweet. he is charming and sweet like his mother. she is just as pretty as Ever. I dont think they would I’m afoy [uncertain — “afraid of”?] having me around because I would forget and take them for the same sweet little girls I usto know. smile!
AI Notes
Album page consisting of a single sheet of letter paper, written in pencil on lined notebook stock, mounted to fill the page. The letter is in a careful but unpracticed cursive hand with idiosyncratic spelling, run-together words, and minimal punctuation. Edna Saunders, formerly a servant in the family’s Savannah household, writes from Fort George, Florida to ‘Mrs. Walker’ — Amy FitzSimons Walker — asking after the family and the grandchildren. ‘Miss Dee’ is Emma Dee Walker Corbell and ‘Miss Mandy’ is Mary Ann Walker McEwan (Amy’s daughters); ‘little Robert’ is Robert Lawrence Corbell III (Dee’s son, b. ca. 1940); ‘little chubby Chris’ is Christopher Gaillard McEwan (Mandy’s son, b. 27 Jun 1942, hence around two years old at the time of writing). The transcription preserves the writer’s spelling and punctuation; several mid-line words are read with low confidence and marked [uncertain].
Edna Saunders writes to Amy FitzSimons Walker from Fort George, Fla., asking after Amy’s daughters Dee (Corbell) and Mandy (McEwan) and their small children — Robert Lawrence Corbell III, and Christopher Gaillard McEwan (born June 1942, hence the “little chubby” two-year-old). The letter appears to be a single sheet; whether it continues on a further leaf is not certain from this album page. The writer’s spelling — “Famley,” “altho,” “afoy,” “usto” — and her practice of running words together have been preserved.