Describes a letter from his mother and a letter to Elizabeth Gouverneur from a slave waiter she met while traveling in the South. Transcription: butcher's store. Letters from my mother [Naomi Butler Gunn] and Rosa [Gunn], on my return to [132] Bleecker St. The former has been to Guildford, for a fortnight's visit to my uncle, whom she describes as 'getting' quite grey, looking old and careworn.' His wife, Mapleson's sister (I always think of her in that relationship ? not a pleasant one) is 'quite an invalid, always lying on the sofa.' 'Eight children at home, three away.' My father [Samuel
Describes a letter from his mother and a letter to Elizabeth Gouverneur from a slave waiter she met while traveling in the South. Transcription: butcher's store. Letters from my mother [Naomi Butler Gunn] and Rosa [Gunn], on my return to [132] Bleecker St. The former has been to Guildford, for a fortnight's visit to my uncle, whom she describes as 'getting' quite grey, looking old and careworn.' His wife, Mapleson's sister (I always think of her in that relationship ? not a pleasant one) is 'quite an invalid, always lying on the sofa.' 'Eight children at home, three away.' My father [Samuel Gunn] who was 'greatly shocked' to think of my mother's 'leaving him' for this much needed holiday 'scarcely gets up all day,' so they have a most melancholy time of it.' I should think so. William Bolton and George Gardiner have visited them, and Sarah Ann [Bolton] stayed eight weeks. Writing during the afternoon and evening. Saw a letter written by a slave-waiter at Savannah to Mrs [Elizabeth] Gouverneur. The confounded woman had evidently been flattering the poor fellow in her loose, lying way with a prospect of purchasing his freedom. He wrote in a fairish schoolboy hand with capitals at the commencement of the lines, but correct spelling, reminding her of 'what she promised,' adding, 'O, I will remember you!' 'Twas half amorous withal. D__n the woman. The barbarity of the thing. Of course she won't answer it ? indeed she can't either spell or write decently, and generally gets other women to do such tasks. Rawson [Gill] showed me the letter: he half designed answering it, telling the poor fellow he was better off down south. Assuredly if Rawson's Title: Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries: Volume 10, page 187, April 18, 1859 . 18 April 1859. Gunn, Thomas Butler, 1826-1903
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