Chatham County, Georgia - Bio: Sarah Laura Wright Beckwith **************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. Files may be printed or copied for personal use only. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. Submitted By: Peter Wilson June 08, 2001 **************************************************************** Sarah Laura Wright Beckwith (1848-1927) Sarah Laura Wright was born 19 March 1848 in Georgia. Sarah Laura's baptismal card gives her parents names, the year 1854, and names Edmund E. Ford as rector at St. Paul's Church, Augusta. Her parents, John Stephen Wright (1819-c.1885) and Mary Isobel Eve (1825-c.1905), were married 26 Jan. 1843 in Baldwin Co. GA. Her father was the son of a family which moved to Milledgeville Georgia, the old capital, from the West Indies. Her mother descended from a Philadelphia Quaker family which waited out the American Revolution in Cat Island and San Salvador, in the Bahamas, before returning to Charleston and Savannah. Claims for restitution of losses suffered by her grandfather, Oswell Eve, on behalf of the Crown during the Revolution are in the MSS.. Collection of Haverford College. The great event of Sarah Laura's childhood was the Civil War. In March 1863 her father was in Cuba, obtaining supplies for the Confederacy. Here are some excerpts from a letter, written in his beautiful hand, to her when she was 15. She was told as a child that, since she was neither pretty nor witty, her chances of matrimony depended upon her being industrious. "Havana, March 21st '63 My dear Sally, I wrote to Lou, then to Perry, and having commenced with the youngest your turn comes next, then Miss Hal will be in order to receive my attention. It is a great pleasure to me in this land of strangers and strange things, to have even an occasional opportunity of communing with my dear ones at home, for while I am writing their images are fresh and clear to my mind, and even their very voices ring familiarly in my ears. Home is before me just as it was the morning I last kissed you all, and so graven is it on my heart that when I awake sometimes early in the morning I can hardly realize but what my absence is, after all, but a dream. "I was very sick two or three weeks ago, and suffered a great deal, having had an acute & painful attack of chill & fever. During the time I had nearly all the days & nights to wait on myself. Often for hours I had no one even to hand me a drink of water, and as for nourishment, I scarcely got any thing fit to eat. O, I had a hard time of it. You know not what I would have given then to have had you, my dear child, at my side for I know how kind & good & loving you would have been to me. God, in His goodness, restored me, and I think I am grateful to Him for it, although I know I am not so much so as I ought to be and I want to be. "While I was sick I made up my mind, that if permitted to get well, I would go immediately home. I thought I couldn't stand it a day longer: but when I did get up I thought it might be wrong, & much prejudicial to my interests. So I CONTENTED? to remain, and here I am. It is now my intention to return in May, as it is dangerous to be here after that time, as the Yellow Fever BEGINS to be epidemic in June. "When I get home I want to see that you have improved much in your studies, and that you still retain your old desire & determination, in stronger degree if possible, to gain all the Knowledge you can. You know I was always proud that you evinced such desire & determination , & how pleased I always was at your efforts in that way. God has endowed you with more than ordinary faculties of mind, my dear child, and I hope and believe that you will not be vain of it, but on the contrary grateful. "Appreciating His goodness, I feel that you will try to fulfil his design in thus endowing you--that you will endeavor to improve daily & hourly, your mind & heart--thus contributing not only to your own pleasure & happiness, but fitting yourself to dispense good to those who may be thrown under your influence * care. "Your light must not be under a bushel, but on a candlestick, that it may give light to all that are in the house." "I trust you are getting on well with your Latin & French. Speak French every opportunity you have, for it is as important--perhaps it may one day be more so to you--to speak than to write or read it. Lay the foundation well in your Latin. When you can get a teacher of Italian, Spanish & German, I shall want you to learn all those languages, not only to read & write, but to SPEAK them. After you learn the Latin & French, I think you could learn the others comparatively easily--the Spanish I think very easy. I have been here only a little over two months, and I can make nearly all my common wants known in that language, & also understand a great deal that is said to me. "My letter to your mother will tell you all the news concerning myself, so it is needless to write you any in this. I want you to write to me and enclose it in your mother's envelope to me & so be sent by the Steamer Alice. Kiss my darling little Lou for father. Please be kind and loving to her for my sake. Love to mother, Grandmother, Aunt Emma [Eve], Hal & Perry, Uncle Joe [Eve], Aunt Annie and all friends. Tell Sarah howdy for me. May she and her husband make a happy pair. Good-bye, my dear Sally. May the good Lord bless preserve & keep you & all the rest of my dear ones at home. Your affectionate father, J. S. W." Sarah Laura's married Thomas Stanley Beckwith, of New Bern NC, on 27 June 1872 at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Augusta Georgia. Mr. Beckwith was a widower, 35 years her senior. He had previously been married to Agnes Ruffin and they had children the same age as Sarah Laura. As a result, he traveled frequently between Augusta and New Bern. It is likely they had a prenuptual agreement to protect the inheritance of his grown children. This companionable marriage ended with his death 22 Aug. 1884. His children by Agnes Ruffin were his primary heirs, so Sarah Laura had to prepare herself to earn a living. She had previously studied Spanish and French, and looked for secretarial and translating work. Thomas Beckwith and Sarah Laura had only one child, Mary Isobel Beckwith, born 21 march 1874. She was called "May Belle" as a child and was doted upon by a household consisting of John Stephen Wright and caring six women. According to the 1880 census the household consisted of Sarah Laura, her parents, John & Mary Isobel, her daughter, May (Belle) Beckwith, her unmarried sister Louisa (Louella?) Wright, her maiden aunt, Emma Eve, and two black servants, Mahala Bettes & Laura Bennister. The maiden aunt, Emma Eve, was famous in the family for using feathers in her embroidery, following examples of Mayan embroidery relatives had brought back from British Honduras. Three of Sarah Laura's four siblings also married: Harriet married William Root, Margaret married Ernest C. Sofge, and William Perry Wright married Hattie Walker. The civil war reverberated throughout Sarah Laura's life. Varina Howell Davis was a family friend since the Civil War. After the war the Wright household helped Varina make a quilt for Jefferson Davis, who was imprisoned alone on a damp island off the coast of Florida. In some sections of the quilt they secreted photos of his family. These eluded his keepers, and gave him hope, although he never fully recovered from the illness of his imprisonment. This is discussed in a letter to Sarah Laura a few years after Davis's release from prison. "Beauvoir House Beauvoir Mississippi 16th Jan. 1887 My Dear little Sallie, My heart smote me dreadfully when your dear letter came, because I had put off writing to you from day to day feeling I could not put off with a short letter, but must write you a good long one, and something always interrupted me and prevented it. I have, my dear child, grown very old ... and the last year has tred(?) on me--very markedly. The best of people must go, so why may not I, who do not claim to belong to that class? Minnie's long absence is beginning to wear upon me a good deal, but thank God she will be at home in February. It is so very dull here that I try to be glad she is not at home. After she has been here a little while she is going up to Chattanooga to visit Mrs. Shackelford, who lives there with her daughter, Mrs. Colyer. I send you a paper with her likeness today, but it is by no means as pretty as she is. How glad I am that you had a pleasant visit to ... Cincinnati. I suppose it is a paradise of China and glass. The New Yorkers are so rich they do not care for the medrinns (sp?) we poor people must get. The Church privileges (sp?) must have given you intense pleasure. I envy you the opportunity. Mr Davis has been fairly well this winter but time tells very much on him in the last three years. Seventy eight is a very long time--on his next birthday he will be on June 6th, 1879. If I could have known this would be granted him when I was breaking down my constitution in the grief of expecting his death in prison, how quietly I should have waited events, but now I am learning the force of "Trust in the Lord, wait patiently upon Him and He will give thee thy heart's desire." Now, my dear, you will see by my writing that I am nervous today, and would not have written but to say how tenderly I love you, and how I should like to see you play upon that range (sp?), the harp of a thousand strings, but unfortunately I do not see my way just now to leaving home. Mr Davis is too old to leave alone and Mt Moriah would be easier moved than he. I use the lovely paper weight you gave me always and think it beautiful independent of the value put upon it by its being my dear little Sallie's gift. I will send you a picture of Minnie as soon as I can get one--of myself there are none. I do not take well, and the only moderately successful one was lost to me by the negative being burned in the artist's gallery. You will be fond of Minnie when you know her, and when you can do so you had better run down and make us a visit. It will do you good. With love to your dear mother, I am dear child, as ever lovingly your friend, V. Davis --give me Dury's (sp?) address." The following note from Varina came in a small black-bordered envelope after the death of Jefferson Davis. It is addressed to Miss S. L. Beckwith, Marietta Ga. "Beauvoir, Miss. Jan. 7th, 1890 My Darling little Sallie, Your dear letter received. I wish I could go to you but unfortunately my duties press on me with such weight that I am paralyzed withe the prospect. The fact is that I am heartbroken and can not work with the will and celerity which flows from hope and expectation of Happiness. I have letters by the THOUSANDS, business pressing for attention, and my poor little Minnie too weak to come home from Paris. I ever I get my head straight I will write to you among the first. I can go nowhere until my work here is done, and when I do not know. Until then know that I dearly love you and never recall you without a thankful sense of your being mine. As ever your devoted friend, V. Jefferson Davis" Sarah Laura writes that in 1892 "I was determined to study Spanish. I knew a little about on account of my father, but I was not perfect in it by any means. I advertised for a teacher, found one and began with all diligence to study. Many of my friends thought me very stupid to study a language which in all probability I should never have any use for. They besought me to turn my attention to German, Italian, pay more attention to French Even Yiddish or modern Greek was more practical, they said. I, however, had made up my mind Spanish was the language I wanted to learn, and I persevered. I had many discouragements, but I never gave up. sometimes I had no one to speak with, but I subscribed for newspapers in that tongue, bought books, wrote and read, taking advantage of any stray Cubans or Spaniards who came along. The war beginning in 1895 brought refugees from Cuba to Savannah, my home for ten years past, and I took advantage of their company on all occasions. Now does it not seem a little strange that being able to speak that tongue gives me the good position I have today? The ways of Providence are strange." During the Spanish American War Sarah Laura answered an advertisement by the Department of War for a bi-lingual secretary for the general staff in Havana, Cuba. She signed her application "S. L. Beckwith." When she received her appointment and arrived for her interview the clerk bridled when he discovered that "S.L. Wright" was not a man. He protested that he could not send a woman into a combat zone, but she pointed out that the fighting was pretty much over and that, since her qualifications had not changed, she expected to be treated like any one else. She got the job. In December 1900 Sarah Laura wrote one her Eve cousins a long newsy letter which is also among the documents I am leaving for the Hubbard Co. collection. Here is an exceprt: "My grandfather [Eve] died many years ago, in his early manhood [before 1830?], leaving a widow and four [living] children. One of these was my mother, Mary Isabel Eve, and she married my father, John [Stephen] Wright, who was from the middle part of Georgia, but his family was from the West Indies. For many years my father had close business relations in Cuba, but never removed his family to this island, our homes being generally in Augusta, Marietta [at the foot of Little Kennesaw Mt.], and Atlanta [but also in Savannah]. In another paragraph she says "I have a mother and sister and nephew living in Savannah." This should be the household of one of her five nephews--William Perry Wright, Sidney & Maryon Root, Theodore & John Sofge--in the 1900 census. "It seems strange that my fortune should be to live now in Havana, returning to the island my father's family was associated with, and to be once more representing our family in the Indies. I was sent for by General Wood as a secretary when he was governor of Santiago, and when he came to Havana as military governor of the Island, I came her likewise. I am a working woman and for this reason I offer no apology for using the typewriter, as the machine is second nature to me now. "I am in General Wood's personal service, and have an office in the oldest building in Havana, the old fortress of La Fuerze, erected, as the inscription states, in 1538. Its appearance is very antique and picturesque, and from my window on one side I look out across the harbor to Morro Castle and Cabana, and on the other side I see the Temple erected on the spot where mass was first said in Cuba, the Palace of the governor and the Plaza des Armas [see photo], besides other notable points. "I have my daughter on the Island. She was a clerk in the Auditor's department until her marriage, last summer, to Arnold Edwin Moody, a nephew of [the evangelist] Dwight Lyman Moody. They live at the barracks nine miles from the city, and the commanding officer also gave me quarters there, and my children keep them in order for me to use when I choose, although on account of my work it is better for me to remain in the town except on Sundays and holidays, which, of course, I spend with them. "The camp is beautifully situated, right on the ocean, and with a lovely view on all sides, sea and hills and blue mountains, and everywhere tall waving royal palms and other tropical growth. The quarters are very pleasant and there is plenty of social life among the officers and their families. I have many Cuban friends likewise, and altogether my life is almost ideal." According to family tradition, before the marriage of her daughter to Rev. Arnold Edwin Moody, a nephew of the evangelist Dwight Lyman Moody and a New Englander, submitted to a polite inquiry to determine if he were a gentleman. To his credit he could recite his ancestors for several generations, and the family of his mother, Ella Burlingame, were early Quaker settlers in Providence RI and distantly related to General Nathanial Greene. The Yankee minister passed muster. The marriage was celebrated on 28 July 1900 in Havana. Their invitation states they will be at home, 67 Prado, after September first, following the fever season. Their eldest child, Alexander, was born in Havana in 1901. Throughout WWI and afterward Sarah Laura worked as a translator for the War Department. In June of 1922 she received a certificate signed by Herbert Putnam, head of the Library of Congress, thanking her for the latest of her translations into revised braille, a novel "Partners" in two volumes by Margaret Deland. It would be interesting to read the novel, to see what sort of fiction struck her as most uplifting to translate for the soldiers. We have a newspaper an article published 18 Jan. 1924 in an unknown newspaper praising her for compiling the first French-English dictionary in Braille. The newspaper was in Aledo IL, Emporia KS or Muskogee OK, whichever town Rev. Moody served as a Presbyterian pastor in 1924. The writer praises Sarah Laura Wright Beckwith for her translations. It reads: "THIS WOMAN COMPILED FIRST FRENCH-ENGLISH DICTIONARY FOR BLIND And She Did It so That Soldier Who Lost Sight in War Might Study Foreign Language The compiler of the only French and English Braille dictionary in the World "This is the distinction of Mrs. Sarah Laura Becksith of Washington D. C., who is visiting her daughter, Mrs. A. E. Moody and the Reverend Moody [at] 528 North Sixth Street." This was one of 3 addresses they had in Muskogee. Reverand Moody had been minister there from 1 Jan. 1921 until his death 3 Aug. 1928. The Moodys arrived in Muskogee in June 1921, after school closed in Galesburg, Illinois. "Braille is the system of raised letters used internationally in teaching the blind. Mrs. Beckwith has spent several years working with the blind, and since the war has devoted her efforts with the blind soldiers. Upon the request of a former service man, who had been blinded by gas, for a French dictionary with English translation that a blind student might study, Mrs. Beckwith investigated and found there was none. So she immediately began compiling one. "Mrs. Beckwith holds the international certificated for instruction for the blind that was presented to her at an international meeting in Toronto. [She] is a translator in the war department and her home is in Washington. She has been in this work 20 years and is eligible for retirement but was held over for service upon the special application of the Secretary of War. She is the only woman ever held over after her term of retirement. "She speaks five languages and was detailed to Cuba during the administration of Gen. Leonard Wood as Lieutenant Governor. At the next intervention she was held over also. She holds the highest decoration that the Red Cross gave for service during the war." Sarah Laura came to Park Rapids several times from 1913 until her death in 1927, to spend summers with her daughter in their little cottage on the south shore of Big Sand Lake. When they lived in Kansas, they traveled up the Jefferson Highway [Hwy. 71] from Missouri. I do not have Sarah Laura's obituary for her. There should have been one in several states. Rev. Moody had died in 1928. His wife and two younger children stayed in the cottage during the depression winters. They had nowhere else to go. They knit sweaters and socks for Marshall Field's to earn a little extra cash. The two older boys managed to finish law and medical school during the Depression. Although Sarah Laura Beckwith was only a summer visitor, she left her mark on the lives of many in the county, particularly through the elementary students of her granddaughter, Mary Moody Anderson. Great grandsons, Frank and Dwight Moody still have cabins on Big Sand and Loon Lakes. It is a tribute to Sarah Laura Beckwith character that her grandchildren and great grandchildren had the integrity and courage to overcome adversity and live long and useful lives. ------------------------------------------- Letter to Sallie, daughter of Paul Eve, from Sarah Laura Wright Beckwith, Secretary to General Leonard Wood in Cuba: ------------------------------------------- Headquarters Department of Cuba Havana, Dec. 24, 1900 My very dear Cousin: Your letter reached me a day or two since, and it is needless to say a pleasant surprise. You are by no means the stranger to me that I am to you, for while I have not seen you since you were a very little girl, still I am cognizant of your family and personal history to some extent. My dear grandmother, Mrs Jane [Ringland] Eve, was well up in all the family relations, the various ramifications, intermarriages, etc., and as I had the great happiness of my grandmother's companionship until long past my maturity [being born in 1848], I suspect there are few in the family who can give more authentic information it than I can. My mother, who was [born] Mary Isabel Eve, is still living [in Savannah] and well versed in the points of interest herself. [Sarah married John Stephen Wright in 1843 in Baldwin Co. GA]. I seem to have unintentionally misled your brother, Duncan [b. ca. 1877], in my letter to him. In my effort not to be prolix I seem to have not been explicit enough, hence he inferred naturally that my branch of the Eve family had always remained in the West Indies. I said the son William of the first Captain Oswell Eve had resided in the West Indies and had never left there, or words to that effect. He himself never left the island of San Salvador [East of Cat Island in the Bahamas], on which he had his plantation, but his two sons did. One of these was my grandfather, Joseph Eve, [and] the other, William Eve, the latter having never married, hence all the descendants of William Eve are in the line of Joseph. This Joseph was own cousin to your father, therefore you see [that] you, while younger, are in a generation ahead of mine. [My grandfather] Joseph Eve married Jane Ringland, whose mother was Isabel Carmichael [and father was George Ringland]. Their [seven] children [Mary Isabel Eve b.1825, Katherine Watkins Eve, Louisa Matilda Eve, John Eve, Joseph Clark Eve (who married Annie Pearsall & had 2 children , Edward & Ella), Emma Eve, renowned for her feather work, and Anna Edgar Eve] are doubly related to one branch of the family, as Mrs. Carmichael, the mother of your cousins and mine--Mrs. Edgar, Mrs. Longstreet, Miss Isabella Carmichael and all that numerous family--was miss Mary Eve, sister of your father. This is why you and I have not only relations on the Eve side, but also on the Carmichael. My grandfather died many years ago, in his early manhood [before 1830?], leaving a widow and four [living] children. One of these was my mother, Mary Isabel Eve, and she married my father, John [Stephen] Wright, who was from the middle part of Georgia [Baldwin Co.], but his family from the West Indies. For many years my father had close business relations in Cuba, but never removed his family to this island, our homes being generally in Augusta, Marietta [at the foot of Little Kennesaw Mt.], and Atlanta [but also in Savannah]. It seems strange that my fortune should be to live now in Havana, returning to the island my father's family was associated with, and to be once more representing our family in the Indies. I was sent for by General Wood as a secretary when he was governor of Santiago, and when he came to Havana as military governor of the Island, I came her likewise. I am a working woman and for this reason I offer no apology for using the typewriter, as the machine is second nature to me now. I am in General Wood's personal service, and have an office in the oldest building in Havana, the old fortress of La Fuerze, erected, as the inscription states, in 1538. Its appearance is very antique and picturesque, and from my window on one side I look out across the harbor to Morro Castle and Cabana, and on the other side I see the Temple erected on the spot where mass was first said in Cuba, the Palace of the governor and the Plaza des Armas [see photo], besides other notable points. I have my daughter on the Island. She was a clerk in the Auditor's department until her marriage, last summer, to Arnold Edwin Moody, a nephew of [the evangelist] Dwight Lyman Moody. They live at the barracks nine miles from the city, and the commanding officer also gave me quarters there, and my children keep them in order for me to use when I choose, although on account of my work it is better for me to remain in the town except on Sundays and holidays, which, of course, I spend with them. The camp is beautifully situated, right on the ocean, and with a lovely view on all sides, sea and hills and blue mountains, and everywhere tall waving royal palms and other tropical growth. The quarters are very pleasant and there is plenty of social life among the officers and their families. I have many Cuban friends likewise, and altogether my life is almost ideal. Another item which might perhaps be worth while to relate, and I hope you wont think me egotistic, but we learn that Providence shapes our ends for us by noting the little things that occur to us. Eight years ago I determined to study Spanish. I knew a little about on account of my father, but I was not perfect in it by any means. I advertised for a teacher, found one and began with all diligence to study. Many of my friends thought me very stupid to study a language which in all probability I should never have any use for. They besought me to turn my attention to German, Italian, pay more attention to French--even Yiddish or modern Greek was more practical, they said. I, however, had made up my mind Spanish was the language I wanted to learn, and I persevered. I had many discouragements, but I never gave up. Sometimes I had no one to speak with, but I subscribed for newspapers in that tongue, bought books, wrote and read, taking advantage of any stray Cubans or Spaniards who came along. The war beginning in 1895 brought refugees from Cuba to Savannah, my home for ten years past, and I took advantage of their company on all occasions. Now does it not seem a little strange that being able to speak that tongue gives me the good position I have today? The ways of Providence are strange. Stenography, by which I make my living principally, I began as a relaxation and relief from care and the distress of poor health. But I have said enough about myself. Our dear mutual cousins, Mrs. Timberlake and Josie and Lula Walton, of course, have been intimately associated with my former life. That blessed man, Dr. Joseph Eve, was ever a most loving cousin and to him I owe my life, for to his unwearied care and skill I am indebted for relief from great bodily affliction. We surely have in his memory one to be proud of, for he was all that true manhood represents. His epitaph is the only one I ever admired, and tells only the simple truth of him. I particularly cherish the concluding lines, "And having finished his glorious life in peace, entered into the fullness of divine joy." give my warmest love to them all. Dear Josie [Walton] deserves to succeed in all her attempts, for a nobler girl never lived. She was a great comfort and companion to her beloved grandfather, and I shall never forget her tenderness at a time of great grief of mine. Likewise an expression of Cousin Mildred also at a time of deep sorrow has ever abided with me-- "We have to learn to bear the inevitable." I cannot begin to tell you how much pleasure it gives me to write you. The name of Eve is very dear to me, and while some of my relations have been closely interwoven with my life, there are others, like yourself, whom I have scarcely met. Your father, however, while personally I met him but a few times, was a dear cousin and friend of my grandfather, and dear grandmother always loved Paul Eve. He never came to Augusta without calling on her and he died about two years before she did. Your sister, Mrs. Stevenson, I saw once when I was a child. It was during the war, and your father was then living in Atlanta, I think connected with the military hospitals there, and my father's home was in Marietta, about twenty miles above. I remember your sister as a most beautiful woman, and just about a year ago I found in the library in Savannah a book written by her son, Paul [Stevenson]. Her mother, your father's first wife, was a specially dear friend of my grandmother. "Cousin Louisa" she always called her, and to the day of her own death she always held her in most loving memory. I have but one child, this daughter I spoke of, and I have a mother and sister and nephew living in Savannah. Our line of the family was always a small one, very different from yours. I have often heard grandmother tell the many times she had been at the table in the old Eve home, "The Hall," near Augusta, at which was seated Captain Oswell Eve, his wife Aphra, eight daughters, and four sons. Of these sons the oldest was named Oswell, and died in England just as he was on the eve of returning to this country. He had gone to Ireland to bring his sister home, your aunt Sarah Adams [who married John S. Adams on 3 March 1803 in Charleston], for whom you are named, and whose husband had died suddenly. Her brother Oswell, knowing that his death was imminent, sent for the captain of the ship in which he had taken passage, and consigned his sister to his care, making him promise to see her safely landed in America. I should have stated that the war of 1812 was going on, hence his anxiety as to the safety of his sister. It was many month, however, before she reached Augusta, as the ship was captured and taken to Halifax. During all this time the news of the death of his oldest son had not reached your grandfather. the next son was John, [who married 16 Jan. 1823] Sarah Davis Carmichael, grandmother's own cousin, for whom I am named, hence those Eves are double relations to us. The other [sons were] William and Paul, your father. The daughters were Ann Pritchard [Eve], who was Mrs. Cunningham, and whose daughter [Margaret, was married 27 Jun. 1833 to] George Schley [son of Governor Schley], and that is where we are related to the Schleys, Mary Eliza, Mrs. Carmichael, Henrietta, Mrs. Longstreet, Maria, Mrs. Bones, Emma, Mrs. Smith, Sarah, Mrs. Adams, and Elizabeth, or Betsey as she was called, who never married. So you see I am not a stranger to family history. I made a pretty family tree once, and was helping my mother to make one for Cousin Mildred when I was obliged to leave home very hurriedly to reach Havana on a certain date, and that was never finished. If you have ever seen that noted family diary [of Sarah Eve of Philadelphia ca. 1740-1790], which fell into the hands of Mrs. Jones, your Cousin Eva, the "little Billy" mentioned there is my great-grandfather [William Eve, who married Mary Clarke of Charleston]. That diary belonged to Uncle Eve, the grandfather of Cousin Mildred. He gave it to his daughter Mary, Mrs. Campbell. She was in her day better informed as to the family than any one, and preserved the diary with care, likewise other interesting papers and letters. She loaned this dairy to her cousin, Mrs. Edgar, and through a misunderstanding it was not returned. Cousin Mary dying, Mrs. Edgar it seems understood that the dairy was a gift, not a loan, and in the course of time she gave it to Mrs. Jones. Mrs. Jones had the diary published, but much of it had been lost, and it is very much mutilated and changed. Grandmother recollected many instances and events related in the diary that had been lost out of it in later years, and she was very much disappointed in the printed history, as much of the best part was irretrievably lost. I trust you can come to Havana some time, and while perhaps, like many others, you may be disappointed at first, still the longer you remain, the better you like it, and the more you seek the more beauties you find. While I love my country, yet I love Cuba so much that it would be a great grief to me to leave it, and I trust I shall not have to do so for a long time yet. Give love to the three dear cousins, as before requested, and I trust you will not object to receiving a share for yourself. It was most kind in you to write and I trust you will pardon this long letter in response. As the Pan-American Medical Congress has been postponed until the end of January, I understand, I trust by that time your brother can come to the Island. Remember me kindly to him likewise. Very truly yours, Sarah L. Beckwith, Care the Palace, Havana, Cuba ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: The Carmichaels, Eves, Wrights, and their many cousins lived in Baldwin, Chatham, Cobb and Richmond counties. They are my deceased wife's people, and I have just a few documents to share with their descendants. Sarah Laura Wright Beckwith was born 19 Mar. 1848 in Savannah GA, married 27 Jun. 1872 in Augusta GA, to Dr. Thomas Stanley Beckwith of New Bern NC [his first wife was Agnes Ruffin], and died 5 Aug. 1927 in Muskogee OK, in the home of her son-in-law mentioned in this letter, Rev. Arnold Edwin Moody, a Presbyterian minister and early leader in the Boy Scout movement. Ancestral families include: Beckwith, Clarke, Cogdell, Eve, Ringland, Root, Sofge, Stanley, Wright ----------------------------------------------------------------------------