Iowa County WI Archives History - Letters .....William O'Brien Tyrer: Letters ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/wi/wifiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Nancy Poquette npoq@hotmail.com December 31, 2006, 4:46 am the following letter was written by William O’Brien Tyrer in 1846. This letter was forwarded to Karen Anding Crook from Julia Dunn: 1846 December 21 From: William O’Brien Tyrer From: Dodgeville, WI To: Ezra Nichols To: Collins Center, Erie Co, NY “I take this opportunity to write to you to let you know that I am alive and well and have not forgotten you. I don’t know that I have anything to write that will be very interesting to you at present. I am here and cannot return to you this winter without much more expense that it will [be] to return by water. Aunt Sally requested Mother [Nelly Curtis Tyrer] to write to me to know whether I would come back or not.” “Uncle Ezra, I have one word to say in this respect. If you had said anything to me about staying with you to take care of you in your old age, I never would have left you. I do not want you to take what I write too hard or saucy [or sassy], but I must be plain and write what I think. I may be wrong; if I am I am ready to receive advice and instruction. In the first place, you know that I have a very bad temper to deal and govern with, and have not the patience that I ought. Secondly, life is uncertain and death is certain. I do not want to return on uncertainty and to disappointed; not thinking that you will disappoint me, only by sudden death, and in this case, relatives sometimes plays the rogue and cheats the one that has done the most out of his honest dues. In this case, I had rather stay here and never show my face in that country, for I can do better here than I can there, by the month, and do it easier. To the question is this: what and know how you will do, and on what conditions you want me should come back on. Hiram feels real cunning tonight, but I don’t feel as much the other way. Enough on my good to say. If I have but one word to say, that is this: I am sorry for doing so.” “I will give a short history of the weather since I wrote my other letter. It is very pleasant for winter. The ground has not been fairly whitened with snow yet, nor froze more than three inches on grass ground. Today and tonight it sleets some, but not bad for this country. You may want to know that I have made this season. I have made eighty-five dollars. We have very good diggings at present. It is general time of health here at present. It is most ten, and I must quit for tonight, with cold fingers. The house is noisy with snoring. L’M Tyrer Wisconsin in December 22d, 1846 Dear Mother, “I take my pen in hand to let you know that I have not forgotten you yet, although you have not wrote much to me, nor I to you. I want to know who Uncle Ezra has in view to live with him, as I mistrust he has somebody in view. He told me the night before I left there that I could come back any time in one, two or three years. They may do better than to have me come back. If so, I do not want to stand in the way. O, Mother, Mother, I with tears of sorrow in my eyes, I now begin to think and know that old folks know more than young. Young people does not know nothing to what older ones do in general; they think that they know more. I want you should talk with Uncle Ezra and Aunt Sally on my account, and write to me soon. O’Brien Tyrer” December 23rd, 1846 James, “A word to you. I have had late ____ [news? communication? word?] from there which has caused my _______. I do not know whether it is true, or it is done to injure me. Tell Uncle Ezra that I do not want that money at present. I had ___________ it would remain where it is no more. I be home in the spring or summer. I am bereaved and can not write no more, so goodbye. Wm. O’Brien Tyrer” [Was he bereaved because of the supposed injury done to him, or because someone died?] “Sally has got a great boy, 5 weeks old yesterday, and it weighs all of 6 pounds.” [Which Sally is he referring to? Could it be LUTHER’s 2nd wife, SARAH? Could she and the infant have died not long after he wrote this? Robert Tyrer listed 1846 as his mother’s date of death. Another possibility is that William O’Brien Tyrer had a sister named Sarah, married to Michael Bennett, but her first surviving child was born in 1849. However, the son referred to, could be her son, they were in Wisconsin too.] (Note: James Nichols was 21 years old and was married March 1848, born 1827 according to Prusha Allen Parkinson’s letter, James Nichols wife died and was buried June 30, 1848 (1868?) I don’t know if this is the same James mentioned in the letter of December 23d or not.) [A second possibility is that the letter was written to William O’Brien Tyrer’s brother James. Julia Dunn transcribed the original letter as it was written, but I have not. I have corrected spelling and added punctuation to allow his thoughts to be understood more freely by the present-day reader. N. P.] File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/wi/iowa/history/letters/williamo29gms.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/wifiles/ File size: 5.4 Kb