Maria Mitchell in Her Own Words

Jascin N. Leonardo Finger • July 29, 2013

July 15 {1863}


My dear Sally,


I am very glad to have the pattern for the drawers. I shall return the specimen by Mitchell {Sally’s son William Mitchell Barney} as I understand how to make them.


{Niece} Maria’s little dress fits nicely and I tell Kate the two children won’t suffer, if they have no other dress for the winter. All that Maria’s is wrong, is in being too large around the waist. I am sorry to hear that Aunt Maria’s cough has not gone. Father thinks he has the whooping cough. He coughs incessantly, but is pretty well. He has been to Boston today.


Tell Aunt Maria to stick to the doctor’s medicine and use a plenty of it. I am ready to pay the bill. I wish I could send you some currants as I have a great many. We have very few cherries . . . .


I think Mitchell is alright in his algebra. He can’t stand an examination in Trig but I don’t believe he will have a rigorous one. Father has seen the Prof. and will give him a letter to them.

When this letter was written by Maria Mitchell to her eldest sister, Sally Mitchell Barney, William and Maria Mitchell were now living in Lynn, Massachusetts near the youngest Mitchell child, Eliza Katherine Mitchell Dame or Kate as she was called. Sally still lived on Nantucket and she and her husband had sent their son, William Mitchell Barney, to visit his grandfather and aunt. Maria also talks about the price of cherries, other family members suffering from whooping cough, and the fact that she and her father plan to attend the Harvard College commencement. “Aunt Maria” was Maria Coleman, Lydia Mitchell’s sister whom she and William named Maria after. I myself remember trying on winter clothes that my grandmother was making for me in the summer – oh that itchy wool! I am sure that Maria’s two nieces felt very much the same.


If you have been enjoying these posts, I am now also writing for “Nantucket Chronicle,” an online magazine − http://www.nantucketchronicle.com. My column will be about Nantucket history – with a focus on island women – and the column is called “Nation of Nantucket.”


JNLF


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