William Stedman Letter - July 1, 1870

Contributed by: Carolyn Burgess Knott
Email: seaknott@mindspring.com

THIS LETTER WAS WRITTEN BY WILLIAM STEDMAN, SON OF WILLIAM C. STEDMAN AND
ANN RAMSEY OF CHATHAM COUNTY, NC; GRANDSON OF NATHAN A.  STEDMAN OF CHATHAM 
COUNTY, NC.  WRITTEN TO HIS UNCLE JAMES
STEDMAN .

TRANSCRIBED BY CAROLYN BURGESS KNOTT
copyright 2000

Marshall, Texas.  July 1st, 1870

Dear Uncle,
   A few days ago I received a letter from you much to my
surprise and gratification.  Our friends and relations in N.
C. have neglected us so long that I thought they had entirely
forgotten us and I had given up all hopes of any further
correspondence with them.  Some time since however Cooper Poe
broke the ice by writing to me an interesting letter which I
promptly answered and now comes your kind letter which I
reply to with much pleasure.  I was very glad to hear that so
many of my relations are still living for although we are so
far apart and have been so long separated, I have never
ceased to think of you all nor has my affection for you
abated in the least.  I was especially glad to hear from Aunt
Polly, Betsy, Eliza and Nabby and trust that many long and
happy years are yet ?  to them.  Of them I must be permitted
to say that I have always been most partial to Aunt Polly on
account of her kind car of my two little brothers and myself
after the death of our Mother.  Please give them my best love
and tell them that I hope to see them once more before I die.
   I have had many ups and downs in this far off country.  I
have made a great deal of money here but lost it nearly all
by a disastrous fire in 1860 and the wrath of the succeeding
four years of war.  I have however never desponded and am
gain struggling to regain what I have lost.  I hope to be
able yet to accumulate enough to leave my family comfortable
when I am taken from them.  We have had nine children, seven
of whom are living.  A little boy almost nine years old was
killed in a tornado in 1866.  It was a severe blow to us and
I shall never recover from its effects.  My wife is in
excellent health and looks almost as young as she did when
left N.C.  Our youngest child is three years old.  We have
but one daughter now in her 17th (?) year and was our first
born in Texas.  The two little boys we brought with us from
N.C. are both grown and are doing nothing.  I fear will never
be of much account.  Dr.  Winship Poe's family lives at
Henderson and are quite poor.  I suppose you heard that his
oldest son was hung in Henderson last year for murder.  Dr.
Poe was a good man and died in good circumstances and if he
had lived, I believe his boys would have turned out better
than they did.  So much for family matters.
   Texas is a great country and I think is destined to be the
richest and most powerful state of the union.  Within the
borders of the state nearly everything that is necessary for
a man's comfort and convenience grows with half the labor
that is required in other countries.  It is emphatically the
poor man's country.  Lands are cheap, timber plentiful and
water good and abundant.  All a man has to do here is to be
industrious and if he is independence is sure to follow.
Land are rising rapidly at this time in consequence of the
great number of immigrants coming in and the building of
railroads and it will not be many years before land is as
high here as in the other states.  This place has some 4,000
or 5,000 inhabitants.  We have a railroad passing here to Red
River which places us in two days travel of New Orleans which
is the great trading point of the southwest.  There is a bill
before congress which has passed the senate making our road
The Southern Pacific Railroad with this place as the eastern
terminus and authorizing four other roads to connect here.
When that is done, Marshall will become a larger city and
eastern Texas will be one of the most desirable portions of
the United States.  Now as to politics, of course, I need not
tell you that I am no radical and am glad to hear that there
is not one black sheep in the whole flock.  If I could have
sold my principles and self respect so far as to ? with that
dirty and common crew which forms the Radical Party, I could
have had almost any position I might ask for.  They offered
to make me Judge of the Supreme Court but I could not afford
to pay such a price even for that high place.  In this
country, respectable people do not visit Radicals and I would
as soon think of inviting a negro into our houses as a
Radical.  I believe I have written everything I can think of
that would interest you.  I want you to write me a very long
letter as soon as you get this and tell me all the news about
everybody not only in the family but out of it also.
Remember me kindly to Aunt Sallie and the children and all my
relations and friends.

                                 Your nephew,
                                 W. Stedman
You said nothing about Aunt Fanny Gilmore.  I hope she is
alive and well and I want you to give her my love."