Courtesy: American Textile History Museum
Transcribed: University of Massachusetts Lowell, Center for Lowell History
Lowell [Sunday] April 3, 1836
Respected Friend1 it is with pleasure I now employ a few moments in writing to inform you of my health which is very good at present and I hope this will find you in the enjoyment of the same they are a having a general turning out here now the girls in the narrow Weave Room went out at once on account of their lowering their wages they took off two shillings2 on a beam but Lawrence3 raised them again and sent for
them to come back and they did Saturday the Spinners all stoped their work at once and run up around Putman4 he grumped and says be oh the Devil how shall I get out of this go to work and I will make the report tomorrow unless they raise the wages they are all going out at 12 o'clo for good the [work?] is very bad and they are raising the Board to nine shillings and Jobhands cannot not much more than bear their
Board so i think you are better off where you are for there is more girls than you can shake a stick at the Lawrence corporation5 say they can spare an hundred girls and not miss them they are running over Holly Thompson has gone to doing house work at Doct Hubbard's6 she could not get in the factory nowhere in Lowell I saw Wilson7 Sunday he sends his respects to you and wants you should come back and court up David his Cousin he is a real pretty fellow you must come in the Fall when they get settled down again Mr. Webb8 & Wegewood9 has left Elkins10 has taken Weges place & Lumis11 Webbs they get along pretty well there has been quite a rel a revival here
1Mary S. Fraser
2Shillings: 1 shilling = about 16 cents, or 6 shillings = $1
3Lawrence: Lawrence Mills or Samuel Lawrence, Agent
Belvidere Mills
4Adam Putnam, manufacturer b: 16 July 1799 Stow, MA; house
Hurd St.; son of Asa Putnam and his 2nd wife Catherine Evelith;
married Dec 1823 Nancy Puffer
5Lawrence Mills
6Charles Hubbard, physician, house Church St., business Central St.
7Clifron Wilson b: 11 Apr 1811, Pelham, NH d: 19 July 1887;
son of Eliab Wilson b: Pelham, NH and Damaris Fox b: [Dracut?]
MA; married Hannah I. Williamson b: 6 July 1836, Pomfret, VT
8Edward A. Webb, overseer Middlesex Mills, house Lawrence St.
9Joshua Wedgewood, overseer Middlesex Mills, house near corner
Hurd and Warren Sts
10James Elkins, overseer Middlesex Mills, boards Miss Eliza
Manning Lawrence St.
11Warner S. Loomis, overseer Middlesex Mills, house corner
George and Warren Sts
among the Methodist12 Louis Dufer has become pious and Serene Buchnam & Clarissa Blake13 quite a change at Mrs. Coburns14 and I hope their will continue to be there and every- where else give my respects to all who may enquire for me
Hannah Parkhurst15 wants to come up their to work16 she wants you should ask Mr. Bingham what he will give her and she will come I shall expect you to write as soon as you get this write all about the folks about your Moses and how much he will give her per week it is almost night I cannot write very mor write as soon as you get this without fail besure and ask Mr. Bingham so goodby Hannah I. Williamson17
[on cover]
Miss Mary S. Fraser18
Stockbridge, VT19
12First Methodist Episcopal Church Chapel Hill - Revs Ira M.
Bidwell and Charles Noble
13Dufer, Buchnam, and Blake: operatives Middlesex Mills
14Mrs. Clarissa Coburn, boardinghouse keeper, Warren St.
15Hannah Parkhurst, operative Middlesex Mills, bds at Mrs.
Clarissa Coburn, Warren St.
16Woolen Mill built in Gaysville section of Stockbridge, VT
17Hannah Irenine Williamson b: 21 Apr 1816 Pomfret,
Windsor, VT d: 14 July 1901 Pelham, NH; daughter of Caleb
Bates Williamson d: 1822 and Hannah Tupper d: 1832;
orphaned at 16; married Clifron Wilson b: 11 Apr 1811,
Pelham, NH d: 19 July 1887
18Mary S. Fraser b: 29 Nov 1814 Pomfret, VT d: 20 Mar 1885;
married Mar 1841 Issacher Adams
19Stockbridge, VT Population 1,419 [1840]
