Correspondence

Scope and content:

Series 1: Correspondence, 1846-1894, is comprised almost exclusively of correspondence addressed to Bettie McCoy Cushing, with most letters written by her husband Edwin Cushing, her mother Jane Carson McCoy, and her cousin Ellie (also signed Ella) in Winchester. A small group of letters from Robert Cabell Anderson (1854-1924) to his future wife Katie Cushing Anderson, daughter of Edwin and Betting Cushing, are included. Additional family members present in the correspondence (as either author or recipient) include Judge Joseph Carson (1806-1871) and Judson McCoy. All correspondence is arranged by recipient.

Contextual evidence within the letters addressed "My dear child" (or similar variant) suggests that they were written to Bettie and/or Edwin Cushing from Bettie's mother Jane Carson McCoy. Mother McCoy, who frequently wrote from Allendale (an Allen family estate north of Mt. Jackson) provided updates to the Cushings on Bettie's siblings and other family members.

The subject matter of the letters is generally newsy with mentions of community happenings and family updates, leadership changes in local churches, health and illnesses, births and deaths, and weather reports. A cousin in Canton, Missouri wrote to Bettie McCoy Cushing in April 1852 about a presumed outbreak of an unnamed affliction in her family. The cousin writes, "Jimmie laid 15 weeks before he was able to sit up, no one thought he would live, but he is now able to go about the house & is beginning to gain a little flesh. Our little negro girl laid eleven weeks & died. & Willie has been confined to his bed nearly 4 weeks with the same disease." In a letter dated February 14, 1887, Bettie McCoy Cushing wrote to her daughter Katie Cushing Anderson expressing her condolences for the loss of the Andersons' young son, Cabell.

As Edwin M. Cushing's work as an auctioneer frequently required traveling away from his wife, Cushing's letters to Bettie are generally sentimental and mention his desire to see her soon. In a July 3, 1853 letter, Cushing writes, "Here I am at the front window just as lonesome as a man without a friend in the world. I sit and look around & everything looks as natural as life except you are not here. Oh how lonesome."

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