Chicago
Nov. 12, 1871
Dear Brother & Sister,
I received both your letters after some delay, although your
last came to hand somewhat sooner than the first. I hardly know what to write nor where to
commence, but I have thought and come to the conclusion to keep you posted in
regard to the great fire[1] and I have a great many papers to send
you, which I would have sent you before this only I could not get postage
stamps and so you will pardon the delay.
I succeeded last evening in getting twenty two-cent stamps and so you will
get the papers right off.
And now in regard to my delay in writing, I have been
thinking every day to write, but every day brings something for me to do more
than the other so that since the fire I never had so much to do in my life, and
we are working night and day and even then we do not get out half the work that
we have to do……….so much for that.
In regard to my loss from this great fire, I don’t know just
what my loss is just yet. I have not
lost any property. I have lost through
parties that was burned out that owed me, and have got one dollar left, and so
they can’t pay me although I have got their notes and I think they all will pay
sometime with the exception of a few.
Yesterday a Mr. Wrisley, a soap manufacturer, was here to see me and
said he would pay his in ninety days.
His note is nine hundred dollars and so it is anything further I will
have to postpone for some other time for I can assure you that I could not
begin to tell you anything about the fire for it would take more time than I
have at present, although we know all, and all you read of is nothing to
compare to It, and I hope that such a thing will never happen again.
We have rented our house to family that was burned out and I
have rented a neat little cottage near out mill. It takes me about ten minutes to walk it and
I have sold my buggy horse and shan’t keep one this winter. I have got my buggy and today (Sunday) I had
one of our team horses in the buggy and we went to a friend of ours on 31st
Street. I wanted to learn something of a
patent cutter head that I got up and I haven’t had time to attend to it but,
however, I learned that it had been granted me and so I suppose I will get my
patent papers in a few days . This head
is more intended for a matcher head than for anything else and is a great improvement
on the old style heads and which are in use here. There was a man from a Boston firm to see me
about it last week. Anything in the
shape of an improvement in a planing machine is look after sharp. I told him that I was in no hurry about it
but I should correspond with his folks as soon as I got my papers from
Washington. More about this in due
time.
In regard to my coming to see you, which I had made up my
mind to come before this, but now it would be impossible for me to do so for we
all have to stay at home and help to build up our city again. Oh how can we build up such a splendid place
again? The best man ever saw in any country,
which I have some papers to show you just what some of them was before the fire
and what it is after. It don’t seem
possible that our beautiful city was burned up and is no more, and we all can’t
help crying when we think of it. Frances
and myself was out with the horse and buggy all the time and she drove the horse
through all that crowd and I was with the wagons getting our friends out of the
fire, and, John, there is no one that can even imagine anything near what it is.
I must close for this time in love to you all and hoping to
hear from you soon.
Yours truly,
Edwin
Excuse haste and all mistakes for I thinking of I much I
have to do for the next month to come. I
will send you a good lot of papers.
[1] The Great Chicago Fire was a conflagration that burned from Sunday,
October 8, to early Tuesday, October 10, 1871, killing hundreds and destroying
about 3.3 square miles (9 km2) in Chicago, Illinois.[1] Though the fire was one of the
largest U.S. disasters
of the 19th century, Chicago was rebuilt and continued to grow as one of the
most populous and economically
important American cities. The fire
began the same day as several other fires destroyed towns and
forests in Wisconsin and Michigan.
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