Flint
Nov. 13, 1877
My Dear Sir,
Your kind letter came duly to hand and I have kept deferring
writing from time to time. I have just
had my photo taken and I now enclose it together with that of my wife and daughter. You see any hair is getting snowy white, and my
face beginning to wear the marks of age.
However, I have good health and that is a great blessing. My wife is not the blooming girl she was when
you last saw her, she was then younger than my daughter is now. My youngest son, whose photo you have is not
so nice looking now as when it was taken.
He met with a gun accident which disfigured his nose a little, but it was a source of thankfulness
that it was no worse. It was not the
bursting of the gun that caused it, it was a double barreled one, and when he
fired one barrel the other went off and the rebounding caused the hammer or
cock to knock his nose and split it to some extent, but it soon got better and
the disfigurement is not much.
We were sorry to hear that you met with such an accident, tho
severe, it might have been worse. In
fact you might have been killed. I trust
you have quite recovered now. Your
daughter too was very ill when you wrote.
I hope she has long since got well and that you all are in the enjoyment
of health.
I hope you have been more fortunate this year than you were
the previous one in escaping the plague of locusts. We in this
country are threatened with the visit of the Colorado beetle or potato bug, but
every precaution has been taken by government, and if he does come he will have
a very lively time of it.
I am glad to hear you have had a revival in your
neighborhood. It is very much wanted in
this country. There is a vast amount of
crime caused principally by drunkenness.
That you will see from time to time by the paper I send you which I hope
you regularly receive. It is sent every
week.
Your brother James was over in Liverpool last week. He is looking well and I should think is
doing well.
One after another of our old shop mates are going to their
long home. You would see that Lou Jones
(Baba) died some months since after a lingering illness. There are not many of your old associates
left and sooner or later we and you will have to leave this world and all we
love. May we be ready to go when the message comes. Will Dawes met with an untimely end; he fell
into a ___ dock at Garston and was either drowned or killed with the fall. Dick, his brother, is living in Flint but he
has had a stroke which has disabled him from working and consequently he is
very poor .
Flint is very much altered, so much so that you would not
know it. The town is supplied with water
from Coed Onn, and gas we have had for more than twenty years. I think I have told you that I have the management
of the gas & water works, altho I am not much of my time at home. I am mostly in Liverpool.
Don’t be long before you write again. Me and my wife will be very glad to hear from
you. With our kindest regards to
yourself and family, believe me to be yours very faithfully,
Thomas Gleave
Some say that my photo makes me look older than I
am.
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