1870: Letter from Chris Hodsdon to Joseph H Cree, June 1870

Freemont [Iowa] June 5, [18]70

Father Cree

To Sir [?] I now write to you to inform you what we have done in regard to the farm. Lizzie received the letter with your draft last week & Mr Pegby being up here at the time we paid him the money and have taken a bond for a deed to be given when the next payment is made. It will be due the first of July. Pegby said it was the first of June that you and him talked. I tryed to have him say Sept or after harvest. All payments is dated from the 10 of March. He claimed that as the time the bargain was made. He seems to have great faith in you. He said Mr Cree knows it bes all right.

I presume Lizzy has written to you about Mr Beach comeing here with me and is working the place with me. He and I agreed with Pegby that we would give him one third of the crops if you failed in buying and if the track closed he was not to have anything so you see that Mr Beach is to have one third and the other two thirds is between you and I.

We have in about thirty-five acres of wheat & six or seven of oats and about twelve of corn.

I sold my house before [I] left home [to] get some money down and am to have $150 the first of August and $200 next Spring.

I would like to have you write to me if you think fit and would be glad to see you out here. I have written all I think of at present and will close this scrip.

Yours respectfully

C. W. Hodson

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This letter was written by Chris Hodsdon, Mary's husband, from Fremont, a small township in Butler County, Iowa, to his father-in-law Joseph H Cree who is still in Pompey, Onondaga County, New York State. Fremont (not to be confused with several other places of the same name) is not far from Clarksville.

It is now 14 years since the previous family letter that we know of. Joe is still living in the same area of Upper New York State that he moved to about twenty years earlier, but his four surviving daughters have all moved "out west" following the dream which Joe had when he first arrived from England in 1843.

Eliza, Joe's oldest daughter, had married and moved out in 1853. Sarah is thought to have married a man called Taylor. Mary and Elizabeth became teachers before moving west. Mary married Chris Hodsdon at Stevens Point, Winsconsin on 17th May, 1862, while Elizabeth has married Hiram Scott and is living in Fremont, Iowa, and is expecting a baby any day now.

It seems that the Hodsdons, having sold their house in Stevens Point, were staying with Lizzie and her husband until they could take over their own place. While searching for land in Fremont, Chris had written to Mary telling her of Lizzie's suffering during her pregnancy. So maybe they were staying so that Mary could help Elizabeth with the birth. Ruth Langenheim had a little note signed by Lizzie to "Sisters Mary and Sarah."

It appears from the first two paragraphs that Joe is joining with his son-in-law, Chris Hodsdon (and perhaps with this Mr Beach) in buying a farm. Joe has sent a bank draft for the first payment to the vendor, a Mr Pegby.

A tragic event was to follow just eleven days after this letter was written - Lizzie died in childbirth on 16th June 1870.