1846: Letter from William Greaves to Joseph H Cree

[Outer:]

Joseph Cree
166 Mulberry St
New York

[Postmark:] Philadelphia Aug 27]

[Inner:]
Philadelphia Aug 27/46
Friend Cree


 

I have to apologize for being so remiss in not answering yours before but I can assure you that it is not out of disrespect but entirely neglect wich is all the excuse I have to offer.

The 1841 Census shows us that William and Martha Greaves were neighbours of Joseph and Martha Cree in Swanwick. They must have migrated at about the same time as the Cree family.

We are all well and doing well. We hope you are all well and doing well. I want to know if you are ready to go west and buy a farm or if you are going to wait untill the land is free. I intend if all's well to go out west soon and buy a farm and I should be glad if you could go along. I should like to have somebody that I know to settle near. There is nothing so likely in my opinion as a farm and if I am blest with my health I intend to have one.

This is one of several references in the letters to "going out west." In fact William mentions the matter three times in this one letter! Clearly this is something the Crees and the Greaveses had talked about, and the prospect of cheap or even free land might well have been one of the main motivations for the migration.

I hope you have had a good season with your Machine and the store Answers well and that you are getting ahead. We received two Newspapers from you. I have got a situation in a large Locomotive factory to recut thier [sic] files. I have been about 12 months and I am very steady and my health is very good and I am getting stout again. I hope you will not be so long in answering this as I have been and I will not be so long in answering the next. My wife desires to be remembered to your wife and says she would like to see her. Henry grows a fine boy.

"Your Machine" and "the store" - tantalising references to Joseph cree's occupation. It ties in with the reference in the first letter from Joseph's mother to obtaining knife blades.

Notice that William Greaves was a filesmith in Swanwick.

Henry was aged eight in the 1841 Census (See Census facsimile below) and would therefore have been eleven years old as this letter was written.

We was sorry to hear of Job Beresford but nothing else could be expected as he carried on. There seems to be many changes in that little place. Send me word if you think there is any likelihood of you geting the land free and what you think about it, weather it will be got or not.

RETAILERS OF BEER.
Beresford Job, Swanwick

[Source: Pigot's Directory of Derbyshire, 1835]

Job Beresford is also mentioned by Joseph's mother in Letter 3. "That little place" is Swanwick.

Brother John Eyre is with us and sends his respects to you. I hope you and all your family are in good health as this leaves us, thank God for it. I must now conclude with wishing you may be ready to go west with us.

John Eyre was Martha Greaves's brother and was shown in the 1841 Census return for Swanwick as a journeyman filesmith living in William and Martha's household. See the facsimile below.

Yours Respectfully

Wm Greaves

PS Direct for Wm Greaves filesmith West Phila. Post Office.

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The Greaves household at Swanwick from the 1841 Census (PRO HO 107/193)


All the transcriptions, notes and commentaries on these Letters to an Emigrant web pages are copyright © Mike Spathaky 2009.