John Edwin Abbot to his sister Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch, 10 December 1848

[From John Edwin Abbot in New Orleans, Louisiana, to his sister Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch. (The letter opens as simply "Dear Sister," but based on the comment at the end about his niece, it's clearly written to Elizabeth.) He describes how he arrived in New Orleans on the Gipsy, under his brother-in-law Charles Lamson, after leaving the Raduga in Rio; mentions a few people there he knows, including one named Charles Brown and his problems; and says he doesn't like New Orleans much.]

Sunday Dec 10th 1848

Dear Sister,

I arrived here on the 31st of November in the bark Gipsy, captain Charles Lamson,1 well and hearty as ever. We had very fine weather and a very long passage of 67 days, which was owing mostly to light winds.

Charles arrived in Rio two days before we were to sail in the "Raduga," and as he offered me a chance to come with him, and as I did not like the crew very well for they were all dutch and portugese and could not speak a word of English, I thought I might as well leave her, so that here I am an after gaurd again. We are now discharging cargo, and after she is discharged the owner wants to sell her, and if she is sold I shall try to gat a chance to go up the straits. If she is not sold, I shall stick by her of course.

Capt. Benjmn. Lovett2 arrived here about a week ago in the ship Middlesex, James Page3 for second mate, and a Beverly boy before the mast. These are the only persons here that I know excepting Charles Brown4 who is here hard up, and has been a loafing on the bark for the last fortnight. He dams Beverly, and everybody that belongs there all up into heaps. He was in business in Baltimore six months ago, and ran away with a girl, and married her, then he shiped mate of a bark bound out to Jamaca and got a fighting with the captain, and left her there with his clothes, and worked his passage to this place, and now he is a going to ship before the mast to go to New York.

I do not like New Orleans very well, for there is nothing but mud and dirt up to your knees all the time. I hear that George5 has gone a good long cruise and I am glad of it, for it will make up for his stopping at home the last time, and I guess that he was pretty tired of it. At any rate I should have been.

I suppose that you are all well, at least I hope so, my niece6 not excepting. What is her name? Do write and tell me.

Your affectionate brother,

John E. Abbot

  1. Charles Elisha Whitney Lamson (1820-1889), widower of John and Elizabeth's sister Georgiana
  2. Probably Benjamin Lovett (1811-abt 1873)
  3. Probably James Jones Page (1826-1897)
  4. Possibly Charles Henry Brown (1824-1852)
  5. George William Abbot (1825-1861), John and Elizabeth's brother
  6. Georgiana Abbot Bowditch (1848-1927), Elizabeth's daughter