Sarah Darlington to Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch, 1868

[From Sarah Darlington to Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch. She talks about educating children, up to age 12, and after.

This letter is incomplete; the first page(s) are missing. However, from the content it's clearly written to Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch, probably in Yancey Co., North Carolina, and probably 1867-1869. (It talks about educating children, up to age 12, and after, apparently in response to questions from Elizabeth. Before the war they lived in Tarboro, where her children could attend school; they didn't correspond during the war; and in Sallie's letter of 17 May 1869 she also talks about educating a boy of age 13. In 1868 Elizabeth's sons John, Joseph, and Frederick were about 12, 10, and 8.)]

a disgust for the study. If a child is carefully taught in reading, spelling, writing, geography and the rudimental parts of arithmetic, I think that quite sufficient until he is twelve years old. You then have a good foundation to build on, and his after improvement will be very rapid. The trouble I have found in teaching has been this; children (or rather I should say scholars, for they can scarcely be called children) of fifteen and sixteen years of age come into a school expecting to take the higher branches, whereas they are so ignorant of the studies I have mentioned, and they have been so badly taught in them, that there is no foundation to build on, and then it is too late to do anything in that way thoroughly or systematically as the scholar and the parents would at once rebel at what they would consider a backward movement, for you know everyone in this country is in such a hurry "to get on," as they call it, without caring much how thoroughly the work is done. As to books, you will find almost any of the modern school books very good. I have used Kerl's Eng. Grammar for the last two years and like it very much. There is an Introductory one for children and a larger one for persons more advanced. For a child over twelve, who is intelligent, I should use the larger one. In the schools in which I have been they use Robinson's Arithmetic. There is an Elementary edition, very good for children.

Hoping to hear from you soon and whenever you feel like writing, I remain, with much love to G'a1 and yourself,

Very sincerely yours,

S. P. Darlington

  1. Georgiana Abbot Bowditch (1848-1927), Elizabeth's daughter