Sallie Darlington to Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch, 2 June 1867

[From Sallie Darlington in Faribault, Minnesota, to Elizabeth (Abbot) Bowditch. She says she intends to take the following school year off from teaching, mostly due to her health, going to St. Peter, Minnesota, then possibly east; mentions Elizabeth's possible return to Tarboro; and encloses her photograph.]

Faribault, Minnesota
June 2nd/67

My dear Mrs. Bowditch,

Your letter of May 7th was rec'd last week; I was beginning to fear you had not rec'd my last one, and I intended to write again, but my many duties leave me little time for letter writing. My health has been very indifferent for some time past, and I find myself unequal to the work that my position calls for. We close school July 10th, and I shall not be engaged in the school next year. I have been teaching here for Bishop Whipple1 four years, and I now propose to try resting a year; in fact, I do not think I have ever given the climate of Minn. a fair trial, for ever since I have been here I have been confined to the school room six hours daily.

I was in hopes of hearing you had by this time returned to Tarboro; I shall like to think of you as being settled in the old place once more. I have a brother2 living on a farm at Yorktown, Va. whom I may possibly visit at some time, and, if so, I should be strongly tempted to run down and see you; it would only be a day's journey.

I wish, indeed, G'a3 could be here at school for a year or two, but the climate would scarcely suit her. We have the thermometer at 42 degs. below zero, which is colder weather than anyone can conceive of who has not experienced it.

Our school has been full from the first, the number of boarders being limited to twenty-seven. More than twice that number have applied, as this is the only Church school for girls north west of the Mississippi; and people dislike to send their children far from home.

When school closes I intend to go to a place called St. Peter, about fifty miles west from here, where I have friends, and where I shall spend the summer and perhaps next winter also. If I should not like being there, however, it is quite possible I may go east before the winter sets in. My plans are, as you see, all undetermined, and I shall be guided by circumstances at the time. Sometimes I feel very much like an exile and would gladly return home to my friends, and then again I get reconciled to my fate and am quite well satisfied with my western life. Of course my feelings are influenced by the state of my health.

I shall enclose you my photograph, although I do not think it a very good one, at least, not very well taken; the likeness, I suppose, is good. You will see that it has rather a distressed look, which is certainly the way I felt at the time it was taken, and, indeed, the greater part of the time. I shall hope to get those you promise me before very long.

After July 1st direct to me at St. Peter, Minnesota, care of Rev. Mr. Livermore.4 I will write to you from there.

Give much love to G'a and Nat,5 and believe me,

Yours ever

S. P. Darlington

We have had no spring weather yet, are wearing merino dresses and sitting by large fires. I believe the season has been backward every where.

  1. Henry Benjamin Whipple (1822-1901)
  2. Edward C. Darlington (1819-1874), Sallie's brother
  3. Georgiana Abbot Bowditch (1848-1927), Elizabeth's daughter
  4. Edward Livermore (1815-1896)
  5. Nathaniel Ingersoll Bowditch (1846-1913), Elizabeth's son