Lucy Hopkins Johnston Ambler to Sarah "Sally" Tate Steptoe Massie, April 18, 1823

Morven in 2007. Near Markham, Fauquier, Virginia. Photo by Jerrye & Roy Klotz, MD via Wiki Commons.

[Lucy Hopkins Johnston Ambler at Morven, about three miles south of Markham, Fauquier County, Virginia, to Sarah "Sally" Tate Steptoe Massie at [Pharsalia,] Near Roses Mills, Nelson, Virginia, April 18, 1823. Postmarked Farrowsville, Virginia, May 3, 1823. Massie Family Papers, Virginia Historical Society. This is my rough, annotated transcription from a copy graciously provided by William Myers. Extra paragraph breaks inserted for easier reading.] 

                                                               Morven April 18th 1823 
My dear Sally 

You plead laziness for your long silence and I plead industry for mine. You do not know how industrious I am I have now three children to work for and it keeps me quite busy. 

Cinthia sews very well but there is not a girl on the farm that is large enough to nurse except one that is too bad for any purpose and the women all have young children so I cannot make nurses of them. 

I really begin to despair of ever geting [getting] even to my father's again. 

In the fall it was so dry that no flour could be ground and with out flour no money to be had which was the only thing that prevented my going then and after [D]ecember I was afraid to go as my little Betsy Steptoe was born in January. 

I hope you are better off in your part of the world for money than we are here. Mr. Ambler had a good deal of corn to sell and last summer the drought in this neighborhood was so severe that no person made much corn and I really believe that there is not one rich or poor that does not want to buy. Among the poor people it is distressing indeed. They have no money to buy it with. 

Mr. Ambler made a resolution not to let it go for anything but cash as he wished to pay a particular debt with it but he could not hold out more than a week. As he had at least fifty applications and not one had a cent to pay for it. He has now parted with all he has to spare and yet every day there are persons coming in to see if they can get it. 

There is one man about eight miles off that is now using the corn he made two years ago and has all the corn of last year and the year before untouched but he will part with it on no terms. He says that if he does it may be scarce another year. It may be an uncristian [unchristian] wish but it is my most sincere one that they may break open his corn house as I do not think a person ought to be punished for such an offence in his case as self preservation is the first thing always. One poor man told him he would starve. Starve and welcome was his answer. What makes it so much worse is the adjoining counties it is just as bad and (I have heard that some persons starved to death over the ridge) but cannot vouch for it.

You mentioned in your last letter that William Langhorne was living with grandpapa. I suppose from that that grandmama Callaway is dead. I am sorry to hear of Mr. Pens [Penn's] making out so badly. Poor Lucy.  I went to see her just before I was married and she was telling me what a bad bargain he had made in the purchase of the cottage. She thought he had given only twenty three dollars an acre and thought that a bad bargain. What would she have thought of it had she known the real price. What are her two last children boys or girls[?] 

Now I consider you a most fortunate person in having but one to plague you. Though not for worlds would I be willing to part with either of mine as I love them all as well as I should one. I suppose though now you have some of Dr. Massie's children with you and you may become as much attached to them, as if they were your own by keeping them with you. 

I wish you would prevail on Mr. Massie to bring you over this summer. We would be delighted to see you and I will learn you how to raise turkeys. I believe this part of the world suits them as no person raises less than twenty and commonly sixty and eighty. I have never kept more than five old hens and I raised twenty eight or nine last year. 

This is a fine counrty for butter. I calculated last fall on making my fortune selling it but the Ohio people sent on twelve or fifteen waggons [wagons] so that it fell from two shillings which was the price early in the season to sixpence. I received eighteen pence for some and 20 and 18 cents for some and ninepence for the rest. The ninepence butter I sold lately and there was sixty odd pounds all made since the first of February. Was it not a shame to give so little for fresh butter and they cheated me out of ten pounds to make the matter worse. 

Mr. A joins me in love to you and Mr. Massie.
                                        Yours affectionately 
                                                      L.H.A. 

[Checked against a transcript as rendered in Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. XXIII, No. 2 (April 1915), pages 189-191. A few variations in punctuation. Biggest change is from "Farmville" in the 1915 transcription to Farrowsville in this one. 

Lucy Ambler = Lucy Hopkins Johnston (1800-1888) married Thomas Marshall Ambler (1791-1875) on April 14, 1819. Their main abode was "Morven," Fauquier County, Virginia, from about 1820 on. For a link, see here. 

Three children = Lucy Letitia Ambler (1820-1853), John C. Ambler (1821-1891) and Elizabeth Steptoe Ambler (January 20, 1823-1900).

Sarah "Sally" Tate Steptoe Massie (1796-1828) was married to William Massie (1795-1862) and was the daughter of James Steptoe (1750-1826). Their son Thomas "Tommo" James Massie (1817-1877) was born on March 23, 1817.There is a massive Massie collection at the University of Texas here.

Mr. Ambler's mother and father = John Ambler (1762-1836) and Katherine (aka Catherine) Bush Ambler (1773-1836: Norton from first marriage).

Cinthea / Cynthia = probably an enslaved servant.  

My father's = Charles Johnston (1769-1833), residing at Botetourt Springs, Virginia.

William Callaway (1779-1855).

Grandmama Callaway = not sure to whom she is referring, as the likeliest candidates had died years before.

Grandpapa = James Steptoe (1750-1826).

Mr. Penn and Lucy =  Lucinda “Lucy” Steptoe Penn (1795-1878) married Robert Cowan Penn (1789-1854) in 1814.]

[Many thanks to Sue Davis, William Myers, Mary Davy and Sally Young for their ongoing research collaboration.]