To
Clara L. Clemens
19 July 1877 • New York, N.Y.
(MS, correspondence card, in pencil: Sotheby’s,
New York, October 1996, UCCL 01454)
New York, July 19.
slcBay Clemens, I have bought two bath tubs & two dolls & sent them by express.—they are
for you & Susie. One of the dolls is named Hosannah Maria & is in quite delicate health. She belongs to [you. She] was out driving & got rained on, & caught a very severe cold. It settled on her mind. When she had partly
recovered, she caught a new cold, which paralyzed the sounding-board of her ears & the wobbling nerve of her tongue. She has
never heard or spoken since. I have consulted the best physicians. They say constant & complicated bathing will fetch her.
Papa
Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
LLMT, 202; Davis 1978, 4; Christie’s catalog, sale of 17 May 1991, lot 90, partial publication; Sotheby’s catalog, sale of 29 October 1996, lot 210, partial publication.
Provenance:
The letter was among those which, in the 1950s, Clara Clemens Samossoud gave or sold to Chester L. Davis, Sr. After his death in 1987, it became part of the collection of Chester L. Davis, Jr. The letter was sold by Christie’s in 1991 to James Lowe, who in turn sold it to the Jacobses later that year. The Jacobs collections was sold by Sotheby's on 29 October 1996.
Emendations and textual notes:
you. She • ~.— | ~
