Record Data
Source citation
Sarah Woolfork Wiggins, ed. The Journal of Josiah Gorgas: 1857-1878 (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1995), 5 - 6.
Type
Diary
Date Certainty
Exact
Transcriber
Meghan Allen
Transcription date
Transcription
The following text is presented here in complete form, as true to the original written document as possible.
Wednesday, Jany 28 [1857] We have passed thro’ the coldest weather that has been known for many years. The thermometer fell to 36˚ below zero at our north window. With the help of good fires in the furnaces we were enabled to keep quite comfortable. Yesterday was a lucky day for us. We received letters from Mobile [where several members of his wife’s family resided] and from [Amelia’s younger brother] Dick, who has just arrived with his good ship at Genoa. I also learned of Dick, who has just arrived with his good ship at Genoa. I also learned of the passage thro’ the House of the bill for increasing the pay of the Army Officers. There is no doubt of the action on it in the Senate. The chief matter of interest at Washington is the inquiry going on as to alleged corruption among the M.C.’s [members of Congress]. The charge was made by the correspondent of the [New York] “Times,” Mr. [James W.] Simonton, in general terms. Notice was taken of it in the House, but no action would have been had on it, because it was merely newspaper report, had not Mr. [Robert T.] Paine [Representative] of N.C. said there was too much truth in the charge, as he knew. Mr. Simonton refuses to give up the names of the members who he says approached him to obtain pay for them for their votes on certain measures. He is in custody & a bill has passed the Senate to compel persons under heavy penalties to answer in these cases.
Poor little Jessie has been quite sick, with teething no doubt, and had kept her mother up for several nights, until she is very much worn out. I am such a poor nurse that I cannot relieve her much, and Anne (the nurse) good as she is, cannot manage the little ones. Willie is delighted with a new table which serves also to support his chair at [the] table. He is very bright, quite grave & tolerable mischievous & troublesome. Yesterday as I was reading a paragraph aloud to his mother while he was playing near, he, without interrupting his avocations, followed my reading & caught very accurately the principal words.
Now that our finances will be abundant for our wants Minnie & myself begin to talk of buying a plantation when we shall have grown rich. I think she would be quite happy if she could see herself 12 or 15 years hence the mistress of a hundred bales of cotton per annum and 40 or 50 ebony faces, whom she would make happy. She has eminently the faculty of making dependents contented, & would I dare say spoil every darkey about her, for the use of any one but herself. The weather has become very moderate again & we propose taking a family sleigh ride today. The mercury stood at 35˚ above yesterday & at 24˚ this morning.
Poor little Jessie has been quite sick, with teething no doubt, and had kept her mother up for several nights, until she is very much worn out. I am such a poor nurse that I cannot relieve her much, and Anne (the nurse) good as she is, cannot manage the little ones. Willie is delighted with a new table which serves also to support his chair at [the] table. He is very bright, quite grave & tolerable mischievous & troublesome. Yesterday as I was reading a paragraph aloud to his mother while he was playing near, he, without interrupting his avocations, followed my reading & caught very accurately the principal words.
Now that our finances will be abundant for our wants Minnie & myself begin to talk of buying a plantation when we shall have grown rich. I think she would be quite happy if she could see herself 12 or 15 years hence the mistress of a hundred bales of cotton per annum and 40 or 50 ebony faces, whom she would make happy. She has eminently the faculty of making dependents contented, & would I dare say spoil every darkey about her, for the use of any one but herself. The weather has become very moderate again & we propose taking a family sleigh ride today. The mercury stood at 35˚ above yesterday & at 24˚ this morning.