"Dear Minnie..."

Emma Savage's Letters to Araminta Brown

This is the last letter that we have from Emma to Araminta.
There seems to have been a big gap between their writing to each other.
Inevitably, there seem to have been a lot of changes.
Emma has gone blind; we suspect that the writing of this letter may have been done by G M Brown, referred to in the Foxearth detail of the family.
It was also this letter which finally led us to the Savage family of Cavendish.

15 Jan'ry 1913

Dear Minnie,

I was so very pleased to hear from you and on my birthday too. Saturday was a terrible day here we had quite a blizzard. We were going to London, but I was taken ill and was unable to go so the master went to Sudbury and sent Mr Willie instead. I have often thought of you and wondered why you never wrote.

Its quite true I am blind and cannot write, but my thoughts is as keen and clear as ever.

I hope you will not let Hilda go into the mill, teach all your children if you can the value of cooking, it will never go out of fashion.

I was very glad to hear your husband is in work again and trust he will make the home better and brighter for you all.

Fancy Ethel and Olive grown to young woman, what a little temper Ethel had but I am glad she is getting on alright. Your father wished he was back in Glemsford and I wished so too - you will remember Mr Paton the schoolmaster he is very ill and has sent in his resignation - poor things they dont know where to go the doctor has ordered him to live in Surrey he has least trouble he turns quite blue in the face. Their youngest son went to America 3 years ago and has been doing well so he is coming home this year for a holiday. The daughter Emmie is engaged to a young man who has gone to Australia and she is going to join him in October. Mrs Hall is deeply grieved they are leaving.

Mr Savages father and mother are in fairly good health for their age - on the 9th of November last they celebrated their 73rd wedding day - The King sent them a telegram of congratulations they were so pleased, they skipped about as if they were 50 instead of 92 and 94. I hope you will be able to come down in the summer - as you know how pleased I should be to see you.

Mrs Blick is still living at Ryde I.W. but she is very discontented, she has 10/- a week to live on 5/- of the old age pension and the other I allow her, but she has had so many different lodgings and falls out with the various people that I really dont know what to do for her.

There is not very much alteration in the place about here. No new buildings and Collleys factory is still empty.

Mr and Mrs E. Watkinson at the shop are living in the house where Mr Marshall lived. They have sold their shop.

Enoch Watkinson is still working at the little factory next the Three Turns - one daughter is still school teacher at Glemsford the other is in service, but poor thing she has very bad health - and his son that he meant for a schoolmaster did not like it and went to a situation in London at the Carlton Club he was doing well and they all liked him so much - but his health broke down and he is living at home with his father and has never been fit to go to work since, its very hard on the Father and Mother for they have tried very hard to get on.

Our storeroom here we have made into a bathroom and W.C. at the end - we can have a warm bath at any time - we have a new kitchen stove and a cistern on the top of the house so the bath is supplied with hot and cold water . The man pumps up the water every morning - it is such an improvement. We have had it about 5 years - Miss Alices husband Mr Higgins designed it and saw it all done in a proper manner. They have bought a farm at West Bergholt near Colchester call the Manor Farm there is 96 acres and they are having very extensive alterations it will be a lovely place when finished - she has such a good husband - he thinks the world of her, they have no children but they are very happy together - you remember Miss Annie who came to spend her honeymoon with you well she married a second time to a widower with one daughter and she is very happy and comfortable. She has a nice house at Clacton and another private house in London of 14 rooms and her daughter Poppy and his daughter are companions.

Mrs Spraggs name is now Mrs Coan - she sent her daughters to a school for cookery and they are both splendid cooks and the strange part is that every servant they have are always anxious to imitate them and learn cooking. Mrs Coan says that if ever they are reduced in life they will never be reduced to want while they have that trade now dear Minnie I must conclude and wishing you all a bright and happy New Year and may each year, be better for you and yours, than the last one
with love
I remain
yours sincerely,
E.Savage.

• Presumably, William Savage, of the Shakespeare Hotel, Emma and George's nephew.
• Ethel and Olive were Araminta's young sisters. In 1901 they were 10 and 8 years old. They went to live in Keighley with Araminta and John which probably explains the tone of this reference.
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• In 1901, William Payton, his wife and 4 children, lived in the Board School on Lion Road. The house went with the job. He was 45 then. His daughter Alice (20 in 1901) was a trainee teacher, and several Paytons feature in the Log Books of the Primary School.
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• John and Jane Savage, from whom this remarkable family grew.
• This possibly refers to Ernest Watkinson who, in 1901 was a Grocer Shopkeeper on Hunts Hill.
  There were 4 Marshall families in the village in 1901. The nearest one to the Watkinsons was just 2 doors away on Hunts Hill.
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• In 1901, Lucy Blick appears on the 1901 Census for Ryde on the Isle of Wight as a domestic cook, living on her own in a single room at 71 Arthur Street.
  She was already 67 and a widow.
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• In 1901, Enoch Watkinson was living, with his family, on Angel Lane. He was a "Cocoa Mat Maker". His daughter Eliza, then 17, was a pupil teacher at the school. His older son, Arthur, then 16, is the only person in the 1901 Glemsford Census returns to be recorded as a worker in the Flax or Linen industry.
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• We are not sure about the other references. The Higgins are mentioned in the 1900 letters, and (we hope) "Annie" may be Annie Wright who featured so much in the early letters.
• And, in passing, here is some fascinating detail about the progress of house improvements at that time.

Read about what we know about the
Brown Family History