Transcribed below is Ellen Cheever Rockwood’s letter to her sister Charlotte “Lottie” Cheever Tucker from York Harbor, Maine, dated September 17, 1915.
This was written soon after the news that Lottie’s daughter,
Elizabeth Washburn Tucker (Betty to her family; Backie to her grandchildren), had
met, by “chance acquaintance on an ocean voyage,” Frank William Cushwa, an
English professor at Phillips Exeter Academy. The voyage was the second passenger ship through
the Panama Canal and ended up at the Pacific-Panama International Exposition in
San Francisco, whence Betty had sent an enthusiastic letter home on August 25,
1915.
Will and Lottie Tucker eventually announced the engagement of Betty and
Frank in December 1915.
What is interesting in the realm of family lore is that Ellen does not seem to have known that the chance meeting on the cruise had actually been orchestrated by her youngest sister, Louisa Cheever, an English professor at Smith, and Miss Helen Pittman, a friend of the Cheever sisters at Choate School who knew Cushwa from his time on the faculty there. (Note Ellen's reference to Pittman's “recommendations.”) Betty’s Aunt Louisa had accompanied her on the cruise and “procured” the introduction.
Chance meeting indeed.
York Harbor, Maine
Sept. 17, 1915
My dear Charlotte:
This is a very
exciting corollary to the Panama trip! I hardly know what to think or say. I have never seen the person to whom I could
think with equanimity of entrusting Betty’s happiness and it is a bit difficult
to get adjusted to having her carried off by a chance acquaintance on an ocean
voyage “all of a sudden”! But his
recommendations from Helen [Pittman] seem to be high, and from what you say I
should judge that Betty is not likely to find it so difficult to know her own
mind as sometimes happens. The visit
from him at home will be sure to clarify things for her, and he can trust to
her good sense and his comments to choose wisely.
I agree with you
that she would not be so likely to find city life so congenial. And Exeter would not be very far away. I can’t bear to think of how you will miss
her when the time comes, or how we shall fare to have someone else taking her
off to New York on little trips. But
much is the way of the world.
We wanted awfully
to lift the slight veil of mystery that seemed to surround Betty when she was with
us, but we had to content ourselves to wait—
When the time
comes for us to give our blessing our hearts will go with—it, for Betty is very
dear and precious to us both—and we have taken great comfort in her all these
years.
I hope her father
is bearing the extra excitement and heat combined without too much fatigue. It
has been very oppressive even here, but tonight a slight shower has cooled
things. We have decided not to leave
early in the week, though Lizzie [Cheever Wheeler] goes to Long Island early
tomorrow morning, and I have sent for Sarah to get our breakfast and tea and
keep the house in order as long as we care to stay. There is a chance that Lizzie may decide to
return after her two weeks with her friends are up. She is really a very excellent cook.
Tell Betty she is
not the only cause of punctures. Nat [Wheeler] came to tea Monday night and on
the way up the hill said, “Doddie [George Rockwood], s’pose you should have a
puncture here, could you get up to the house before you slipped.” Returning after tea, lo! an ominous sound as
he went up from the hedges. So Nat and I
walked home as George had to go back to the house to change his only white
trousers before tackling it. Wednesday we had a fine trip to Exeter and back
with Bancroft [Wheeler], but just as he passed the Breckenridge’s, the same rear
tire that he had put on the night before had to come off he all the heat of noon
hour on the highway! Was it not curious
three punctures within four days, after going 2,800 miles in three months
without one!
I am off to bed now
as we rise early to see Lizzie off on the 7 o’clock train.
My especially dear
love to you all
Ellen
