Manuscript Bereavement commonplace book (Addition 70) 2024-0148

Containers:
Box 13, Folder 8
Extent:
0.04 Cubic Feet
Scope and content:

This addition to MSS 16758, The University of Virginia Collection on the History of Childhood, Parenting, and Family Building, contains one volume of an anonymous bereavement commonplace book, dated 1856 and 1874. The manuscript consists of ninety-eight pages of writing, with the rest left blank. The manuscript contains writings by three different women. The first (and most extensive) is by an unnamed governess who writes of the loss of a child in her care, Harry. Her spidery handwriting is even and accomplished, and her use of "thee" and "thou" throughout suggests she may have been a Quaker. For thirty pages, she expresses her heartfelt love for the child and her grief during Harry's decline. She describes her memories of the boy and his siblings and details the boy's last illness, of about six days' duration, and death.

The following forty-eight pages include bereavement verses including poetry, both original and copied from published works, segments of stories, and verses from the bible. within these pages, the Governess left three pages blank; on the first of these blank pages, "M.E.G." [later identified as Mary E. Grote] wrote about the death of her firstborn son, "Ernie," whose father was Ernest William Davis. In the first line of her text, Grote refers to the manuscript itself as "this choice collection."

The verse then continues in the governess' hand. Until another passage by Mary Grote appears. It is a five-page memorial titled "To Ernie," dated August 30th, 1874. It is possible that Grote's earlier one-page passage may have been written in 1874. Fourteen blank leaves separate Grote's writing to an entirely different hand and content.

There are five pages of "Hints For Housewives." These undated, unrelated notes seem to be brief views on issues that arise in a household including damp cupboards, flies, roasting meat, buying eggs, mending china, and other domestic matters.

Language:
English
Acquisition information:
This collection was a purchase from Michael Laird Rare Books to the Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia Library on 28 August 2024.

Access and use

Location of collection:
University of Virginia, Special Collections Dept.
Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library
University of Virginia
P.O. Box 400110
160 McCormick Rd
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4110
Contact for questions and access:
POC: Brenda Gunn
Phone: (434) 924-1037
Phone: (434) 243-1776
Fax: (434) 924-4968
Restrictions:

This collection is open for research.

Parent restrictions:
The collection is open for research use.
Parent terms of access:
This collections contains some in-copyright material. Visit our Permissions and Publishing page (https://library.virginia.edu/special-collections/services/publising). For more information about use of Special Collections materials. The library can contain copyright material on request, but users are responsible for making their own determination about lawful use of collection materials.
Preferred citation:

MSS 16748, The University of Virginia Collection on the History of Childhood, Parenting, and Family Building, Addition 70, Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia Library.