James Underhill to FPK, December 1, 1915
Dublin Core
Title
James Underhill to FPK, December 1, 1915
Description
Letter concerning mother and marriage
Creator
James Underhill
Source
From the collection of Frances Parkinson Keyes Papers, Special collections, University of Vermont
Date
1915-12-01
Contributor
Ellie Miner
Format
Typewritten letter
Type
Document
Identifier
Box 1-39
Document Item Type Metadata
Text
James Underhill, Ph.D., mining engineer and geologist, Idaho Springs, Colo.
Dear Frances, I was very glad to get your letter and U will first comment on several points. I remember the walk you speak of and the $10.00. I imagine you do work for your living as you say. Our mother has never criticised anything that you did to me since your marriage. I can easily imagine what Henry thinks especially with the condition in the immediate neighborhood. Lucy and I naturally think too. We thank heaven nearly hourly that we are not compelled to live near the old lady and hope that here will find out about the thing.
Now for your direct questions. It would take a book to write all that influenced me to take the position and act as I did at the time of your marriage. It was probably 90% pure cussedness. I was very angrey on account of the way our mother acted when out here with you. I felt disgraced in a sense in Lucy’s eyes on her account. Then when you were married she intimated that I was expected to put up a few thousand dollars to give you the proper send off. Or at least that is what it amounted to. That particularly enraged me when I remembered that she had done absolutely nothing for me when I was married. In fact quite the contrary. At the time of your marriage we were making almost nothing and loving off of our income from investments. We had been let down with a thud from doing a fine business. If I had done what she seemed to expect I should have had to have borrowed the money or sold securities at a loss. I consulted Cousin Alice in the matter for like you I was still somewhat “troubled because I thought she was troubled” Cousin Alice said that I could not be expected either to go back or to put up anything. I will come back to this later. When our mother announced that she was going to marry Pillsbury I was in Exeter. She wrote that she was marrying in great part to give us, you and me, greater advantages and she also gave a list in my case of th4 things that she was going to do for me. She never did any of them or kept any of her promises. In my joy I wrote her an enthusiastic boyish letter in reply telling her how glad I was. Forever afterwards on all occasions she reminded me how glad I had been to have her marry and before she got rid of him or he her, she was telling me al the time that she had married him to please me entirely and she really thought that I was to blame for the whole affair. Now you had told me our here that a marriage would probably be arranged for you and she had said the same thing or nearly so. In the light of that Pillsbury episode I know perfectly well that if I was even polite about what I \said in regard to your marriage and there was any trouble afterwards, she would always hold it up to me as my own doings and put the blame on me entirely. I had nothing against [page 2] you or henry and knew absolutely nothing about him or your marriage except what I had heard from you or your mother and do not now. I tried to write pleasant letters about it to you at the time. Perhaps I succeeded. I wrote the nastiest letters that I could to our mother and perhaps I succeeded there too.
You ask if I thought that you had a lot of money. I have thought very little about it and except when our mother was stirring up things. A lot of money may seem anything from a silver dollar to a child to millions to other people. I have thought that you were comfortably fixed. If I had been asked to guess your income I should. Knowing absolutely nothing about it, have guessed that you had something between $2,000 and $10,000 a year. I, however, knew nothing about your financial position except what our mother has written. She has always tried to give us the idea that she had done a great deal for you because you had married to suit her and that you had received $30,000 worth of wedding presents. While she did not say so she wanted us to think that she had given you the greater portion of the $30,000. She also wrote that you were to live on a farm “that almost paid taxes” Such items as a rule do not go with great poverty. As to your being happy I took it for granted that you were happy as you seemed to have everything to make you happy. As a matter of fact I have not thought about it.
As you probably remember our mother professed to be very anxious to have me marry. She promised me if I would marry that she would give me a thousand dollars, house furnished and al the jewelry that my father had given her. As you probably remember she gave me absolutely nothing. When she was here with you she said that my wedding present would come later as I was not ready for it. What she ment by that I have no idea. Have you?
Just before I became engaged she proposed that I establish myself in Denver, She agreed to finance me there. When I became engaged she seemed very well pleased at first but when I told here that I was ready to go to Denver she replied that she had changed her mind on the advice of Hart and Fowditch and would not help me to get established in Denver at all. Further she told me to tell Lucy’s mother, of all people, that neither she nor Lucy could look to her for anything and that she was going to cut off my allowance. She did this oweing me about a thousand dollars back money. Why she was glad to have me marry Lucy one day then apparently so suddenly changed her mind I have no idea. Have you?
She has always tried to make me think that she was doing a great deal for other people and would have done the same for me if I had married to suit her. In that way she has filled many pages telling me what she has done for you, Ervin, Anne and not what she is doing for Taisy. Doubtless she has told you how much she did for me financially. As a matter of fact when she and Pillsbury had over $15,000 a year she gave me $750 a year for about seven years and the greater part of this if not all had to be spent to keep up her credit. But on the other hand for twelve years she got $750 each year from the Underhills which for several years she lived on when my living cost almost nothing. She has always been very bitter because she got nothing from the Underhill estate and I did and she pretends that the $750 a year was given to her not to me. But the Underhills never lost an opportunity to tell me that it was my money and sent for me and that she had no right to use it for herself. At the time they started ending it, her mother agreed to give her $750 each year also but never kept her part of the agreement. Some day I will tell you the story of how she did happen to get some money of her own. It makes a very pretty story if you are not particular how you express yourself. Cousin Alice told me the whole thing just before she died.
I have sent you with this list of questions. Some of them may sound silly to you but I can use any information you may be able to send perhaps very effectively.
We have put up a small building on the main street nearly opposite the R.R. station. It is office in front and home and small garden behind. The office is very complete and well equipped in every way. Many including the state engineer have told us that we had the best equipped engineers office in the state. The home part is far from complete either in finish or in regard to furnishing. In contrast with your palatial residence there is only one bed room. We were doing a bug business when we started building and had every reason to think it would keep up. It did not and we are now in about the same position that we were in when you were were married. While we have considerable more that we had then at the same time many of our securities have ceased to pay dividends, let us hope temporarily, and our securities are somewhat greater in nearly every line. We are also trying to pay off the debt on the building.
Very best regards from us both to you all,
Affectionately your brother
James Underhill
Dear Frances, I was very glad to get your letter and U will first comment on several points. I remember the walk you speak of and the $10.00. I imagine you do work for your living as you say. Our mother has never criticised anything that you did to me since your marriage. I can easily imagine what Henry thinks especially with the condition in the immediate neighborhood. Lucy and I naturally think too. We thank heaven nearly hourly that we are not compelled to live near the old lady and hope that here will find out about the thing.
Now for your direct questions. It would take a book to write all that influenced me to take the position and act as I did at the time of your marriage. It was probably 90% pure cussedness. I was very angrey on account of the way our mother acted when out here with you. I felt disgraced in a sense in Lucy’s eyes on her account. Then when you were married she intimated that I was expected to put up a few thousand dollars to give you the proper send off. Or at least that is what it amounted to. That particularly enraged me when I remembered that she had done absolutely nothing for me when I was married. In fact quite the contrary. At the time of your marriage we were making almost nothing and loving off of our income from investments. We had been let down with a thud from doing a fine business. If I had done what she seemed to expect I should have had to have borrowed the money or sold securities at a loss. I consulted Cousin Alice in the matter for like you I was still somewhat “troubled because I thought she was troubled” Cousin Alice said that I could not be expected either to go back or to put up anything. I will come back to this later. When our mother announced that she was going to marry Pillsbury I was in Exeter. She wrote that she was marrying in great part to give us, you and me, greater advantages and she also gave a list in my case of th4 things that she was going to do for me. She never did any of them or kept any of her promises. In my joy I wrote her an enthusiastic boyish letter in reply telling her how glad I was. Forever afterwards on all occasions she reminded me how glad I had been to have her marry and before she got rid of him or he her, she was telling me al the time that she had married him to please me entirely and she really thought that I was to blame for the whole affair. Now you had told me our here that a marriage would probably be arranged for you and she had said the same thing or nearly so. In the light of that Pillsbury episode I know perfectly well that if I was even polite about what I \said in regard to your marriage and there was any trouble afterwards, she would always hold it up to me as my own doings and put the blame on me entirely. I had nothing against [page 2] you or henry and knew absolutely nothing about him or your marriage except what I had heard from you or your mother and do not now. I tried to write pleasant letters about it to you at the time. Perhaps I succeeded. I wrote the nastiest letters that I could to our mother and perhaps I succeeded there too.
You ask if I thought that you had a lot of money. I have thought very little about it and except when our mother was stirring up things. A lot of money may seem anything from a silver dollar to a child to millions to other people. I have thought that you were comfortably fixed. If I had been asked to guess your income I should. Knowing absolutely nothing about it, have guessed that you had something between $2,000 and $10,000 a year. I, however, knew nothing about your financial position except what our mother has written. She has always tried to give us the idea that she had done a great deal for you because you had married to suit her and that you had received $30,000 worth of wedding presents. While she did not say so she wanted us to think that she had given you the greater portion of the $30,000. She also wrote that you were to live on a farm “that almost paid taxes” Such items as a rule do not go with great poverty. As to your being happy I took it for granted that you were happy as you seemed to have everything to make you happy. As a matter of fact I have not thought about it.
As you probably remember our mother professed to be very anxious to have me marry. She promised me if I would marry that she would give me a thousand dollars, house furnished and al the jewelry that my father had given her. As you probably remember she gave me absolutely nothing. When she was here with you she said that my wedding present would come later as I was not ready for it. What she ment by that I have no idea. Have you?
Just before I became engaged she proposed that I establish myself in Denver, She agreed to finance me there. When I became engaged she seemed very well pleased at first but when I told here that I was ready to go to Denver she replied that she had changed her mind on the advice of Hart and Fowditch and would not help me to get established in Denver at all. Further she told me to tell Lucy’s mother, of all people, that neither she nor Lucy could look to her for anything and that she was going to cut off my allowance. She did this oweing me about a thousand dollars back money. Why she was glad to have me marry Lucy one day then apparently so suddenly changed her mind I have no idea. Have you?
She has always tried to make me think that she was doing a great deal for other people and would have done the same for me if I had married to suit her. In that way she has filled many pages telling me what she has done for you, Ervin, Anne and not what she is doing for Taisy. Doubtless she has told you how much she did for me financially. As a matter of fact when she and Pillsbury had over $15,000 a year she gave me $750 a year for about seven years and the greater part of this if not all had to be spent to keep up her credit. But on the other hand for twelve years she got $750 each year from the Underhills which for several years she lived on when my living cost almost nothing. She has always been very bitter because she got nothing from the Underhill estate and I did and she pretends that the $750 a year was given to her not to me. But the Underhills never lost an opportunity to tell me that it was my money and sent for me and that she had no right to use it for herself. At the time they started ending it, her mother agreed to give her $750 each year also but never kept her part of the agreement. Some day I will tell you the story of how she did happen to get some money of her own. It makes a very pretty story if you are not particular how you express yourself. Cousin Alice told me the whole thing just before she died.
I have sent you with this list of questions. Some of them may sound silly to you but I can use any information you may be able to send perhaps very effectively.
We have put up a small building on the main street nearly opposite the R.R. station. It is office in front and home and small garden behind. The office is very complete and well equipped in every way. Many including the state engineer have told us that we had the best equipped engineers office in the state. The home part is far from complete either in finish or in regard to furnishing. In contrast with your palatial residence there is only one bed room. We were doing a bug business when we started building and had every reason to think it would keep up. It did not and we are now in about the same position that we were in when you were were married. While we have considerable more that we had then at the same time many of our securities have ceased to pay dividends, let us hope temporarily, and our securities are somewhat greater in nearly every line. We are also trying to pay off the debt on the building.
Very best regards from us both to you all,
Affectionately your brother
James Underhill