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Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, November 18, 1870

Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, November 18, 1870, Page 1

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Title	Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, November 18, 1870
Subject	Correspondence Medicine Health
Description	Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, New York, November 18, 1870.
Date	November 18, 1870
Collection	James Harper Starr Letters
Collection Identifer	A159, Box1, Folder2
Collection Link	http://library.sfasu.edu/findingaids/index.php?p=collections/controlcard&id=304
Biographical Note	James Harper Starr, an important figure in early Texas public life, was born at New Hartford, Connecticut, on December 18, 1809. A medical doctor, Starr's first practice was in Georgia where the good reports he heard about Texas inspired him to move with his wife, Harriet J. Johnson, to Nacogdoches in 1837. Here Starr served variously as President of the Board of Land Commissioners of Nacogdoches, Secretary of the Treasury of the Republic of Texas, and as Confederate agent for the postal service west of the Mississippi River during the Civil War. At the close of the Civil War, Starr's public career came to an end. In 1870 he moved to Marshall, Texas where he established the city's first bank. He died July 25, 1890 and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery at Marshall. (Craven, John Nathan, "Starr, James Harper" in Handbook of Texas, 1952)
Scope and Content Note	Original handwritten letters between former Nacogdoches residents discussing business and personal events.
Associated Dates	1870-1879
Type	Correspondence
Repository	East Texas Research Center
Repository Link	http://library.sfasu.edu/etrc/
Transcript	Marshall, Texas. Nov. 18, 1870 Mrs. Jas. F. Thorn. Dear Madam, I am in receipt of your letter of the 6th inst. and will endeavor to reply to all of your inquiries as fully as I am able to do so. We had had such encouraging letters from Mrs. Hart that we hoped for her an early and complete recovery, and are now pained to learn of her further prostration and suffering. May she yet recover, and enjoy the evening of life as she deserves. I observe your request in her behalf that after supplying Mrs. Durst $200. we continue selling her lands and remit to her - owing to the depressed price of cotton land- selling is just now somewhat suspended, but we think ere long the demand will increase, and that we will be able to convert more of her land as she wishes - It is always a pleasure to be useful to her, than whom no one has higher claims upon the kind offices of friends. As regards your will, there is a package in our office deposited by your husband I think many years ago, endorsed the wills of yourself and husband, no record is made of it - none is ever made here of wills until proven after the decease of the testator - on the joint request of yourself and husband we will of course send it to you, but could not with propriety break the seal of the envelope to send one and not the other - nor do I understand that you wish it = But as you suggest a new will renders the former a nullity. I am very sorry to perceive evidences of anxiety and distress on account of your condition previously. We have supposed that notwithstanding your participation in the general losses consequent and attendant upon the war that your condition was a very enviable on in every respect. - that whilst your children were beginning life under the most happy and auspicious circumstances and surroundings, you were possessed of an estate quite sufficient for your own use, and such as would admit of your indulging your generous sympathies in aid of some of your less fortunate friends - of course I was not aware of any very heavy liabilities, pecuniarily and that there are none which should disturb your happiness or repose. I will enclose an Abstract of your remaining Texas lands. Some of them are not now convertible, but others are at what we call good prices ($3. gold per acre or more sometimes perhaps for some tracts other $1. to $2.). and whilst you are steadily realizing from those which are convertible the State is being developed and others not now salable will be brought into market. We have made sales of your land during the year past quite gratifying to ourselves, and we trust so to you and Mr. Thorn. Frost's property, though under some liability to Wm. Garner and for current expenses here has hardly been touched and when he attains his majority he can avail himself of all favorable opportunities to sell and pass the proceeds into active use in business. Of course Mrs. Garner's happy condition causes you infinite happiness, and no anxiety - I am of opinion that you can continue to realize from your lands $5000. to $10,000- per annum without sacrificing any at rates below the highest current prices. Of course moneyed convalscing (sic) and wars may interrupt. Hence I conclude that your anxious state of mind should not continue. I hope you do not allow the superior wealth and affluence and fashion and display of New York to disturb your repose by inducing a craving for similar means of show and extravagant indulgence. Pardon the idea - but to us of moderate aspirations and small means it sometimes seems that persons who are happily supplied with every reasonable wants gratication (sic) are allowing the overshadowing wealth and display of others to make them miserable - It has been truly said that our chief material wants are "board and clothes". Do not let us who work our way along, subsisting more on our daily earnings - the income from labor - than on accumulated Capital to equal you who have so much more of the world's goods, in the enjoyment of, and thankfulness for the blessings which providence has so kindly bestowed. As regards your losses during the war, I wish I could be instrumental in obliterating from your mind every vestige of belief that your misfortunes were the result of bad management - any special errors which were not attributable to the general chaos and shipwreck in which we were all involved. Your cotton losses were great, but of those who were here giving attention to their own interests in person not one in twenty perhaps I may say one in fifty fared any better. Those who saved their cotton were the rare exceptions to the general rule, and the result was as often owing to some fortunate accident as to anything else. We were in a whirlpool of anarchy at and before the conclusion of the war in which personal property was insecure, and too often lost. Confederate money was taken by all alike, or nearly so. We were fighting for our homes and the right of self-government and in such a contest the credit of the government issues could not be repudiated - of my little means, when the war came on, upwards of twenty thousand dollars was owing to me for the sale of lands (the best part of my lifetime earnings) which amts. were paid in Confederate notes. But the matter never distressed me. I had fifty cents in silver (or rather Mrs. S. had) when I got home after the surrender, and was indebted more than one thousand dollars borrowed gold (you may smile at my mentioning this insignificant sum, but to me it seemed a million) and saw no hope of paying but by labor. To be sure it was all paid in good time and in gold with interest, but I mention the fact as illustrative of our condition. I had opposed the war, opposed secession, as had Genl Edwards, and as had Nacogdoches county through the counsel of a few of us; but when the avalanche came it came upon all alike and we who had so strenuously opposed were found, were I trust our posterity and race will ever be found, ready to sacrifice all in self defence (sic). Property was nothing - the defence (sic) of our homes and the right of self-government everything. If your losses were great (and they were cruelly so) those of your lamented brother were far greater in proportion to his means. Pray let us "look not sorrowfully upon the past" - The shadows of that war cloud will accompany all of us of our generation to the grave, but let us not allow them to entirely darken our path and deprive us of the enjoyment of the evening twilight, which if we will may be all happiness. I perceive that my note is becoming sermonish, and that I am volunteering a moral lecture when none was solicited; but I trust a ready pardon will be granted. Your note will be disposed of as you request, and this endorsed to Mrs. Hart in compliance with your wishes. It will always be a pleasure to give you any information you may desire respecting your interests in Texas as long as they remain in our care. You are aware of our change of domicile in our old age, after living just a third of a century at Nacogdoches, we felt that justice to our children demanded of us a removal to a point where communication with the outside world is less difficult, and though the separation from our Nacogdoches friends was a trial and great sacrifice, the change will doubtless prove to have been a wise one. We are just settling ourselves in a new house and hope ere long to be as comfortably situated as our moderate desires claim that we should be. Remember us kindly to Mr. Thorn and your children, and be assured that I remain your friend and ob't serv't Jm H. Starr
Rights	This item may be protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. It is available for non-commercial research and education. For permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the East Texas Research Center at asketrc@sfasu.edu.

Title	Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, November 18, 1870, Page 1
Collection Identifer	A159, Box1, Folder2
Rights	This item may be protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. It is available for non-commercial research and education. For permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the East Texas Research Center at asketrc@sfasu.edu.

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Starr, Marshall, Texas, to Mrs. James F. Thorn, November 18, 1870

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