Etta Bailey Burgiss papers

Items

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  Letter from Victoria Bailey to Etta Bailey — November 29, no year (188_)
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  Letter from Victoria Bailey to Etta Bailey — July 17, no year
• Letter from Victoria Bailey to Etta Bailey — June 24, no year
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  Letter from Victoria Bailey and William Bailey to Etta Bailey — undated
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  Letter from Victoria Bailey and William Bailey to Etta Bailey — September 29, 1881
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  Letter from Victoria Bailey to Etta Bailey — July 22, 1881

  At the time her mother sent her this letter, Etta is 14 years old; Victoria is 39. Etta’s sister Estelle died five years earlier; her father will die one year later. Her twin brothers are now 9 years old, sister Fannie is 6, and sister Bettie is 3. The letter refers to "Aunt Eliza." Eliza Bailey was a resident of Greenville, S.C. and attended Greenville Womens College. She received a degree in 1865; she is also on a census in 1880. Etta is in Greenville at a school.
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  Note: “This is every single one of them.”

  This is a small slip of paper with a handwritten note: “This is every single one of them.” The handwriting does not match any other in the collection. This collection of letters from Victoria to Margaret was kept by Margaret; Vic died relatively young, long before Margaret. One possibility is that Margaret gave the letters to Etta shortly after Victoria’s death. For example, at a funeral, Margaret might have mentioned to Etta that she had saved all Vic’s letters, and she’d send them back to Etta. We do not know.
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  Envelope, cream, July 7
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  Undated envelope, cream, not postal service
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  Undated envelope, blue, not postal service
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — March 21, 1869

  This letter touches on several important topics. The Bailey’s organized a Sunday School at Tabor; that’s Mt. Tabor Presbyterian, which was the Bailey family’s central place of worship for decades. The Masons formed a lodge: WC’s Masonic career was extensive; read more at the entry on W.C. Bailey. Here, Victoria is referencing that he formed the Bailey Masonic Lodge on November 17, 1868, with 23 charter members. She notes that Enoch Cunningham’s son Tom will be tending business on the first floor of the store house, and boarding with the Baileys — and she makes the joke about running a boarding house. This is reflected in the 1870 census, where the residence is noted as a boarding house and Thomas Cunningham is listed among the boarders; so is Vic’s “tolerable good cook,” who is a 23-year-old woman named Sarah Benson — listed as mulatto.
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — December 6, likely 1868
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — July 4, probably 1868
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — undated, probably early 1868.
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — December 27, 1867
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — undated, around the summer of 1867.
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — July 3, 1867
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — likely May 1867

  Regarding the date: the key data point is that she talks about Margaret’s namesake. That has to be Margaret Henrietta Bailey, who in the July 3, 1867 letter is already going by “Etta” — the name she would go by the rest of her life. She was born in 1866, and is apparently already talking/walking by this letter (which pushes it as far from 1866 as possible). It could well mean that she went by “Margy” from birth to this point, and the “Etta” nickname hasn’t developed yet; perhaps it came about over the next few months as Etta was learning to talk and trying to pronounce her own name. However, it’s also possible that this letter is after the July note, the “Etta” moniker is already in use, and Etta has just figured out she also has a first name that’s named after her Aunt Margie — and is reveling in that thought. If so, the letter could be from any point up to 1869, when Estelle was born (and would have almost certainly been mentioned).
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — December 30, 1866
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  Envelope of letter from Victoria Bailey to Margaret Sullivan — August 24, 1866
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — August 21, 1866
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  Letter from Victoria Cunningham Bailey to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — September 30, 1865

  In this letter, Victoria explains and describes her marriage to W. C. Bailey.
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  Envelope of letter from Victoria Cunningham to Margaret Sullivan — August 14, probably 1865
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  Letter from Victoria Elizabeth Cunningham to Margaret Cunningham Sullivan — June 2, 1865
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  Envelope of letter from Victoria Cunningham to Margaret Sullivan — February 27, 1865