Letter from Helen Hunt to Charlotte Cushman, July 29, 1875

Letter from Helen Hunt to Charlotte Cushman, July 29, 1875

Jackson, Helen Hunt

Cushman, Charlotte Saunders, 1816-1876

Relationships-- Intimate--Same-sex

Relationships--Intimate--Opposite-sex

Marriage

Hunt wants to stay with Charlotte Cushman at Lenox while also telling her to get some rest. She also talks about meeting her at the station and about the uninteresting sea coast in Rye Beach. Helen Hunt explains to Cushman her reasons for marrying Mr. Jackson.

Credit

Library of Congress, Charlotte Cushman Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

For transcripts, please also see Colorado College.

Hunt, Helen Jackson, 1830-1885

LoC, CCP, Box 11:3408-3411

1875-06-29

Reference

[3408] Regina Cara,

What can I ever say - what can I ever do – for this dear letter written with your own hand. when to write was such pain! I feel guilty at being glad of it; but I cannot help being glad. all the same.
Indeed I will come and stay a day or two with you at Lenox. Nothing that could happen would give me such pleasure as to sit at your feet again for a few hours. But I think I would better not go with you. The journey will tire you. You ought not to be

[3409] spoken to by the way; and you ought to rest for some days after getting there, before seeing any one. So I will wait; but I will come any day you name: - and if you will let me know what day you go through Worcester, I will come down, and kiss you at the station. The trains stop five minutes; that would be long enough.
I hope you will go at once. I can’t bear to think of your spending one ounce of strength in bearing up under that enervating Newport air.- I do not know another air so subtly undermining as that is to me. - I see by my new life now what I have been robbed of by the N. England sea coast
I suppose that there are

[reverse 3408] persons whom it suits and who need it; the people who are obliged to flee from Colorado because they cannot sleep there, for instance, long for the sea, inexplicably. I know a woman there [crossed out] in Denver [both words inserted] who is literally dying by inches from the over stimulus of the nerves; she has not slept without opiates for months: she told[?] me that she dreamed night after night of the sea. She so longs for it; she is nearly well as soon as she gets to it, though she is a much diseased woman. – Now I sleep like a top[?], – even [inserted] in Colorado! – and here by the sea, I sleep night and day too! – I have had hard work to keep from nodding here, every moment since I came.
Dear old Mrs. Cross[?] came this morning with Mrs. Emmons and took Mrs. Hunt

[reverse 3409] and me for a fine drive. +++ the +++ of the Beach, Little Boars Head &c. It is to me. a most uninteresting sea coast - so inferior to Newport: the great charm of the region is in the quaint old life here. – The apple trees, and the farmhouses. The apple orchards look fairly twisted with astonishment at the gay world which has come in; - since I was here the tone of the place has changed marvelously. Little Boars Head where I spent two months twelve years ago, in a primitive farmhouse, is now a sort of Brighton promontory, -- full of villas with names, and Mrs. Secretary[?] Robeson’s flag flying on the breeze! –
I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your warm words about my

[3410] marriage. It is a joy to have somebody glad of it, for most of my friends seem only dismayed – and think evidently that I have taken leave of my last sense; and as I have such mighty misgivings myself, such things disturb me. My misgivings are much more for Mr. Jackson than for myself however. He deserves a much better wife than I can possibly make; and[?] he needs a different sort of woman; but he will never see this and I only [last three words crossed out] unless we are married, and I can only pray he may not after! Why do you say to me, Dear Queen, “only stick to it.” -- I do not come of a race of liars – and having taken eighteen months to determine to give my word, I shall

[3411] most surely abide by it, unless something were to happen, [two words crossed out] to change all things, and make it plainly my duty to abandon the plan. One thing is certain that I do not marry with any romantic illusions to be dissipated[?]; any ideal to be shattered. I have sat opposite this man. three times a day, at meals, for nearly two years. He has spent about [inserted and underlined] every hour out of business hours. in my presence! I know every foible, & fault he possesses. I know all he is not [underlined]! - But he rests me; and I trust him to the core, which is what I have seldom felt of an man. I think he is very much what old Mr. Crow must have been twenty years ago; -

[reverse 3410] You can form from that, perhaps some idea of the marvelousness of my being brought to think it possible to marry him. I know perfectly well. that I haven’t a friend in the world who will not wonder on seeing him; I know perfectly well that there will be moments where he will jar on my taste, or my prejudices or conventional customs, so that I shall turn red: - but [underlined] – of all the men I have known who would never have jarred me, that way, there has not been one [underlined] of whom I should be so sure of never having to blush at heart [underlined], for a meanness or a falsity which I [underlined] alone knew!

[reverse 3411] He is truth[?], and uprightness itself - & as sunny as sunshine; and he has won me to care for him by so slow a winning that I am persuaded it must last. Forgive this egotism. I know you love me enough to care; and I know I love you so much that to have you [underlined] glad and sure I am right is more to me than to have all the rest sorry!
I stay with Mrs. Hunt today and tomorrow – and go back to Princeton on Sat. She looks well, but is full of the trouble. When is there to be any rest for her! -- Farewell beloved Queen. – Your faithful H.H.

Hunt, Helen Jackson, 1830-1885

Cushman, Charlotte Saunders, 1816-1876

Rye Beach, New Hampshire

43.0120186

-70.7719426