"...she rose up tall, and imposing as an Egyptian Prophetess of old..."

Autograph letter signed by Nettie C, Maynard, to her friend Myrtle A. Newton. Englewood, Cook County, Illinois, 31 December 1880. 10 pages, 8vo, with original pre-paid envelope with green embossed 3-cent postage and 1 January postmark.

A lengthy and heartfelt letter written by a Quaker woman, Nettie C. Maynard, to her close friend on New Year's Eve 1880 as "the last sands in [the] hour glass of Time for 1880 are quietly slipping away." Maynard was born in Connecticut c. 1841, and lived in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago with her husband W.P. Maynard, her sister-in-law Julia Bidwell, her mother M.C. Colburn, and a 20-year-old servant named Adie Christoph.

Nettie writes to her friend Myrtle in New York City, after having read a newspaper with dire predictions for the coming year. In response, she recalls a time when she saw Sojourner Truth speak earlier in her life. She recounts the occasion in vivid and emphatic detail: "After reading this horrible article I felt a good deal as I fancy Sojourner Truth did once, years ago, when she had listened a good while to the many speakers at a Womens’ Rights Meeting, many of whom spoke of how matters and things in general and Womens’ Rights in particular were to be run, and secured, and taking advantage in the momentary lull of "declamations" she rose up tall, and imposing as an Egyptian Prophetess of old, and raising her black, bony hand to enforce silence, said, as only she could speak it, Chillun! Whar am God? This pertinent question accomplished what nothing else perhaps would, so fully secured the attention she required, and I am told the speech that was the result, was the speech of the occasion. But Brother Smith can give you the faith of it better than I. All I have to do with it on this occasion is, I felt like asking the dismal writer of Perehelion horrors, the same question."

She continues her letter with reports of the weather, poetry, and references to their shared Quaker faith: "The loving trust of our gentle Quaker Poet is much needed, when the cradle song of the New Year is set to such stormy music, and I feel to say with him 'Yet in the maddening maze of things Beset by storm and Flood, To one fixed stake my spirit clings I know that God is good!'" Nettie also relays her mother's thanks for a gift that Myrtle sent and recounts the surprise birthday party they held for her, which included a 22 lb turkey. The letter closes with a New Year's Eve joke: "Willie says if I expect my letter to go this year I must hasten."

An excellent eyewitness recollection of the vigor with which Sojourner Truth commanded an audience.

Condition: Minor short separations at old folds.

[African Americana, African American History, Black History, Women's History, Quakers, Quaker History]