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CATHARINE HARVEY's LETTER TO LODA By: Max Reed In Vol. 2 No. 2 of FOOTPRINTS, a reproduced letter from Catharine Harvey to her Huddleston grandchildren. There is a question as to the year this letter was written as only "May 31" appears on the heading. There is also the suggestion that Catharine lived in Mansville, IT (Indian Territory) as this appears to be the return address. The letter was written May of 1897, most probably on Sunday May 30, 1897. This letter states that Catharine has just received a letter from Laura yesterday and that Laura and Finley were "booth baptized the 2 day of May by a Christian preacher. Laura joined on Sunday night and Finley joined the next day at the water" My grandmother Laura (Harvey) Nelson was baptized May 2, 1897 and my grandfather Finley was baptized the next day. May 2, 1897 was in fact a Sunday. Also, there is an additional page to this letter which was not included. That page is written to Loda Huddelston who was about 6 and a half years old. That page is headed.........
May 31, 1897 was a Monday. So this page was either written the next day (The letter to Zena Huddleston was written on....Sunday long and lonely day.....) Or Catharine mistakenly wrote May 31 instead of May 30. It was the Huddleston grandchildren who lived in Mansville IT and not Catharine. Sarah Alice (Harvey) Huddleston died on January 12, 1891. Demetrius Huddleston and the four children moved to Nocona where Laura and Finley lived sometime after 1893. The first year in Nocona they liven in a half-dug-out. They then moved on the Clinghamsmith place west of Nocona. (A half-dug-out is like a room, half of which is dug out of the ground and the top half constructed of wood. You have seen pictures of these in old photographs.) The Huddlestons left Nocona when Loda was five years old. That would have been between July 1895 and July 1896. They moved to Mansville IT. It was on a visit to her Huddleston grandchildren as well as to her son Charles in July of 1898 that Catharine died at Roff, Indian Territory. (I assume her son William also lived near Mansville in Ardmore at that time.)
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