The Package of Old Letters

On this date in our family history . . . the 25th day of June . . . in the year 1950 . . . my great-grandpa, Edgar Henry, died in Rockdale, Milam County, Texas . . . his final resting place is marked with a double headstone in the Oak Lawn Cemetery in Rockdale . . .

 

Edgar Henry was born 31 January 1872 at Old Independence, Washington County, Texas . . . Edgar and his twin sister, Emma (1872-1944), were the 4th and 5th of eight children born to William Paschal (1836-1912) & Josephine Wingfield (Davis) Henry (1842-1899) . . . Edgar and Emma's parents took up residence in Milam County, Texas c. 1876, when the twins were about 4 or 5 years of age . . .

Edgar married Berta Mary Sharp (1873-1955) on 02 January 1895 in Crockett, Houston County, Texas . . . Berta was born 10 November 1873 in Houston County, the 5th of six children born to Samuel Houston and Mary Alexandrien (Lemaire) Sharp . . . FYI . . . Edgar's twin sister, Emma, had married Berta's older brother, Sam Houston Sharp, Jr., a few years earlier . . .

Edgar and Berta set up housekeeping in Milam County where Edgar's parents lived until their deaths (1899 and 1912) . . . they then moved to West Texas for a while early in the 20th century, but returned to Rockdale ca. 1939 shortly after two of their grandchildren moved in with them on a permanent basis . . . Edgar and Berta both died in Rockdale, and were laid to rest at Oaklawn Cemetery . . . a goodly number of their descendants still live in Rockdale and Milam County at this time, and others from across the state sometimes return to Milam County in the Autumn of the year for a family reunion . . .

FYI . . . I created the above collage by very carefully placing a torn and crumbling ledger page on my flat-bed scanner . . . and then layering on top of it a floral file folder that I had picked up a while back in a package at Tuesday Morning . . . I scanned those two items together as one image . . . then using Picasa . . . I cropped that image . . . added the photo of Edgar . . . and created a 2nd image using the collage feature . . . then I added the text in Picasa as well . . .

That fragile handwritten page came from a ledger belonging to Edgar Henry, and contains lyrics to old folk songs . . . this particular page contains a version of a set of lyrics to a song called The Package of Old Letters . . . as you can see, part of this page is missing, so I'm guessing at the closing lines, but here are the words I think my great-grandpa penned on these pages . . .

In a little rosewood casket
That is resting on the stand
There's a package of old letters
Written by a cherished hand

Won't you go and get them, Sister
And read them o'er to me
I have often tried to read them
But for tears I could not see

You have brought them sister
Come sit down upon my bed
And lift gently to your bosom
This poor aching throbbing head

Tell him that I never blamed him
Or a word of censure spoke
But oh tell him sister tell him
That my heart his coldness broke

When I'm dead and in my coffin
And my shroud about me wound
And my narrow bed is ready
In the pleasant churchyard ground

Place the letters and the locket
Both together on my heart
And the little ring he gave me
Never from my finger part.