Guide to Reading Letter Transcriptions
Some of these features are only visible when "plain text" is off.
| Textual Feature | Appearance |
|---|---|
| passage deleted with a strikethrough mark | |
| passage deleted by overwritten added letters | |
| passage added above the line | passage with added text above |
| passage added on the line | passage with added text inline |
| passage added in the margin | passage with text added in margin |
| handwritten addition to a typewritten letter | typed passage with added handwritten text |
| missing or unreadable text | missing text noted with "[illegible]" |
| uncertain transcriptions | word[?] |
| notes written by someone other than Willa Cather | Note in another's hand |
| printed letterhead text | printed text |
| text printed on postcards, envelopes, etc. | printed text |
| text of date and place stamps | stamped text |
| passage written by Cather on separate enclosure. | written text |
I am sending you a war book4—the best one I have yet
read, and I don’t know anyone who would be more interested in it than you. I do not
know the woman5 who wrote it, but I have known
friends and relatives of hers for year years and
have often heard from them of her happy life on her Polish estate. She and her children6 are here now, and I
shall see her as soon as she is well enough to meet people. The book is, I
think, an absolutely truthful account of what she saw and suffered. I brings the war closer to me than anything else I have read. I can
understand why the French say that they fear the German domination so much that they
have forgot the fear of death.
I know you will enjoy this book as much as I did.
Yours always WillieI send lots of love to your mother7.
Information about this letter:
- Source File:
- cat.let0385.xml
- Letter identifier
- 0385
- Contents
- Document is one leaf, handwritten on recto only.
- Person to whom letter was written
- Carrie Miner Sherwood1
- Date letter was written
- [December 23, 1916 to September 9, 1917]
- Explanation of conjectured date
-
When the Prussians Came to Poland was reported by Publishers Weekly as a new publication in the 23 December 1916 issue. Julia Miner died on 9 September 1917, indicating that this letter was written between those dates.
- Place letter was written
- New York, New York, United States2
- Location of original letter
- WCPM Collection, National Willa Cather Center, Red Cloud, NE
Individual Annotations
5 Bank Street (New York City): The apartment Cather shared with Edith Lewis beginning in 1912, located in Greenwich Village in the Manhattan borough of New York City. Subway construction forced Cather and Lewis to relocate in 1927.
Person Annotations
Sherwood, Carrie Miner (1869-1971). Sherwood, Carrie Belle
Miner (1869-1972) Civic leader; Cather's friend. Born in Waukon,
IA, to James L. Miner and Julia Erickson Miner, Carrie Miner was the eldest
of their children. The family moved to Red Cloud, NE, in 1878, where the
Miner Brothers store became the largest in town. Cather remembered meeting
Carrie there. In 1884, Carrie, her mother, and siblings were confirmed in
the Catholic church. In 1888, she studied music at St. Mary’s Academy at
Notre Dame, IN. She married bank clerk Walter Sherwood in late 1889; they
had two sons. The Sherwoods travelled often in the West, and visited Europe
in 1930. They built a new house at 3rd and Seward streets in Red Cloud in
1908; Cather sometimes sent materials for Carrie to keep in its spacious
attics. Carrie Miner Sherwood led local Red Cross work during the two World
Wars, served on the Red Cloud school board and park commission, and was
active in the League of Women Voters and in the Ladies Guild of Grace
Episcopal Church. Cather corresponded with Carrie Miner Sherwood throughout
her life and dedicated My Ántonia to Carrie, model
for Frances Harling in the novel, and her sister Irene. Carrie was one of
Mildred Bennett’s chief sources for The World of Willa
Cather (1951), and was instrumental in setting up what is now the
Willa Cather Foundation in Red Cloud.
Turczynowicz, Laura de Gozdawa (1878-1953). Canadian-Polish-American singer, teacher, and director. Born in Ontario, Canada, Laura Christine Blackwell left in 1907 to study music in New York, Germany, and Poland. In 1907, while in Poland, she married Stanislaw de Turczynowicz, who claimed the title of Count Gozdawa. The couple had a daughter and two sons. After the outbreak of World War I, their estate was commandeered by German general Paul von Hindenburg and occupied for eight months, an experience she recounted in her memoir, When the Prussians Came to Poland (1916). In 1915, after obtaining American passports, she and her three children escaped to the U.S., where she organized relief aid for Poland. After the war, Laura de Turczynowicz lived and worked in California and in Canada until she retired to Santa Monica, CA, in 1935. Cather praised de Turczynowicz’s book.
Hermann, Wanda Jolanda Gozdawa de Turczynowicz (1908-2001). Polish-American artist. Born in Krakow, Poland, Wanda de Turczynowicz was the eldest of the three children of Stanislaw, Count Gozdawa, and the Canadian-born Laura Blackwell de Turczynowicz. In 1915 their country home was occupied by German forces under General Paul von Hindenberg, an event chronicled in her mother’s book, When the Prussians Came to Poland (1916). The three children and their mother escaped to New York, where Willa Cather may have met them. The family later lived in California and Canada. Wanda became a painter of landscapes and portraits. She married Elliot Hermann, and died in El Paso, TX.
1323Turczynowicz, Stanislaw Piotr de (1909-after 1941) (“Peter”). Polish-American son of Laura de Turczynowicz. Stanislaw Piotr de Turczynowicz, one of the twin sons of Stanislaw, Count Gozdawa, and the Canadian-born Laura Blackwell de Turczynowicz, was born in Poland. In 1915 their country home was occupied by German forces under General Paul von Hindenberg, an event chronicled in their mother’s book, When the Prussians Came to Poland (1916). With their mother, the twins and their sister, Wanda, escaped to New York, where Willa Cather may have met them. The family later lived in California and Canada.
1324Turczynowicz, Wladislaw Pawel de (1909-after 1943) (“Paul”). Polish-American son of Laura de Turczynowicz. Wadislaw Pawel de Turczynowicz, one of the twin sons of Stanislaw, Count Gozdawa, and the Canadian-born Laura Blackwell de Turczynowicz, was born in Poland. In 1915 their country home was occupied by German forces under General Paul von Hindenberg, an event chronicled in their mother’s book, When the Prussians Came to Poland (1916). With their mother, the twins and their sister, Wanda, escaped to New York, where Willa Cather may have met them. The family later lived in California and Canada. After attending college for one year, Paul worked as a commercial artist. In 1943, he enlisted in the U.S. Army.
Miner, Julia Erickson (1844-1917). Cather's Norwegian-American
friend. Born in Norway, where her father was a musician and a
leather-worker, Julia came with her family to the U.S. in 1853. They settled
in Iowa, where she met and married James L. Miner in 1868. The family came
to Red Cloud, NE, in 1878, where J. L. Miner became the leading merchant of
the town. They had eight children, of whom five survived to adulthood; their
four daughters, Carrie, Mary, Margaret, and Irene, were all good friends of
Cather. Julia Miner was widowed in 1905. Cather portrayed her as the strong,
active, musical Mrs. Harling in My Ántonia (1918),
the only time, she said, that she drew a “portrait of an actual person.”
Place Annotations
Work Annotations
When the Prussians Came to Poland (1916) by Laura de Gozdawa Turczynowicz
