Saturday Sept. 13th 1845²

Dear Father

I received your letter this afternoon by Wm Griffith. You wished me to write if I had seen Mr. Angell. I have neither written to him nor seen him nor has he written to me. I began to write but I could not write what I wanted to. I think if I could see him I could convince him of his error if he would let me talk. I am very glad you sent my shoes. They fit very well indeed they large enough.

I want you to consent to let me go to Lowell if you can. I think it would be much better for me than to stay about here. I could earn more to begin with than I can any where about here. I am in need of clothes which I cannot get if I stay about here and for that reason I want to go to Lowell or some other place. We all think if I could go with some steady girl that I might do well. I want you to think of it and make up your mind. Mercy Jane Griffith is going to start in four or five weeks. Aunt Miller and Aunt Sarah think it would be a good chance for me to go if you would consent-which I want you to do if possible. I want to see you and talk with you about it.

Aunt Sarah gains slowly.

Mary

  ^{1Mary Stiles Paul b: 26 Jan 1830, Hanover, NH d: 12 Dec 1899, 
    Cambridge, MA; parents: Bela Paul b: Taunton, MA and Mary 
    Briggs b: Keene, NH; married in Lowell 1857: Isaac Guild b: 
    19 Jun 1831, NH; Isaac Guild 1860: marble works, Lynn, MA; 
    children: Irving Tracy Guild and Sidney Paul Guild. 
    Twenty-five of her letters, covering the years 1845-1862 have 
    survived. She began working as a domestic in Bridgewater, 
    Vermont.  1845-1848 worked in Lowell textile mills. 1848 
     joined her father in Claremont, New Hampshire. 1850 returned 
     to Vermont for a short spell. Then she joined Lowell companions 
     at an agricultural utopian community in Redbank, New Jersey for 
     a year. Following her brief tenure at the collective, she once again 
     returned to New Hampshire.
  2Woodstock, Vermont.}