Northampton
September 5th, 1867

My dear Brother

I thank you heartily for your kind letter as well as for the very handsome proof of the affection you bear myself and my dear Addie. My silence has not been, I assure you, intentional but from much cause of anxiety ever since our arrival at Northampton. We think the Lord is now about removing us from Northampton to Stratford upon Avon, where I hope brighter ways are in store for us. No doubt the Lord has chastened us for our good & I desire to be thankful for many mercies received at his hands. Do not say a word of this to Mamma - she is of such an anxious frame of mind, that I do not wish to say any thing of the past to her - nor indeed to Anne. Prospects do seem brightening.

My dear Addie, I doubt not, will find a kind and thoughtful husband in dear Roberts. John, my eldest son, is capable of taking a good situation, which I expect will be found for him at Stratford. Frank & Allie we must send to school. I call the latter Allie, but his name is Alfred - in remembrance of you when you were a little boy. Then we have little Beatrice, a chubby puss of three years old.

John & myself desire to be remembered to your wife whom we trust is well. We have both your likenesses but none of Walter & his wife & family. Are they all well? I had hoped that you, having scarcely reached middle age, time had not begun to set her mark upon you - I mourn the loss of teeth. I will as soon as more settled have my photograph taken that you may judge for yourself of time's tender mercies respecting me, but if it should be the Lord's will that we once again meet on earth may the sole change on those so long apart be change of countenance and not of heart.

With love to all in which dr R unites. Believe me dear brother,

Your affectionate sister,

F. Kraushaar

My husband is at present at Stratford on Avon