My dear Sister, Chicago, l. November, 1871


A few hours after I had mailed a letter to you yesterday I received yours of the 14. October: - to our disappointment we did not at the same time receive any from either Mathilde or Grandmother (in Dessau). Judging from this, obviously no one over there seems to have any conception of the enormity of the catastrophe, in spite of my telegram. Apparently the interpretation of "Everything is lost" ( in the telegram) seemed to be that I meant the newspaper only, not also our home, Hesings also, who heard of the fire while in Salzburg got this impression and all the German papers and correspondences of the 11. and 12, of October in Germany printed stupid remarks that the dispatches from Chicago apparently were the usual blown-up stories (to be expected from the U.S.) That is silly and shows ignorance. The catastrophe was 10 times as dreadful as the first cable dispatches to Germany which carried the story. Even now, 23 days later I shudder when I think of it. The holocaust seemed like the incarnation of Hell, or Judgement Day and the memory of it will stay with everyone, who lived through it, always. Even today one has to have a great deal of will-power to walk through the miles of ruins without losing one's mind.

As soon as I can I will send to my mother-in-law and Mathilde a dozen or so photographic views of the more important ruins, which will at least give them an idea of some of the destruction. No brush or camera obscura and no word description can possibly give an idea of the whole.

I don't really want to write about the above, but about the one point which worries you, My old safe in the vaults of the Lombard Building, which I rent for $37.50 a month , came through the fire in tact and unharmed. All the documents, et cetera in it are safe, whereas in the supposedly fire-proof vaults of the Post office building, in which the safe-deposit box of the Collector of Internal Revenue's office material was kept, 1,800,000 dollars of paper money was burned and a half million dollars in gold melted into unidentifiable lumps. So all documents (seals) which I needed as Collector in every day duties, kept in that "fire-proof box" are burned, as well as my two-hundred dollar bills. However, in such a catastrophe as this I doubt whether anybody will make trouble if I don't have those seals. Congress is about to pass a bill which will cover the loss of all government documents and seals lost in the fire and mine will be included.
I will still get my second quarter's money, which will amount to about $1000.

I won't complain about these losses, because thousands are in worse shape than I. At least the office (Internal Revenue) saved my life. Because if I hadn't been able to repay you and my brother-in law the money you had here I would have sent a bullet into my brain. Then my wife and Mathilde could have shared my life insurance with you. - Well, it wasn't necessary and so everything is probably better for all of us.

Our little boy is still in the country with his wet nurse. Gertrud was out there yesterday and found him healthy and happy. We are not certain whether we can bring him home here this winter. Margarethe returned to us immediately after the fire and is keeping house for us. I think she feels more comfortable in our little cottage than in the big house. The fire succeeded in making me thinner. Trousers which I hadn't been able to wear, even leaving the buckle open, I now have to buckle tightly to keep them up. Gretchen has been up for four days, walks around the bedroom, or sits in the big armchair. At the moment she is knitting a pair of wool socks for me. She is very thin but looks well.