Rain, the 23rd of August 1876
My Dear Brother!
First I have to communicate to you this time the sad
response[1] that
after short sickness our dear father was sent to kingdom come on June 24
Our unforgettable good father, who [….], felt qu= easy only 8 days before his death and thought himself that he would feel better = soon. But in midst of these days he realized that his condition suddenly worsened, whereupon we hurried to give= him the last rites, but what happened within 15 minutes was that he suffered a stroke[2] which destroyed his brain and thus, he could only receive the Anointing of = the Sick[3]. He laid like this for three days a= nd could not remember anything. = When on the 24th of June, his saint’s day[4],
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I [asked] myself, whether he remembered nothing about himself, [I] had to yell into his ears, but noticed that he recognizes me.[5] I congratulated him to his Saint&#= 8217;s day whereat I realized again that he understood me. However, his breath became shorter= and shorter and he passed away softly and calmly on the same day.[6] Therefore I ask you to pray for hi= m and always include him in your prayers. Our mother was hit the hardest; first her advanced age – she is soon 85 years old – and the care she received from our father, which cannot be replaced.[7] He brought her everything she ever wanted to eat and to drink. M= oney wasn’t saved [on her care].
The reasons why you haven’t received a letter fr= om me for such a long time are first, because of the strict/stringent […], second, because of this, I had to pack away and store everything, whereupon your last letter with figures was also moved and was found only recently, w= hen I moved in. It was a burden f= or me that I couldn’t write you immediately about our father’s condit= ion.
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I can’t read individual words without context so= I can’t even give you an idea what’s on the torn pages. Sorry.
Page 4, last paragraph:
Also in my brother’s family everyone is healthy = and well and they had a son in the beginning of July whose name is Joh[…]= .
Mother is currently still at Martins, but she’ll return within 14 days to me.
Many greetings also from Martin.
[1] R= 30; to tell you the sad news that …
[2] Cere= bral apoplexy
[3] Last rites or extreme unction. In = the German letter this is written in active voice as something like: “…we could only give him the last rites,…”
[4] Or n= ame day
[5] This sentence doesn’t make perfect sense in old/modern German or English to me, sorry!
[6] In t= he German text he softly and calmly sleeps away to the Lord
[7] Literally: “the care does not have a second”