Wednesday 29th (January)
Still despairing of ever receiving a letter from Piqua. I was
invited out this evening but did not go as my company did not come for me. I went
to school thus expecting to hear an address from Prof. Holdrich but was disappointed.
We had no lecture therefore. I have my composition almost done and how happy I am
and expect to copy it tomorrow. I have a hard lesson to study in Latin this evening
and think I had better hurry and commence. Brother is here tonight and I expect
we shall have another fuss when father comes home.
Prof. Holdrich is not identified. He is not found in the
1850 Census, the 1850-51 City Directory, or the list of teachers in The Alumna (The Alumna 1859 97-98). Could Serena mean
Prof. Hazert who will present a lecture about the microscope at the Melodeon
next week?
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The Cincinnati
Enquirer February 6, 1851
Serena’s father could enjoy a hearty laugh – at the expense
of others. Levi Coffin, the prominent abolitionist, tells a story about Albert
and his brother Henry in The
Reminiscences of Levi Coffin. In connection with the escape of a family of
slaves, “Mr. Coffin tells an amusing circumstance. As he needed money to defray
expenses he called at the pork house of Henry Lewis, one of the stockholders of
the ‘Underground Railway,’ Here he found Mr. Lewis, his brother Albert and
Marcellus B. Hagans, at a later time Judge Hagans, but then Henry Lewis'
bookkeeper. (He was married to their niece, Almira Lewis.) There were also
three slaveholders sitting in the office. Mr. Coffin asked for some money to
help some poor people, knowing that Lewis would understand him. Thereupon not
only did Lewis, his brother and Hagans contribute but the three Kentuckians
also added their mite, unconscious of the fact that they were assisting slaves
to escape from their masters.
"Some time later when some slaveholders from the same
neighborhood sitting in Lewis' office were cursing the abolitionists, Lewis
informed them of the fact that some of their own neighbors had helped the
abolitionists with their money."
A great-grandson of Albert will have a similar sense of
humor one hundred years later. After noticing numerous violations of the fire
code in businesses near his, he and a friend will amuse themselves during their
lunch hour by impersonating fire inspectors and giving stern warnings to the
business owners and managers.
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| Serena’s father, Albert Henry Lewis. |
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