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Date
12-22-1862
Keywords
letter, McIlvaine, Bedell
Recommended Citation
McIlvaine, Charles Pettit, "Letter to Bishop Bedell" (1862). Charles Pettit McIlvaine Letters. 359.
https://digital.kenyon.edu/mcilvaine_letters/359
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Cleavland Dec. 22 / 62
My dear Bishop,
I came from [Warren] today & expect to be at home tomorrow. Fourteen were confirmed yesterday. I had Abbot preach last Ev. & was greatly pleased & surprised at the excellence of the sermon in all respects & the force & propriety of his delivery. While we have been looking abroad for men to fill our host pulpits, I suspect we have not obtained better material than Abbott—so far as preaching goes; & I believe he is a good Pastor. My object in writing now is to put you in [possession] of matters at Boardman, [quoad] Mr. Boardman, so that if you have any thing [more] to do with him; you & I may be [done] one.
After service he & she came to speak to me, an honor which I think was not done me when I was there before. They asked me to come & see them. I answered that probably I would, but it depended on my time before leaving that P.M. for Canfield. When I got to McMurphy when I met his Warden Mr. [Fitch], & had [?] [my many concerning] matters, especially how he had treated your application for a [?] of that paper, I wrote him a note of which a copy is enclosed / Keep it, for I keep no copy—McMurphy has a copy)— Then I went to Canfield. We were taking tea, not having been there more than a half-hour, when he came accompanied by a lady a [?] B[?] (Beauchamp) who I [learn] [lives] [in] & is a teacher in his family—not a member of the parish. After we had done tea he said he wanted to see me in private, so we went into another room, leaving McMurphy & [Hill] behind. But he called his lady companion to go with him, so seeing he had brought her for a witness. I said I could not proceed with any conversation till I had called in McMurphy & [Hill]. They came in after an introduction by him about what false things men said of him & his doings. I said the point I must get at was his treatment of your request [?]. He said there was one thing he regretted in that [?] that he wrote the answer [on] your note. That was wrong, I said you had not mentioned that. Then he took out a copy of the paper which you asked for & said he would read it to [show] that Trustees of the Fund could be elected only by the Parishioners, that [consequently] the late elections by the Vestry was unlawful, that as he was the only Trustee of the [previous] election, that paper was rightfully in his keeping & [none] but he was in charge of the fund. I said I could not hear the [reading], that I would have nothing [less] than the paper or a copy. After a good deal of [?] about McMurphy & [?] matters by which he tried to [?] [?], he handed me a copy with which he had [come] provided. The lady was [very officious] & [intrusive], not to say [?], putting in her [?] at [various] times, which I [love] with all [patience]. After a long & excessively disagreeable setting they [retired]. I have left his copy of the paper with McMurphy & [he is] to send me a copy of it. On [?]pecting it, I see no foundation for Boardman’s [claims], but on the contrary that the Vestry is the body to elect the Trustees.
He is a poor tricky man, & a great [thorn] to McMurphy. I enclose the list of candidates composed at Canfield & Warren; or rather I will, if when I get my baggage there shall be time before the train goes.
I hope you got home well, you & [Mr. B].
Yours very affectionately
Chas. P. McIlvaine