Details
PIERCE, FRANKLIN, President. Autograph letter signed ("Fr Pierce") as President, to Dr. Boardman, Washington, D.C., 16 September 1856. 2 pages, 4to, integral blank. Fine.
Two months after failing to win renomination by the Democratic party, President Pierce reports to a Philadelphia physician on the health of the First Lady: "...Mrs. P[ierce] passed one or two days at the Gerard House on her return from Long Branch...Altho it would have afforded Mrs. P[ierce] great pleasure to see you and make the acquaintance of Mrs. Boardman, she hardly anticipated it...Mrs. P[ierce] would have been greatly improved by her sojourn at Long Branch with her sister but for a severe cold which seized her only two or three days before she came away and from the effects of which she has not yet entirely recovered. Yes, I am as you suggest a good deal worn down in body & mind -- and feel sensibly the need of rest and change -- but it is not quite clear how I am to secure either..."
Jane Pierce suffered periodically from bad health all her life, but after her son was killed in a train accident in 1853, she grew chronically ill and spent most of her years as First Lady in seclusion.
Two months after failing to win renomination by the Democratic party, President Pierce reports to a Philadelphia physician on the health of the First Lady: "...Mrs. P[ierce] passed one or two days at the Gerard House on her return from Long Branch...Altho it would have afforded Mrs. P[ierce] great pleasure to see you and make the acquaintance of Mrs. Boardman, she hardly anticipated it...Mrs. P[ierce] would have been greatly improved by her sojourn at Long Branch with her sister but for a severe cold which seized her only two or three days before she came away and from the effects of which she has not yet entirely recovered. Yes, I am as you suggest a good deal worn down in body & mind -- and feel sensibly the need of rest and change -- but it is not quite clear how I am to secure either..."
Jane Pierce suffered periodically from bad health all her life, but after her son was killed in a train accident in 1853, she grew chronically ill and spent most of her years as First Lady in seclusion.