About
There are actually four distinct “archives” left to me by my grandmother.
The first is a trove of documents and correspondence from friends of Paul written
to him and his wife, Henny. There is an online mention that Paul corresponded with
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, but I have not found proof of that among the things here.
The second group is prose and poems written by Paul along with a two volume opera
dated 1855. He collaborated with many. More about that later.
Third, we have a series of letters written in old German cursive (likely Kurrent or
Sütterlin script), which was common at the time and although his penmanship was perfect,
the old tiny script used seems impossible to decipher. These letters are written
with a fountain pen, in a language that up until today, had been lost.
However, with the assistance of Artificial Intelligence, I’m beginning to put things together.
Lastly, I have many letters that are actually typed. According to my grandmother (also
named Henrietta), her grandmother’s eyes became so poor that she could no longer
read her husband’s handwriting, so a neighbor would type them out for her, so she
could read them for herself, again, and again, until the next letter arrived.
It is these letters, along with the handwritten, that I am able to scan, feed
to AI, and finally read for myself, these things that I have kept in my care
for the past 40 years.
As you will see by some of the examples I will soon post, these faded,
yet beautifully scripted letters that my Great-Great-Great-Grandfather wrote
to his wife, his Dear Henny, were worth holding on to.