Stuyvesant Fish Morris - Writings About Morris Family

Writings About Morris Family

Jeffrey Thomas writes:

"In 1864 Henry James wrote of in a letter, 'Miss Ellen Van Buren is here -- pale, thin, and drooping. We taunt her facetiously with being in love ... whereat she smiles languidly.' Four years later Henry James commented in a letter to William James, 'We heard from Elly Van Buren that she is engaged to one Dr. Morris of New Rochelle, a young physician who has cared for her for 4 years and never has been attentive to any girl in the interval. I should think Elly's own conscience should sting her.' About this time Alice James remarked acidly that Elly's flustered carryings - on about her engagement were likely to exasperate her fiancé beyond endurance. In 1913, Henry, writing to his acolyte Howard Sturgis about the relatives he had mentioned in his memoir A Small Boy and Others, explained enigmatically, 'Yes, my Father's two other sisters were my Van Buren and my Temple aunts. I should have liked to drag in the former's daughter, the intimate of our childhood, or of mine, later Mrs. Stuyvesant Morris, but forebore.' In January 1902 William James wrote to Henry during a visit to the United States, 'I also saw Elly Van Buren, old looking but unaltered in manner.'"