Letters of Rebecca Gratz EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES By RABBI DAVID PHILIPSON, D. D. Author of The Reform Movement in Judaism The Jew in English Fiction, etc., etc. PHILADELPHIA THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY OF AMERICA 1929 COPYRIGHT, 1929, BY THE JEWISH PUBLICATION SOCIETY PHILADELPHIA, PA. REBECCA GRATZ, FROM A PAINTING BY SULLY DEDICATED TO THE SISTERHOOD OF THE BENE ISRAEL CONGREGATION CINCINNATI FOREWORD As is stated in the essay which introduces this collection of the family letters of the leading American Jewess of her day, these important epistles were placed at my disposal by the niece of Rebecca Gratz, Mrs. Thomas Hart Clay of Lexington, Kentucky. My thanks are due to Mrs. Clay, not only for her ready consent to my request to let me have the letters for publication, but also for the per mission to have photographs made of the superb portraits of her father, Benjamin Gratz, and her aunt, Rebecca Gratz, by the great American painter, James Sully, for inclusion in this volume. The picture of the Benjamin Gratz homestead was likewise loaned to me by Mrs. Clay for reproduction in these pages. Mrs. Clay furthermore gave me much interesting information concerning her famous aunt whom she had seen on occasional visits to Philadelphia with her father during her childhood. My thanks are also due to the Sisterhood of the Bene Israel Congregation Rockdale Avenue Temple of Cin cinnati, who supplied the funds for the publication of these letters as a memento of the fortieth anniversary of my service as rabbi of the congregation. How beautifully appropriate it is for an organization of Jewish women to v VI FOREWORD be the medium through whom the noble thoughts of a great sisterJewess are given to the world I desire to thank my friend, Rabbi Louis I. Egelson of Cincinnati, for his helpfulness in reading the proof and seeing the volume through the press. D. P. Cincinnati, Ohio. February, 1929. INTRODUCTION During a brief sojourn at Lexington, Kentucky, several years ago, I had the pleasure of forming the personal ac quaintance of Mrs. Thomas Hart Clay, the last surviving child of Benjamin Gratz and a niece of Rebecca Gratz, who is generally supposed to be the original of the famous character, Rebecca, in Sir Walter Scotts novel Ivanhoe, through the description of the famous American Jewess fur nished Scott by Washington Irving, an intimate friend of the Gratz family. In the course of a most interesting and revela tory conversation, Mrs. Clay, whose cultivated mind is a storehouse of valuable historical data and reminiscences, in formed me that she had in her possession a large number of letters that had been written by Rebecca Gratz to her broth er Benjamin and her two sisters-in-law, the wives of Benja min Gratz. I sensed at once that here was possibly an unex pected and important discovery that might prove of great value. I urged Mrs. Clay to place these letters at my dis posal. She acceded graciously to my request. My supposition as to the value of the letters was more than realized when I had the opportunity to examine the very interesting corre spondence. The letters number hundreds and extend over more than half a century, namely, from the year 1808 to the year 1866. Although being largely family letters still they contain much that transcends the narrow family circle. Events of the day are mentioned and commented upon, books of recent ap INTRODUCTIONpearance are discussed, men and women in the public eye are referred to. The reader of these epistles feels that he is perusing the outpourings of an unusual personality. The letters are pervaded with a deep religious feeling and a broad humanity, which stamp the writer to have been a noble woman whose charity knew no creed and whose in terests were as wide as her heart was warm and her impulses unselfish. These letters verify the traditions that have de scended about Rebecca Gratzs loveliness of disposition and elevation of spirit...