Searching for the Argyle sisters.

I grew up knowing one of my Nan's half-sisters, Great-Aunt Edoo, Edith Argyle.

She lived down the way from my Grand-parents in Vanderbijlpark. She is mentioned regularly in Nan's letters,  I do not, however, have any recall of her talking about other sisters.

After Bertie, Mom's cousin, made contact with me I went looking among Nan's letters again for mention of her other half-sisters - Kathleen and Elsie.

There is a reference to John, Elsie's only son, in Nan's letter on the 21st January 1964. She writes and thanks Mom for a newspaper cutting. Seems to be about matric results.
'Elsie said she would watch the papers for me but so far had not seen anything. She is so anxious for John so I do hope he has got through for her sake.' 



Her set of letters from Messina during the May of 1968 mentions a Kath which I assume is Kathleen and in Nan's letter to Mom on the 1st December 1969, where she lists her last requests, she has Edith and Kathleen together and instructs Mom to give them 'some little token in my memory.'

There are a set of four handwritten letters from Nan to Mom between the 14 and 25 March 1966, penned from her rooms at the Bedford Inn in Port Shepstone, she and Pa moved from Room 22, to 6 and then 14 during this period.

These letters describe the death of her sister Elsie.

They are frank and share with Mom and the family, the details of how diabetes has ravaged Elsie's body, 'her face lined with pain', what the doctors and surgeons are trying the do.

And the smell of this hideous disease, 'Els is so conscious of the smell that she got Ernie to get some air wick to use in the ward.' 

Nan is shocked and saddened, they visit each afternoon and evening after dinner at the Inn, and help in anyway they can.

She also writes of Ernie, Elsie's husband, of helping him pack up their goods on their farm and writes that John was leaving for Tempe.

The farm was sold at this time and Nan says 'It is heart-breaking to go in and pack all her things, it seems to be so final.'

The final letter of 25th March, 'The funeral is this afternoon at Marburg at 3 o'clock.'

She writes of Ernie, selling all their possessions and there is one line I just love:
'Our Dad has been wonderful, as usual, Ern has just left everything to him.'  


These letters are tough to read, Nan with her younger half-sister, watching her suffering and her pain, being part of her last few weeks and I am moved.

The letters are a wonderful legacy of family, of family caring for one another and particularly of family showing up during such difficult and emotional times.

Nan even sends Mom one of Elsie's unfinished projects, a baby pram cover for her best friend's grandchild, 'to be finished if you do not mind, I believe it is a simple pattern and there is only a couple of rows to do and it has to be bound and threaded with ribbon.'
My sisters would do this for me too.