”My health is so very bad that I do not know whether I will ever reach New Orleans or Cuba again.
Martin Duralde, Jr.To Henry Clay Duralde, 8 August 1846
”My cards are laying with the cock-roaches on the shelf.
Martin Duralde, Jr.To Allen Jones, 12 August 1846
Wracked by tuberculosis (or consumption as it was then called), 23 year-old Martin Duralde spent a month and a half during the summer of 1846 at several Virginia springs in a futile attempt to recover his health. As Duralde, the grandson of the legendary Henry Clay of Kentucky, traveled to the Blue, Red, and White Sulphur Springs of Greenbrier and Monroe Counties, (West) Virginia, he kept a letterbook that is now part of the LVA’s collection (Accession 22281).
Duralde’s companion for part of this trip was a man named L. H. Coulter, called “Old C.” in the letters. Travelling up the Kanawha River towards the springs, the two men stopped in a small town where they had heard that “there was a great superfluity of money.” While running a card game there, Old C. was caught dealing two cards off the deck and “ruined a fine prospect” of the two winning between several hundred and two thousand dollars. Their prospects didn’t pan out at either the Blue or Red Sulphur Springs and the two gamblers moved on to the White Sulphur Springs. There, Duralde hoped to strike an arrangement with a “Dr. C.,” with whom they would split profits from running a card game at the doctor’s cottage. However, the doctor promised much, but delivered little. Old C., broke and absent from his family, returned home to Kentucky, while Duralde was left to wait out the rain at the springs with few prospects at the card table.
Having hoped that a visit to the springs might restore his health, Duralde conceded that he had not improved. “I have become a confirmed case of consumption,” he wrote Henry Clay, “and can only hope to linger out a life of much suffering.” Duralde left White Sulphur Springs on August 18, his destination New York and ultimately either New Orleans or Cuba. The last letter in the book was written to his brother Henry Clay Duralde on August 23 in Richmond. He died on 17 September 1846 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from a “congestion of the brain.”
``The Dr. waltzing with the rich lady.``
``The Dr. is introduced to the rich lady, who presents him with a rose. He is determined to try his skill in legerdemain by lighting her of a fine breast pin.``
``She faints.``
Duralde’s letterbook includes his sketches, for which Old C. frequently served as a model. The above sketches begin a tale in which the Old C. character and “the Doctor,” perhaps based on Dr. C. in White Sulphur Springs, attempt a modest crime. Unfortunately, Duralde never finished the tale, leaving the Doctor’s success or failure unknown.
(The letterbook is open for research.)
-Trenton Hizer, Senior Finding Aids Archivist
Interesting. Was Martin Duralde Jr. the son of Martin Duralde who commanded Apelousas Post, Illinois ?
Thanks for your comment! I forwarded it to the author of this post, Trenton Hizer, and he provided the following information: “Martin Duralde (1737-1822) was born in France and immigrated to Louisiana. A prominent citizen, he commanded the Opelousas Post in what is now St. Landry Parish, Louisiana, from 1795-1803. Duralde’s son, also Martin Duralde (ca. 1785-1848) married Susan Hart Clay (1805-1825), daughter of the Kentucky Senator and U.S. Secretary of State Henry Clay. Their son, Martin Duralde (1823-1846), kept the sketch book in possession of the Library of Virginia. One of the daughters of the first Martin Duralde, Clarissa, married William C. C. Claiborne ( 1775-1817) the first American governor of Louisiana.”
Thank you for posting this. The information on Martin Duralde I is correct. I am descended from his daughter Celeste.
Did Martin Milnoy Duralde, have a “Raymond” family connection?
He and my 7th great-grandfather, “Jean Baptist deVedrine,” were next door neighbors in Dulralde. Martin also wrote deVedrine’s last will and testament. A hand large and expressive document in the Louisiana Secretary of States archives.