I didn’t know Hazel Allen, but from the scrapbooks, photo albums and magazines lying on tables at the auction house, I could tell that she saw the value of saving history.
My first introduction to her were some complete editions of and clipped articles from the Richmond Afro American newspaper from the 1960s, frayed around the edges and dulled with age. Along with some other papers, a 1923 speech or paper she wrote called “The Object of a Family Reunion” were inside a wooden scrapbook with her named carved on the cover.
Her collection was overwhelming. Items were lying in stacks on tables and crammed in boxes under tables. Scrapbooks of photos and photo albums, Ebony magazines from the 1960s, loose family photos, school certificates, report cards.
It was so much and so personal that it nearly broke my heart to see it all go for change to bidders. It was the type of stuff that we all save for our own reasons but family members toss because it holds no significance for them. There was so much of hers that I understood why the family let some of it go.
One of the most interesting groups of papers were love letters to her dating from August 1919 to July 1920 – the envelopes faded, the stamps missing. She was Hazel Hynes then and her beau was Jasper Allen. I can only assume that they eventually got married.
From what I could surmise from Jasper’s letters, they met in the summer of 1919 in Richmond, VA, where they both lived. In one letter, he mentioned Church Hill, an African American community in the east end of the city. Douglas Wilder, the first black governor of Virginia, was born and raised there. One resident born in 1903 said in an oral history that although some residents were doctors and other professionals, Church Hill was an enclave of poor people who made a living the best they could.
This was one of those turn-of-the-century communities whose families were 40 years out of slavery with scant resources and many of them with limited education. The neighborhood, as Wilder mentioned in an oral interview, was very close knit and had everything they needed right there.
Jasper went off to Newport News, VA, around September 1919 or so to work in the shipyards, likely hired by the Newport News Shipbuilding Co. He got a room by himself at a boarding house with a landlady named A. Williams (whom his letters were in “care of”). Workers headed out to the shipyards each morning at the sound of a 7 o’clock bell, according to one letter, and Jasper spent some time home at night writing Hazel.
About four or five months later, he wrote that he fell off a ship and broke his right arm. When he woke up, he was in the hospital, apparently knocked unconscious. His friend Walter wrote his letters to Hazel.
Jasper apparently was lonesome for Hazel and home soon after arriving in Newport News. He had what he called the “Up home blues.” He wrote a lot about missing her.
I arrive saft I have just got work today. I shure do miss you some bad … I want you to be a good little girl till I get thir and I can be good (to) you … I have a good job in the ship yard, help build them.
Back in Richmond, Hazel was in school. It’s not clear where she lived in Richmond because he asked her to come to Church Hill. Jasper’s letters refer to her “studies” and “school.” They are not very detailed so I’m not sure what schooling she was engaged in. He noted that her studies were giving her headaches, so it must’ve been college.
(In an oral interview, the Church Hill resident born in 1903 said her own schooling followed this path: George Mason for elementary school, Armstrong for high school. She wanted to teach so she went to Normal School, which she described as two years of high school, and then off to practice-teach. College was Virginia Union University for two years.)
A couple times Hazel must have accused Jasper of having another woman and was ready to dump him. He pleaded with her to trust him. Likewise, he accused her of having someone else.
Dear you thank I have some one down hear. when I gave you my word when I left I ment what I said I dont thank you did.. I thank if I had seen someone I love better than I did you I would told you in a good way … If you have found someone that love (you) better please write me one more little letter so I can kiss you good by sor(ry) to my heart that you maid me cry.
Jasper seemed to have marriage on his mind, going so far as telling a friend that he was married to Hazel and making a request of her: “I am coming on so you can meat me. Dont forget that I am going to bring a nother boy with me when I come I told him I was married to you so don’t’ sa(y) nothing when you see him.”
His letters were littered with misspellings and he apologized quite often for his “bad writing,” telling her to take all his mistakes for kisses. There were plenty of them so she’d be smothered in kisses. “I love you to my hart. Hazel you is the only girl I ever realy love in my life I have to tell you whether you believe it or not sugar girl.”
I’d love to read Hazel’s letters to him to see her side of the relationship and her thoughts in her own words.
Interestingly, the 2-cent stamps on the letters had been cut out – either by the auction house or the family. I’m guessing it was the auction house. Those postal used stamps will likely end up on an auction table.
