Hope for the Christmas Bride: a Mail-Order Bride Short Story

Determined to escape her bleak existence working in a textile mill, Louisa answers a matrimonial advertisement, praying for a new life in the Colorado Territory. Her harsh winter journey, critical strangers, and fears of an uncertain future test her faith and hope. Will Joseph, a shy, scarred rancher who doesn't celebrate Christmas, offer the safe haven and family she dreams of? Or has Louisa risked everything for a marriage without love?

The train rumbled rhythmically, vibrating Louisa’s entire body and causing her to drop a stitch in her knitting. She sighed, drew her thick shawl closer around her against the chill coming off the window, and picked up her stitch again.

Across from her, Mrs. Patterson kept up a steady chatter, pointing out the homesteads and small towns as they whizzed past. Her husband, the Reverend Isaiah Patterson, remained silent, mostly keeping his eyes on his small Bible. If he glanced at Louisa at all, his mouth pinched tighter and his brows furrowed lower, as if he didn’t know what to do with her.

What made him so sour-faced? Was it because he was a preacher and always preoccupied with sin? Or because he resented the need for her to travel with them? The reverend at her old church was much more kindly, always having a good word for those who struggled in their lives. She wondered if Reverend Patterson would have been judgmental no matter what profession he was in.
She wondered if Mr. Joseph Blackwell would be judgmental.

Louisa pulled her shawl tight around her shoulders. December was no time for a train journey across the frigid Midwest. At least she was only going to the Colorado Territory instead of clear to California.

Her elbow rustled the letter in her pocket and made her wonder once again what her new husband might be like. Would he have a pinched mouth and disapproval in his eyes, or would he be kind? Watchful and suspicious like the foreman at the textile factory, or jovial like the gateman?

Even though she had Mr. Blackwell’s three letters memorized, she pulled them out anyway. Just looking at his handwriting was hopeful. It looked like he’d started and stopped the first letter a few times, which made her think he was a careful man. If he was careful with his written words, perhaps he would be careful when he spoke. She didn’t want a lifetime of being yelled at.

DEAR MISS MONTGOMERY.

I AM AN HONEST AND SOBER MAN. I HAVE A GOOD HOUSE AND 160 ACRES FOR CATTLE. I CAN SUPPORT A WIFE. MY RANCH IS SIX MILES OUT OF BOULDER CITY WITH A GOOD CREEK FOR WATER. PLEASE WRITE BACK IF YOU ARE INTERESTED.

SINCERELY, JOSEPH BLACKWELL

Louisa had discussed it with her sister, Molly, late into the night, to the point that the factory foreman the next day had threatened them if they dozed off again. Molly had been gobsmacked when Louisa first considered the advertisement in the Matrimonial News, and while Louisa hated the idea of leaving her sister, she longed for a family and a home of her own. And it wasn’t going to happen in Rhode Island. There were too many women like her who had lost fiancés in the War of the Rebellion, and too few men who returned. She was determined she wasn’t going to spend her entire life’s strength in a factory mill.

What would Mr. Blackwell…Joseph…be like? Would he expect her to take care of animals? Would there be neighbors nearby? And what about her cooking? She had been fine with porridge and bread and soup, but that was before Mama died. Since she and Molly moved into the factory boardinghouse, Louisa hadn’t cooked at all.

She was a hard worker, though, and had assured him of that in her own letter. She’d turn her hand to anything asked of her; anything respectable, that is.