Minister
to France. She also wore black velvet mittens of that date.

While my sister, Mrs. Eames, was residing in Paris with her son and
daughter, her home on the corner of H and Fourteenth Streets was
occupied by Ward Hunt and his wife of Utica. Judge Hunt had recently
been appointed a Justice of the Supreme Court, and I immediately renewed
my associations of former days with his family. Next door to the Hunts
lived Mr. and Mrs. Titian J. Coffey, the former of whom had accompanied
ex-Governor Andrew G. Curtin of Pennsylvania upon his mission to Russia;
and the adjoining residence, the old "Hill house," was the home of Mr.
and Mrs. James C. Kennedy, the latter of whom was Miss Julia Rathbone of
Albany. Their hospitality was lavish until the death of Mr. Kennedy,
when his widow returned to Albany where a few years later she married
Bishop Thomas Alfred Starkey of New Jersey. Mrs. Robert Shaw Oliver,
wife of the present efficient Assistant Secretary of War, is her niece.

After Mrs. Kennedy left Washington, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Elkin Neil of
Columbus, Ohio, with their daughter, Mrs. William Wilberforce Williams,
lived in the "Hill house." They were people of large means and
entertained on an extensive scale. Mrs. Neil belonged to the Sullivant
family of Ohio whose women were remarkable for their beauty. The wife of
William Dennison, one of the District Commissioners, was Mr. Neil's
sister and her daughter, Miss Jenny Dennison, was one of the belles of
the Hayes administration. There were so many representatives of the
"Buckeye State" at that time in Washington that someone facetiously
spoke of the city as the "United States of Ohio." Mr. and Mrs. Matthew
W. Galt, parents of Mrs. Reginald Fendall, lived in the next house in
the H Street block, while adjoining them resided Colonel and Mrs. James
G. Berret. I knew Colonel Berret very well. Nature had been very lavish
in her gifts to him, as he was the fortunate possessor of intelligence,
sagacity and fine personal appearance. It was his frequent boast,
however, that through force of circumstances he had received but "three
months' schooling," but he took advantage of his subsequent
opportunities and became an efficient mayor and postmaster of the City
of Washington, while a prince might well have envied him his dignified
and imposing address. He sold his attractive home to Justice William
Strong of the U.S. Supreme Court, who with his family resided in it for
many yea