Overview This 7-page transcript of an undated letter from Mary Chesley Killam is a descriptive memoir of her pioneer years in Lawrence, Kansas from 1855 to 1863. Writing to a newspaper near her native village of Barnstead, New Hampshire, she recalls the appearance of Lawrence when she and her husband first arrived, incidents involving abolitionist John Brown as a frequent guest of their hotel, and pro-slavery attacks on free-state Lawrence, including William Quantrill's Lawrence massacre of August...