The Ridge,
Dover Plains, Duchess Co., N. Y.
Dec. 6, 1886.

Dear Miss Goodrich:

Assuming that Gilbert Livingston of Poughkeepsie was your grandfather, I send you the enclosed autograph of your grandmother, Catharine Livingston, his wife. Also an autograph of Henry Livingston, for many years the clerk of Duchess County, who, I suppose to have been the father of Gilbert Livingston, and the author of the poem.

Will you kindly inform me, at your leisure, whether I am right in this assumption? Your family record can settle the question. The late Smith Thompson was a son-in-law of Gilbert Livingston [and a son-in-law of Major Henry, having married Major Henry's 1st cousin and his daughter.] I mean the Judge of the U.S. Court and Secty of the Navy under President Monroe.

As to the drawing of the old Livingston stone house on the Locust Grove Estate, please allow me, at some time in the future, to make a copy of it. In your letter to me, you speak of Arthur Breese. I enclose also, for your acceptance, a letter written by him, to Henry Livingston, your great-grandfather? Was he a brother of Sidney Breese? [Arthur Breese was the father of Sidney Breese, U.S. Senator and chief justice of the Illinois Supreme Court.]

Will you kindly give me, from your family record, the date of the birth and death of your grandfather and great-grandfather.

Catharine Street, in Poughkeepsie, running north from the Morgan House was named for Catharine Livingston, who owned the land in that region. She had a pasture lot there. But perhaps I can carry pepper to Ceylon by mentioning these matters. [wrong Catharine Livingston among thousands of Catharine Livingstons]

With our kind regards to your mother and sister, I remain

Your sincere friend
Benson J. Lossing.

Miss C.G. Goodrich