Harry Gordon Gracie's letters.
These are letters and postcards from Harry
Gordon Gracie, aged 24, to his parents and family from a 5½ month world trip in
1924. Although the family was not
wealthy and he was a bank teller, circumstances took him on this 'trip of a
lifetime'. He was asked by the Treloar
family of Tamworth to accompany their son, Bill, whose doctor had advised
treatment at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. He apparently suffered from chronic dysentery
following his time in the Light Horse Brigade in the Great War. Specialists found it could not be adequately
dealt with in Australia. Thus he was
sent to one of the world's centres of learning and healing, the Mayo Clinic.
Most of the letters were addressed to his
father Arthur Gracie, at "Abergavenny", French St, Artarmon, NSW,
Australia. This is now a mixed
residential and industrial suburb five minutes on the freeway north of the
Sydney Harbour Bridge, opened later (in 1932).
RMS Tahiti 2p letter 17/08/24
RMS Tahiti 6p letter 22/08/24
RMS Tahiti 6p letter 3/09/24
San Francisco Hotel Whitcomb 5p letter 9/09/24
San Francisco 'Cliff House' postcd 10/09/24
Rochester (plain paper) 7p letter 23/09/24
Hotel Campbell, Rochester 4p letter 1/10/24
Hot C, Rochester (p. Chicago) 3p
+snap letter 15/10/24
NYC, Hotel Martinique 6p letter 26/10/24
3 colour postcards of New York sights - blank.
White Star Line S.S. "Homeric" 4p
+pstcrd letter 3/11/24
Regent Palace Hotel 2p letter 9/11/24
Australia House 3p letter 27/11/24
Regent Palace Hotel 7p letter 3/12/24
Folkestone (odd notepaper) 2p letter 11/12/24
Paris, Hotel St Petersbourg 4p letter 12/12/24
Paris, Hotel St Petersbourg 7p letter 15/12/24
Helston, Cornwall 2p letter 23/12/24
Perth Orient Line 3p letter 3/02/25
Photo album contains snaps from the return
voyage which is not detailed like the forward journey. The reason was that his letters would have
reached home after him. These
destinations included Gibraltar, Naples, Pompei, Suez, Colombo and Perth.
