I’m referring to something you’d see presumably just on the letter itself after you opened it, but not on the envelope necessarily. I first thought this was a Monty Python joke, where some woman has written into a public opinion type show and signs herself “General Baden-Powell, Mrs.”, or something similar to that. But recently I happened to be looking at a memoir by Pete Best, covering his time as a Beatle. Before Brian Epstein took them on, Pete had been the group’s business manager; included in the book is a letter from a promoter requesting their fees and conditions for performing, addressed as follows:
So why was the extra “Mr” needed? And is this still done, to the extent that people still do write letters at all?
I’ve never seen that. It’s possible that it was an error on the part of the person who wrote that particular letter.
“Ariadne Wrackwillow (Mrs.)” or “Ariadne Wrackwillow (Miss)” was occasionally used by a woman signing a letter to a stranger, so that he would know how to address his reply (in the days when “Ms.” was not an option, and a simple “Ariadne Wrackwillow” would have been an unpardonable solecism). But, even then, his reply would simply have been to “Miss (or Mrs.) Ariadne Wrackwillow”.
The same need did not arise for men. But a man might occasionally put a qualification or description after his name in, e.g., a letter to the newspapers, to indicate that he had some knowledge or authority with respect to the topic of discussion. So a naval officer or ex-naval officer writing a letter about naval policy, for instance, might put “(RN)” after his signature.
I believe the “(Mrs.)” thing began not because of the advent of “Ms.,” but because of the custom of a woman to interact socially using her husband’s name.
So, the wife of John Smith would be justified in signing a letter “John Smith (Mrs.).” She wouldn’t sign it “Mrs. John Smith,” because you don’t give yourself a title.
So I take it, then, that this was done with women’s names only. But in those days, wouldn’t she have been expected to style herself Mrs. John Wrackwillow, or John Wrackwillow (Mrs), assuming that her husband’s name is John?
In such contexts, Americans often add suffixes and other titles as necessary, or state the same in the body of the letter. It’s by no means universal, however.
Something slightly different from the above was at work in the woman examples. The former Miss Ariadne Titwillow, on marriage, became Mrs. George Smith; it would have been a major social solecism to refer to her as “Mrs. Ariadne Smith”, which would imply she was a divorcee.
On the other hand General The Rt. Hon. Dr. Melvyn Rutherford Thistlethwaite, Sc.D., 45th Hussars, M.P. for Bridgehampton North (Lib.) (Mr.) would append the appropriate salutation which he preferred to have used for general soxial correspondence. Someone writing him regarding Army regulations would address his letter to Gen. Thistlethwaite, someone inquiring about the relative numbers of pangolins in the Madras Presidency and the Straits Settlements would address Dr. Thistlethwaite, but someone inviting him to dinner or urging his concern over the plight of the Scottish barrel industry would write to Mr. Thistlethwaite, that being his stated preference.
My presumption is that Pete Best was either poking fun at the old convention, or else stating the obvious by way of punctilious attention to old social norms going out of style.
I am inclined to agree with jayjay that the extra “Mr” in the OP’s example was actually intended to mean “manager”. All the other explanations being given seem only to apply to women.
Another possibility is that in those days sometimes letters to men would use “Esq.” (for Esquire) after the name, instead of “Mr.” before. (I can remember being rather bemused at getting a letter addressed to “njtt, Esq,” once when I was about 10 years old.) I am sure that, in practice, this often led to people mistakenly using both Mr at the start and Esq at the end. It only takes one more level of confusion, if you have come to think that that is the convention, to wind at with Mr at each end. I dare say the sort of people who were arranging rock ‘n’ roll gigs in the late 1950s or early 1960s were not always very well schooled in the niceties of epistolary etiquette, but may have been trying hard to sound like real businessmen, thus making mistakes and overcorrections like this.
Once she marries, Ariadne is formally addressed as Mrs. George Smith. If she is widowed (or, if you must acknowledge the possibility, although it would be much more polite not to) divorced, she is thereafter addressed as Mrs. Ariadne Smith.
Her name, however, is at all times Ariadne, and after her marriage she signs her letters “Ariadne Smith”, and in most contexst she is referred to as Ariadne Smith. It’s only when she is formally addressed on a letter or on a card of invitation that she becomes “Mrs. George Smith”.
So, if she needs to guide her correspondent as to how to address a reply to her, she has to sign her letter “Ariadne Smith” and then put “(Mrs George Smith)” after that. If she just writes “Ariadne Smith (Mrs.)”, then she’s indicated that any reply should be addressed to Mrs. Ariadne Smith, because she is a widow. Or that other thing.
Best was the addressee of the letter concerned, so he didn’t write the envolope.
Do you have any other examples in addition to the one in the OP? The General Lastname, Mrs, convention has already been explained, but without other Mr Mr examples this could simply be explained as either meaning manager or being a mistake or idiosyncrasy on the writer’s part. It’s certainly not something I’ve ever seen in the UK.
Anecdote: My father had as a brother Knight*, an older gentleman who held him in some esteem (possibly because of his fecundity, among other reasons). This older gentleman was from Italy, and was always very proper in written correspondence. I wish I had the words to describe the beauty of the envelopes we received from him in the mail (several different colors of ink, hand-lettered calligraphy). But I digress. Some.
Whenever one of us kids would go through a rite of passage, such as First Communion, Confirmation, Ritual Defloration, any of the big ones, he would send us through the mail, a note of congratulation and benediction. The beautiful envelope always made receiving such a letter a real treat. But, as they were addressed to us as legal minors, the name would always be in the form of Master Bartleby Wrackwillow, or Mistress Ariadne Wrackwillow.
End anecdote.
Same here. My mother, who is a bit of a bug for etiquette, insisted (and insists) that a legal minor is addressed as Master Bartleby Wrackwillow. I think she picked it up from her mother.
To make matters worse, or at least more pretentious, I am a Third - that is, my father and grandfather have the same first, middle, and last name as I. So I would get mail like birthday cards addressed to:
Master Firstname Middlename Shodan, the Third.
My wife wanted to name our son IV, but I demurred. I wanted children, not to found a Carolingian dynasty.
Yours etc.,
Shodan Pinkerton Farnsworthy III, (Ret.), B.S., LS/MFT, BYOB
Yes, I can remember when it was considered “correct” (but, even then, almost absurdly formal) to address something to a young boy as to “Master” whatever (as opposed to “Mr.” for a grown man). I think I got the occasional letter (or birthday card or whatever) addressed to me that way when I was a kid. I don’t recall ever hearing of a convention to similarly address young girls as “Mistress” - after all, they already had “Miss” to distinguish them from the grown and married women addressed as “Mrs.” - but I will take your word that it was once sometimes used. However, this is all quite irrelevant to the OP’s question.
As we apparently, between the lot of us, only know of the one example, ever, of someone writing “Mr” after a name in this way, the most plausible explanation is that it was a mistake.
