Rebel Souls
Page 33
111 “lords of the lash”: Ibid., 43.
111 “The first and most sacred”: Ibid., 27.
112 “We want negroes cheap”: Eric Walther, William Lowndes Yancey: The Coming of the Civil War (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006), 217.
113 “I pronounce the gentleman”: The Congressional Globe: The Debates and Proceedings, 36th Cong., 1st sess. (Washington, DC: Office of John C. Rives, 1860), 1032.
113 “Every man in both houses”: James Hammond to Francis Lieber, April 19, 1860, letter printed in The Life and Letters of Francis Lieber, edited by Thomas Sergeant Perry (Boston: James R. Osgood, 1882), 310.
114 “The sporting fraternity talk”: Plattsburgh (NY) Republican, February 4, 1860.
114 “Commonplace people and commonplace events”: New-York Illustrated News, March 17, 1860.
114 referred to Menken as “Mrs. Heenan”: WW to Henry Clapp Jr., June 12, 1860, CW, The Correspondence, 1:55.
115 “an elephant for fifty quid”: Lloyd, Great Prize Fight, 25.
115 During the early rounds: Round-by-round account from multiple sources, including 1860 story from Bell’s Life, a British sporting journal, reprinted in Bob Mee, Bare Fists (Woodstock, NY: Overlook Press, 2001), 149–160.
116 “Tom got a hot ’un”: From Bell’s Life story reprinted in Mee, Bare Fists, 153.
118 “a little faster than”: New York Herald, July 20, 1860.
118 “like two chariots of fire”: New York Post, July 21, 1860.
118 earth-grazing meteor procession: Scientific details and details about the rarity of these events from Don Olson, physics professor, Texas State University–San Marcos, e-mail exchange with author, January 29, 2014.
118 “most sublime spectacle”: New York Herald, July 22, 1860.
118 “A Forerunner of Ruin?”: Philadelphia Inquirer, July 23, 1860.
118 “Year of Meteors”: Leaves of Grass (final edition), 238–239.
119 Abraham Lincoln was elected: Account of 1860 election from multiple sources, including David Potter, The Impending Crisis: America Before the Civil War, 1848–1861 (New York: Harper Colophon, 1976).
120 “We can make it pay”: Thayer & Eldridge to WW, August 17, 1860, WW Papers, Charles E. Feinberg Collection, LOC.
120 “All that is wanted”: SP, November 10, 1860.
120 “a scrape the horror”: Henry Clapp Jr. to WW, March 27, 1860, printed in WWC, 1:237.
120 “We go by the board”: William Thayer to WW, December 5, 1860, WW Papers, Feinberg Collection, LOC.
120 costly to Ada Clare: Gloria Goldblatt, “Ada Clare: Queen of Bohemia” (unpublished manuscript, 1990, Billy Rose Theatre Collection, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts), 137–138.
121 “in a rocket way”: WW to Jeff Whitman, May 10, 1860, CW, The Correspondence, 1:52.
121 Lincoln made a stopover: Lincoln’s visit to New York was in February 1861. But the event seems to fit properly in this chapter since it occurred during those nervous months before the Civil War began.
122 “a capital view of it all”: CW, Prose Works, 1892, 2:500–501.
122 “Two characters as / of a Dialogue”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 1:436.
123 estimated at fifty thousand: New York Daily Tribune, August 14, 1860.
123 “Adah, as she walks”: Macon Daily Telegraph, October 5, 1860.
124 “Drifts That Bar My Door”: Adah Isaacs Menken, Infelicia (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1868), 67–68.
124 “Gives the most varied”: New York Herald, December 13, 1860.
124 “I can not sew”: Allen Lesser, Enchanting Rebel: The Secret of Adah Isaacs Menken (Philadelphia: Ruttle, Shaw & Wetherill, 1947), 53.
125 “absorbed all of good”: Adah Isaacs Menken, note addressed “To the Public,” dateline Jersey City, New Jersey, December 29, 1860, HTC.
125 Stephen Masset: The identity of the person that saved Menken’s life has always been a source of mystery and confusion. A convincing case that it was Masset is made by Foster and Foster in Dangerous Woman, 107–108.
CHAPTER 9: BECOMING ARTEMUS WARD
127 Charlie Brown: Born Charles Brown, on becoming a famous newspaper columnist, he started using a middle name and added an e to his last name, becoming Charles Farrar Browne. His nickname was spelled both Charlie and Charley. I’ve chosen to use Charlie Brown, which appears to be the most frequent spelling, especially among those who knew him in his youth. See, for example, Annals of the Early Settlers of Cuyahoga County (Cleveland: Early Settlers Association, 1928), 26.
127 On January 1, 1861: John Pullen, Comic Relief: The Life and Laughter of Artemus Ward (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1983), 34.
128 napkin into a puppet: American Magazine, January 1896.
128 names like Abraham: Relatives names taken from The History of Waterford County, Maine (Portland, ME: Hoyt, Fogg & Donham, 1879).
128 Brown hid a deck: James Austin, Artemus Ward (New York: Twayne, 1964), 21.
128 sending fake letters: Scribner’s Monthly, May 1881.
128 “Is Cats to Be Trusted?”: Frederick Hudson, Journalism in the United States, from 1690 to 1872 (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1873), 692.
129 “To promote cheerfulness”: Pullen, Comic Relief, 21.
129 “The Dandy Frightening the Squatter”: See J. R. LeMaster and James Wilson, eds., The Mark Twain Encyclopedia (New York: Routledge, 1993), 203.
130 Brown also managed: Discussions of Brown’s first published effort from multiple sources, including Edward Hingston, The Genial Showman: Being Reminiscences of the Life of Artemus Ward (London: John Camden Hotten, 1871).
130 Plain Dealer’s local editor: Account of Ward’s early days at the paper from multiple sources, including Scribner’s Monthly, May 1881.
130 “noncents”: Artemus Ward, His Book (New York: Carleton, 1862), 90. Note: Fractured spellings taken from Plain Dealer columns reprinted in this work.
130 “puncktooaly”: Ibid., 82.
130 “Decleration of Inderpendunse”: Ibid., 39.
131 “glowrius”: Ibid., 67.
131 “confisticate”: Ibid., 194.
131 Presently, Vanity Fair: Description of publication from multiple sources, including Frank Luther Mott, A History of American Magazines, 1850–1865 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1957), 520–529.
131 asked for $1,200: Pullen, Comic Relief, 33.
132 “Quiet as he seemed”: Charles Godfrey Leland, Memoirs (New York: D. Appleton, 1893), 235.
132 “It is late, sir”: William Winter, Old Friends: Being Literary Recollections of Other Days (New York: Moffat, Yard, 1909), 287.
133 “He possessed”: Ibid., 285.
133 “vishus beest”: Artemus Ward, His Book, 67.
133 “He came with about”: North American Review, April 1889.
133 alter his appearance: Description of this from multiple sources, including Pullen, Comic Relief, 41–42.
CHAPTER 10: “THE HEATHER IS ON FIRE”
135 Southern soldiers had fired: Account of attack on Fort Sumter from multiple sources, including James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988).
136 “I can almost see”: CW, Prose Works, 1892, 1:24.
137 “The heather is on fire”: McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, 274.
137 “My soul swells”: William Thayer to WW, April 19, 1861, WW Papers, Charles E. Feinberg Collection, LOC.
137 “The excitement caused”: Brooklyn Eagle, April 20, 1861.
138 “tempest of cheers”: Atlantic, June 1861.
138 “I have this hour”: Emory Holloway, Free and Lonesome Heart: The Secret of Walt Whitman (New York: Vantage Press, 1960), 121.
138 “Could there be anything”: Clara Barrus, Whitman and Burroughs: C
omrades (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931), 339.
139 “Regiment of Beaux”: Francis Wolle, Fitz-James O’Brien: A Literary Bohemian of the Eighteen-Fifties (Boulder: University of Colorado Studies, 1944), 215.
139 “Why, when I am”: Ibid., 220.
139 Bohemian became synonymous with journalist: For a discussion of this, see Junius Henri Browne, The Great Metropolis: A Mirror of New York (Hartford, CT: American, 1869), 151.
140 Pfaff’s habitué to war correspondent: For names of some of the writers who made this transition, see Louis Starr, Bohemian Brigade: Civil War Newsmen in Action (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1954), 9.
140 “The sights now there”: Leaves of Grass (final edition), 678.
141 “the harvest time for theaters”: Asia Booth Clarke, John Wilkes Booth: A Sister’s Memoir (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1996), 81.
141 “I remember well”: New York Times, January 20, 1875.
142 “He was a queer fellow”: WWC, 4:485.
142 story of Ivan Mazeppa: Details about Mazeppa, the historical figure, from multiple sources, including Hubert Babinski, The Mazeppa Legend in European Romanticism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1974).
143 English playwright Henry Milner: Details about Milner from multiple sources, including Michael Foster and Barbara Foster, A Dangerous Woman: The Life, Loves, and Scandals of Adah Isaacs Menken (Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2011).
144 Mazeppa opened on June 7, 1861: Details about the Albany production from H. P. Phelps, Players of a Century: A Record of the Albany Stage (New York: Edgar S. Werner, 1890).
144 “crowded from pit to dome”: Ibid., 317.
145 “It had to be seen”: Wolf Mankowitz, Mazeppa: The Lives, Loves, and Legends of Adah Isaacs Menken (London: Blond & Briggs, 1982), 20.
145 “I was not impressed”: Undated reminiscence by a person named Baize from HTC.
145 “resting on the bare back”: Adah Isaacs Menken, “Some Notes on Her Life in Her Own Hand,” Special Collections, John Hay Library, Brown University.
146 “My business here is wonderful”: Menken to John Augustin Daly, July 18, 1862, HTC.
146 “‘went it’ pretty rapid”: Ibid.
146 “It won’t do to be married”: Ibid.
147 “Artemus Ward will speak”: The Complete Works of Charles F. Browne, Better Known as “Artemus Ward” (London: Chatto and Windus, 1871), 192.
147 “Ladies and gentlemen”: J. E. Preston Muddock, Pages from an Adventurous Life (New York: Mitchell Kennerley, 1907), 96.
147 “And the audience”: Century, February 1902.
147 “I met a man”: Artemus Ward: His Works, Complete (New York: G. W. Carleton, 1877), 266.
148 An example is Ward’s penitentiary joke: For a thoughtful discussion of Ward’s precision as a humorist, see John Pullen, Comic Relief: The Life and Laughter of Artemus Ward (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1983), 50.
149 “clear as a bell”: Muddock, Pages from an Adventurous Life, 95.
150 “Comic copy is what”: Eli Perkins, Thirty Years of Wit: And Reminiscences of Witty, Wise, and Eloquent Men (New York: Werner, 1899), 176.
150 “Do you believe”: Adah Isaacs Menken to Hattie Tyng, July 21, 1861, printed in Infelicia, and Other Writings: Adah Isaacs Menken, edited by Gregory Eiselein (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview Press, 2002), 231.
CHAPTER 11: WHITMAN TO THE FRONT
153 “quicksand”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 2:517–518.
153 “A lady’s thimble”: James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 238.
154 “either insane or drunk”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 1:461.
154 On February 16, O’Brien: Details of O’Brien getting shot mostly from Francis Wolle, Fitz-James O’Brien: A Literary Bohemian of the Eighteen-Fifties (Boulder: University of Colorado Studies, 1944).
155 “Aldrich, I see”: William Winter, Old Friends: Being Literary Recollections of Other Days (New York: Moffat, Yard, 1909), 77.
156 Velsor Brush: Jerome Loving, Walt Whitman: The Song of Himself (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), 10.
156 “Then let me”: Wolle, Fitz-James O’Brien, 236.
156 “After I’m dead”: Ibid., 246.
157 “No more electric”: Fred Pattee, The Development of the American Short Story (New York: Harper and Bros., 1923), 155.
157 dizzying succession of major battles: List of battles that George Whitman fought in from Jerome Loving, ed., Civil War Letters of George Washington Whitman (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1975).
158 called a “slough”: WW to Ralph Waldo Emerson, December 29, 1862, CW, The Correspondence, 1:61.
158 “Thos Gray good looking”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 2:487.
158 “John McNelly night Oct 7”: Ibid., 494.
159 “David Wilson—night”: Ibid., 496.
160 “Wounded”: Details about this poem from Ted Genoways, Walt Whitman and the Civil War (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), 159.
159 “The vault at Pfaffs”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 1:454.
160 sometime late in the autumn of 1862: Some accounts date WW’s fight with the poet George Arnold as occurring at an earlier point in 1862, or even in 1861. For my account, I place it in late autumn of 1862 based on George Sixbey, “Walt Whitman’s Middle Years, 1860–1867” (PhD diss., Yale University, 1941), 124. Sixbey is meticulous about chronology. Further support for the fight with Arnold occurring in the autumn of 1862 comes from the reliable Clara Barrus, Whitman and Burroughs: Comrades (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931), 3.
160 “Success to the Southern Arms!”: William Sloane Kennedy, Reminiscences of Walt Whitman (London: Alexander Gardner, 1896), 69.
160 “Oh! mine gots, mens”: William Shepard Walsh, ed., Pen Pictures of Modern Authors (New York: Putnam’s, 1882), 166.
161 “If there is a worse”: James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom, 574.
161 “First Lieutenant G. W. Whitmore”: New York Herald, December 16, 1862.
162 “The next two days”: WW to Louisa Van Velsor Whitman, December 29, 1862, CW, The Correspondence, 1:58.
162 “Any pickpocket who failed”: Atlantic, June 1907.
162 “You could stick”: CW, The Correspondence, 1:60.
163 “Remember your galliant”: Ibid., 59.
163 “healthy beat”: This slang term and subsequent ones such as “dead beat” from CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 2:503.
163 “Death is nothing here”: Ibid., 508.
163 “Sight at daybreak”: Ibid., 513.
164 “Both in and out”: Leaves of Grass (final edition), 32.
164 “A beautiful object to me”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 2:504.
164 “I do not see”: CW, Prose Works, 1892, 1:33.
165 “regiments, brigades, and divisions”: CW, Notebooks and Unpublished Prose Manuscripts, 2:507.
CHAPTER 12: BOHEMIA GOES WEST
167 “held the town”: Joseph Henry Harper, The House of Harper: A Century of Publishing in Franklin Square (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1912), 150.
168 “With his beautiful wife”: Gordon Hendricks, Albert Bierstadt: Painter of the American West (New York: Harry Abrams, 1975), 113.
168 “Fitz did not come back”: Donald Dulchinos, Pioneer of Inner Space: The Life of Fitz Hugh Ludlow (New York: Autonomedia, 1998), 143.
168 “Rose frightened and good cause”: Ibid.
168 a taste for something far stronger: Helen Ludlow’s knowledge of her brother’s drug use from Helen Ludlow to Rev. Leander Hall, June 1, 1876, Special Collections, Union College Schaffer Library.
168 “to goad wearied nerves”: Ibid.
169 translation of an Italian poem: Dulchinos, Pioneer of Inner Space, 138.
170 “the depot of a fur trader”: Nancy Anderson and Linda Ferber, Albert Bierstadt: Art & Enterprise (Brooklyn: Brooklyn Museum, 1990), 73.
170 “golden shower”: New York Times, May 17, 1863.
172 “How I would rejoice”: Otis Skinner, The Last Tragedian: Booth Tells His Own Story (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1939), 92.
172 The eastern half: Details about this leg of Ludlow and Bierstadt’s journey from multiple sources, including Dulchinos, Pioneer of Inner Space.
173 “angry faces, a rolling surf”: Fitz Hugh Ludlow, The Heart of the Continent (New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1870), 73.
174 “wiped out like a grease-spot”: Ibid.
174 “great oscillating patch”: Ibid., 64.
174 “I had such a view”: Ibid., 75.
174 “He rushed forward”: Ibid., 69.
175 “Overland Mazeppa”: Golden Era, February 21, 1864.
175 “This was a place”: Ibid.
175 “There are the Rocky Mountains”: Ludlow, Heart of the Continent, 130.
176 “Nature has dipped”: Ibid., 131.
176 “quite unbreathed before”: Ibid., 178.
176 “Mount Rosalie”: Golden Era, February 28, 1864. In this account, Ludlow says that Bierstadt “by right of first portrayal, baptized” the unnamed mountain as “Monte Rosa.” The artist’s sketch would become the basis for his painting A Storm in the Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie.
177 “enfilading”: New York Post, May 26, 1863.
177 “rotatory” . . . “our Parrhasius”: New York Post, June 5, 1863.
177 “The conglomerate of the latter”: Ludlow, Heart of the Continent, 166.
178 “To understand the exquisite”: Atlantic, April 1864.
178 148 Mormon pioneers: This number often appears as “143 men,” but there were also three women and two children, hence 148 pioneers.
179 “Yet I, a cosmopolite”: Ludlow, Heart of the Continent, 309.
179 “Heavens! What strange unsexing”: Ibid., 312.
180 “Scriptural dignity”: Atlantic, April 1864.
180 “Your Union’s gone forever”: Ibid.