Forever and Forever (Historical Proper Romance)

by Josi S. Kilpack

  In time, Henry would use his writing as a platform to share his views against slavery, and there were indications that Fanny agreed with him at the time those works were published. At the time of this fictionalized discussion (1836), the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 had ended the practice of slavery in England and British Colonies. America was resistant to the change but less than thirty years away from their own Civil War.

  Chapter Seven

  Henry remained in the Appletons’ company for approximately three weeks and regretted having to part ways with the family in Schaffhausen. However, he had received a note from Clara Crowninshield expressing her eagerness to return to America. On Henry’s final day with the Appletons, he read Derby’s sermons to William as a parting gift. Henry left for Heidelberg—where Clara had remained during his trip to Switzerland—only a week before William succumbed to tuberculosis. William was buried in Schaffhausen; I am guessing they chose that city for its Protestant roots, though the Appletons had transitioned into the Unitarian religion by the 1800s.

  Fanny records that she missed Henry after he was gone, so her feelings for him were at the very least friendly if not a bit warm. We also know there was a great deal of literary discussion and translation taking place between them.

  There is no evidence that Henry planned to journey to Germany with the Appletons as a guide, though I used it to contrast their different circumstances and to plant the seeds of one of Fanny’s reasons for resisting his attentions.

  Chapters Eight and Nine

  Fanny recorded in her journal that, while in the salon of the Strasburg hotel, she saw Henry walking down the street with three women who she would later learn were Miss Crowninshield and Mrs. Bryant and her daughter. There is no record that anyone other than Fanny saw him from the window. Miss Bryant would have been very young, perhaps only twelve or thirteen. Her being old enough to spark Fanny’s envy was mistakenly included in one of the resources I read, but I decided to include it as it helped explain why Fanny would become so cold toward Henry. The day after she saw him on the street, Henry and his companions had breakfast with the Appletons at their hotel. In her journal, Fanny simply said, “They leave.”

  In Heidelberg, Henry became acquainted with the family of William Cullen Bryant, poet and editor of the New York Post. Their friendship continued until Bryant’s death in 1878, just four years before Henry’s death.

  Chapter Ten

  The Appleton family were members of the Federal Street Church during the years that William Channing served as minister, making it one of the first Unitarian churches in the country. Religion was an important part of the Appleton family, and Fanny’s journal reflected very deeply thought-out religious ideas and spiritual experiences throughout her life.

  For reasons not well understood, the Appleton children referred to their Uncle Sam and Uncle William’s wives as Aunt Sam and Aunt William. They were very close to their extended family, and Aunt Sam did indeed play an important part in the girls’ lives, especially after their mother died.

  Other than an offhand mention of “Many suitors,” I found little about Fanny’s or Molly’s interactions with other men. There is also little explanation of why Fanny resisted Henry’s attentions, though I feel the motivations I created for Fanny are in keeping with their situation. It is interesting to me that two such eligible young women were not married by the ages of twenty-four and twenty, respectively, but their reasons presented here are my own conjecture. John Peterton is a fictional character.

  Emmeline Austin, Susan Benjamin, and Robert Apthorp were all people with whom Fanny corresponded regularly while in Europe, as well as other times in her life. Letters to and from them make up a fair amount of the correspondence that allowed biographers to piece together her life and attitudes. I have attempted to stay true to the reflections of their characters and connections to Fanny made through their correspondence.

  Chapter Eleven

  Henry was actually the one to call on the Appletons on Beacon Street after the family returned from Europe in 1837, but because of the vagueness of the records regarding what transpired between Henry and Fanny at that time, I restructured some of the details to create a more natural transition.

  Henry and Tom certainly renewed their friendship after the Appletons return, and since that friendship served as a connection between Henry and Fanny for several years, it did not seem to be much of a stretch to include it in the novel. From all accounts, Tom was an easygoing, jovial man, quick to laugh, and who enjoyed the finer things in life. There is some ambiguity regarding his sexuality, but whatever the reason, he never married, and he spent most of his life traveling the world and indulging in the best company, food, wine, art, and culture. He would become known as a “Great Wit” and respected on both sides of the Atlantic. Tom and Henry were good friends throughout their lives, and Tom helped Henry with his children after Fanny’s death.

  Henry came to lodge at Craigie House—which he called Craigie Castle—following the 1836–37 term at Harvard. The history included is the actual history of the house, including the fact that Henry’s rooms were the very rooms George Washington had used when he stayed there during the Siege of Boston—or so he was told. Perhaps Mrs. Craigie told all her lodgers the same.

  Nathan Appleton later purchased Craigie House as a wedding gift for Henry and Fanny, along with the ten acres between Brattle Street and the Charles River so that no one would ever build something that would block their view of the river. Craigie House is now a historical park and museum for both the Washington and Longfellow connections.

  The preservation of the Longfellow house is remarkable; nearly all the furniture and artifacts in the museum belonged to the Longfellow family and have been kept just as they were when the Longfellows lived there. Henry and Fanny also worked to preserve the history of General Washington’s time in the house and purchased several pictures and mementos in keeping with that time period.

  Chapter Twelve

  The Appleton girls did study French when they were young, and they were reacquainted with Mr. Longfellow after their return to Boston, but that the Appleton women would have continued to learn French or that they would have presented it to Henry is conjecture.

  Henry did visit with Fanny under the mistaken idea that she wanted to learn German—something he had written to her about while she was still in Europe—but we do not know the context of the offer on his part or the acceptance on hers. Fanny’s journals, though quite prolific during certain times of her life, were rather sparse during this time.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Jared Sparks and Sarah Lowell were both tenants of Craigie House during the time that Henry lodged there, but they were probably not all tenants simultaneously, and I do not know for sure who lived in Craigie House with Henry in 1837. Sarah Lowell was the aunt of James Russell Lowell, who was a student of Henry’s and who went on to become a member of the Dante Club and a great poet himself.

  Sparks did not actually become the McLean professor until 1839.

  Chapter Seventeen

  In 1837, Fanny rejected Henry’s first marriage proposal a few months after her family’s return from Europe. It is not clear why she rejected him or how exactly he had pursued her other than his determination to teach her German. In December of that year, he wrote a letter to Molly expressing his brokenhearted regret, reflecting the close ties he shared with the entire Appleton family.

  Chapter Eighteen

  While Henry had a great many male friends, he also seemed to feel comfortable with women of his mother’s—and Aunt Lucia’s—generation. He often dined with Sarah Lowell or Mrs. Craigie. There is no indication that Sarah Lowell, or any one person or circumstance, served to motivate Henry toward writing and publishing again, but we do know that after Outré Mer he did not publish another book until 1839. We also know that he did not abandon his feelings for Fanny following his proposal, though her rejection was painful for him.

  Chapter Nineteen

  On Jan
uary 9, 1839, Nathan Appleton married Harriett Coffin Sumner. We do not know the details of the wedding or Fanny’s feelings toward it. In letters she expressed her discomfort with the age difference between Harriett and her father when they were courting; Harriet was twenty-two years younger than Nathan, and merely ten years older than Tom. Following the wedding, Fanny and Molly traveled together a great deal—perhaps to avoid being underfoot at Beacon Street. Nathan and Harriet went on to have three children together.

  In 1841, Fanny wrote in her journal that she was becoming quite good at faking her enjoyment in life, indicating that she may have experienced her own bouts of depression.

  Chapter Twenty

  One constant in Henry’s life was his close friends. He always seemed to be surrounded by good and supportive men and women who surely helped him through the dark times he experienced. Around the time that Hyperion was published, these particular five men were so often in each other’s company they became known as the “Five of Clubs” around Boston and Cambridge. Cornelius Conway Felton would eventually become president of Harvard College. Charles Sumner would rise in the political ranks throughout his life. All of them remained good friends throughout their lives.

  That the five of them would travel with Henry to pick up the first copies of Hyperion after it was published in New York is an aspect of my own imagination.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  What motivated Henry to send a Swiss cheese along with a copy of Hyperion to the Appleton family is unknown—but after meeting Jewett in New York, that’s exactly what he did. Fanny’s response to the gift Jewett brought to Beacon Street was put in ink in a letter she sent to Emmeline Austin not long afterward where she expressed in razor sharp words what she thought of both Henry and the book, marking perhaps her very lowest regard for the man who was still in love with her. In regard to the book, she said it was “a thing of shreds and patches like the author’s mind!”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Theresa Maria Gold Appleton had been raised in the Pittsville area of western Massachusetts, and Fanny and Molly often spent summers and holidays with their mother’s family. In 1839, they were allowed to rent their own set of rooms and their own carriage for the first time, and they spent the next few months living more independently then they ever had before. They had many friends, in addition to their family, with whom they visited and explored the area.

  That their visit to Massachusetts followed Fanny’s discovery of herself within the pages of Hyperion and would have been a type of escape from the whispers is my own conjecture. That said, both her reflection in Mary Ashworth and her reaction to it was well-known following the book’s publication. She would become rather infamous for it in years to come. It seems reasonable that even if the visit to Lenox was not because she was running from the unwelcome notoriety, the distance from Boston at that time certainly could have been a welcome relief.

  Chapters Twenty-Three and Twenty-Four

  Hyperion was Henry’s second prose novel, and his first romance. All the details included in these chapters are true regarding its reception, the financial problems of the publisher, the accusations regarding Mary Ashworth being a caricature of Fanny, and Fanny’s irritation at the infamy that followed.

  What is ambiguous is whether or not Longfellow meant to mimic Fanny in the work. Some accounts say he was surprised so many people made a connection between Mary and Fanny, while other accounts said he had written it as a kind of purging.

  Regardless, after learning of Fanny’s reaction, he seemed to accept that his love would forever be unrequited. However, he did not “fall out of love” with her despite the further distance the book created between them and instead claimed to have accepted that he would always live as though “maimed” not to have her love returned to him.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  On December 26, 1839, Mary Appleton married Robert James Mackintosh at 39 Beacon Street. The ceremony was simple and the wedding party small, probably due to Harriet being eight month’s pregnant. The ceremony was followed by a luncheon before the bride and groom left for their honeymoon.

  The sentiments shared by Fanny in this chapter are reflective of her journal entries and letters written about the event. She was very happy for Molly, and would travel to Washington D.C. with her and Robert for a few months before they left for England, but she would always miss the connection the sisters had shared before Molly’s marriage.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Ronald Mackintosh was very nearly a honeymoon baby and was born on his mother’s twenty-seventh birthday, October 18, 1840. Fanny learned of her “Cockney Nephew’s” birth a few weeks after it occurred.

  Fanny’s journals show increased study and reading during 1840, including her enjoyment of two lectures given by Richard Henry Dana Sr. that fall, which I assume would have been part of the lecture circuit Henry had been instrumental in developing. She likely did not attend the lecture with Jewett as her thoughts in this chapter were written in a letter to him. Henry’s introduction of Mr. Dana is fictional.

  Fanny had always been interested in literature, but it was at this time that she seemed to truly take on the cloak of a critic and expanded her reading to new places. Henry did not necessarily recommend she read Macaulay’s lecture, but they did discuss Milton during their time in Europe and she did enjoy the essay first published in the Edinburgh Review that she had read during the summer of 1840.

  Incidentally, Henry and Fanny’s daughter Edith would eventually marry the grandson of Mr. Dana, Richard Henry Dana III, in 1878. Their son would be the last Longfellow to live in Craigie Castle prior to the house and its contents being donated to the National Park Service in 1972.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Ronald Mackintosh’s delivery was a difficult one, but the effects were not well understood until Tom and Fanny went to England. Though what Molly’s diagnosis would be today is unknown, she had specific problems with her hips and, likely, an opium addiction as a result of trying to manage the pain. The effects of opiates were not well understood at that time.

  That there would have been such a formal “counsel” between Fanny, Tom, and Robert as shown here is unknown, but we do know that Fanny and Tom were attentive to Molly’s needs while still seeing the sights of England.

  Tom and Fanny would have arrived in Liverpool and likely made their own way to London rather than being picked up by Robert.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Mrs. Craigie’s failing eyesight is a fictional detail, but Henry did sit with her as she became ill, and she enjoyed his work and his company during the years of their friendship. Upon the death of Elizabeth Craigie, John Worcester, the other boarder at Craigie House at the time, leased the property from the Craigie heirs and lived in his half with his new wife.

  I’m unsure what legal agreements might have been entered into between Henry, Worchester, and Mrs. Craigie, but after Henry’s marriage to Fanny, Nathan Appleton was able to purchase the house. Worcester and his wife continued to live there until the home they were having built was finished, at which time the Longfellows became the sole occupants of Craigie House, determined to preserve its legacy.

  That Mrs. Craigie once told Henry that she feared seeing an old woman in bed would deter him from marriage seems a reflection of the level of friendship the two of them shared. The story of the canker worms is often shared to illustrate Mrs. Craigie’s eccentric nature that increased as she aged.

  Chapters Thirty and Thirty-One

  Henry did not bring Fanny a cheese or a copy of Ballads and Other Poems, though she had read it by the time the New Year came along. The thoughts shared in this chapter by Emmeline are actually Fanny’s thoughts from her letter regarding Voices of Night, which had been published in 1839, a few months after Hyperion.

  I do not know where Fanny’s heart was when Henry came to visit, but she recorded in her journal that it was a “heavy visit.” I had the visit take place with only the two of them in order to give Henry and
Fanny an exclusive conversation.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The relationship between Harriet and Fanny is not well communicated in letters and journals. Whether that was because it was unremarkable or because Fanny was attempting to be polite we do not know. We also don’t know what type of mother Harriet was, but Fanny did love her half siblings, and when she became a mother, she was very involved in the daily lives of her own children. I would imagine that seeing Harriet—a woman not much older than Fanny—would have been a powerful example to Fanny, which I chose to reflect. However, it is speculation based on little more than impressions and hopes.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  The Water Cure was based on the idea that impurities in the body could be “broken” with an induced “fever” and minimalistic approach to diet and activity. Henry arrived at the convent, which had been turned into a medical spa of sorts, in late May and resided there for four months, taking multiple baths in the waters every day, eating a very bland diet, and getting plenty of rest and relaxation.

  Henry did not have a face-to-face meeting with Sumner before he left for Europe; instead, Sumner sent him a letter that expressed the depth of their friendship, which I tried to reflect here. Sumner struggled socially and may have had what we would call Asperger’s as he functioned on a highly logical plain.

  In their later years, after Sumner had risen in the ranks of the Republican party, a famous portrait was done of the two of them titled The Politician and the Poet. It shows the striking contrast between the two men even in their appearance: Sumner was big and broad and imposing, while Henry looked like . . . a poet.

  They remained close friends until Sumner’s death in 1874, an event that was difficult for Henry due to how close the men had been.