From Mary E. (Mollie) Clemens and Samuel L. Clemens To Jane Lampton Clemens and Pamela A. Moffett
26 November 1872 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: NPV, UCCL 00835)

Hartford Nov 26. 1872.

Dear Folks,

I will write only a note to say Sam has arrived safely and in good health after being gone three months & a week; and of passing through the most [ terriffic ] S[t]orm of a week—and just before reaching Hartford of a narrow escape of a car wreck as there were ties fastened on the track in two places. 1 Give thanks for his safe delivery at home Mrs Langdon leaves Friday; and we expect to get away next week.

Sam brought an English gentleman with him for the night and has just carried him to the train. Mr Wood is on his way to New Zealand. 2 Had a [Fejeee] Islander with him as servant. Sam says Livy shall not cross Mrs Hookers threshold and if he talks to Mrs H he will tell her in plain words the reason. 3

Mrs Geo Warner is within three weeks of confinement and Sunday was taken with something like apoplexy, [s or] spasms—but today is a little better; so there is hope of her life. 4

Write us soon.

There is a great deal more I could say but I am taking “the epizootic” and my eyes and nose both run faster than my pen. 5

Love to all.

Affly M. E. C.

Dear Mother & Sister—Very glad to get home—& shall be glad to return to England in May. In London I bought a steam engine for Sammy’s Christmas present. Bought it second-hand & had it thoroughly repaired. Paid $80, gold, for it. It cost about [ $4 $140] when new. Sammy must learn how to run it before he blows himself up with it. He must contrive work for it to do, & hunt up all sorts of applications for its power. It is a very excellent little toy, & can be made to do a stout job of work. It will arrive from London before long, & go straight to Fredonia. I bought no other presents for anybody, because there are so many of us I didn’t know where to begin—& as Sammy can’t be allowed to read, I thought he ought to have some amusement.6

Love to you all.

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

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1 On Monday morning, 25 November, Clemens left the Batavia in Boston, whence the ship proceeded to New York. He took an express train for Hartford, which narrowly escaped derailment near Enfield, Connecticut, about fifteen miles north of Hartford:

About three-quarters of a mile from the bridge the express train coming south on the west track, about seven o’clock Monday evening, met a pile of ties. The engineer saw them, and by his presence of mind and the Westinghouse brake was able to stop the train before the crash so that no damage was done. (“A Villain’s Work,” Hartford Courant, 27 Nov 72, 2)

The attempt on Clemens’s train, and similar attempts on three later trains the same evening (one of which was derailed), were the work of an “insolently drunk” man who was ejected from a train for refusing to pay sufficient fare (“A Villain’s Work,” Hartford Courant, 27 Nov 72, 2; “From Europe,” Boston Evening Transcript, 25 Nov 72, 4).

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2 C. F. Wood wrote to Clemens in 1907:

Dear Fellow Traveller of 35 years ago. You will remember our voyage in the “Batavia” from Liverpool to Boston—our “battened down” existance for two days during the storm, our games of Euchre to keep up the spirits of the more dejected passengers, and our looking on at the rescue of the survivors of the crew of the “Charles Ward.” I was on my way out for a cruise in the South Seas and you on our arrival at Boston, kindly took me to your home at Hartford. I know you are much enjoyed, but I shd like to call & see you & press your hand once more. (3 July 1907, CU-MARK)

In 1875 Wood described his travels in A Yachting Cruise in the South Seas: “Early in November, 1872, I left Liverpool by the Cunard line, and crossing the American continent by the Great Pacific Railway, sailed from San Francisco for New Zealand, calling at the Sandwich Islands.” He explained that he was “induced to publish these few imperfect sketches of my last cruise by the belief that any facts relating to the manners and customs of these islanders, should not be allowed to perish” (C. F. Wood, “Preface,” 1).

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3 In a September 1872 speech to a convention of Boston spiritualists, Victoria Woodhull, Isabella Beecher Hooker’s close ally in the women’s rights movement, accused Henry Ward Beecher (Hooker’s half-brother) of committing adultery with Elizabeth Tilton, one of his parishioners. Woodhull reiterated the charge in the 2 November issue of Woodhull and Claflin’s Weekly, objecting not so much to the relationship itself, but to Beecher’s hypocrisy in condemning free love from the pulpit while practicing it in private. Beecher and Tilton remained silent, refusing to deny or admit the truth of the charge. Hooker, unable to believe in her brother’s innocence, defended Woodhull. The rest of the Beecher family (except for Catharine, Beecher’s oldest sister) ostracized Hooker, and Clemens seems to have followed suit. The Beecher scandal became a cause célèbre in August 1874, when Theodore Tilton sued Beecher for alienation of affections. Beecher’s trial ended in a hung jury in July 1875, but in February 1876 a church council reviewed the case and officially exonerated him (Andrews, 35–41; Clark, 207–9, 220–21; Oliver, 117–49; Shaplen, 199, 260–62; L2, 14; Woodhull). Victoria Claflin Woodhull (1838–1927) was born in Ohio, and in her early years collaborated with her family in selling patent medicines and telling fortunes. At age fifteen she married Dr. Canning Woodhull, whom she divorced in 1864. She subsequently formed a liaison with James H. Blood (and may have legally married him), but in 1876 she divorced him as well. In January 1870 she and her sister, Tennessee Claflin, opened a profitable stock brokerage in New York with the help of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and in May of the same year the sisters founded Woodhull and Claflin’s Weekly, which advocated equal rights for women and a single standard of free love for both sexes. In part because of these views, Henry Ward Beecher often attacked her from the pulpit, citing her as an example of vice. In May 1872 Woodhull became the presidential nominee of the Equal Rights Party, with Frederick Douglass as her running mate (Shaplen, 133–38, 157, 269; Marberry 1967, 15, 27, 188).

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4 Lilly Warner recovered, and gave birth to her third surviving child, Margaret (known as “Daisy”, on 23 December (Elisabeth G. Warner, 1).

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5 The term “epizootic,” which technically meant a type of equine influenza, was used informally for human illnesses such as the common cold. Mollie was evidently treating herself with a homeopathic medication, designed to cure by exacerbating her symptoms.

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6 Clemens’s nephew, Samuel Moffett, suffered from an unidentified problem with his eyes which prevented him from reading. The steam engine did not arrive in Fredonia until January 1873 (L4, 332; 22 Jan 73 to PAM).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, Jean Webster McKinney Family Papers, Vassar College Library (NPV). Mollie Clemens wrote on the first three pages of a folder; Clemens filled the fourth page.

Previous publication: L5, 229–232.

Provenance:see McKinney Family Papers in Description of Provenance.

Emendations and textual notes:

terriffic • [sic]

Fejeee • Tejeee [crossbar omitted]

s or • s or or [‘s’ partly formed; corrected miswriting]

$4 $140 • $4140