Home at Hartford: Day By Day

November – Sam and Charles Webster wrote to New York Governor David Hill) urging that Frank M. Scott, former bookkeeper at Webster & Co., serving a six-year sentence for embezzling, be pardoned [MTNJ 3: 497n49]. Up until this time Sam was adamant and hostile for punishment of Scott, so the turnaround suggests someone else’s influence, say Livy’s?

November 19 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Mary Mapes Dodge (1831-1905), editor of the children’s St. Nicholas Magazine, explaining that publishing Prince and the Pauper in her magazine would lose “30 or 40,000” sales. Sam added:

November 19 Saturday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Charles Webster, enclosing $500.

“I leave for Canada Nov. 25, & shall be back about Dec. 7. If you should need more money meantime, write your aunt Livy. She will send it.”

Sam needed to go to Canada, so as to claim residency when P&P was released. This would secure copyright there [MTBus 176].

November 19 Monday – Back in Hartford, Sam telegraphed Howells. He and Livy repeated an invitation for the Howellses to visit. Sam had not received a letter from Howells written the same day expressing that he couldn’t return to Hartford for a solid week, but would come “two weeks from to-day” (Dec. 3) [MTHL 1: 449-50].

“I have told thirty lies and am not out of the Woods yet; S L Clemens” [MTP].

November 19 Wednesday – Sam and Cable gave two readings in Chickering Hall, New York City. From The New York Times, Nov. 19, 1884:

GENIUS AND VERSATILITY.

MR. CABLE EXHIBITS BOTH AND MARK TWAIN SOMETHING ELSE.

November 19 Thursday – Sam left New York City for Washington, D.C. 

Sam wrote to Rollin M. Daggett, letter not extant but referred to in Daggett’s Nov. 28 reply.

Sam sent a full morocco copy of Grant’s Memoirs to Philip H. Sheridan (1831-1888) [Gribben 640].

From Sam’s notebook:

November 19 Saturday ­– In New York City, Sam responded to an invite from Bram Stoker (1847-1912) to attend a 2 o’clock performance of Faust at the Star Theater. Stoker, Henry Irving, and Charles E. Howson organized the production, which opened Nov. 7.

November 19 Monday – Orion and Mollie Clemens finished a letter to Sam & Livy they began Nov. 17 (annotated, letter & clipping enclosed);

William H. Wiegel, an old, wounded veteran with six children wrote asking Sam for a loan of $35; he had a $1,500 claim against the government that would be settled. A return envelope was unused [MTP].

November 19 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Thomas Bailey Aldrich, thanking him for the “lovely book” and promising in December to send him “one that hasn’t much poetry in it, but pictures enough to make up” [MTP]. Gribben labels this as “an advance copy” of Wyndam Towers, since “Aldrich published no other volumes during this period” [18].

November 19 Wednesday – Rev. Edwin Pond Parker wrote to Sam upset at learning a “public reception” for H.M. Stanley would be given following his Hartford lecture, and solely to those who had paid $1 to hear him. He applied to Sam assuming that the Stanley’s would be their guest again [MTP].

An unidentified person from N.Y. sent Sam a critical note about the firing of the conductor [MTP].

November 2 Tuesday – Sam gave a speech for Hartford Republicans at the Hartford Opera House. It was a celebration of the victory of James A. Garfield and Chester A. Arthur (1839-1886) in the 1880 presidential election. Sam’s speech was title “Funeral Oration Over the Grave of the Democratic Party.” Some in attendance were taken back by Sam’s doleful presentation [Fatout, MT Speaking 146-7].

November 2 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Thomas B. Aldrich about a check received for an article. Sam knew he’d written it since he’d received a check for it; if Aldrich had “any other articles” he didn’t “wish to be responsible for,” Sam wrote, “remember I am here.” Sam announced he would:

“…arrive in Boston about 4 to-morrow afternoon. Let’s dine with Osgood—what do you say? Invite Howells—better telegraph him, perhaps” [MTP].

November 2 Thursday – Karl Gerhardt wrote to Sam and Livy having rec’d the new letter of credit for £100, and promised that “every cent will be used to the best advantage” [MTP].

November 2 Friday – Margaret Meestenmacher wrote from St. Louis to ask Sam & Livy for funds to help her church. Evidently she’d known the Langdons [MTP].

November 2 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Charles Webster about a mix up with too many books sent to station masters on the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western Railroad—men who were involved in arranging “hotel” or “parlor” cars for the Clemens family when they traveled back and forth between Elmira and Hoboken. Griffith, A.

November 2 Tuesday – Sam had a visitor in Hartford — Sarah Knowles Bolton, a prolific American author of a “famous” series of books (Poor boys who became Famous, Girls who became Famous, Famous Men of Science, Famous American Statesmen, Famous English Statesmen, etc. (see Nov. 3 entry). She did not stay overnight.

November 2 Wednesday – William Mackay Laffan of the N.Y. Sun wrote to Sam that he’d just returned from Boston the night before and could not dine with him on Monday as he’d proposed [MTP].

November 2 Friday – It’s not clear whether Sam and Livy had been in New York since Oct. 25, but more likely is that they returned to Hartford by Saturday Oct. 27, and that Sam then returned to the City by this day when he wrote a short letter to Edmund C. Stedman. Not quoted from the letter is that Sam returned to Hartford by the 4 p.m. train after visiting the Cranes, who were still in New York. Stedman wrote Sam on Oct.

November 2 Saturday – William Dean Howells wrote his father, “I am going down to spend Sunday with Mark Twain…” [MTHL 2: 618 n1].

Frederick J. Hall wrote to Sam that he was “stirring up our general agents…Yesterday, November 1st — which was by the way my twenty-ninth birthday — we sent out 500 volumes Sheridan; 680 volumes Literature [LAL]; secured an order from Watson Gill for 2500 more Grant…” Monthly report enclosed but not extant [MTP].

November 20 Thursday – Charles B. Campbell wrote from Newark, NJ to ask Sam for the late William L. Garrison’s autograph, should Sam have one to spare [MTP].

William W. Kellett wrote from Boston to offer Sam a tardy (by 3 years) thanks for his writing which lifted him while suffering cold in England [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “Good letter"

November 20 Saturday – In Hartford, Sam sent an autographed note to an unidentified person: “None genuine without this label on the bottle” [MTLE 5: 203].

Robert Rutledge receipted Sam $80 for lessons from Nov. 6 through Nov. 20; included with the Clemens girls were Julia and Susie Twichell [MTP]. Note: may have been violin and/or music lessons.

November 20 Tuesday – George W. Cable arrived for a visit. He went with the Clemenses and the Warners to a reception. Cable wrote his wife the next day that he’d “Talked my head off; but don’t worry, there wasn’t anything in it.” At the Clemens home, Cable read for “Mark T., his sweet wife, her mother, & Clara and her sister. They were pleased…” [Turner, MT & GWC 23].

November 20 Thursday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Newburgh, New York.

Sam wrote a letter marked “Confidential” from Hartford to William N. Woodruff, Hartford machinist and contractor, about the Nathan Hale statue competition for the Conn. State Capitol [MTP]. Gerhardt won the competition in Mar. 1885 [Perry 168; Schmidt]. (See MTNJ 3:179n6 for more about Woodruff.)

November 20 Friday – Sam wrote from The Normandie Hotel, New York City to an unidentified person, and gave his plans, thinking he might return to Hartford for the weekend then return on Monday for the entire week.

“Dear Sir: When & where can I see you for a moment—meaning an hour—on business?” [MTP].

November 20 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Henry B. Barnes. Sam’s letter is another of the obvious responses to one not extant. Barnes had invited Sam to speak at the Stationers and Publishers Dinner on Feb. 7, 1887. Sam offered these terms: