April 1 Thursday – Twichell got a letter from a man who wished him to perform a marriage ceremony at the U.S. Hotel, but concluded it was April Fools joke: from his journal:
“I had suspected the trick, but on mentioning the matter to M.T. and showing him the letter, he declared his conviction that the writer was sincere and even went as far as to offer me $8 for my fee. How I wish I had taken him up” [Yale 76, copy at MTP].
April 10 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Elisha Bliss about Edward House’s book on Japan’s incursion into Formosa (House had published it in Tokyo in 1875). Sam called the affair a “small & entirely uninteresting riot out there,” uninteresting to Americans, and told Bliss he’d suggested a better type of book to write. He also told Bliss to keep William F. Gill’s letter of refusal for Sam to use the story he’d done for Lotos Leaves.
April 10 Tuesday – H.W. Bergen wrote from Buffalo having rec’d Sam’s of Apr. 5. He thought Sam’s idea of using a hack a good one. “I telegraphed you last evening with ref. to the check so that I may receive it while here” [MTP]. Note: Bergen was Sam’s road agent, reporting on play performances in various cities.
April 10 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Elmira to David Gray, his old friend and editor from Buffalo. Sam thanked Gray for the visit to his house. The Clemens family would sail at 2 PM the next day.
Sam also wrote a goodbye note to Joe Twichell. Joe had agreed to let Sam pay his way to Germany after the family had been there some time, and Sam promised to write from Germany and advise him when to come [MTLE 3: 45].
April 11 Sunday – In Hartford Sam wrote a short note to John S.H. Fogg (1826-1896), polio victim and collector of signatures and photographs of famous people. Sam wrote the only good likeness of him had appeared in the London Graphic and later in Appleton’s Journal [see MTL 6: 447].
April 11 Tuesday – Frank Bliss wrote to Sam, with statement showing $1,196.96 “paid to your credit”
Dr Clemens / I enclose statement of copyright to 1st Apl—if all correct will hand you ch for same when you come in send it to you if you prefer—
April 12 Monday – Bridges W. Smith wrote from Atlanta to Clemens:
Mr. Clemens— / Dear Sir —
April 12 Wednesday – Sam wrote a postcard from Hartford to Bliss. He’d received Bliss’ statement but not the check. Sam also wanted the price estimates on the “Full set, of full plates, full size” for those cuts that would go “into that English size without cutting. Please hurry it up” [MTLE 1:42].
Phineas T. Barnum wrote to Sam asking what he should change on an enclosure (not in file) [MTP].
April 13 Tuesday – Sam and Joe Twichell went to Brooklyn to stay at the home of Dean Sage. On the Hartford to New Haven leg to NYC:
April 13 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Miss Holmes, who evidently requested Sam send her an autograph and a drawing. Sam claimed “figure-drawing as my specialty,” but admitted that some thought he was good at landscapes and still life, though the persons who thought so couldn’t tell the difference. Sam sent her a picture of the President and a caption [MTLE 2: 40].
April 14 Wednesday – In Brooklyn, Sam and Twichell sat in on a session of the Henry Ward Beecher trial. Dean’s father, Henry W. Sage, had been a trustee of Beecher’s church for nearly 20 years and employed Beecher’s son in his lumber business. Dean Sage came at noon and the trio lunched at some club, then all three went back to watch the trial.
April 14 Friday - O.C. Greene wrote from Duluth, Minn. to relate a story found in the diary of a late friend in 1864 -- an old pepperbox and the head of a buffalo strung dangling from an old tree somewhere 10 miles west of the South Platte. Greene felt this did “justice to the aspersed reputation of Mr. Bemis” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env.
April 14 Saturday – Sam wrote a letter of condolence to Nancy Fish Barnum (Mrs. P.T. Barnum) on the loss of her youngest daughter, Pauline Barnum Seeley:
April 15 Thursday – The New York Sun, “Ragged Edge in Earnest,” reported on Sam attending the Beecher trial of the previous day:
Mark Twain shambled in loose of coat and joints and got a seat near the plaintiff’s table. He closely resembled Mr. Moulton, and was mistaken by many for that much-watched attendant.
Twichell’s journal:
April 15 Saturday – Ainsworth R. Spofford confirmed copyright for Mark Twain’s Sketches New & Old entered July 21, 1875.
Francis Boott wrote from Cambridge, Mass apologizing for not sooner answering Sam’s note of Apr. 3, which reached him through Howells. “I was glad to learn that the little trifle I sent had given pleasure…” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “Boott Composer”
April 16 Friday – Sam was in NYC, where 0.17 inch of rain fell on the NYC area [NOAA.gov].
April 16 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Moncure Conway. Evidently Bliss had given it to Sam straight about progress on the pictures, for Sam told Conway:
Just as I feared, Tom Sawyer is not yet ready to issue. Would not be ready for 2 weeks or longer, yet. Therefore the spring trade is lost beyond redemption. Consequently I have told Bliss to issue in the autumn & make a Boy’s Holiday Book of it.
April 17 Saturday – Sam left for Cambridge, Mass. without Livy to visit William and Elinor Howells [MTL 6: 449]. Livy wrote on Apr. 23 to Elinor Howells that her wet-nurse got drunk when Livy was away, which explained her absence [MTL 6: 451n2]. Note: Livy had been ill recently.
April 17 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to John L. RoBards, now an attorney in Hannibal, responding to an old offer to move the coffins of his brother Henry and his father, John Marshall Clemens, from the Old Baptist Cemetery, a mile and a half from Hannibal, to the newer Mount Olivet Cemetery, southwest of town, which RoBards had founded.
April 17 Tuesday – Sam wrote a postcard from Hartford to the American Publishing Co., requesting that a copy of Tom Sawyer and Sketches be sent to Absalom C. Grimes [MTLE 2: 43]. Grimes and Sam were both steamboat pilots and members of the Marion Rangers, along with Ed Stevens, Sam Bowen and nine or ten other Hannibal youths.
April 18 Sunday – Sam wrote from Cambridge to Livy and enclosed a poem from 11-year-old Winny Howells. Sam & Joe’s trip to Concord for the Apr. 19 centennial celebration was thwarted by packed trains. Sam had a bad case of indigestion, so the pair returned home and tried unsuccessfully to con Elinor Howells that the trip had been a success [MTL 6: 449].
April 18 Tuesday – The Hartford Courant announced:
Amateur Theatricals.
April – 4th of seven installments of “Old Times on the Mississippi” appeared in the Atlantic Monthly.
April – Matthew Freke Turner wrote “Artemus Ward and the Humourists of America,” for New Quarterly Magazine. Turner didn’t care much for Sam, thought he and Harte deserved public criticism; that Sam’s was a “low humor, ridiculing sacred things, forced, long-winded, tedious in his parodies,” [Tenney 7].
April – Sam inscribed a copy of George Ticknor’s (1791-1871) Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor (1876): “S.L. Clemens. / Hartford, / Conn. / April, 1877” [Gribben 704].