To the British navy and merchant marine, however, the brig Holkar was a menace.

Slowed only by the captured ships and other prizes they had to sell, Captain Rowland and his crew turned back home to turn in his prizes. The Emu was taken to New York, and other prizes to other ports.

After he’d sold his prizes, Rowland found himself near the coast of Rhode Island. There, his relatively small boat came across a massive British frigate, or ship of the line.

The HMS Orpheus searches for privateers to destroy

As for Captain Rowland, he continued capturing boats until he came across a British frigate, the Orpheus. Frigates tend to have around fourty guns, and according to author William James (who is decidedly conservative when it comes to British firepower) the Orpheus had 36 guns. The brig Holkar, the first time it appeared in British newspapers, had 16. (It also had 16 guns when an Australian author wrote about it nearly two centuries later. Not surprisingly, however, at the quick defeat of the Emu, British reports exaggerated the Holkar’s gun-power to 18.)

The Orpheus was well over twice the size of the brig Holkar, and more likely three or four times. HMS Orpheus was a professionally built ship made of the finest materials for the world’s most powerful navy. The Holkar was a quickly made private investment commanded by an obscure captain in an impoverished nation.

The Orpheus was at that time commanded by Thomas Hardy. Hardy knew that his ship had superior strength to most of the privateers. For the most part, American privateers weren’t worth capturing, so Hardy aimed to destroy.

Hardy blew other little privateer vessels to pieces, some were probably not even worth mentioning. I don’t even know how many of their crews or captains survived, if any.

11 May 1813, the Orpheus meets the Holkar

However, Captain Rowland would not go down without a fight. The spectacle must have at first been comical to Hardy, when the tiny Holkar dared point its guns at the massive Orpheus.

Edgar Morton Maclay, in his “A History of American Privateers”, says that through determined firing, Captain Rowland initially succeeded in repelling the Orpheus. A few well placed shots, and Thomas Hardy retreated to look for easier prey.

Despite this small triumph, the men of the Holkar couldn’t celebrate yet. Soon after the action, the Holkar’s crew had noticed fifteen bodies in British uniforms floating in the water, and being washed onto the shore. Among those floating bodies was a “captain of marines”, “Captain” or Lieutenant Collins.* The British frigate Orpheus came quickly into view, and the Orpheus was hungry for revenge.

The Holkar runs for its life

Captain Rowland knew that vengeance from the HMS Orpheus would be nasty. So, to save the lives of his men, Rowlands landed the Holkar and had his men flee, leaving the brig behind.

British reports say that the Holkar’s men didn’t run far.  They waited nearby, with rifles aimed at the ready, ready to protect their ship if the British tried to steal it.

As it was too shallow for the massive frigate to follow, Hardy sent in a Commander Dance to go after the Holkar, presumably to destroy it, as the brig was considered unfit for the imperial navy.

The legend of Captain Dance and ticking bomb

Captain Christopher Claxon once told a tale, intended for “juvenile readers”, about Commander Dance’s run in with the Holkar. Like all stories about this period, it began believably enough, Captain Hardy had sent Dance with his boats to destroy the privateer.

At the start of the story, the American crew, with Captain Rowlands, was waiting on the beach with rifles, ready to defend their brig. (The stereotype spread at that time by the like of William James was that Americans, due to living out in the wild, were all born sharp-shooters. So, juvenile British readers would have had goose bumps to hear that their hero Dance was faced by Americans with rifles.)

Well, in this juvenile story, Dance didn’t simply destroy the Holkar by setting it on fire and shooting it to bits as commanded. No, instead Dance boarded the Holkar and went below deck.

Once there, Dance saw a trail of gunpowder (just like in the cartoons) which was lit and the flame was moving fast. Almost all of the gunpowder had been burnt up, so that the flame was nearly at the magazine. For those who know a little about ships, the magazine usually has a pretty intense concentration of gunpower, and many a ship has exploded by accident when a careless seaman drops a match.

According to Claxton’s story, if the fuse reached the magazine, the explosion would blow up not only Dance and his party who entered the Holkar, but all the men in boats around. (Unlike in the cartoons, they could not survive such a blast.)

Apparently, Dance then “with coolness and intrepidity” put the flame out with his finger, getting a booboo in the process.

Well, in the story Dance’s finger did get a little burnt, but even if the story were true, I don’t see that as being particularly brave. I mean, burn your finger or get blown to bits? Really, I hope most people would sacrifice the finger.

I’m amazed that Captain Rowlands would have time to come up with such a scheme.

It’s true, Americans had used fire ships in other wars, a practice which goes back centuries in naval warfare.  But those well documented fireships were carefully planned. Considering Captain Rowland’s conduct elsewhere, I find it unbelievable that he’d destroy his own ship in such a fashion, and risk the lives of his own men as well as his own, just to take a few small landing boats and a few seamen. (Captain Rowlands probably knew that some of those men may have been Americans were who forced to sail under impressment.)

Whatever the case, Commander Dance is then said to have set the Holkar on fire, destroying the ship anyway (and risking that the magazine would explode in a similar fashion.)

My guess is the reason that this story didn’t seem to appear anywhere else is because either Dance or his friend Captain Christopher Claxton made it up.

That’s not the only thing made up.

How many guns did Captain Rowland’s Holkar really have?

Privateers like Captain Holkar and his crew earned their living by selling prizes, but privateers weren’t the only people paid on commission in 1812. Sailors in the official navies got prize money when they captured or destroyed a ship, and the British were especially apt at rewarding their war heroes with money.

Captured ships were put into classes. If the defeated ship had over a certain number of crew, or over a certain number of guns, the victorious crew would get more money for its capture or destruction.

So it’s no surprize that, after the Holkar (and the evidence of her size) was destroyed, the British papers reported her as having 20 guns. Had the brig Holkar only 16 or fewer guns as official American records said, then Commander Dance and his men wouldn’t get as much prize money for destroying her.

When he brought in his prisoners, Captain Rowland said something which could have later cost the captain of a the “Holkar II” his life.  Meanwhile, Susannah Lalliment and the other convicts were still stranded on a small island in Capo Verde.

(to be continued.)

* The British account printed in the London Gazzette in July 1813, repeated in many other places, says that Lieutenant Collins was killed by the Wampoe, an 8 gun letter of Marque, which had been destroyed by the boats of the Orpheus the previous month.  This account also says that Collins was the only person hurt, and implies that there were no casualties in the struggle against the Holkar. While these facts are possible, the Gazette’s assertion that the Holkar had 20 guns is just not credible.

In October, after a few months in the London prison, she was put with dozens of other women on board the “Emu.” (The believable numbers of convicts on board the Emu vary from 40-60. One source even claimed 200, but they got the name of the ship wrong.)

October 1812, The Emu departs for Australia

The Emu was no cruise ship. She carried 11 guns (although she only admitted to 10), and she had a “patent defense” system to stop anyone from boarding. There were a couple dozen sailors on board the well armed vessel. They were ready for pirates.

Though the French, in the words of Shafic Ghorbal, were “without a navy worthy of the name”, there were still active privateers and pirates out to harass British vessels.

The Danes gave the Brits a run for their money. Pirates from small states around the world looked for easy prey, capturing crews and holding them for ransom, or worse. And in June, nearly a month before Susannah had been sentenced, the United States had declared war on Britain.  British ships were the cause of American anger, and they’d soon be the focus of it.

The Anglo-Saxon tribes of Britain had a long tradition of privateering. They did “commerce raiding” on the Spaniards since the times of Elizabeth. Legalized piracy, or privateering was an art that the Anglo-Saxon had never quite abandoned since his days in the Jutland peninsular. And now that her former colonies in America had declared war on Britain, British civilian ships were fair game for the Anglo-Saxon privateer.

The newspapers let sea captains know what to expect. On Tuesday October 20, 1812, about the same time that the Emu left England, the “Morning Chronicle” warned its readers of American privateers in search of British booty. Among the privateers sent out from New York were five brigs and four schooners, including the Retaliation of 9 guns, the Anaconda of 18 guns, and the Holkar, listed as having 16 guns. (Not to be confused with a ship of the same name which captured ammunition in the American Revolution.)

Most British ships traveled in a convoy, and Susannah’s prison ship, the Emu, was no exception.

The Emu left Portsmouth under the protection of the 185 ton brig James Hay, commanded by Captain William Campbell.  But the Emu’s commander, a Lieutenant Bisset, didn’t stay with his babysitters for long. At Lisbon, Bisset took his ship away from the confines of the convoy. The Emu was now on her own, with a skeleton crew, far outnumbered by the prisoners on board.

October 1812, The Holkar Recruits in New Haven

Newspapers disagreed on just how many guns the Privateer Holkar had. Considering her speed, she probably had fewer than the 16 which most historians credit her with.

In Connecticut, a tale is told about the Holkar’s first days at sea. Unable to recruit a big enough crew to man her 16 guns in New York, Captain Rowland the took the Holkar to New Haven, Connecticut, in search of more hands. To get attention, and to show off the power of their new ship, the crew fired round after round from all 16 cannons, (if there were that many), frightening some of the townspeople who thought that the port of New Haven was under attack.

At first, a distaste for this legal form of piracy made recruiting for the Holkar next to impossible. After a few days passed, however, the Holkar found among the population of New Haven some of the older sea dogs who were perhaps too aged to get jobs on ordinary ships. If it were only patriotism that were motivating them, young men might have served in the regular navy, but the older men were willing to take greater risks (and sacrifice some of their virtues) for money.

Soon, the batch of desperadoes were off, and they met up with ship after ship, and took several prizes. These included the Dorcus, and an unnamed 14 gun brig, as well as two trading vessels, whose booty was sold to pay off the Holkar’s crew. None of these victims seemed to make the British newspapers, perhaps they were thought to be lost at sea. Soon, however, the “twelve” gun brig Emu spotted the “sixteen” gun brig Holkar. The Emu’s commanding sailor was ready for a fight.

18th November, 1812, The Holkar meets The Emu

The “Captain” of the Emu, Lieutenant Bisset, was “an arrogant lieutenant of the British Navy.” Bisset knew that the privateers were in the tradition of boarding their prize, and the ship was built in such a way as to make boarding nearly impossible. If he and the crew of the Emu put up enough of a resistance, perhaps the Holkar would leave them alone.

Perhaps to the disappointment of the old sea dogs on the Holkar, (as to fans of naval battles) the Emu put up no resistance. With the exception of Bisset’s first mate and one other, the crew of the Emu refused to fight against the Yankees.

Did they refuse because they sympathised with the American cause, or because they feared for the safety of Susannah Lalliment and the other women on board? The records I’ve found don’t answer that question. Either way, the quick surrender showed that the Emu’s crew didn’t think of the American privateer as “pirates”, but more as chivalrous warriors who would treat their prisoners well. While they were right about Captain Rowland’s intention, the crew of the Emu could not have guessed what would happen next.

10th January 1813, the fall of the Aurora

Captain Rowland and his Holkar needed the money, as we’ve said, so they carried on raiding. Next, they captured the Aurora on 10th of January, 1813. Towing all these ships were a bit taxing, so they decided to give the female prisoners on board the Emu their “liberty” while they took some of the men back to America as prisoners of war.

15th January 1813, Susannah Lalliment is “set free”

The Holkar liberated the female convicts by marooning the poor girls on an island off the coast of Africa. The captives on the Emu were left with enough provisions, or food, for six months, and the
island had no lack of water. It wasn’t totally deserted either, there was a mission run by Portuguese nuns.

However, apart from the nuns, not many ships stopped by St. Vincent island in Capo Verde in 1812. The convicts had very little clothing, no were to escape to. If only the Holkar had taken Susannah to America, instead of deserting her with convicted felons. Before long, the provisions of the castaways would run out. Meanwhile, the Holkar was still on a cruise.

(continued…)

(References will be given at the story’s conclusion)

The Lalliments were skilled lace makers in Nottingham. The lace business in Nottingham, however, was changing.  New technology put many traditional craftsmen out of work.

Perhaps being descended from immigrants contributed to workforce mobility.  Susannah and her father moved to London; and that’s where all the trouble started.

The usual story goes like this: To save her father, Susannah accepted the burden of guilt.[*]

The records from the Old Bailey paint another picture.

Susannah worked as a live-in housekeeper for the Newton family.  Her father John Lalliment lived elsewhere.  John would “seldom” visit his daughter, and when he did, he never went upstairs.

The Newtons accused Susannah of stealing a ten pound note from the room upstairs.  They accused her of stealing it from a hidden box, which they claimed was locked.  The Newtons never said how they thought Susan got the key, or why the said key would be lying around.

According to Mr. Newton, when the note went missing, on the night of May 1st, 1812, no one was in the house except his family members  (the other Newtons) and Susannah Lalliment.  So Miss Lalliment had to be the theif.

On the first of July 1812, two months after the alleged theft, Susannah and her father John Lalliment were put on trial for theft of the note.

Susannah denied that the note was locked in a box.

The Newton’s had lodgers, and Susannah claimed that she’d taken money from them too.  “I often found money in the lodgers rooms.  The last money I found was three  shillings.” Susannah said “I told my mistress,” or her boss, Mrs. Newton.  Mrs. Newton told Susannah to put the money on the drawers.

Susannah kept the money, because she thought the lodger was putting it there on purpose to “try” her.  Susannah didn’t try to cover it up, however.  She told the lodger that she took the money he left lying around.

Then, Susannah claimed, she thought that the ten pound bank note was also intentionally left out in the open to tempt her, so she took it.

From her past behavior, the owners claimed it was obvious that Susannah had taken the money, and not her father.  Her father, after all, lived elsewhere, and he had never been to the room where the note was kept.

So why was her father, John Lalliment, on trial?

In those days, they didn’t have the same kind paper money the way we do today.  The ten pound note was more like a cheque or a money order.  So, when the bank note went missing, the owners put a stop on  it.

Susannah apparently gave the note to her father, after he had given her a few shillings.  She told him that she “found the note in the street.”

Susannah claimed to be illiterate, and her father John probably couldn’t read either.

John Lalliment recognized the bank note as money, but he probably didn’t know how bank notes worked.  If he did, he’d know that it wasn’t a good idea to use notes that were left on the street..

So John Lalliment decided to buy “five and sixpense” worth of “calico”, and he used the ten pound bank note that his daughter gave him to pay for it.

Now, John may have asked Susannah to steal the note, but to pretend like she was completely innocent and took the blame for his crime is a stretch.    All the evidence pointed to her.

Susannah did say “my father is quite innocent,” and my guess is, she was telling the truth.

I do think that the owners tempted her after they heard about her taking the money that the lodgers left on the floor.

However, all that was now irrelevant.  The plaintiffs brought forward bankers, cloth sellers, and other witnesses, all who brought forward evidence against the Lalliments.

Susannah was found guilty, and condemned to death.  Her father was found innocent, but he’d never see his daughter again.

Before she’d die, however, Susannah would meet an American “pirate,” Captain Rowland.

[continued...]

References:

• Susannah’s trial at the Old Bailey online

• ([*]More references will be supplied at the story’s conclusion)

I was thinking it would be nice if we could vote for some books that teach history.  It would be a shame if some substandard “chewing gum for the brain” book won.

It would be much worse, however, if the winner were one of those dull “classics” that everyone displays but no one reads.

No, I think it should be something interesting, something people don’t already have on their bookshelf.  Maybe some forgotten episode in history.  The book should be well written, and something that makes people want to learn more.  (Neither jingoistic hero worship nor resentful rants are that interesting.)

I was thinking that Americanos: Latin America’s Struggle for Independence by John Charles Chasteen is a quick read.  We read the personal stories of revolutionaries, travellers, and even mercenaries guarding a postal train.  It has the added advantage of leaving a lot of unanswered questions, and has a great bibliography.

Other books I was considering nominating include CS Forester’s The Barbary Pirates which appears to be out of print.

Although Forester’s book is highly romanticized, it’s a fast and entertaining introduction to the “Tripolitanian War” that trained America’s sea captains for the war of 1812. Besides, it’s just as accurate as many of the academic treaties on the same period (which I know doesn’t say much.)

For World War II lovers, I’d consider The History of the British Army Film & Photographic Unit in the Second World War
by Dr. Fred McGlade.  It covers the story behind some of Britain’s rising filmmakers, as well as the point of view of people on the front. Why do some people think that America won World War II on her own? This book answers the question in more ways than I expected, including interesting eye witness reports of the taking of Rome, the disappearance of photographs, and the campaign to get Americans to join the war.

In addition, Dr. Glade’s book let’s us know why it was so important to document the war without sounding preachy.  He knows how to find the right quotes to bring life to back to the events.

Despite the fact that Dr Glade knows his stuff, he doesn’t write like a stiff academic.  His is definately a book worth reading.

Americans in Paris: Life and Death under Nazi Occupation 1940-44 by Charles Glass is also fascinating. As the title suggests, it explains the way expatriots were treated during the occupation, but it goes beyond that. Glass lets us know

(As this the vote is limited to residents of the UK and Ireland, meaning that most of the eligible voters will be from England, perhaps Dr. McGlade’s book would be more likely to win.)

Some books I would not suggest include Battle Cry For Freedom (an over rated and factually inaccurate compilation of soundbytes), Horrible Histories (though kids find it entertaining, it turns them off from finding out more), and anything written by Osprey in the past ten years or so (nice pictures, terrible history.)

Any other suggestions?

More about World Book Night.

Here the Earth, river, &c torn with furious convulsions, opens in huge trenches, whose deep jaws are instantaneously closed; there throws a thousand vents sulphurous streams gushed from its very bowels, leaving a vast and almost unfathomable caverns. – William Leigh Pierce, eyewitness

1812 was a year of science.  The discovery of dinosaurs, the electric battery, iodine and many other marvels firmly placed the year within the “Age of Reason.”

Tecumseh, from John Frost's Illustrated Historical Sketches of the Indians

At the same time, new “superstitions” were developing.  One of these was helped by three of the most powerful earthquakes America had ever known.  Some scientists fear such earthquakes could come again, and this time, the devastation could be much greater.

Recent Earthquakes are merely aftershocks of the New Madrid (Missouri) quakes from December 1811 to February 1812.

Were the quakes prophesied by Tecumseh?

The quakes were said to be predicted by the great Indian chief Tecumseh. Tecumseh and his brother were around that time gathering the Indian tribes in America.  The British had armed Tecumseh’s followers and encouraged them to attack American settlers, with the hopes of containing and perhaps repossessing the American colonies. [see The Jefferson from a Canadian Point of View.]

While the British instigated and encouraged the Rebellion, it was Tecumseh’s skills as a leader and speaker that made the rebels a threat to the United States.

“You do not believe the great spirit has sent me.” Tecumseh was reported to have said to Indians who were reluctant to follow him, “You shall know.  I leave Tuckabatchee directly, and shall go straight to Detroit.  When I arrive there, I will stamp on the ground with my foot and shake down every house in Tuckabatchee.”

Then, his half skeptical audience counted the days for him to get to Detroit.  The predicted he would arrive there on 16th December, 1811.  And when his “prophecy” proved wrong, they’d know Tecumseh was a liar.

However, on just that date, a massive earthquake hit the Mississippi river and its surrounding area.  “Every house  in Tuckabatchee” indeed fell.

Tecumseh, suspicious of “whites”, (or more accurately non-Indians, including free blacks and those of Indian descent who adopted Western culture), did not give the speech until there were only Indians in the audience.

Some historians doubt that Tecumseh made such a speech at all, because no white men were present to record the events.   I find such an argument ridiculous.  Furthermore, there were American citizens who did hear Tecumseh speak about those Earthquakes (and lived to tell about it.)

John Dunn Hunter was one such man.  “Brothers, the Great Spirit is angry with our enemies.” he later recalled Tecumseh as saying,  “He speaks in thunder, and the earth swallows up villages, and drinks up the Mississippi.  The great waters cover the lowlands.  Their corn cannot grow, and the Great spirit will sweep those who escape to the hills from the earth with his terrible breath.”

Now, I find no evidence that the Great Spirit has bad breath, but most of the other events did happen.  The earthquake was so great that the Mississippi flowed backwards.

The recorded loss of life among American citizens was relatively low, at a few thousand, but with illiteracy rampant, and the fact that the area was sparsely populated by “Westerners” who have passed their records to us, means we don’t know the full death count.

If anything, Tecumseh’s speech under-states the full destructive power of the Earthquake.  William Leigh Pierce was in his boat when one of the earthquakes struck. “One of the spouts which we had seen rising under the boat would inevitably sunk it, and probably have blown it into a thousand fragments[...]”

Yesterday, with the benefit of hindsight and two centuries of scientific research behind it, the skeptical News Tribune reported that the February 1812 earthquake caused “a portion of the Mississippi River to reverse course for several hours.”

Still, many Indian tribes did not want war, and individual Indians did not see Tecumseh as their leader or his brother as a prophet.  “Great Spirit, Whiskey too much, heap drunk,” one Indian was reported as saying about Tecumseh.

(Unfortunately, many settlers did not know, and often did not care to learn, the difference between a peace loving Indian and a warlike one.  As late as 1890, history records massacres of America’s indigenous population, where civilians were treated like warriors and no mercy was given.  Tecumseh, in contrast, treated his prisoners well, and prevented the more bloodthirsty of his followers from hurting the defenseless.)

So, did Tecumseh predict the earthquakes?  Some speculate that he knew the signs to look for.   He may have listened to old tales from his people, developing a science of predicting the future from memory of the distant past.

Note: Tecumseh himself was never seen as “the” prophet.  It was his brother who held this title.  However, many predictions were attributed to Tecumseh.

His name signifies “flying panther” which is sometimes translated to “meteor.”  Tecumseh was also said to have predicted the coming of a comet, among other natural phenomena.

 Sources:

Books

After the Earth Quakes: Elastic Rebound on an Urban Planet
by Susan Elizabeth Hough and Roger G. Bilham.

The Half-way Pacifist: Thomas Jefferson’s View of War, by Reginald C. Stuart, 1979

Larousse Dictionary of North American History

Illustrated historical sketches of the Indians, by John frost(1837)

Journals and other sources

“Tecumseh” by James Mooney; in The Indian Advocate, (Oklahoma), 1st of August, 1903

Anonymous email and Facebook communications, during January 2012.

British and American historic newspapers.

Contemporary news articles including: the above linked “Geologists see fault in Earthquake fears” from the News Tribune in Illinois, Historic Earthquakes from the USGS website, The New Madrid Earthquake: 200 years later by Ladon Jones, and Earthquakes cause small stir in Lake County from The Pacer in Tennessee.

French Theatrical, by Louis, from two old prints

From Shakespearean actor Kenneth Branaugh, to a portrayal of former Prime Minister Margaret “Maggie” Thatcher, you’ll see the British flag waving down the aisle at this year’s academy Awards.  Again.  Yet again.

One starts to wonder if the Americans have a “sense of inferiority” when it comes to the dramatic arts. If so, from whence does this pathetic inferiority complex come?  Let’s start in the month of April, 1812.

200 years ago, America was swooning over another English darling, a Mr. Thomas Morton.    The drama that carried his name was Marmion, an adaptation of the epic poem by Walter Scott.

Marmion was a love story which climaxed with the story of Flodden Field, in 1513, the one where James IV lost his life.  When questioned why he’d make a poem about such a defeat, the poet said that at Flodden “all was lost but our honour.”

When adapted for the stage, the poem was scarcely 4 years old.   But these were the days before international copyright agreements, and it appears that Scott’s permission was never sought.

An American producer named Mr. William B. Wood first had the idea of having a play called Marion written by British playwright Thomas Morton.

An element of invention

Despite sharing the poem’s popularity, the play was in no way a direct adaptation.

“The Chronicles of Hollinshead supplied me with several characters,” the playwright later recalled, while in America,  “and particularly with a good speech for King James, in which a close parallel is run between the conduct of England to Scotland, and (by allusion) to this country.”

Marion first appeared on stage in New York stage in April, 1812.  Cooper presented the play as by English author, “Thomas Morton Esquire”, who also had written lesser known plays such as “Columbus”, and others.  (There was a reason these other plays were lesser known, which we shall return to later.)

This introduction of a hitherto unknown English playwright was well received, and the audience was now in a receptive mood.  They enjoyed the play, apparently.

It a critic in London, writing for “The Opera Glass,” made a quotation from the play, remarking at the “powerful effect” it must had had on the American stage, at a time when hostilities were about to commence between the British Empire and the American Republic.

According to the playwright, the play “ran like wildfire through all” the “theatres” of America.

The play was published by Palmer in Philadelphia, and an abridged version of it was distributed in the publication called “Acting American Theatre.”  The playwright, however, was to preoccupied with The War of 1812 at that time to get a first edition.

In a strange coincidence, the very day the playwright had sent his “Marmion” to the New York stage, another playwright, known as Mrs. Ellis, was about to produce her own “Marmion.”  Mrs Ellis wanted the playwright of the above mentioned “Marmion” to put in a “puff or two” to the newspapers about her drama.  I don’t know how he responded.

In any case, her drama didn’t seem to do as well.  (Perhaps Mrs. Ellis’s “Marmion” might have fared better had an “Englishman” been announced as its playwright.)

The “Marmion” which carried the name of Thomas Morton, however, had critical as well as theatrical success.  The playwright remembered how it was “quoted with applause by a critic in the American Quarterly Review” and others remembered how it packed the house at the cinema.

Something not to be proud of

Despite this success, the playwright “never felt very proud of the circumstance” which brought this play to the public.

Regardless of what the producer said, the playwright wasn’t English at all.  Mr. Thomas Morton didn’t exist.  The writer’s real name was James N. Barker, Esquire.  He had a couple of relatively successful plays to his name, such as the Indian Princess, a play about Pocahontus.

The title Pocahontus was “stolen” by British playwrights, who had butchered the story with their own version.  They tried taking publicity by pretending they had the play which did well in America,  (despite their insistance on keeping the British copyright).

When the British version of Pocahontus failed, the theatre people at  Drury Lane pretended that their “stupid” production had done well in America.  So why not return the favour by pretending one of Barker’s plays was British?

“James N. Barker, who had written several pieces before, and which had no fault but being American productions, at my request, dramatised Marmion –  “  according to Producer William B Wood “I well knew the then prejudice against any native [or American written] play, and concerted with [James Fenimore] Cooper a very innocent fraud upon the public.”

(Yes, the same Cooper who wrote Last of the Mohikans was in on this hoax.)

In order to get American audience to like a play “we insinuted that the piece was a London one.”  The ruse included having the actual play bound in British style and posted to the theatre, long before the performance.

The text was brought to the stage while the actors were rehearsing for another play.  Then “it was opened with great gravity, and announced without any author alluded to.”

Even the actors were duped, because the producers “knew” that none of them could keep a secret.  Not even the “prompter” who announced the play knew of its true origins.

Not even the actors knew

So Marmion “played with great success for six or seven nights.”  After the seventh night, the producer “announced the author, and from that moment it ceased to attract.” ^[1]

The very moment the audience knew that the writer was American, and not British, people stopped watching it.  This has gone down in the history books as evidence of “American sense of inferiority in drama.”^[2]

It wasn’t just English playwrights who got the acclaim.  The Italian Father, was thought to be a German play.  When its true American origin was discovered, they stopped enjoying it.  That was in 1803.

James N. Barker had a string of plays that were well received, but the producers decided not to announce the nationality of the author.

Among Barker’s plays were a tragedy by the name of “Attila”;  Indian Princess, as mentioned above;  A five act comedy called “Tears and Smiles“;   “How to try a Lover” ;  “Travellers” ;  “The Armourer’s Escape” ; and “Superstition“.  Barker never seemed to write a story by the name of Columbia, but he did write a “mask” by the name of “America.”

[1] A History of American Theatre from Its Origins to 1832, William Dunlap

[2] the Encyclopedia of American Facts and Dates, edited by Gorton Carruth and Associates, (Thomas Y. Cromwell Company, New York second edition, 1959.)

The men were celebrating. Pushing the Americans back at Queenston Heights on the Niagara front was, no doubt, a decisive moment in the combat, but there was no telling what turns the war would take.

Benjamin allowed himself the luxury of a daydream. He imagined his return to London and Rosalynn. As the second son, he thought a career in the military was his one viable option, as he was ill suited to the Church, but in his heart and soul he was a man of science. After the war, he knew he must follow his dream.

He would return home, resign his commission and find a way to become a gentleman scholar. He knew it was his destiny and, if Rosalynn could convince her father, they would marry and finance a modest household with their combined, if less-than-stellar, annual incomes. He need only to survive the battles to come and the passage home.

Benjamin patted his breast pocket. The whispered, crinkly sound of the single sheet of paper assured him of her love. He could recite each line of her letter, and kept the paper close to his heart as other men at war might carry a lock of their sweetheart’s hair. Rosalynn was not a typical girl. She had a sharp mind, and interests in biology and geology that nearly equaled his own. The other officers assumed that her letter was full of romantic poetry or sweet reminders of home, but Rosalynn wrote of a remarkable scientific discovery.

Dearest Benjamin:

I am putting pen to paper, still in the breathless excitement of this wondrous day. Had I not seen the creature’s skull with my own eyes, I’d have been sure it was a legend, a bedtime story about a monster, designed to frighten little children into obedience, but it is real. The ancient, fossilized skull is unlike any beast I have ever seen. Nothing, not even the images in your many books detailing the anatomy of beasts from far-away lands, comes close to this odd monster. I saw the exhibit at the Museum of Natural Curiosities and found myself surrounded by the most eminent gentlemen of the Royal Academy of Science and the Geological Society of London. I longed for you, and longed to see you among those intelligent minds.

The creature’s skull was found by a young girl on the cliffs of Lyme just last year. I learned that the specimen was purchased from her by a local gentleman, and that William Bullock then bought it for his collection of marvels. The poor girl, Mary Anning, was paid enough to feed her family for a year, but given little credit by the gentlemen scholar. The men assume her find to be an accident of luck. Although my inquiries on the subject have yielded facts to the contrary, for this uneducated peasant is a genius of a curious type, with a keen eye and the bravery required to unearth such a find amidst the danger of falling rocks.

Benjamin dear, I had my notebook and made copious sketches, for I surely want to share this experience with you. Of course, I was not entirely welcomed by the gentlemen. One had the audacity to instruct me on the relative value of drawing such monsters when a more ladylike subject would be flowers. Oh, how little of me he knows. My flower drawings are meant only to accompany your treatise on hybrid roses.

Please examine the two sketches at the bottom of this page. The skull is a replica, in miniature scale, of the sketches I am using to render a watercolor for your return, and the rose is a symbol of my enduring affection and devotion.

Come home safe and soon.

Your devoted Rosalynn.

Benjamin looked toward the men in his command and hoped that Major General Isaac Brock would keep them safe. He longed to go home, resign his commission and follow his destiny in science in the company of his beloved Rosalynn.

Lord George Gordon Byron, by Thomas Phillips

Lord Byron, the English poet, was born George Gordon Byron on the 22nd January 1788. His parents were Captain John Byron, Lord of Rochdale, and Catherine Gordon of Gight. Byron was also to take the name ‘Lord Noel Byron‘ in later life as a condition of an inheritance.

On the 27th of February, 1812, Lord Byron, famous for his poetry and infamous for his relationships and huge debts, rose for the first time to address his peers in the House of Lords, London, England to voice his objections to the Frame Breakers Bill.

What was the Frame Breakers Bill?

"Ned Defends his mothers mill against the Luddites" by HM Paget; woodcut illustration in George Alfred Henty's "Through the fray."

At the beginning of the 19th century, England was undergoing an Industrial Revolution, and more and more machinery was being used to modernise mills with devastating side effects, including widespread unemployment and poverty. The county of Nottinghamshire was an area particularly affected and from 1811 to 1813 the Luddite Revolution took place. The Luddites were a group of beleaguered ex-employees of the mills, displaced and disillusioned. Their leader was a mythical character known as King or General Ludd; it was purported he lived in Sherwood Forest like his mythical counterpart, Robin Hood.

Feelings ran high and violence was prevalent and the destruction of the new weaving machinery was rife. The mill owners, standing hand in glove with the Government, demanded action.

The action came in the form of the Frame Breakers Bill, a capital bill, a bill that meant the death penalty for offenders swinging at the end of a rope.

Back to Lord Byron

Lord Byron made his first speech to the House of Lords in opposition to this inhumane bill and in support of the Luddites.

Initially those reading it may be forgiven for mixing the text up with the kind of poorly written article being touted around the internet as “quality freelance writing“, the big difference is when read through eyes that allow for the fact it was written 200 years ago it is a very cleverly worded speech striking right at the heart of the problem and makes perfect sense, unlike the modern-day comparison; I hope if the poet can read these words he will forgive me for drawing this comparison.

The Speech of 1812

To sum the speech up in a few paragraphs would be impossible, but one thing is for certain: Byron was very critical of the Government.  Looking at the speech in more detail there are a number of parallels to be drawn with modern-day.

• “…the House is already aware that every outrage short of actual bloodshed has been perpetrated,…” - it is only a matter of time before this statement is disproved in any case of civil unrest, the recent events across many countries on several continents bear this out.
• “…it cannot be denied that they have arisen from circumstances of the most unparalelled distress.” - we still manage to distress people today by depriving them of work and forcing them into poverty.
• “The perseverance of these miserable men in their proceedings,…” - referring to the mill owners; this could also apply to our modern-day bankers.
• “…yet all these movements, civil and military had led to—nothing. Not a single instance had occurred of the apprehension of any real delinquent actually taken in the fact,…” - we still do not seem to have found a tactic, other than standing around until frustration turns to violence.
• “that in times like these, when bankruptcy, convicted fraud, and imputed felony, are found in a station not far beneath that of your Lordships,…” - we only need to think of the Members of Parliament convicted or sacked for fiddling their expenses to have a modern-day equivalent of this part of his speech.
• “But while the exalted offender can find means to baffle the law, new capital punishments must be devised, new snares of death must be spread, for the wretched mechanic who is famished into guilt.” - I am not drawing any direct parallel to modern-day but I include it as I enjoyed the clever wording and meaning of this sentence.
• “As the sword is the worst argument that can be used, so should it be the last.” -hear, hear.
• “and have sat down to enjoy our foreign triumphs in the midst of domestic calamity.” - well, to be fair, Byron could have been writing this today, although our ‘foreign triumphs’ may have been pushing it a bit far.
• “as your charity began abroad, it should end at home.” - again a call that is muted often when we give vast amounts of money to other nations that could have been used at home.

Some commentators thought Byron was theatrical in the presentation of his speech, something the House was not used to.

Lord Byron himself commented: -

“I spoke very violent  sentences with a sort of modest impudence, abused everything and everybody, put the Lord Chancellor very much out of humour, and if I may believe what I hear, have not lost any character in the experiment”.

The Poem With No Author

Below is the last two stanzas of a poem to which Lord Byron never put his name; although judging by his thoughts on the Frame Breakers Bill there seems little doubt he penned it.

“Some folks for certain have thought it was shocking,
When Famine appeals, and when Poverty groans,
That life should be valued at less than a stocking,
And breaking of frames lead to breaking of bones.

If it should prove so, I trust, by this token,
(And who will refuse to partake in the hope?)
That the frames of the fools may be first to be broken,
Who, when asked for a remedy, sent down a rope.”
http://www.luddites200.org.uk/Byrons_poem.html

From this it can be seen that he believed the Governments answer to the problems of 1812 were very heavy-handed and mismanaged.  Is it not true that alienating your perceived enemy further drives you apart with stronger conflict rather than giving you a foundation for moving towards a mutually acceptable conclusion?

Although personally I would not support the idea of total annihilation of your enemies as being a suitable conclusion to a conflict, to use this theory on your own countryman - in order to stop their voice being heard - seems totally without justification.

Would the Invention of the Bicycle of Been Useful?

Old-Fashioned Bicycle. photograph by Alexey Romanov

In hindsight maybe the advice of Norman Tebbit, in 1981, in response to a young conservatives statement that unemployment would make rioting a natural reaction: -

“I grew up in the ’30s with an unemployed father. He didn’t riot. He got on his bike and looked for work, and he kept looking ’til he found it.”

Tebbit’s statement led to a huge backlash and he was misquoted wildly as having said to the unemployed “Get on yer bike”.  Unfortunately for the Luddites the advice would never have been useful to them as bikes were not invented for another 50 years; and, ironically, thanks to the development of machinery. Lord Byron, however, may have found Tebbit’s suggest as useful as ‘the rope’.

Other Modern Comparisons

Lord Byron ended his days in self-exile brought on by severe debt and ruinous relationships.  He moved around Europe ending his days in Greece where he died after an illness and much blood-letting.

Lord Byron Monument in Athens, Greece. Photographer: Georgios Kollidas

There is no doubt modern-day Greece could do with a hero to help resolve their problems today.

Because of the services Greece felt Lord Byron did for them the Greek people commissioned a statue showing him being held by Greece depicted as a female figure; it stands in the Garden of the Heroes. Although his body was returned to England his heart is buried under the statue.

Maybe if Byron was around today he would be ‘that’ hero.

In these modern times when celebrity-ism is rife and people are lifted to the heights of ‘Icon’ because they have a good publicist maybe they should be thanking Byron for starting the trend.  The term “Byromania” was created by Annabella his wife following the furor that surrounded him; being a self publicist, he used his personality to attract people to him and understood how he affected those he came into contact with. He also saw himself as a man of action and preferred this persona to others he was known for.  Some think his self exile was to escape the clamour of stardom but is this likely considering he placed himself at the forefront of the problems in Greece.

Also in these modern times a leaf has been taken from the mill workers of Sherwood Forest and there is a modern movement with the self-explaining name of ‘Luddite 200′, They are rising against the perception of modern threats posed to the commonality from such things as modern technology, climate change, bio-diversity and generic engineering.

What Does Lord Byron Teach Us?

One lesson is for sure whatever language the countries or worlds problems come in, whether it be the olde English, modern English or internet English, those problems have been repeated many times in many different shapes and sizes over the centuries. Likewise, the search for an answer that is a reasonable compromise seems to be just as far out of our grip as it was 200 years ago. Those with the power and influence always seem to hold the upper hand.

Both sides will be just as far away from each other at the beginning as at the end and the views of the protagonists will range from the hard nose ‘put them all up against the wall’ to the more pacifist view where we practically ignore the problem hoping it will go away.  Yet despite starting off on the high ground, reasonable people end up giving up more in the compromise than those that challenge.

Despite Lord Byron’s passionate appeal for common sense and humanity to prevail, the Frame Breakers Bill became law in 1812.

“…the House is already aware that every outrage short of actual bloodshed has been perpetrated,…”

12 Luddites and 1 mill owner were killed during attacks on mills 200 years ago; 3 Luddites were hanged for the murder of the mill owner and 14 others hanged for their parts in the riots. No one was charged with the deaths of the Luddites during the riots.

Does this mean taking the life of another is permissible as long as you have the justification of the law behind you and you are being paid to do it? Oh and of course, if you are a starving person with your job prospects under serious threat your behaviour is judged as illegal and therefore you become fair game for the law to exploit.

Sounds familiar?

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Without sadness, happiness would become mundane

A woodcutter was going about his business, when he turned around and saw the “monstrous” creature. Naturally the woodcutter was afraid of snakes, so he whacked the animal on the head.

That didn’t stop the snake much, so the woodcutter ran for his life.

After running for “more than thirty yards,” the woodcutter looked back, and saw that the “monstrous reptile” was “close to his heels, with his crest erect, at the very point of springing upon him.”

Then the woodcutter struck again.  He was aided by one of his colleagues, and the snake was “with much difficulty killed.”

(Other than its the size, this doesn’t seem to fit the description of a diamond python.)

Not much else made the papers in Australia in 1812.

“There has been a Theatre in Botany Bay for some time.” Quipped the Ipswitch Journal in England on November 28,  “They have a bank which may be thought equally diverting.”

The running stories in the Sydney Herald that month were linked to current affairs abroad and in Britain, with some of them taken directly from the British papers.

As far as local news went, most of that involved shipping news, including people who were leaving and asking anyone who they owed money to come forward.

There were stories of people being punished for “abominable” crimes, but few details were given other than the names of the criminals and the fact that the populace had little sympathy for them.

The Sydney paper also carried advertisements about missing livestock and absconding workers. (There were warnings not to employ these people, as they “belonged” to another employer.)

The population of Sydney was small, but in the next few decades, it was destined to grow.

Sources:

• 1812 ‘SYDNEY.’, The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 – 1842), 4 January, p. 2, viewed 1 January, 2012, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article628389
• Other articles and issues of the Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser

A contact of mine is raising money for a documentary about Basque children who escaped to England in 1937.   The contact only has a few hours to raise another tens of thousands of pounds for the project, or they risk losing everything.

There are other historical films, however, where time was even more urgent.

My contact’s film, “To Say Goodbye”, is  the story children who were evacuated from Bilbao in the time of Franco.  These children were then taken to England.  They were only meant to be in Britain for 12 weeks, but many have lived their entire life in exile.

The filmmakers plan to make an animation, using the recorded voices of the last surviving children.

Under the funding rules of a broker they are using, the filmmakers need to raise over 58,000 pounds within the next few hours.  Time will probably run out long before you read this.  By then, “To Say Goodbye” will probably say goodbye to the money that has been pledged so far.

Promoting the British War Effort

In his book, The History of the British Army Film & Photographic Unit in the Second World War, Dr Fred McGlade writes about the struggle to create films to get America involved in the war effort. It seems the Germans were spending a lot of money on movies, and the Brits were losing the propaganda war. Much of the footage we have of the Second World War today is because of a small group of dedicated men who filmed what was then current events. (See The British Photographic Unit in the Second World War.)

One of the first conflicts to be recorded on film was the conflict in Crimea. The invention of the photograph has changed history. We know much more about the American Civil War than most previous wars, as the number of photographs of that war tell us stories much quicker than words ever could.

The misuse of the Camera

Some war films and other “histories” have been pure propaganda.

I came across an old news report of a First World War battle being staged. The reporter witnessed the scene of a local baron, showing his prowess, through a kind of contemporary re-enactment. His forces were firing valiantly at a fictitious enemy.

Unfortunately for him, some real soldiers watched the events, didn’t know it was staged, and took up arms against the baron and his actors.  As they fled the real enemy, the reporter saw the Baron’s true character.

Telling the story of Armenia

Another story about World War I grabbed my attention. It was a book called “Ravished Armenia”

The book tells how Aurora Mardiganian escaped torture and massacre, and the horrors she went through.

Here Aurora tells of what she witnessed happening to another girl:

“And you, my little one,” [Hagdi Ghafour] said, just as low and soft.  And he repeated the questions to her he had spoken to her sister. She spoke softly, too – softer than had her sister, yet just as firmly. “She was my sister. With her I saw my mother die, and now you have taken her. I, too, have asked God to take me again to Him. You may kill me also, but I will never submit to you.”

After this, Hagdi Ghafour threatened to kill her as a warning to the others.  Three men with whips (called Bashi-Bazouks in the text) stood near.  They stripped the girl of her clothes and swung her “like a hammock.”

“Then, while we screamed with the horror of it, the third bashi-bazouk brought his whip down upon the swaying body.”

“I shut my eyes so I could not see, but I could not shut out the sound of the whip cutting into the flesh, again and again, until I lost count. Even when the girl screamed no more and her moans died away the whip did not stop for a long time. Then suddenly I realized the blows had ceased.  I looked and saw one of the bashi-bazouks lifting the girl’s body from the floor. He held her by the waist, and her arms and bleeding legs hung limp. She was dead.”

The author then spoke of seeing bodies on the side of the road, “I counted bodies laid at the roadside until I could count no longer! I wondered if God could make room for all of them in heaven.”

While Mardiganian escaped, time was running out for her fellow Armenians. The world needed to be convinced that Armenians deserved statehood, to prevent those tragedies from happening again.

The book was serialized in the Washington Times in 1917. But not all Americans read books and stories in the newspaper in the 1910s. The story had to be told on film as well, in order to reach a wider audience.

Aurora Dramatizes her own Story

In 1919, the Washington Times told the story of how this book became a film.

Aurora Mardiganian, still refered to as a girl, was no movie star. When she came to the ballroom of the Hotel Plaza, the “little waif” “hesistates at the door; a tear glistened in her eyes.”

According to an Washington Times, her mind didn’t hear the music of the orchestra and “bright lights of the New York Ballroom”, but rather the “darkness of the tents” and the rattle of the “drums which beat a call to summon an execution squad.”

She now had a new struggle.  The film had to be completed, to show the world, those who don’t read books, that Armenia was a nation worth saving.

A film was made, shot “just as Aurora remembered it.”

“Come down,” the director told her as one scene was to be shot, “just as you did at Geulick.”

Filled with memories, Aurora lept “to the balcony rail” and “threw her body over until her feet began to dangle over…” she lost her grip, bulky rugs folded around. She fell to the ground, and her foot bent under her and was crushed.

The Doctors attended Aurora, and gave her painkillers. Her ankle was fractured. Doctors orders included plenty of rest.

“But that will delay the making of my picture – and the committee wants it quickly, that they may let all America see it.” she protested.

She lept out of bed. “See” she cried “see, all is well already – it does not hurt at all – I can walk and do my picture all right now.”

At first, Aurora was carried.  They shot the scenes where “she could stand or sit still.” and not put weight on her fractured ankle.

The hurt seemed to heal, and Aurora denied that there was any more pain.  She re-enacted “wild” scenes of escape, of the enemy raiding the camps. “Aurora declared that her ankle was so well that she could do whatever was required of her.”

The picture was finished within the scheduled time frame. The last scene to be shot featured Aurora “on the deck of a steamship reaching her arms to the Statue of Liberty.” When this was shot, Aurora collapsed on that deck, moaning in pain.  Now that her work was done she could admit that it hurt.

The film could now be released, and the world would be convinced.

(Alas, it was not to be. Armenia did not gain a secure independence until the end of the Cold War.  And by then, it was much smaller than the homeland envisioned by Woodrow Wilson and others of the time.)

The Nanking Massacre

In 2009, Lu Chuan went to the small Welsh town of Lampeter to tell students about his film “City of Life and Death” which depicts events known as the Nanking massacre.

In his research for this project, Chuan visited libraries in China and Japan, finding documents which will probably still be there twenty years from now. As an ex-military man, Chuan also saw the benefit of interviewing Japanese veterans who were present at the massacre.

These men often welcomed Lu Chuan into their homes, offered him tea, but stood in an awkward silence. The interviews, from what I understood the translator say, appeared fruitless. Lu Chuan relied on his experience in the Chinese military to try and understand the way a soldier thinks. A Japanese soldier is just a soldier after all.

Not everyone agreed with Chuan’s version of the story. Despite Chuan’s past success and fame, and despite the fact that “City of Life and Death” included top Chinese talent and was very well done, it was rejected from some Chinese film festivals. The Japanese actors involved, according to Chuan, received death threats, and some had moved to China.

Chuan’s decision to tackle this topic seems to have cleared the way for other films about the Nanking massacre.

As history passes, old monuments wash away. There may not always be physical pain involved in talking about the past, there way not always be death threats and broken feet. However, there is another kind of pain that many filmmakers (and authors and lecturers) have to over come. There is the pain that is caused by the bad memories of the past.

When the story is worth telling, a storyteller must learn how to live with that pain it causes the storyteller until that story is told.

Writing hurts, research hurts, memory can hurt, and we should respect the right of others who remain silent about the past and chose not to go through that pain.  Some choose to cover it in fiction, others merely point the researcher in the direction of stories similar to their own.

I remember a child once telling me that “you never cry daddy.” Sometimes we need to hide the pain until our job is done.