Charles Dickens, Edwin Stanton, and the Assassination

[Linda Anderson]

(03-04-2015 09:29 PM)RobertLC Wrote:  Charles Dickens made two visits to the United States. His first occurred in 1842, while the second was in 1867-68. During the second, he was in ill health, but determined to complete his “reading tour.” As one would expect, his most popular reading was what we know as, “A Christmas Carol.”

During both visits, however, he had opportunities to meet with government officials, including President Tyler during his first visit and President Johnson during his second.

Margaret Leech writes the following in her Pulitzer Prize winning book, Reveille In Washington, (page 391), “About three o’clock on Friday afternoon – so Stanton later told a party of gentlemen, of whom Charles Dickens was one – Mrs. Stanton came into the War Office to ask her husband how she should reply to an invitation from the President to go to the theatre that evening … Mr. Stanton said, but they had always refused because he disapproved of the President’s exposing himself. On this occasion, as might have been expected, he again instructed his wife to send regrets.”

Unfortunately, Leech does not cite references in her book. So during my limited search, I’ve found one reference in Dickens’ letters that notes a dinner with Charles Sumner and Edwin Stanton.

In a letter to his friend John Forster on February 4, 1868, from Washington, DC, Dickens writes about the dinner with Charles Sumner and Edwin Stanton. During the dinner visit, Stanton relates the story of the Cabinet meeting on April 14, 1865, for which he was late, and prior to his arrival, Lincoln had shared with the Cabinet members his dream, “I am on a great broad rolling river – and I am in a boat – and I drift – and I drift! … .” However, the arrival of Mrs. Stanton in the War Office is not mentioned in this letter from Dickens.

Leech does not list Dickens in the Bibliography at the end of her book, nor does she list Sumner. She does list one source for Stanton, but it is an 1870 reference to the death of Stanton. I have not yet read it to see if it mentions Dickens. Additionally, I have not yet found references by Sumner or Stanton regarding the dinner meeting or any other meeting with Dickens, but I’m looking.

So my questions are:
Is anyone aware of a source from which Leech might have gotten her reference of Stanton telling Dickens about the day of the assassination including Mrs. Stanton visiting the War Department?
Is anyone aware of occasions, other than the one I mentioned above, during which Stanton and Dickens might have gotten together?

Thanks in advance.
Bob

Bob, this is from the Lincoln, Stanton and the Aeolian Harp thread:

From the article in the Atlantic Monthly, April 1930, titled "Dickens, Stanton, Sumner, and Storey."

"The record of a dinner held in Washington at which present were the host, Charles Sumner, Charles Dickens, Edwin M. Stanton, and Moorfield Storey, Mr. Sumner's secretary. This memorandum was written by Mr. Storey the evening of the dinner, immediately after the departure of the guests."

Stanton and Sumner gave their accounts of Lincoln's assassination. Stanton "alluded to Mr. Lincoln's breathing [on his deathbed], and said that it sounded like an aeolian harp, now rising, now falling and almost dying away, and then reviving, and reminded him in what he had noticed in the case of one of his children, who had died in his arms shortly before."

http://rogerjnorton.com/LincolnDiscussio...ht=aeolian