Fanny Kemble's Civil Wars

312 Pages·2000·16.6 MB·English

by  Catherine Clinton

CATHERINE
i
ii
HTa HE| SETEO RY OFNd MAalM ERICA’S MOST UNLIKELY ABOLITIONIST
Can. $38.50
British stage star turned Georgia plantation mis-
tress, Fanny Kemble is perhaps best known as
America’s most unlikely abolitionist, whose
passionate writings against human bondage made her a
heroine of the Union cause. Irrepressible in word and
deed, Kemble captured the imaginations of many
famous Americans of the antebellum era. Walt Whitman
was held spellbound at one of her early New York City
stage performances, rhapsodizing: “Fanny Kemble! Name
to conjure up great mimic scenes withal—perhaps the
greatest! Nothing finer did ever stage exhibit.” Henry
James predicted that Fanny Kemble’s literary gifts would
“make her what I call historic,’ and abolitionist
Catharine Sedgwick enthused: “She is a most captivating
creature, steeped to the very lips in genius.”
By the mid-1830s, American society was firmly in
the grip of Kemble’s celebrity. A tulip was named in her
honor. Young ladies adopted “Fanny Kemble curls” and
donned “Fanny Kemble caps.” Harvard undergraduates
smeared themselves with molasses to fend off rivals for
scarce tickets to her performances, and lecture atten-
dance fell off so sharply on the afternoons of Kemble’s
matinees that Harvard faculty threatened to cancel
classes. In a fit of passion, one smitten suitor rented the
horse Niagara so that he could be astride the mount
Kemble had once ridden.
Her private life, however, was the stuff of tabloids
for different reasons. She married, for love, Pierce
Butler—a Philadelphia native and heir to a Georgia
plantation fortune—but the union soon turned bitter. In
her correspondence, Kemble derisively referred to her
husband as “my lord and master,” and tried to run away
from the couple’s Philadelphia home after just four
months of marriage. This defiant behavior fueled public
scandal, which reached an incendiary peak in 1835, when
Kemble published her Journal of Residence in America.
The book not only aired Kemble’s controversial views
on slavery but launched a satirical send-up of American
society, which Butler maintained would bring shame on
their friends and family. The book became an instant
bestseller and left New York City “in an uproar.”
(continued on back flap)
Digitized by the Internet Archive
In 2022 with funding from
Kahle/Austin Foundation
https ://archive.org/details/fannykemblescivi0000cath
7 '
_ -
¢ ec
a Pyrcutas . 7
7
a eeah | ee= Le e a” (ae
_
——_
a
3 a =

Catherine Clinton
Za
SIMON & SCHUSTER
New York London Toronto Sydney Singapore
BZz. e
SIMON & SCHUSTER
Rockefeller Center
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
Copyright © 2000 by Catherine Clinton
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction
in whole or in part in any form.
Simon & Schuster and colophon are registered trademarks
of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Designed by Jeanette Olender
Manufactured in the United States of America
1 @ & 7 & i) 8 G 2b BD
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Clinton, Catherine, date.
Fanny Kemble’s civil wars / Catherine Clinton.
p.cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Kemble, Fanny, 1809-1893. 2. Actors—Great Britain—Biography.
3. Plantation owners’ spouses—Georgia—Biography. I. Title.
PN2598.K4 C58 2000
792'.028'092—dce21
[B] 00-030097
ISBN 0-684-84414-1
FOR MICHELE GILLESPIE
<*>
3) AD)
noi non potemo aver perfetta vita senza amici
sastaad IDd lt AO
~ >
Pee Sere GUN ES; Gre cates are tan
; os s
es
we « Tee
' me |e ane, Cae
— = fan © op OSs aD
~ ae 2H0 sae Oe
ey wee O24) has) hot Ra
= s—)* On! a =
as ' as
> )eu}| Ba,
5 ¢