10? July 1870 • Elmira, N.Y. (Lyceum 1871, 27, UCCL 00485)
Friend RedpathⒶemendation,—I find in your list of lecturers the name of Hon. Thomas Fitch, Member of Congress from Nevada. My attention was more particularly called to this matter by your inquiry as to what I might chance to know about him. I know him well, as lawyer, newspaper‐editor, silver-miner, & Ⓐemendation Congressman.2explanatory note I know him to be an orator by birth, education, & instinct. He is a fascinating speaker. I pledge my word that he will hold any audience willing prisoners for two hours that can be gathered together before him, in any city of America, from Boston to New Orleans, & from Baltimore to San Francisco. And no matter what subject he chooses, whether it be worn or fresh, old or new, he will make his audience think they never listened to any thing so delightful before. I have heard Mr. Fitch pretty often; & so I am not afraid to make these strong statements.3explanatory note
Clemens probably returned to Elmira from Washington on Saturday, 9 July, or the day following. He and Olivia presumably did not return to Buffalo until, at the earliest, 22 August, a day after the memorial service for Jervis Langdon (7 Aug 70 to Larned, n. 1click to open link). But since he was associated with Buffalo in the public mind, Clemens headed this letter accordingly.
See RI 1993 , 678–79, and ET&S1 , 262–66.
Clemens may have promised a “puff” when he saw Fitch in Washington on 6 July and encouraged him to lecture. The present letter was too late for inclusion in the Boston Lyceum Bureau’s promotional magazine for the 1870–71 season, published shortly before 13 July. Redpath used most of it (“I know him . . . statements.”), however, in newspaper advertisements for Fitch’s 29 November lecture in Boston (see the textual commentary). He surely also used it to advertise the other lectures Fitch delivered during a two-week tour that concluded before the third session of the Forty-first Congress convened on 5 December (3 Dec 70 to Redpath, n. 2click to open link). The entire letter appeared in the bureau’s promotional magazines for 1871–72, 1872–73, and 1873–74, when Fitch, having been defeated for re-election to Congress, lectured more extensively. Redpath’s successor, George H. Hathaway, reprised it in 1883–84 for Fitch’s return to the platform (“New Publications,” Boston Advertiser, 13 July 70, 2; BDUSC , 187, 1000; Redpath 1876; Pond, xxv; Lyceum: 1871, 27; 1872, 37; 1873, xii; 1883, 21).
References
- Lyceum.. The Lyceum Magazine: Edited by the Boston Lyceum Bureau, and Containing Its Third Annual List. For the Season of 1871–1872. Boston: Redpath and Fall. 1871
- Machlis, Paul, ed. Union Catalog of Clemens Letters. Edited by Paul Machlis. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press. [In some cases, UCCL catalog numbers cited in this volume supersede those assigned in 1986 and reflect corrections or additions to the catalog since publication. An updated version of the catalog can be consulted via the Letters Search page at MTPO.] 1986
- Blanck, Jacob, comp. Bibliography of American Literature. Compiled by Jacob Blanck. 9 vols. New Haven and London: Yale University Press and Oxford University Press. [Citations are to volume and item or page number.] 1955–91
- SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 4: 1870–1871. Edited by Victor Fischer, Michael B. Frank, and Lin Salamo. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1995
- SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Roughing It. Edited by Harriet Elinor Smith, Edgar Marquess Branch, Lin Salamo, and Robert Pack Browning. The Works of Mark Twain. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. This edition supersedes the one published in 1972. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1993
- SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Early Tales & Sketches, Volume 1 (1851–1864). Edited by Edgar Marquess Branch and Robert H. Hirst, with the assistance of Harriet Elinor Smith. The Works of Mark Twain. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1979
- BDUSC. Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1774–1989. Bicentennial edition. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. 1989
- Redpath, James. “To Our Patrons.” In Lyceum 1876[bib11981], unnumbered prefatory page. 1876
- Pond, James B. Eccentricities of Genius: Memories of Famous Men and Women of the Platform and Stage. New York: G. W. Dillingham Company. 1900
“Hon. Thomas Fitch, M.C.,” Lyceum 1871, 27. Although published in July 1871, a year after Clemens wrote the letter to Fitch, the Lyceum provides the only complete text of the letter available. It was either transcribed directly from the MS or from an earlier transcription in a promotional brochure for Fitch issued sometime during the 1870 season by the Boston Lyceum Bureau ( BAL 3324; no copy found for inspection). Several newspaper advertisements published in November 1870, each of which included an excerpt from the letter, were likewise probably based on a transcription prepared for advertising copy either directly or indirectly from the MS, but none provides any substantive or suggestively authorial accidental variants. They are: “Boston Lyceum—Extra Lecture,” Boston Evening Transcript, 26 Nov 70, 4; “Boston Lyceum. Extra Lecture,” Boston Morning Journal, 26 Nov 70, 3; “Boston Lyceum.—Extra Lecture”: Boston Advertiser, 26 Nov 70, 2; Boston Evening Traveller, 29 Nov 70, 3. The first three papers repeated their advertisements on 28 and 29 November.
L4 , 170–171; “Personal,” New York Tribune, 28 Nov 72, 2, excerpt.