a.“

.16 "1*
(‘0'. --
:.‘u‘..a.‘l

 

{HESIS

0-169

Date

This is to certify that the
thesis entitled

William Gilmore Sims and His

Novels of the American Revolution

presented by

Frankl in A. Cawley

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

M A degree in EngliSh

Major professor

August 21. 1950

 

 

 

By
TI? R1111 EgL III A o C i l T] LEI
_ .l

A 131133153

Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies of Michigan
State Colleme of Anriculture and Applied Science
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the defiree of

ins-Wm W? items

.34....) v1. ALB—L

Department of English

1950

'l'HESIFE

Chapter Page
I. Simms's Early Years--The Social Influences........l
II. SimmS'S Literary Theories...0.000.000.0000.c.0000 7

III. Treatment of the American Revolution
in Accordance with the Theories ...............1h

IV. Historical Background--Use of David Ramsay.......18
V. Southern Social Influences ..................... 28

VI. The Novels

1. IbglPartisan 0000000OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOfig
£8

2. Mellichamne a000.00000.000000000000000...

E. Katherine Walton OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. .
o The SCOUt 0000000000000000.000.0000000000 50
So The Forayers and EUtEW OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. 52
6. 7"'rOOC1-.CI’aft o00000000000000.000000000000000 53
VII. Simms's Characters oooeoooooooooocoo-00.000000. Sh
VIII. DialDflue oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo 58
IX. Critical Judgment Of Simms 000000.0000000000000 61

Biblj.0?r8.mh.y0000000OOOOOOOOOOOCCOOOOOOOOO0.0... 61".

mm: a” ‘2
fiés'biyfi - ;._“}.

WILLIAM GILMORE SIKES
And His Novels Of The American Revolution

I. Sinnig Early Year§--The Social_Influences

William Gilmore Simms is a name rarely heard nowadays.

It is generally necessary to explain that he was an Ameri-
can writer, a young contemporary of James Fenimore Cooper,
whose best works show a considerably greater creative fac-
ulty than do those of the better known writer; and.whose
backwoods characters are frequently more finely drawn and
more realistic than any of COOper's. It is the purpose of
this study to consider the best writings of Simms and to show
why, despite his being one of the South's best authors, they
are little read today.

Simms was born April 17, 1806, at Charleston, South
Carolina, where his father migrated shortly after the Rev-
olution.1 It is necessary to give a short biographical ac-
count of Sinms's life, together with a sketch.of the Charles-
ton society in which he lived, for the southern social order
had considerable to do with his literary defects. William.was
the second child and the only lining one. His mother, Harriet

 

lflilliam.P. Trent, William.Gilmore Simms, Boston, 1892: 99- 1-h-

Singleton, died in giving birth to the third. This mis-
fortune was in concert with the elder Simms's business fail-
ure, after which he took to wandering, leaving William in
the.care of his maternal grandmother.

At six fiilliam.was sent by his grandmother, Mrs. Gates,
to free school. The South Carolina free schools were in-
credibly poor, and when we read Simms's testament regarding
them.it seems miraculous that he should ever have come to
anything as an author and it is certainly an indication of
genius, or at least, tremendous talent, however poorly it was
cultivated in the Charlestonian world:

"With the exception of one (of the schools)

I was an example of their utter worthlessness.

They taught me little or nothing. The teachers

were generally worthless in morals, and as ignor-

ant as worthless. One old Irishman, during one

year, taught me to spell, read tolerably, and write

a little. Not one of them could teach.me arith-

metic. There was no supervision of the masters or‘

commissioners worth a doit. The teachers in some

cases never came to the school for three days in

the week. We boys then thought these the best.

When the did come, they were in a hurry to get

Silva-ye o o o '

Yet the boy became an omniverous reader, and when he could
not read the poetry of his favorites, Byron, Scott and Moore,

he took to writing his own. His prose staples seem to have

 

21bid., p. 7.

been Pilsrims Progress and Vicar of Tagefield.3 His last

 

 

two years of formal education were spent in private schools,
where he was not particularly better off than before.

It is not known precisely when firs. gates took her
grandson from school and apprenticed him.to a druggist,
but her hone seams to have been that he should become a
physician, although no further reasons than this can be
given.h

About 1816 the elder Simms visited Charleston and be-
came affectionate with his son, wanting him.to go west. At
this time William.heard from.his father_many tales of rough
border life and Indian warfare which in part were undoubtedly
responsible for the remarkable wilderness adventures taking
place within his books.5 To this influence must also be
added the tales his frandmother told him, for she had lived
in the time of the Revolution and knew any number of fascina-
ting bits of adventure which.apparently William later made

good use of.

3Ib1d., p. 7.

Ll'Ibido, pp. 8, 9o

SIbid., pp. 12, 13.

be

After his father's visit, William continued working in
the drugaist's shep, keeping on at the same time with
readin? and writing. The next most influentia event was his
visit to his father in the then southwest in 182h or 25. Af—
ter a sea trip to New Orleans and a hard overland journey, he
found his father at his plantation near Georgeville, Mississip—
Pi.6 This was a considerable sojourn, during which time he
travelled among the settl ments, carefully observing back-
woodsmen and Indians and their habits and customs.7 Here
were the originals of such scout heroes as Supple Jack Ban-
nister, Thumbscrew, and Watson Gray, whom.no reader of Simms
finds easy to forget. His father would have had him stay in
Mississipsi--or anywhere but Charleston. He knew that, be-
ing comparatively low born by the Charleston standard, Wil-
liam.would need friends, family, and fortune to succeed at
anything. Said the elder Simms:

"Whatever your talents they will be poured out

.1.

like water on the sands. "gharleston! I know it
only as a place of tombs.

How right the old man was will hereinafter appear.

61bid., Pp. 1h, 15.
7Ibid., pp. 15. 16.
81bido 3 p o 170

S.

For all that William acknowledged the faults of Charles-
ton society, he was still proud to be of that city, and for
better or for worse he embraced it with all his soul.9 For
a time he seemed to have done wisely. In 1827 on his twenty-
first birthday he was admitted to the bar and was likely to
have been a successful lawyer, but he soon followed his most
natural bent, threw up his law career, and determined to live
by his pen.10 We are not concerned here with his sallies in-
to the fields of poetry and drama. Suffice it to say that
his literary endeavors necessarily played second fiddle to
his efforts to "succeed"-in the eyes of Charleston society.
In Charleston it was not good to be known as "a mere literary
man".11 But it is evident that in 1836 Simms's stock rose
when he married Miss Chevilette Roach, the daughter of Mr.
Nash.Roach, of Barnwell, South Carolina.12 This was his
second marriage, his first wife having died in childbirth in
1827; and although.we are not to suppose it was not a love
match the fact remains that the marriage was socially advan-

tagious. Simms eventually inherited his father-in-law's

 

91bid., pp. 19-21.
101bid., p. 52.

11Van Wyck Brooks, World 93 Washington Irving, Philadelphia,

19h5. p. 291.
1392- Cito. pp. 95-97.

6..

plantation, complete with slaves, beautiful grounds, and a
name--Woodlands. He never became primarily a planter, but
was engaged in several editing ventures, all of wtich failed,
often because it was not considered important for a gentleman
of S uth Carolina to be concerned about subscription rates.13
He lavished time and effort contributing to numerous literary
magazines, which died out like spring flowers in the desert;
for South Carolinians, who worshipped literary lawyers like
Legare’and Crafts, were not likely to appreciate any young
upstart who did not follow eighteenth century models as those
two did and who did not belong to the foremost families.1h
Finally he spent some time in the state legislature (lahhy
18h6) and even ran for the governorship, (December 8, lBhé),
losing out by a narrow margin.15 Activities like these
drained him f those energies which could have been em-
ployed so much more profitably had they been devoted to writing
only What he was truly fitted for--tales of his native state
during the Revolution. This was a tragedy which he did not

realize for many years. To him a true—blue southern gentleman

 

13W. P. Trent, William Gilmore Simms, pp. 5k-56.
1thid., p. 51.

151b1d., pp. lul.2.

 

was the Egg ElE§.E;§£§' The South Carolina s andards and
conventions and prejudices were his undoing.16 How could
any man's mind be free to create without let in a society
believing that:

"any freeman might with virtue aspire to any height,
and no Negro slave might so aspire, ever; but every
slave could expect always, as many a 'waae slave'

in Boston could not expect, all of the basic neces-
sities of Xistence plus a recognition of his hu-
manity,o his brotherhood in God'”17

“The planting aristocracy, however proud of its po-
lite learning, looked with condescension on any of
its sons who misht be ambitious to make a career
of literature; this attitude had a discouraging
effect on youth.who were ambitious for a lige of
letters or had the scholar s temperament.
This is What the hOpeful son of South Carolina had to con-
tend vvith. We shall now proceed to a consideration of his

principles of lilprature, which are acted upon to a consider-

able degree in the novels of the.American Revolution.

II. Simmsfs Literary Theories

Simms explained his principles in a collection of es-

says and addresses called Views and Reviews of American

 

 

16Vernon L. Parrington, ILiin Currents in americ n Thoueht,
New York, 1930, vol. 2, p. 12 .

17Thorp Spiller, et La1., Literary Historv of the United States
lqu York, 19! L3, p0 L.SOO

18M. E. Curti, Growth.g£ American Ehoufiht, New York, 19h}, p.hSO.

Literature, Historr, and Fiction. They:

"constitute a class in themselves, illustrative of
our history, our materials of art, the moral of our
aims, and the true develOpment of our genius...They
aim at showing what may be done among us, and insist
upon what we should do, in regard to the essential
of our progress;.."

And what is it Simma insists upon? It is Americanism in
literature. It is worth remarking on the similarity in

tone between the articles in Eiggg and Reliew§.gfl;&mgniggn
Literature, History and Fictiog, published in lBhS, and Emer-
son's American Scholgg, delivered in 1837. That "intellec-
tual declaration of independence" may very well have helped
to shape Simms's own views on Americanism in literature and
may have been the more influential because of his life long
Iondness for Revolutionary history. Compare the statements
on Americanism in literature to follow with this excerpt:

"Our anniversary is one of hepe, and, perhaps,

not enough labor...Perhaps the time is alreadyf
come when it ought to be, and will be, something
else; when the sluggard intellect of this conti-
nent will look from under its iron lids and fill
othe postponed expectations of the world with some-
thing better than the exertions of mechanical skill.
Our day of dependence, our long apprenticeship to the
learning of other lands, draws to a close. The
millions that around us are rushing into life, can-
not always be fed on the ears remains of foreign
harvests. Events, actions arise, that must be sung,
that will sing themselves. Who can doubt that po-

etry will revive and lead in a new ape...?"2

 

1W. G. Simms, Views and Reviews of American_Literature, His-
tozx, and Fiction,NewfiYork, 18kg: advertisement.

 

QR. w, Emerson, The American Schola§,N'. Foerster, American
Voetgy and Prose, Cambridge, 1947: -o Ash-

9.

Looking to European models de-nationalizes our own
literature, says Simms. It is natural that our literature
should be at first imitative, since we are a new nation
and have no body of lore and literature that is properly
ours and descending to us from remote periods. But we
must overcome this servility.3fi 'We are not without the
start of a national literature already. Our history supplies
the raw materials for it. In considering American history
as a fit subject for literature we must note that it falls
more or less naturally into four unequal periods. First
were the frequent and unsuccessful attempts at colonization
in the Elizabethian period by the French, Spaniards and Eng-
lish.from.the explorations of Cabot under Henry VII to the
Jamestown colony in Virginia--a period of some seventy—five
years. Second was the history and progress of settlement
from.the time of Jamestown to the accession of George III,
when America was no lonmer dreamed of as the land of golden
treasure, but viewed in the light of sounder economics,
when Indian wars were fbught with an eye to genuine improve-
ment of the colonists' lot in America, and not merely for
immediate exploitation. The third period consists in the
preliminaries up to the Revolutionary War, dating more or less

from.the French and Indian Wars-~when Britain, seeing the

yr—

7393. 0113., Article I.

10.

growing prosperity of her colonies, saw fit to impose duties
vithout representation of the taxed people. The sentiment
of independence grew strong; partisan conflicts in the South
were increasingly common--the wars of—-

"...riflemen and cavalry, the sharp-shooter and

the hunter, and the terrible civil conflicts of
Nhig and Tory, which.for wild incident and dar-

ing ferocity, have been surpassed by no enents in

history. +
The fourth.period ran from the end of the Revolution to the
present (lBhS); it was the transition from colonial to re-
publican condition and a nGPiOd of :rowing awareness of
our imerican character.

The events of these four periods, Simms believes, the
future Homer will use as the original did; that is, not al-
together factually, not so much to make an accurate report
as to shape the material into interesting and instructive
tales for the improvement of morals as long as probability
is not outraaed.

We must now consider to what extent Simms utilized the
four arbitrary historical periods. An examele of literature
based on the first period of our history--tha of hasty ex-

ploration and exploitation--is Vasconselos? a story of the

 

h'Ibido, p 6/0.

SIbid., article IV.

11.

early Spanish~voyagers and the explorations of Hernando De
Soto. Vasconselos is supposed to be (not surpassing the
limits of probability) one of De Soto's men. Another basis
for literary endeavor Simms considered to be the settlements
of the Hugenots in Florida under Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral
of France.6 These people travelled in Georgia and the Care-
linas, which brought them.particularly to Simms's attention.
Still another is Cortez and the conquest of Mexico. 0f the
only completed.speci!wen asing materials from.the first per-
iod this may be said. Vasconselg§,was begun many years be-
fore its publication in lBSh, but laid aside in favor of
pleasanter work. It has not the humor that graces thet>est
pages of the novels of the Revolution, but it sold well,
even though published under a pen name, Frank Cooper, for
Simms was a little dubious as to what made his books sell;

merit or reputation.7 Vasconselos indicated merit, but that

 

is something of a mystery today.
Suitable story material derived from.the second and
third periods of our history would be the adventures of

Captain John Smith and Pocahontas, and the life of Daniel

Boone, "the first hunter of Kentucky."9 Aside from the

 

61b1d., Article v.
7di111Lm.P. Trent, william Gilmore Simms, Boston, 1892, p. 120.

89'2” Cite, firtiC13 VI.
91bid, Article IV.

12.

outlining Simms did little or nothing with the materials,

but the principle is t”e same which.he applied in the Par-

tisan series.

dict

puts

An excellent character for Simms to have used was Bene-
Arnold, whose fate was coupled with Major Andres. Simms
his principle into action once more:

”When the grandson of the last Revolutionary
soldier shall be no more-~when the huge folios
which now contain our histories and chronicles
shall have given way to works of closer summary
and more modern int erest--the artist will find

a new form for these events, shape all their fea-
tures anew, and place the persons of the drama

in grouping more appropriate for scenic action.
There will be more individual character given to
the history--the general events will be thrown
out of sight--the personal will be brought into
conspicuous relief in the foreground--the rival
heroes of the piece will be forced into closer
juxtaposition, and the treason detected in the
moment of its contemplated execution will be
crushed by the timely interposition of Washington
himself. He will be made to have seen the true
nature and to have suspected the purpose of the
traitor, from.the moment of his very first lapse
from.honor-—to have had his eyes upon the tempter--
a stern, cold, silent watch--keen and vigilant, and
the more terrible from.its very silence and unim-
posing calm. His watch.will have been maintained
with an interest no less personal than patriotic.
It will not impair the character of Washington to
show that he, too, had his ambition...It may be
that, in the hands of the future dramatist the
sword of fi'ashinrton himself shall be made to do
justice upon the head of the traitor--as, by a
similar license, Richmond slays Richard, and Mac-
Duff the usurpsr of Scotland, in the presence of
an audience."

 

10Ibid., pa. 55,56.

l3.

 

Of the fourth period we may take Beauchampg, or The
Kentucky Traced , as a representative product. It is based
on a sordid love affair occurring in Simms's ”present”,1land
so far as modification of cold fact for story telling purposes
goes it follows the general pattern.

Views and Reviews gm American Literature, History, gag
Fiction is important for Simms's remarks on James Fenimore
Cooper, for his not only continues to set forth his own ideas
but makes sound criticism of the better-known author. Simms
defends his inventive theory for dialogue and action in the
following:

”A writer of Romance cannot more greatly err than when

he subjects his hero to the continual influence of
events. We have no respect for heroes placed al-
ways in subordinate positions--sent hither and thi-
ther, baffled by every breath of circumstance--crea-
tures without will, constantly governed by the ca-
prices of other persons.
This criticism.he applied to Scott in the novels of Waverly,
who is nothing to Cleverhouse, and Morton, who is nothing to
Burley. It is true of Cooper in the Two Admirals. But The
Spy made Cooeer‘s reputation and made Americans think of
their own resources. Here an American had sprung up equal

to the best Europe could produce. It helped rid us of the

 

11W. P. Trent, William Gilmore Dimms, Boston, 1392, pp. 115-20.

129;. Cit., p. 215.

1h.

feeling of intellectual dependence upon Europe that we still
had.13 Cooper's Leatherstocking is less believable than
Simms's backwoodsmen, mainly because of the lack of realism

in his speech. He uses terms like "varmint" and ”argyment",
but these and some others occur rarely enough to seem.unnatur-
al, particularly in conjunction with the flawless syntax. The
dialect words are conscious efforts to give flavor, but they
do not succeed, since they do not fit in with the other 619 -
ments of his speech. Simms,as we shall see in the samples

of his writing given below, is far more authentic.

III. Treatment g; the American.Revolution,

 

in Accordance WiEE,th9 Theories

Simms found the era of the Revolution the best suited

to the needs of the American writer, whose duty is stated

here:

"History itself is only valuable when it promotese..
a just curiosity awakens noble affections—«elicits
frenerous sentiments--and stimulates into becoming
activity the intelligence which it informs.. Hence,
it is the artist only who is the true historian.

It is he who gives shape to the unhewn fact,--Who
yields relation to the scattered fragmented-who
unites the parts in coherent dependency, endows
with life and action the otherwise motionless au-
tomata of history...It is the soul of art alone,

 

13Ibido ’ p o 215.

15.

which.binds periods and places together;--that
creative faculty Which.as it is the only quality
distinguishing man from the animals, is the only
one by which.he holds a life tenure through all
time—-the power to make himself known to man, to
be sure of the possessions of the past, and to
transmit with most happy confidence in fame, his
own possessions to the future.

It is really of very little importance to
mankind whether he is absolutely correct in all
his conjectures or assertions, whether his theory
be true or false...Assuming that...he offends
against no facts which are known and decisive, no
reasonable probabilities or inferences,-—it is
enough if his narrative awakens our affections,
inspirits our hones, elevates our aims, and builds
up...a fabric of character, compounded of just
principles, generous tendencies and clear, correct
standards of taste and duty..."1

This, then, is the duty of the American writer. It is the
surest and best way to the establishment of a genuine Amer-
icanliterature. So long as the romancer does not violate
ordinary truth, he may invent and endow as he pleases. We
must never believe that America is too young for a national
literature. Although our history is recent, it is as heroic
as that of any older nation whose founding is hoary with age
and with.legend. The American writer will use the bare facts
of the Revolution as Homer did the Trojan War and render them
pleasing, instructive, and morally elevating.2 Simms had

strong and original ideas about the cultivation of American

 

21bid., Article III.

16.

literature, and it is likely, as we have seen, that there-
ideas owed their conception partly to Emerson and also to
the tales from.his fathenénd grandmother in his childhood
and to the actual experiences he had during his visits to
the border country in 182h or 1825. These experiences helped
excite an interest in American Indians, and later Simms was
fascinated by Henry Rowe Schoolcraft's Algic Researches, deal-
ing with Indian myths, poetry, and ethnology.3 This work, in
conjunction with the foregoing and his own boyhood excursions,
enabled Simms to give us such.wonderful pictures of wilder-
ness, ragged heroes, equally ragged villains, and stalwart
Indians--the last occurring mainly in ghg'Yemmasaeg.

Althouch Simms wrote hastily and rarely revised, he was,
paradoxically, an indefatigable laborer when it came to gath-

ering materials for his work.

"He filled commonplace books with information culled
from all quarters. He was constantly in correspon-
dence with local antiquirians, asking such minute
questions as where the Ghangeburg tavern was standing
in 1780, and what was the tavern keeper's name. No-
thing was too trivial to require investigation.”

And this was not all. Simms was well read in the his-
tory of the revolutionary period. One guiding light in par-
ticular is David Ramsay, author of History of the.American-

,Revolution, Whom Simms quotes in the introduction to 1Catherine

 

 

 

3Van Wyck Brooks, World of Washington Irvine, Philadelphia,
19’4-S! P; “3000 ‘

“W. P. Trent, William Gilmore Simms, Boston, 1892, pp.191,2.

l7.

Walton, and whom.he even makes appear in that book. It
was only in accordance with a principle expressed in.Xg§3§
and Reviews 9; American Literature, History, and Eictien--
that of employing actual characters to suit his purpose so
long as what he makes them do is not actually contrary to
historical fact.

Ramsay tells us that the Americans were poorly prepared
for conflict with Great Britain. There was no training. Love
of liberty was dominant ever discipline and submission, and
this gave the A mericans their spirit in the face of the dan-
gers they were facing. Christopher Gadsden, one of the South
Carolina delegates to the Continental Congress, said:

"Our houses being constructed of brick, stone,

and wood, though destroyed, may be rebuilt, but

liberty once gene is lost forever."

The spirit of those words, which.must have been known to
Simms, is embodied in the speeches and actions of the author's
heroic partisans. According to Ramsay, on the British side
were arms, ammunition, trained leaders, experienced army
organizers, good morale, great financial resources,21nd a

big navy; on the American side were valor, enthusiasm,

fighters acquainted with Indian war methods, paper money,

 

SDavid Ramsay, History g3 the American Revolut‘on, Phila-
delphia, 1789, I, 197.

a willingness to live without foreign trade, and the belief
that liberty was more important than material things.6 The
connection between Simms and Ramsay and the use which Simms
made of these opposing forces--the best of material on one
side and little more than an idea on the other appears be-
low.

IV. Historical Baekground--Use pf David Ramsay

 

The influence of Ramsay's history is obvious throughout
the series in more than the general plan of action. With
a view to authenticity Simms creates within the novels of
the revolution an atmosphere very much like that which Ram-
say tells us prevailed at that period. The most important
element in this is the trends in thinking. There were three
distinct classes of colonists, Ramsay says: (1) Those who
were for rushing into extremeties; (2) Those who knew their
rights, but were averse to revolution; and (3) those who
disapproved of what was going on--some out of love for Bri-
tain, others from love of ease and self-interest. These last
two groups commonly did not participate in the aetien, for
they thought that Great Britain's power would presently stamp

out the foolhardy rebellion.1

 

61bid., I, 197,8.

lIbid., I, 125.

19.

Simms made much use of the varying political views
among both.his high.and his low characters. As a high
character example of the first category Lieutenant Porgy is
foremost. He owned a plantation upon the Ashepoo, but with
the coming of war he gave himself up to the swamps and 1diari-
en's men for the duration. Singleton is another, who ”rushed
precipitately" into the struggle. The looting of his estate
by the Tories showed him.there was only one course open to
him commensurate with.honor, regardless of material consid-
erations.2 Ernest HelHehampc is another wnose situation is
very much the same, but few of the high characters seem.to
act from.as noble principles as the low character patriots.
While Simns's gentle heroes are frequently driven to war by
loss of property, there are plenty of representatives from
the lower ranks of Society who have had no such.motivatien.
Consider Supple Jack Bannister in The Scegt. He explains the
situation in his plain talk manner in an effort to win over
his luke warm.Tory friend Huggs, the tavern keeper and oc-
casional entertainer of Edward Conway, leader of the Black
Riders.

"...it made the gall bile up in me to see a man

that I had never said a hard word to in all my
life, come here, over the water, a matter, maybe,

 

.,.. . . \
2w. G. Simms, The Partisan, New York, 1882, p. lu2.

20.

of a thousand miles, to force me, at the p'int
of the bagnet, to drink stamped tea. I never
did drink the tea no how. For my own drinking,
I wouldn't give one cup of coffee well biled,
for all the tea that was ever growed or planted.
But, 'twas the freedom of the thing I was argy-
ing for, and 'twas on the same argyment that I
was willing to fight...It's agin' nature and
reason and a man's own seven senses, to reckon
on any man's right to make laws for another,
say, King George, living in England, never had
a right to make John Bannister, living on the
Congaree, pay him taxes for tea or anything...
I won't pay George the Third any more taxes.
That's the word for all; and it 3 good reason
why I shouldn't pay him? when, for all his try-
ing he can't make me...’

The second group--those knowing their rights but

averse to active participation--is exemplified mostly in

Katherine Walton. Colonel Walton himself was one of these.

In The Partisan he had taken a B ritish protection as ex-

 

pedient, but for no other reason, and he turns down a royal

commission.

"By what right, sir, does Sir Henry Clinton call
pon us for military service, when his terms of

protection, granted by himself and Admiral Ar—

buthnot, secured all those taking them.in a con-

dition of neutrality?...By What right does your su-'

perior violate his compact? Think you, sir, that
the Carolinians would have made terms with the in-
vaders, the conditions and maintenance of which
have no better 3 curity than the caprice of one

of the parties?"fi

Ella Monekton and her brother, Alfred, the secretary to Bal—

four in Katherine Walton, are two other illustrations of the

 

3W. G. Simms, The Scout, New York, 1882, pp. lhO-lhB passim.

14.93. Cit., 33.12134

21.

second category. The widow Menckton ”well knew how irksom
‘were his labors under the eye of such a man as Balfour".S

But out of love for his old mother, Alfred has stayed in
British employ, apparently not believing enough in rebellion
to join the American forces like many another young man in

the novels. Bill Iumphries in The Partisan, for instance,

 

or Willie Sinclair‘ in The Forayers and Eutaw, both of whom
acted with the disapproval of their respective fathers.
There are numerous representatives of the third group Ramsay
mentions-~those who disapproved of what was going on, some
out of love for Britain and others from love of ease and
self—interest. Old Colonel Sinclair, Willie's fa her in
The Foravers and in Eutaw is blindly attached to Britain,
and his fiitir in British.arms is infinite. He was ”a

good example of the best English squirearchy, when the
souirearchy of England was legitimate-~1n the days of
Falkland and Hamdlmpirank, hearty1henestg-stubborn".6 he

arieves that his son could not feel with him, think with

him, and sustain the banner which he has borne.

 

.53. G. Simms, Katherine Walton, New York, 1882, Po 1&6-

6W. G. Simms, The Forayers, Hew York, 1882, Do 1&7.

 

22.

A less honorable member of the third category is the
older Humwhries, the tavern keeper at Dorchester, whose
son is one of the partisans.

"Hone of the villagers was more dutiful or
deVOut in their allegance than Richard Humphries--
Old Dick, sly Dick--Holy Dick as his neighbors
capriciously styled himp-who kept the 'Royal
George', then the high tavern of the village.

The fat, beefy face of the good-natured Hanoverian
hung in yellow before the tavern door, on one of
the two main roads leading from the country to the
to» . The old monarch had, in this exposed posi-
tion, undergone repeated trials. At the commence-
ment of the Revolution, the landlord, who, after
the proverbial fashion of landlords in all countries,
really cared not who was king, had been compelled
by public opinion to take down the sign and replace
it with another more congenial to the pepular feel-
ing. George, in the meantime was assigned less
conspicuous lodgings in an ancient garret. The
change of circumstances restored the venerable
portrait to its place; and under the eyes of the
British garrison, there were few more thorough-w
going loyalists in the village than Richard Hum-

phries."

It has thus far been shown how Simms synthetized the
types of individuals Ramsay listed in his history. This
technique is plainly in accordance with his opinions as
expressed in the Eipws and Reviews 2£_Americag Literature,
Histor , and Fiction, quoted earlier. We must now consider
the political differences among his characters. Ramsay tells

us that during the height of the British power, numerous Tory

 

7:3. G. 31mm, The Partisan, New York, 1882, pp. 19-20.

23.

'bands formed, pledging allegiance to the king, and using their
commissions as a shield to cover their plumderings.

"Among those who call themselves loyalists, there
were many of the most infamous characters. Their
general complexion was that of a plundering ban-N
ditti more solicitous for booty than for the honor
and interest of their royal master. Among these
people, the royal cumdSsaries had successfully
planted the standard of loyalty and of that class
was a great proportion of those, who in the upper
country of Georgia and the Carolinas, called them-
selves Kinq‘s friends. They had no sooner emp
bodied and begun their march to join the royal
army at Augusta than they commenced such a scene
of plundering of the defenseless settlements
through.which they passed as induced the orderly
inhabitants to turn out to oppose them. Col.
Pickens, with about 300 men of the latter charac-
ter immediately pursued and camsup with them.near
Kettle Creek. An action took place which lasted
three quart rs of an hour. The tories were total-

ly routed."
Simms employed such passages as this several times, three of
which.will Serve to illustrate. In Thg Partisan, Singleton's
band ambushes a Tory group who were about to murder a neigh-

bor and his family because of a personal grudge held by the

leader. With the passace from Ramsay in mind, here are Simms's
remarks on Amos Gaskens, the Tory leader.

"The arrival of the British forces,the seige and
surrender of Charleston, with the invasion of the
state by foreign mercenaries, presented him.with.a new
field for action, and with.thousands of others, to
whom all considerations were as nothing weighed
against the love of low indulgence, unrestrained
power, and a profligate lust for plunder, he did not
scruple to adopt the cause which.was strongest and
ms: likely to procure him those objects for which

his appetite most craved."9

8David Ramsay, II, llh.

9.9.2. Sit... 10p BBB-3%-

23.

In.Mellichamnc a Tory band is mentioned as meeting at Sink-
1er's Meadow, where they were to receive arms from Barsfield,
the Tory captain.10 But we learn that these men were wiped

out by Karion when he found them at the rendesvouz playing
cards.

"They were shot down in the midst of dice and

drink, foul oathes and exultation.upon their

lips, and with those bitter thoughts of hatred

to their countrymen within their hearts which al-

most justified the utmost severities of that re-

tribution to Which the furious partisans subjec—

ted them. "11
A third instance showing how Simms used this and similar
passages in Ramsay occurs in The Scout. The band known as
the "Black Riders of the Conaaree" are working models of
those individuals of whom Ramsay tells us. Simms describes
these "Black Riders" as:

"...detached bands of ruffians formed upon the

frontiers of Georgia and in the wilds of Florida--

refugees from all the colonies-~(who) availed themselves

of the mountains. Harrassed by the predatory inroads

of these outlawed squadrons...the more civil and suf—

fering inhabitants gathered in little bands for their

overthrow."1
And it might be added that Hell Fire Dick in The Forayers and
in.§gtag,is another of this genre. He is ruthless and thieving
but nevertheless a kind of useful officer employed from.time

to time by the British.

 

10W. G. Simms, Melliohampe, New York, 1882, p. lkl.

 

llIbid., p. 276.

12W. G. Simms, The Scout, New York, 1832, p. 13.

 

2h.

We have so far discussed group politics. Simms is
<3oncerned with the creeds of individuals, too. Frequently
the Revolution amounted to civil war, and when it did not
:relationships were at least strained. In The Partisan
Richard Humphries, as we know, is an opportunist and a loyal-
ist, while his son Bill is an.ardent patriot. “In The Scout,
aside from the melodramatic hatred of the brothers Edward
and Clarence Conway, there exists between them the difference
in politics. Edward leads the Black Riders, while Clarence
is a commander of the partisans, and is saddened by Edward's
”present public course" and his "position in this conflict."13
We have quoted the speech of Supple Jack above, giving the
crux_of the araument--that it was the freedom of the thing,
whether a man has a right to levy taxes upon individuals
living in another country. Colonel Sinclair: in The Forayers
holds the opposite view:

"What is riaht yesterday is right tomorrow--
right for a thousand years--riaht for eternity."
"Hes, Sir? (argues Willie , "in simple morals

that would be euite true, but not in respect to the

policy of nations. With.these, right changes aspect

according to political necessities, and the altered
condition of states. There is one truth, sir, which
alwa s eludes the class to which.you belong...That

the merican colonies have passed through their min-

ority. A people who are able to maintain themselves

asainst foreign pressure, have survived the neces—

sity of foreign rule. The mental and social develop-
ment Which enables them to defend themselves by arms,

 

13Ibid., p. L3.

25.

are in proof of resources which revolt at foreign
dominion. If the American mind is eoual to its

own necessities, it is adequate to its own rule.

If we no longer need English armies for our protec-
tion, we no longer need English mind for our govern-
ment."

"But this, sir," (says the Colonel),"is the
argument of ingratitude. You forget the past, sir--
the immense debt, arms, men, money, all means and
appliances, for the strength and safety which we
owe to the mother country."

"No, sir, it is Britain that forgets. We have
forgotten nothing. Britain had a right to expect
our gratitude, but not the sacrifice of our liber-
ties. That you should lend me money--nay, give it--
protect me in weakness-~help and cherish me in sick-
ness--gives you no right to enslave me for ever for
these services."

"Don't talk of slavery, sir; taxation is not
slavery."

”The denial of our right, sir, is the worst
slavery and this was the error and offense of Bri-
tain. It proved her to be neither just nor wise..."1h

Compare Ramsay:

"...the friends of the ministry asserted that the
Americans had been long aiming at independence--

that they were magnifying pretended grievances to
cover a premeditated revolt--that it was the business
and duty of Englishmenw..to bring them back to a
rememberance that their present greatness was owing
to the mother country, and that even their existence
had been purchased at a? immense expense of British
blood and treasure..."1

"Under...favorable circumstances, colonies in the
new world had advanced nearly to the magnitude of
a nation, while the greatest gart of Europe was
ignorant of their progress. 1

Thus we see how Simms, in following his authorities, used

historical fact according to his own ideas to draw an au-

 

lhfi G. SiMMs The Ferayers, New York, 1882, pp. 52,53.

_‘.... L),

 

ISDavid Ramsay, 1.,152o

16Ibid., p.,h.

26.

thentic, carefully detailed background for his characters
to move against and be influenced by.

Still another group represented in Simms's work is that

which played one side against the other or were first en-
listed in one side or cause and then the other. Of the
double dealers we should consider ”Goggle” Blonay in The
artisan, and in Hellichampe. We first meet him when Single-
ton's band overcomes Travis's Tories,(not Colonel Travis,

father of Bertha), in the early part of The Partisan; and sev-

 

eral of the captives are taken into the American force. ”Gog-
gle”, so called from.his fishy-eyed look, is thouaht to be no
good by Humphries, and so he turns out to be,17 deserting to
British employ in the first minute the offer of solid gold

is made him. Another notable example of such behavior is
Colonel Travis, in The Forayers and its sequel, Eutaw. Tra-
vis is in the British Commissariat and is the agent who pur-
chased five hundred head of cattle from old Sinclair. It
gradually appears to him that British power is not what it
used to be, and this, along with.some proddings from.his own
conscience, causes him to seek reinstatement as a rebel Amer-

ican. Governor Rutledge offers him a commission. Travis is

 

17W. G. Simms, The Partisan, New York, 1882, p. 97.

27.

110t thoroughly bad, but, as were a great many, was swayed by
<3ircumstance to join the side which seemed riahtest and
strongest at the time.

Still other double dealers are the Blodgits in The

‘—

 

3Forayers and in Eutaw--the whining, curish, Pete and his vi-
cious old mother. These people keep a sort of tavern for the
amusement of the British by which.m ans they can buy snall
amounts of their arms and amunition at a time to avoid sus-
picion, and hand the weapons over to the Americans, toaether
'with the solid gold they get from the sale of lisuor. The
Blodgits find it more attractive to keep most of their ac-
quisitions for the post war times and to sell them.to who-
ever bids highest.

At this point it would be worthwhile to mention that
Simms's knowledge of the revolutionary inflation and the
utter poverty of the rebels appears to have been derived
from.Ramsay}8 Simms started to make interesting use of
this matter when in Katherine Walton the partisans use
bows and arrows for hunting and intend to use them in war-
fare.

"The partisans of Carolina, during the struggle

for recovery of the state, seldom went into action
with more than three rounds to the man."19

 

18%. Cit., II, 125-136.

19W. G. Simms, Katherine Walton, New York, 1882, p. lh2.

28.

But nothing is made of the idea in the later chapters of
Katherine Walton or in any other novel of the series.

We can see from the foreaoing, then, that there is
considerable relation between Ramsay and Simms's own work
in.the creating of atmosphere and in the depicting of the
various political beliefs and conflicts of the citizenry of

the time.

V. Southern Social Influences in Simms

In the novels of the Revolution Simms makes several.
illuminating remarks upon the southern social system--re-
marks on slavery, and upon the old family ties-othe aristoiv
in contrast with the newly rich. It is interesting to note
Ramsay's passaaes on slavery and to see how slightly the or-

der of things had chanced in the South from his time to Simms's,

5
l.)

l

f

whose own statements in the novels are made in a familiar, it-
is-as-true-now-as-then manner.

"Slavery also led to the engrossing of land, in
the hands of a few...Such is the force of habit,
and the pliancy of human nature, that though de-
grading freemen to the level of slaves, would, to
many be more intolerable than death, yet Negroes
who have been born and bred in habits of slavery
are so well satisfied with their condition, that
several have been known to reject proffered free-
dom, and as far as circumstances authorize us to
judge, emancipation does not appear to be the with
of the generality of them. The peasantry of few
countries enjoy as much of the comforts of life
as the slaves who belong to good masters. Interest

29.

concurs with the finer feelings of human nature

to induce slave-holders to treat with humanity

and kindness, those who are subjected to their

will and power. There is frequently more happiness

in kitchens than parlors, and life is often more

pleasantly enjoyed by the slave than his master..."l
IRameay speaks of slavery's faults as well, but our object
is to see the persistence of that peculiar species of south-
ern rationalization from Revolutionary times and before up
through such prepaqanda as William Grayson's The Eireling
and the Slave and The Pro-Slave21.Argument.

Let us consider I‘I'Iellichamne for the pro-slavery idea.
Hellichampe has been detected in his visit to Janet Ber-
keley by the Tory Barsfield, who gives pursuit. Kellichampe
has the old family slave, Scipio, attract his pursuers' at-
tention while he himself escapes. Scipio thrashes around,
and is finally cauiht by Barsfield. His denial of any know-
ledge of Mellichampe's whereabouts displays the loyalty which
slaves were supposed to have had--and many did have-~for their
masters. He leads Barsfield and his crew on a fruitless search
having sworn he had not seen his master at any time these past
three weeks:

"...the adroit Negro contrived to baffle the vin-

dictive Barsfield. He led him from.place to place,

to and fro, now here, now there, and through every

little turn and winding of the enclosure in front
of the dwelling until the patience of the Tory becaae

 

1 '. 0113., I.,2}.g_.

 

30.

exhausted, and he clearly saw that his guide had
deceived him...2

Such.adroitness and wiliness on the part of a Negro Simms
attributes to loyalty more than intelligence, and to a
fear for his own life. If Scipio had been white, Simms
might very likely have proclaimed his actions to be ty-
pical of a high order of intelligence and a remarkable
coolness of mind in a difficult situation. Later in the
book Scipio succeeds in passing a sentry to get arms to
the captive Mellichampe by saying that he is chasing three
of the plantation's best cows that had been made off with,
”Kaise you sodger lub milk." Tn he sentry is satisfied with
this answer to his challenae not only because it is reason-
able, but because of the seeminr' ly artless way in which.it
is pres'nted. Simms describes Scipio as:

”...cne of those trusty slaves to be found in

almOSt every native scuthern family, who, having

grown up with the children of their owners, have

acquired a certain correspondence of feeling with

theme A personal attachment had strengthened

the bonds which necessity imposed, and it was

ouite as much a principle in Scipio' s mind to

fight and die for his owners as to work for them. 3

Whether or not Scipio's loyalty is the result of his being

a slave, it is obvious that Simms apzroves highly of the

 

2W. G. Simms, Hellichamne, New York, 1832, p. 105.

3Ibid., p. 10t-

31.

institution of slavery while he rather incongruously disap-
proves of importation:

”To their arts (the Indians') the Gullah.and Ebo Negroes,
of which the colony had its thousands furnish ed by the
then unscrupulous morality of the mother country and the
northern colonies, added their spells and magic...‘LL

Simms hastened to defend slave owners at the expense of the

northerners, amone whom.he found most of his publishers.5 The

scoundrel H'Kewn, we learn:

"...had bought at moderate prices, a lot of new Negroes,
from the coast of Guinea, from.a virtuous Puritan cap-
tain of Rhode Island, who had gleaned wonderfully from
the Gold Coast, and whose great grandson, by the way,
has since shown himself a virtuous abolitionist in

the senate of the United States, breathing hate and
horror toward the descendents of the very people whom
his ph -ilanthropic r”randu-sire had sold the stolen Ne—
9:roes. 0

Such.mayhave been an accurate description, but however it
pointed out the northern faults, it did not purify slavery
nor prove it to be good because another thing was bad. With
this we compare chapter Twenty— Edi ne of Woodcraft,'which is
notable for picturinq the bonds of affection which often

existed between slaves and their masters:

"You nebber guine done wid Tom, maussa. I‘tick
to you ebbrywhere; you comp' ny good 'ngugh for Tom
in any country, no matter whay you go.

 

kw. G. Sinus, The Partisans, New York, 1882: D- 22h.
SOscar Weaelin, Egggi3£§_g£_flilliam;Gilmore_§imms, New York,1906.
61;]. G. 31mg, jioodnraft, New York, 1882, p0 b-560

71bid., p. 182.

9

32.

Porgy fears bankruptcy and separation from.his favorite
slave:

”Give you, Tom: Give you to anybody? No! no!
old fellow! I will neigher give you, nor well you,
nor suffer you to be taken from me in any way...
Nothing but death shall ever part us, and even death
shall not if I can help it. When I die, you shall be
buried with me. He have fought and fed too long to-
gether, Tom, and I trust we love each other quite
too well to submit to separation. When your kitchen
fire grows cold, Tom, I shall cease to eat; and you
Tom, will not have breath enough to blow up the fire
when.mine is out! I shall fight for you to the last,
Tom, and you, I know, would fight to the last for me,
as I am very sure that neither of us can long out-
last the other."

"Fight for you, Eaussal Ha! Jes' le' dem
Tory try we, maussa!"

This kind of writing,'undoubtedly went home to many a slave
owner, but was too clannish to be pOpular very far north of
the Mason-Dixon line.

The Southern mind could scarcely conceive of the im-

porality of slavery, so firmly rooted was the idea of the

white man's burden. In Woodcraft widow Evcleigh visits

- Major fioncrieff shortly before the British.evacuation of

Charleston. It is her purcose to have restored to her cer-l
tain slaves Which she knows Koncrieff has. More than that
she wants to recover Porgy‘s slaves too. The southern

philosophy is a curious mixture:

 

81bido , P o 183.

33.

”We are taught to love our neighbor as ourself,

and such love can be shown in no better way, perhaps,

than in Riving heed to his interest at the moment when

we attend to our own."9
With that, these two human beings spend considerable time dis-
cussing bills of sale for other human beings, and the right to
consider them as personal property.

Simms casts light upon the southern social system in
another respect than slavery: the caste system, regulat'ng
individual and f wily status. The lines between various so-
cial levels are clearly marked in Simms's novels in accordance
with the "Greek democracy” mentioned earlier—~it being dif-
ficult for a person to raise himself to a new level ”success-

fully", with the approval of those who had already "arrived."

In The Forayers occurs this passage between Willie Sinclair

 

and his true love, Bertha Travis:

”Willie, dear Willie, you know even better than
I what difference exists in the several ranks of our
society. Now, you know that mine is comparatively
humble stock; and though my mother comes of good
family in the Low Country, yet, in marrying,my
father, who was an obscure Indian trader, she in-
curred the reproach.and anger of her own kindred.
Thqyneglected, and finally cast her off."

Ӥhg was as good and noble as any of them."

"Yes, but in such cases, it seems, the wife
sinks to the husband's rank and loses something
of her own..."10 ‘

Willie's father disanproved of any alliance between a girl

of such parentage and his son, and is won over only by

 

9Ibid., p. 20.

10* G. Simms, The Forajers, I6W York, 1882, p?- 282 F F-

Ii.

3h.

meeting her, so that her personality and character can
overcome his silly preconceptions. Her father, Captain'
Travis, has aspired to become a planter. He owns a fine
home and slaves, has money, and wishes to be on a par with
those whom he considers the preper models of gentility. he
is a self-made man, by hook or by crook, and 5imms's term,
"nevus homo", means simply that he has not yet been accepted.
His commission from Governor Rutledge improves his position,
however, but by this time he is not thinking so much of so-
cial climbing as saving his family from the villainous Ingle-
hardt. Governor Rutledge's exclamation to Inglehardt, who
attempts the governor's capture, shows the high.rank of a
southern gentleman:
"VYou neither know me--nor yourself. If you
knew either of us, sir, you would know that I.am
not to be made prisoner by you!’
Inglehardt's cheek flushed. He could feel the
sentiment of scorn. He, the son of the overseer
and grazier, felt the sting of the sarcasm.from the
born gentleman."
Here is clear proof of the feudal order of things; gentlemen
are born, and the statement in this case means that it is a
sort of title which laborers and sons of laborers have no
right to aspire to. It does not mean here that a born
gentleman is one whose innate characteristics entitle him to
in

that ranking, regardless of social station, w-ich is the only

sense in which the old saying has any validity.

 

llIbido’ I). “.080

35.

Rev convenient, then, for Simms to ma} is his villain,
Inglehardt, a ”son of an overseer and grazier”. Simms is
forgetting his own ancestry in his effort to please the
gentle readers of Charleston, who, unfortunately for the
author, did not forget as easily.. Inglehardt, too,

"...Was a new man; an ambitious man, anxious to

shake off old and inferior associations; anxious to bring

himself into constant communication with.persons of

whose social rank there could be no question."

Again, a whole book illustrating the southern idea of
social rank is Woodcraft, the story of Captain Porgy's read-
justment a ter thdwar and his efforts to reclain his planta-

tion from decay and mortgage. He meet Porgy for the first

time in The Partisan, where it is pointed out that he is not

 

a "low" character at all, and that the cream of Charleston

\A

aught not to be disgusted at his seeming un“enu teelity:

"Now it will not do to misconceive.Lieutenant
1’org‘y. If we have said or shown anything calcula-
ted to lessen his dignity in the eyes of any of our
readers, remorse must follow. lorry mi;jht play the
buffoon if he pleM.sed but in the meantime let it
be und.erstood tha t'he was born to wealth and had
received the educltien of a gentleman. He had
wasted his substance, but this matter does not
much concern us now. It is only important that
he should not be supposed to waste himself. He
had been a planter--was in Home measure a plantgr
still, with broken fortunes upon the Ashepoo."l

an apology for the man who can say, ”Damn the pat triotism

fl
that won't eat stolen food.

 

12Ibid., pp. 291,292.

13?. G. Simrs,I;1e Partisan, New York, 1332, p. 358.

36.

VI The Novels

1. The Partisan

We proceed now to the worlcs themselves--Simms's
novels of the American Revolution, or The Partisan Ser-
ies, as they are sometimes called. It is simpler to deal
‘with them according to the action as it naturally progres-
ses throu h the series. The first of the group is She 5a;-
tisan: 'a TLle of the Revolution, publis h.d by Harper Bros.,
lTe ew Yorlz, in 1835; the next is mellichamo e: a Leaend 2; Egg
Santee, also byTfl mier B ros. of New York in 1836; then
Katherine Lalton, or the Rebel Q: Dorchester, published
by A. Hart, Ph eiladelahia, 1851. These three comprise a
trilosy in which many Of'the same characters aiwmlr through-
out from the earliest pages of The Partisanto the last of
Katherine Walton. This trilogy is followed, from.the his-
torical viewpoint, by The Kinsmen, gr_Black Riders Qg'ghg
Conearee, published by Lea and Blanchard of Philadelphia,
18b1, and. republished in 185h by Redfield, of New York as

T

The Scout. .he next work is The Forayers,‘g§ the Raid of
the Boa-Days, published by Redfield of New York, in 1855.
This has its sequel;,Eutaw, also published by Redfield
of New York in 1856. The final work, not in the order

of composition, is Woodc aft, 92.3%??8 Abgut.tba.fiaxar
cote, republished by Redfield, of ITew York, in 1856.

37.

Originally this story came out in 1852, published by Lip-
pincott, Grambo and Company, of Philadelnhia, and was known

at that time as The Sword and the Qisteff; 0 Fair, Fat,

 

 

”.71 ‘ . .1 .1.-. u
and norty.1 These are the novels containin

best (and some of the worst) that o mms ever wrote.

intended to build the rest of the series. In the intro-
duction we may observe how Simms put to work his principle
as exoressed in Views and Reviews 9§ American Literature,
History, and Fiction!

"The work was originally planned as the first of

a series devoted to the illustration of the war

of the Revolution in South Carolina. Uith.this
object I laid the foundation of this work more
deeply and broadly than I should have done, had

I ourposed merely the sinfile story. I designed,
in fact, a trilory. Several of the Dersens of

the story were estimated to be the property of

the series...I so arranged my material as to

make each of the stories independent of the
others...My aim has been to give a story of events
rather than of persons. The one, of course, dould
not well be done without the other; yet it has
been my object to make myself as greatly indepen-
dent as possible of the newcSSity which would
combine them. ‘A sober desire for history-~the
unwritten, the unconsidered, but veracious his-
tory--has been with.me, in this labor, a sort of
nrincinle. The phases of a time of errors and of
wrongs--of fierce courage--tenacious patriotism--
yielding, but struggling for virtue, not equal to
the pressure of circumstances, and falling for a
time, Antaeus-like, only for a renewal and recovery
of its strengtha-it as been my aim to delineate...

 

I

l M u o .n 1". . ‘ o “ . 7 v
Oscar degelin Jritincs 2a ”llllflm Gilmore bimgg, Lew Iork,
1905, pp. 13-1é;23,2o,28. '

38.

Nor is The Partisan merely a local chronicle em-
bodying traditionary characters only...Gates, har—
ion, De Kalb, Cornwallis, Tarleton, and others
are all the property of our histories...The se-
verity with which I have visited the error of
Bates, and the traits which I have given his char-
acter may be thought harsh, but they are sustained
by all the best authorities...I am.decided that
a nation gains only in glory and greatness as it
is resolute to behold and pursue the truth. I
would paint the disasters of my country, where
they arose from.the obvious errors of her sons,
in the strongest possible colors. We should then
know...how best to avoid them...I have somewhat
departed from the absolute plan of the story to
dilate upon the dangerous errors of the leading
personages in the events drawn upon. The history
of the march of Gates' army I have carefully elab-
'orated with this object; and the reflective mind
will see the parallel position of cause and effect
which I have studiously sought to make obvious,
wherever it seemed to me necessary for the purposes
of instruction. It is in this way only, that the
novel may be made useful, when it ministers to
morals, to mankind, and to society..."2

The ideas set forth in this excerpt from.the introduction
to The Partisan will be seen to agree with those in the
essays: they are, in fact, the same.

The Partisan commences with.an introductory chapter--

 

a sketch of conditions in South Carolina after the fall of
Charleston. Cornwallis rules, and Tarleton is the terror of
the land. This sketch.follows Ramsay accurately, and it is
from this point, when South Carolina was well nigh.out of
the war, except for the bands of Sumter and Marion and a

few lesser groups, that gimme begins his story. Simms be-

 

;Qp. Cit., introduction, pp. v-viii.

39.

gins well: we understand that it is to be an action story, and
as soon as the scene has been laid in the fir st chapter we are
fairly well ip_medias res. The at: 1osphcre becomes tense even
such a little way into the book as the second chapter, where
we have a sharp quarrel going on between a disgruntled young
man of the town of Dorchester, South Carolina, and the Bri-
tish sergeant Hastings.

"Look you, youn" man, do you see t: at tree? It

won't take much treason to tuck you up there."

"Treason indeed' I talk no treason, Sergeant

Eastinrs, and I defy vou to prove any a~in me. I'm

not to be frightened this time o'day, I'd have you

to know 7; and though.you are a sodger and wear a

red coat, let me tell you there is a tough colt

in the woods that your two legs can't straddle.

There is no trea seen in that, for it only concerns

one person, and that one person is your own self,

and I'm as wood a man as you any day."

It is not hard to become interested in the book with.speeches
like that before one, and The Partisan is full of them; plain
and fearless homespun speeches that make the British tyrants
and their toadies writhe in a ger.

In the fourth.chapter there is mention of Sir Henry
Clinton's proclamation. This was virtually an order for all
those who had submitted to British rule at the fall of Charles-
ton to take arms against their rebel brothers. The gist of
the proclamation runs as follows:

"...the helping hand of every man.was wanted to

reestablish peace and good aovernment...the com-

mander in chief wished not to draw them.into dan-

ger while any doubt could remain of success but
as that we s new certain, he trusted that one and

all would heartily join, and give effect to nec-
essary measures for that purpose. Those with
families nonld be permitted to remain at home

and form a militia...but from those who had no
families it was e (pected tt at they "ould cheerfully
assist in drivinq their op:ressors and all the m s-
cries of war, from their borders .”

In other words, "help the con~uerors in the pursuit and the

.1.

destruction of your own relatives and friends.” It was
enough to drive principled and peaceful Tories onto the rebel
side, as was the case in The Partisan of Col. Walton, the
father of Katherine Yaelton, the heroine of a later book.

The plot takes its departure from this edict, and we are
entertained for the next five hundred pages with the raising
of Lajor 5in3leton' s parti s«.n band, their numerous raids upon
strategic locations of British.power, the capture of Col.
Walton after the battle of Camden, and at the end of the
book, the darin3 rescue of the valuable Colonel from the
rallows by ‘irzgwl eton and a body of picked men. We wonder,
.hovrever, whether one man is worth the burning of half the
town of "Dorchester, and the de-.th of several brave woods-
men, when he has not shown hizm elf to be utterly ind s n on-
sable to American victory. rPhis brincs us to the sub plot,

-

which in la ater worlzs too freduently becomes the major one--
the love affair between Iajor 3in ugleton and Katherine Wal-
ton, the Colonel‘s daughter. It seems as if walton were to

be rescued more on the basis of his paternity than his colonclcy.

 

Q

hahsay, Listoryw of tile American Revolution, Phila-
delphi a, 1789, volZ, p. 57.

hi.

The real action of The Partisan ends with the battle
of Ce nden, in which Gates was defeated and the army nearly

destroyed. Simms's account corresponds to that of Ramsay,
with only the addition of his own characters. The last charfe
of Baron De Kalb is a remarkable piece of writing, vivid and
inspired,h-the equal to anything of the same type in Scott
or in Cooper.

There is some melodrama in The Partisan, although no-
where near as much as occurs, for instance, in Mellichampe
or The Scout. Sines cannot do love scenes. They are pages
to be skimmed or skipped entirely, since they have little
connection with the rest of the story in The Partisan. If
it were possible to e? tr icate the good from.the bad in Simms,
it would be worth while; for the bad is horrid. Consider this
briéf sample:

”Robert, you know h.w I esteen you--"

”Utter no professions, lhaie--not so coldly, at least--
if you really have any regard for me."

‘You mistake, you do me injustice,c cousin--I would not
be cold or inconsiderate. I do esteem you--'

xhsteem.”

Nell,wellé-love you, then, if you like the word better.

He pressed" her hand.

'1
|

There is_no grace to this; it is not convincing, ye Simms

drags it in by the ears to please the taste of his native

 

 

112.

Charleston. It reeks of self-consciousness. The minute

”1

Simms's characters change from those who say, nain't it?”

to those who say, “Is it not?" he loses all headway and
floundcrs about in a subliterary quagmire. Compare such

stuff with the speech of his backwoodsmen. Singleton leads
his and in search of Marion, shortly before the Battle of
Camden, and he comes upon one of Harion's scouts, whom they
approach warily, but determincdly. This man is called Thum -
scregw, who is a major character in the next book, Iviellichamne.
Says he:

”Why, hello! now; but you block a fellow in,
miahty like as ef you wanted to look at his teeth.
What mought your with be, stranger?"6

Yet his powers are not necessarily limited to the homely
frontiersman. Compare the address to the partisans on the
eve of the Battle of Camden by General Marion, certainly no
drawing room character, being infinitely above that genre:

"I take up the sword, gentlemen, with.a solemn
vow never to lay it down, until my country, as a
free country, shall no longer need my services. I
have informed myself of all these difficulties and
dangers--these inequalities of numbers and experi-
ence between us and our enemies--of which I have
plainly told you. Having them all before my own
eyes, have yet resolved to live or die in the
cause of my country, placing the risks and privations
of the war in full opposition to the honor and du-
ty--the one which I may gather in her battles, and
the other which I owe her in.maintaining them to
the last. I have told you all that I know, in or-
der that each man may make his election as I have

 

(DEE-jag. : p. 11-01;“

[3.3 .

done. I will urge no reasons why you should love
and fight for your country, as my own sense of honor
and shame would not suffer me to listen to any other
on the same subject. Determine for yourselves with-
out argument from.me. Let each man answer, singly,
whether he will go forward under my lead, or that

of any other officer that General Gates shall as-
sign, or whether he will now depart from.our ranks,
choosing a station,'henceforward, of neutrality,

if such will be allowed him, or with the forces of
our enemy. Those who determine with me, must be
ready to leave within the hour, on the route to
Lynchls Creek, and to the continental army.”

This again is some of the best of Simms, but how
self-conscious he becomes with Hajor Singleton, from
one of the best Charleston families:

"This war--the merciless, the devastating
war! Oh, my country, when wilt thou be free

from invasion--when will thy people come back to

these deserted dwellings-~when will the corn flour-

ish.areen along these stricken and blasted fields,
without danger from the trampling horse, ang the
wanton and devouring fire? When--oh,when?"

Yet in The Partisan there is considerably less of

the heart-on-sleeve writing than exists in Hellichampe.

2. Mellichampe

Mellichamne goes off on a tangent from.the circle of

 

novels of the Revolution. It begins just after the rescue

of Col. Walton at the close of The_3artisan, and its plot

 

comprises an episode, filling up the time between Gates'de-

feat and the Tory ascendency to the coming of General Greene.

 

7Ibid., pp. L29, u30.

81bid., p. 2&6.

1a.

In the introduction Simms defends himself against
that critic who objects "to the preponderance of low and
vulgar personages:i in The Partisan. That objection is ty-
pical of a romanticist, says Simms:

"...of one who is willing to behold in the pro-
gress of society none but its most lofty and
elevated attributes--who will not look at the
materials which make the million, but who picks
out from.their number the man who should rule,

not the men who should represent--who requires
every second person to be a demigod, or hero, at
the least--and Who scorns all conditions, that
only excepted which is the ideal of a pure mind
and delicate imagination. To make a fairy tale

or a tale in which.none but the colors of the rose
and rainbow shall predominate, is a very different,
and, let me add, a far less difficult matter, than
to depict life as we discover it--man in all his
phases, as he is modified by circumstance and
moulded by education-~and man as the optimist
would have and as the dreamer about inane per—
fectability delig ts to paint him..."9

The word for this is realism; and it was heresy in gentle-
manly Charleston. We must praise Simms for this, certainly,
but he did not stick to his guns as we could have wished him
to. He submitted to popular sentiment when he gave us Ernest
IJellicharrzne and Janet Berkeley, and the book is saved only by
its "preponderance of low and vulgar characters”,10 like
Thumbscrew, "Goggle" Blonay, Bill Humphries, and Lance
Trampton.

933’. G. Simms, Mellichamne, New York, 1882, pp. 5,6.

19;g;g., advertisement, p. v.

Regarding Ernest I«'lellichampe, let us see what sins
the author's apostaey led him to. The third chapter of
Mellich.amne diSIT lays at once sore of the best and some of

’1

the worst of Simms's writing. onsider the aristocratic
romantic hero whose eye is--
"black and fiery, his cheek brown and thin, his
hair of a raven black like his eye, his chin full,
his nose finely Roman, and his forehead imposingly
hi h...he seemed pass sionate and impatient, and his
thin nut deeply red lips e_uivered and colored with
every work and at every movement..”
This is dis wu ting,if itis possible at all. He learn that
he is the scion of an old plantation family whose misfor-
tunes durina the war are not to be thought on by Ernest
Hellichampe without his being maddened by it. his grief
was caused by one Captain Barsfield, a Tory leader, who
attacked the plantation of Mellichampe's father and killed
the man in a fair fiaht. IViellichampe flies into a rage
with his friend and savior on more than one occasion--
Thumbscrew--when the latter, having sighted Barsfield on
the way to the Berkeley plantation, did not shoot him.in
the back. Not shoot Barsfield in the back! Ernest treats
Thumbscrew hizh handedly for failing to do so, until his
tantrum.has run its course. This is what iimms intended

to please the Charleston best people with, who were not much

more real than some of his lite erary concoctions. The story

 

llIbid., p. 32.

is slight: the attempted wooing of Janet Berkeley hy'the
evil Barsfield, the wrath of Kellichampe, and the partisan
skirmishes with Barsfield's Tory band.

But side by side with the aristocratic mouthings there
is tLe backwoods speech.and the Negro dialect, at which
Simms was a master. Thumbscrew is something of a philoso-
pher. Mellichampe complains that Thumbscrew is too worried
about him, and the scout says:

"...I loves you, Airnest, and I watch you like

an old hen that's got but one chicken left, and

I clucks and scratches twice as much for that

very reason. If there was a dozen to look after,
new, the case would be different; I wouldn't mafia
half the fuss that I make about one: but you see,
when it so hap‘ens that the things a man's got to
love gits fewer and smaller they gits more valua-
ble, Airnest, in his sight; for he knows mighty
well, if he loves them, that he's jist like an

old bird that comes back to the tree when the blos-
soms and the flowers have all dropped off, and are
rotting under it. It's mighty nigh to winter in
his heart then, Airnest--miahty nigh—-and the
sooner he betins to look out for a place to sleep
in, the wiser man you may take him to be..."12

It speaks volumes, but there were those in Simms's time who
apparently preferred words from Janet Berkeley. at that
point in the story When it is necessary for the partisans
to burn the Berkeley place to get at Barsfield and his co-

horts Janet presents the partisans with a bow and arrows,

 

12%” P- 790

1L7 .

which are to be shot into the roof to start the fire. Sur-
prise is expressed that she should want to destroy the place,
but she reswonds bravely:

”Sacred as my home, as my own and my mother’s
birthplace, it is yet doubly sacred as my country's.
Place your combustibles upon these arrows, and send
them to the aged roof of that family mansion; and I
shall not joy the less to see it burn because it is
my father's, and should be mine, when i know that
in its ruin the people and the cause 1 love rust
triumph. God forbid and keep me from the mean
thought that I shall lose by that which to my coun-
try must be so great a gain.

It is enouah to say that the plot struggles on through

.. 2 ' "r I H I
heaters like"The maiden's Gift,'”The wounded Lover , 'Lov-
er‘s Doubts and Treams", and ”Love Passages"; that the vil-
lainous Barsfield and his hand are destroyed and the lovers
united, although at the cost of Thumbscrew's life. His
death is sentimental, but it is controlled, thorouihly be-
lievable, and suite movina. It is to be compared with the
prolonqed dyine of Emily, Singleton's sister in Ehgfliagtiggg,
and the fault seems not so much a lack of skill in.3imms as

a willingness to prostitute his art to those who object to

H
"the preponderance of low and vulgar characters .

 

13Ibid., p. 196.

3. Katherine Walton

In Kathe ine Walton, the last of the trilogy, Simms's
fault is not so much inability to describe high society as
it is the change in interest from Singleton to the British
Major Proctor.1h Simms shows that Proctor had provocation
for murdering Major Vaughan, but the sudden importance of
the former is at odds with Simms‘s expressed purpose of
showing the progress of the Revolution. Like Mellichampe
it is incidental, not concerned with.the major movements of
the time. Katherine Ualtqn "brings us to the city”, while
the other two works dealt with the interior and low and river
sections. Sinus says of his heroine that she is:

”...a woman drawn...after our best models of good

manners, good taste, goodiintellect, and noble,
renerous sensibilities; frank, boyant, 3E3 uncon-
fined; yet superior to mere convention.

She may be drawn after the best models, but she is wooden.
With one exception Simms never drew a woman in his stories

that was not wooden.

Katherine Walton was carefully assembled. She term.is

 

accurate, since Simms did much research into the times of
the occupation, and his characters-éDavid Ramsay, Tom Sin—

gleton, Harry Barry, "Had” Campbell, and Commandant Balfour,

 

lLLA. H. Quinn, Historv'gf.flmerican Fiction, flew York, 1936, p.118.

15W. G. Simms, Katherine Walton, New York, 189

 

L29 .

the ruler of Charleston and the villain of the piece-~are

all historical personafics. Simms quotes Ramsay, who is his
authority for the characterization of Balfour, as saying:
ll .
By the subverSion of every trace of popular
government, without any proper civil establish-
ment in its place, he, with a few co-adjutors, as-
sumed and exercized legislative, judicial, and ex-

ecutive powers over citizeng in the same manner as
over the common soldiery.'l

,

He was, then, a tyrant, and the book is concerned witn his
“achinations--the attemfited wooing of Katherine Walton, the
threat of Balfour to hang her father if she will not have
him, and the escape of froctor from Charleston.

Sinns allows his story to ramble on for four hundred
and sixty pages, and then rushes the ending in the last
fourteen.

Iafor E">inrgleton befriends Proctor, pretending to be a
Captain Furness, of the loyalist backwoods riflcmen. For a
while his speech is typical of the frontiersman, but presently

Simms foréets himself and allows ”Furness" to Speak out of

O
I

larathr’ Which dereliction no one seems to notice-~except
the reader. Although Simms makes tolerable fun of British

society in Charleston, we miss the swamps and the forests.

J

Enen thouqh the melodrama is kept within reasonable limits,

the story does not compare favorably in interest with The

Partisan.

 

161b1d., an. 9,10.

a. The Scout
We proceed now to the next book in the nevolutionary
series: The Scout. It's action occurs at about the time
of General Greene's first victories, pushing the British
‘back toward Charleston. The story makes an excellent start--
‘better than Katherine Walton or Mellichamne. Simms shows
1113 descriptive powers in the first chapter:
. "The dusky shadows of evening were approaching
fast. Clouds, black with storm, that threatened mo-
mently to discharge their torrents, depended aloomily
above the bosom of the wateree. a deathlike stillness
overhung the scene. The very breezes...had at length
folded themselves up to slumber on the dark surface
of the sluggish swamps below. ITO voice of bird or
beast, no word of man, denoted, in that ghost- -like
revion, the presence of any form of life...‘
Here is something Simms knows and believes in, and his work
is gOOdo
Unfortunately, after an admirable beginning, we are con-
fronted with more melodrama--perhaps the worst isimms ever
wrote. The plot basically concerns the fight of the parti-
sans against a Tory outlaw hand known as The Black Riders
of the Congaree. The rebels are led by Clarence Conway, the
lover of Flora Middleton; while the Black Riders are led by
Edward Conway, Clarence's half brother and rival for Flora's

love. The climax is the fight between the brothers, and Ed-

ward is beaten and left for dead. We are sorry to see that

51.

he is not actually so, and the melodrama goes on for a great
many more pages, relieved for a time by Greene's siege of
Ninety-Six, and the retreat of the British.
There are murky dialogues between the brothers, who
frequently address each other as llClarnece Conway” and
""1 : . o 1
ndward Conway'. On the whole the book 18 too ta ky, and
except for the scout, i’upple Jack Bannister, we are glad
enouwh to lay it down. Strangely, The Scout contains some
very good humor. Among the funniest pages Simms are those
in which the Tory scout, Watsan Gray, leaps upon Supple Jack
near the Hiddleton plantation, saying:
"Oh: ho! Caucht at last, Supple Jack; Supple,
the famousl Y our limbs will scarcely help you now...
"...Watson Gray...You‘re rather a small build of
a man, if my memory serves me rightly-~you 'ha'n'tn
half my heft, and can't surely think to manage me.
"I do indeed...If I'm light, you'll find me
strong-—strong enoufh to keep your arms fast till my
wild Lrish come up, and lay you backward.

"Well, that may be, Watson. But my’arms ain't
r I
my legs, my lad. keep them, if you can.

it

and Jack trots off down the road with Watson unexpectedly
and helplessly piggy-back.

"...It's but nateral that you should kick and worry,
at riding a nag that you hadn't bitted, Eatson Grey,
but it's of no use; you're fairly mounted, and there's
no getting off in a hurry...’

17W. G. gimme, The §gg§£;,N9W York, 1882’ p. 231’

52.

The scene is ludicrous, and a wonderful change for the
better; but it is too short. The melodramatic clouds close

in again wi h little relief to the end of the book.

5. The Forayers
The Forayprs and Eutaw may be considered together, s ince
at the end of the former book several matters are left pend-
ing that are settled in Eutaw. The

vs 03 ens at the moment when Rtwdon is pre-

0 yield the care of the army to his lieutenant
), at the moment when, aporoaching Orangeburg
lalace of rest, after the retreat from Ninety-Six,
after the abandonment and destruction of Camden, after
the loss of almost all their posts in the interior, the
British...are seeking to sna atch a momentary rest from
fatigue and da n er--not willing to seek their fees , and
scarcely able to cover themselves from.pursuit. 1

51' 1-"

That is the background, against which the hero, ”illie Sinclair
and hi-s zen vanquish Hell-rirc Dick's out aws and the Tory band
led by Captain Inglehardt, a man With ambition, and the cunning
and coldness to gratify it, a man who (to appear doubly vil-
lainout to aristocratic readers) had

"abandoned his caste, an unforgivable offense
which moved the dislike of all its members. lé

Inslehardt has the father of Bertha Travis, Willie's true
love, in his power-—has evidence against him.that would

ruin him if it were aiven to the Br r1t ish, and, in short,

offers Travis the choice of the halter for himself or the

 

1 I! r1 ‘3' . "‘ f
18%. G. Dimms, The Forayers, New York, 188:, p. o.

lglbid., pl 292.

S3.

altar for his daughter and Inglehardt. All these affairs

are only settled at the close of Eutaw, which could almost

be called the second volume of The Forayers, were it not for
the battle at Eutaw Springs near the end of the book. Neither
volume is satisfactory in itself, and both together are infer—
ior to The Partisan, for Simms becomes too involved in plot

and subplot and evil machinations to do justice to what was

P-

his original inspirat on --the fight for independence.

I

o. Woodcragt

The last book in the series is Woodcraft. Set in the
post revolutionary period after 1732, it is remarkably free
from the turgid melodrama of the preceding three works. As
in the other books, many of its characters are ”drawn from
the life”,20 and those who are not are superior to those
modelled on real personages of the time. Captain Percy re-
turns to his estate, new in ruins, with two stout friends,
the one-armed Serreant Millhouse, and Lance Trampton, a young
man of eiqhteen or nineteen who first appears in The Partisan.
There are few plot digressions--the idea being constantly in
mind to release Porgy from debt, make his plantation upon the

Ashepoo a flourishing estate, and marry if he can either the

 

20W. G. Simms, Woodcraft, New York, 1882, p. 3.

Sb.- 0

riCh widow Eveleifzh or the poorer but comelier widow Griffin,
Lance's mother. Porgy succeeds in all but the marital mat-
ters, the widow Eveleiah preferring to remain a friend and the
‘widow Griffin marrying Fordham, the backwoodsman overseer on

Mrs. Eveleiah's plantation.

VII. Simms's Characters

“1

- . ‘41.“ fig- L‘z.‘ “.md

Little has been said so far about Simms's characters,

j .
n

and only slightly more about their speeches. Let us first

consider the women and then the men, most of whom need only

7'.

a few words said about them.

p.

Ir - - ' ~
——--I—-— -——._"—o'-l“

Simms does not do his women well. Except for the widow

-.
2..-;

     

 

Erewton in Katherine Walton, they are almost all oversensi-

tive, priggish, wooden puppets. There are only two women
The first

0.
1-!-"

SO

upon whom it is worthwhile to comment otherwi c.

of these is Eother Blonay. In her case he does not need to

bother with female psychology, for she is a witch-like per-

son, about whom we do not remember so much that she is a we-

man as that she is a fearful creature whose features were:
"thin, shrivelled...darkly yellow, hag-like, and
jaundiced. The skin was tightly drawn across the
face, and the high cheekbones and the nose seemed dis—
posed to break through the slender restraints of their
covering. Her eyes were small and sunken, of a light
grey, and had a vicious twinkle, that did not accord
with.the wretched and decayed aspect of her other fea-

tures..."

 

1W. G. Simms, The Partisan, New York, 1882, pp. 180,181.

55.

The other exception is Ellen Floyd, the Cassandra-like
sister of l'zat Floyd. She makes a startling appearance in
Eutaw, rescuina her brother as he is about to be hanred by
Lein Watkins and his outlow gang. She shows herself a we-
man of action in this passage.2 She devotes her life to
keeping her weaklina brother out of trouble, knows woodcraft
like any scout, and has a stranae gift of prophecy which her
loutish associates consider madness. She is intelligent,

high minded, and unassuming. b'uch is the woman--the only

5’

really interestinc one 5 1ms ever created-—whom he has cal-
led up from.his imasination; but he seems not to know just
what to do with her, and he throws her away, finally, letting
her be shot to death by Hell-Fire Dick.

Major Sinfaleton would likely have been a stilted, un-
believable creature had he been confined to the drawing room,
but the backwoods firhters needed a leader, and he is an ad-
mirable one. He plans the expeditions and directs them; he
is active all the time, and when,ta king with his brothers-
in-arms he is decisive and energetic. If he made more love
to Katherine Walton than he is allowed to, he would sink in

our estimation. 0n the whole he is level-headed, and not

set before us so often that we tire of him.

 

2W. G. Simms, Eutaw, New York, 1382: D5- 23'33-

56.

Colonel Yalton is a shadowy individual, and except for
his being an illustration of how certain colonists reacted
to the infamous call to arms proclamation of Sir Henry Clin-
ton, and by his capture enabling the plot of Katherine Hal-
ton to be formulated he serves no special purpose and calls
for no particular development.

Ernest mellichampe has been dealt with previously. He
is a literary monster--the product of cancerous romanticism.

Balfour, the commandant of Charleston, Simms drew from
life, using Ramsay (already quoted) as his authority. He,
Edward Conway, Captain Barsfield, Captain Inglehardt, and
1“Jr. M'Kewn all comprise that group which may be termed high-
character-villain; and they are not much different from the
nineteenth century melodrama type that flouriShed during
Simms's life time.

Clarence Conway has nothing memorable about him. He
is simply his brother's antithesis, even in the matter of
appearance--Edward being swarthy and Clarence fair.

Old Colonel Sinclair is a little more unusual, but not
sufficiently pleasing. He is blindly loyal to British rule,
which.Porgy gently ridicules him for.

The most interesting of all Simms's characters is the
eigantic Foray, philosopher, humorist, gentleman, and no less

(3

a fighter. His manner of speech is illustrated here in his

57.

criticism of Col. Sinclair's disparagement of the Americans:
”Hy venerable friend, you never, I fancy, heard

of Ike Kassey's bulldog?"

"You are right in your fancy."

”Jell, sir, Ike had a bulldoa--a famous bulldog--
that whipped all other dogs, and whipped all bulls,
and Ike honestly believed that he could whip all beasts
that ever roared in the valley of Bashan. On one oc-
casion, he pitted him arainst a young bull, whom.he
expected to see him.pull down at the first jerk, muzzle,
and throttle in a jiffey. But it so happened that fow-
ser--the name of his dog--had, in the process of time,
lost some of his teeth. He did take the bull by the
nose, but the younm animal shook the old one off, and
with one stamp of his hoof he crushed all the life out
of Towser. But Ike, to the day of his death, still
believed in Towser, and swore that the dog had no
fair play; that the bull had impronerly used his hoofs
on the oécasion; and that, in fact, having honestly
taken his enemy by the nose, according to bulldog
science, the victory must still be conceded to him.
How, your faith in British science is not unlike
that of Ike flassey in his dogs; but the bull may safely
concede the science, so long as he can stamp his ene-
my to pieces. We are workina just in this fashion in
our fihhting with the British. They have the science,
but they are losing the teeth; while we are young and
vigorous, lack the science, and have the strenqth.
Scientifically, the British whip us in all our con-
tests; but we do an immense amount.of very interesting
bull-stamping all the while; and it is surprising how
much doq life we are crushing out of the British car-
cass...

Porgy nresents some interesting conflicts. For instance,
the man rho could speak thus wisely would ruin his rice crop
by draininfi the fields to catch the perch out of them, just

to satisfy his astoundina appetite.

 

3Ibid., p. 350.

58.

Porgy is nearly matched in interest by a group of wild-
erness scouts, such as Simms may have known when he visited
his father in Kississippi. Among the best of these are 5up-
ple Jack Bannister, Thumbscrew, and Jim Ballou. These men
and others like them call a spade a spade, are fearless, and
have a miraculous knowledge of hunting and tracking--aenerally
known as "woodcraft". when Jim Ballou starts to track Henry
Travis's captors in Egg Forayers we must wonder at the remark-
able loaic he uses in following the culprits' horses, telling
them from all others by tell-tale marks which.would be hidden

iron any but a practiced eye.u

VIII. Dialogue

Some samples have been given of the types of speech to
be found in Simms's works. Enough has been said about the
flowery dialOgues, but more may be said of the backwoods and
the Negro dialects. The speeches of these people are nota-
ble for homely but sharp imagery, for realistic syntactical
arrangement, for successful spelling of the printed words to

match.the pronunciation, and finally for a consistency in all

these things throughout the seven books. In this Cooper cannot

 

MW. G. Simms, The Fora erg, New York, 1832, pp. L65, #68.

59.

even be compared with Simms. The only failure-—a nodding
iHomer--is in Singleton's impersonation of Captain Furness,
'whose backwoods speech wears off like whitewash in a rain
storm; and no notice is taken of the change. For imagery I
Give these examples:
:I sweatc d like a bull in fly time"
now look you, sex! you don 't lie close and keep

still, b the eternal fires, I'll slash your oozen

(weasand jest as auick as I would that of a fat

shote in December...”1
It has been noted by sociolo ists that among primitiVe peo-
ples and among the less sophisticated of our own civiliza-
tion the lack of modifiers acquired throuah formal education
is amply made up by the use of similies and metaphors. Thus
where a learned man mifiht cut a man's throat deliberately,
coldly, and remorselessly, a certain villainous scout would
do it as he would ”that of a fat shote in December”, the hog
cilling time. Notice the aphoritic dualities of this sample:

"The cues tion no::, I reckon--now, that you' ve

aot him in your clutches-~is what you're doing to

do with him. To my thinking, it' s jest the sort of

cuestion tha.t bothered the man when he shook hands

with the black bear round the tree. It was a starve

to hold on and a soueeze to let go, and da ger to
the mortal ribs whichever way he took it.

 

lIbido ’ 7.3-? . "112 , LLB .

2W. G. Simms, The Scout, New York, 1382, p. 111.

so.

A good simile:

”Lyin~ comes ag natural to a trooper as mother' 3
milk to an infant.

The one-a.med Millhouse' s loyalty to, and determination to
work for, his friend Porgy:

”But I‘m rot a hell of a big heart for my
friend, Tom, by thunder; and when there's heart
enough in a man' s buzzom, Tom, he can always find
arms enough to sarve his fri nd even if so be
both hand.s are chopped off.

The ca.reful fitt ing of Soelling to pronunciation is observ-
able in this:

I! ' o . ”5

...he d a-j01ned us long ago...
Here is Son Negro dialect:

”Ki! ”sussa: you no lub sleep you 'se'f, da‘s
no reason why he no mood for udder people. fli3ger
lub sleen, mass torgy, an' 'taint 'specéfvl for um
to git up in de morning before de sun.

Besides his skill in dialect, Simms has a flair for names,

and those of his backwoods heroes and villains linger in the

 

l 'r . "v a ~~ ‘7 __
;i G. Simms, deodorait, new iork, 1882, p. 10h.

 

’ -. fl 0 r'm "‘ ,1. .0 ‘3 "‘I , ‘7' -31.. an? .-
"I o K‘ . 0:].TL.S , [1’10 :- (Pint—1'15: '22:, J5"? ..r -‘- (filfi-s’ 11‘“, J o

\ -.
< 1?)

 

. 0 c2. . I" o o "' g . ¢ .- .
Inind. ~upole Jack, nearing Dick, flex Souirrel, The frailer,
iiill-Fire Dick, “Goggle” Blonay, Thumbscrew, and The Serpent
are sure to he rem mbered for their heroism.or their wicked-

:ness, and all the more so because of the titles they bear.

IX. Critical Judgment of gimme

It is regretable that Simms should have been so concerned

5 ! I o ' ~ 0 1 o
with belonging” to Charleston society. He might have av01ded

IJ

Ernest He lichampe and others of that ilk if he had been a

little less impressionable or a little more wise. It would

have been easier for him in his last years had he never be-
come disillusioned, never seen Charleston in the proner light.
His father's words came home:

"Thirty-odd years have passed, and I can now
mournfully say that the old man was right. All
that I have (done) has been poured to waste in
Charleston, which has never smiled on any of my
labors, which has steadily ignored my claims,
which has disparafied me to the last, has been the
last place to give me its adhesion, to which I
owe no favor, having never received an office, or
a compliment, or a dollar at her hands; and with
the exception'of some dozens of her citizens, who
have been kind to me, and some scores of her young
men, who have honored me with a loving sympathy
and something like reverence; which.has always
treated me rather as a public enemy, to be sneered
at, than as a dutiful son doing her honor. And
_I, too, know it as a place of tombs. I have buried
six dear children within its soil! Great God! What
is the sort of slavery which brings me hither."1

 

13. P. Trent, Villiam.Gilmore Simms, Boston, 1892, p. 239.

62.

I

5-1-4

is epitaih, which he composed himself, reflects his disap-
‘pointment'

”Here lies one who, after a reasonably lone life,
distinguished chiefly by increasing labors, has left
all his better works undone.”2

iHad.Simms spent less time pandering to the petty tasks of
Charleston society, and in extra-literary matters, he might
never have written such an epitaph. As it is, he adjudged

himself succinctly and accurately. Said Kayne:

I? . Q 0 O
31mms's Genius never had fair play! Circumstances
. I H o 1 H
hampered him. inus the man was areater than h1s works.

”A really freat author...5imms emphatically T

I s
and there is no use in maintaining so fulsome a propeei-
o o a '
t1on. But h1s talents were splendid...
Said Foe:
"...He has more vigor, more imagination, more movement,
and more weneral c pacity than all our novelists (save
Cooper) conbincd.”+
This essay has been concerned with the best of his wri-
tings, the novels of the American Revolution. There is enoughg
good in them to show what he mirht have done had he been will-

ing and able to control his imagination, to revise and to trim

his prolix productions; and, like another southerner, Edgar

 

31bid., pp. 321, 322.

LLE. A. foe, Works, New York, 1871, vol. III, p. 510.

A.

63.

Allen Poe, to leave the discouraging section to which he de-
voted himself and free himself from.the political and other

encrvating concerns which took so many of his best years and

thoughts.

6&1

B I B L I O G R A P H Y

f Washington Irving, Philadelphia,(19h5).

Brooks, Van Uka, World

 

Cambridge History of American Literature, vol. I, (1917).

Curti, Merle 3., Growth of American Thought, New York,(l9h3).

 

Dictionary g§_American Biography, article by Carl Van Doren,

T1939).

.Iarrinaton, Vernon L. Main Currents g§_flmerican Thought, New
York, 1930, vol. 2.

 

l o ,- . . . ‘7 /
Quinn, Arthur H., History of American Fiction, h w York, (1930).

 

?amsay, David, History of the American Revglution, Philadelphia,
1789 .

Simms, William Gilmore:

Views and Reviews in American Literature,_History, and
Lict1on, new ork, 1 4)).

The Partisan, New Y ork,(1582).

Mellichamne, New YOPk9(1882)‘

 

Katherine Walton, New York, (1882).
The Scout, New York,(1882).
___.__fi__.

The Forayers, New Y ork,(1882).

 

Eutaw, New York,(1882).

Woodcraft, New York,(1882).

 

Spiller, Thorp et a1., Literary History_gf the United States,
New York,(l9h8). '

Trent, William.P., William Gilmore Simms, Boston,(1892).

o~9
l

fer613n, Oscar, writings 92 William Gilmore gimme, New York,
1906 .

h‘.r.41.aifir-s..‘. - a a

van]

RBGM Us: My

'~ ‘52