Sargent, Lucius M. (Lucius Manlius), 1786-1867

A miscellaneous writer, antiquarian, and temperance advocate, Sargent was born in Boston to Daniel and Mary Turner Sargent. His father was a wealthy merchant, and Sargent attended Philips Exeter Academy before entering Harvard in 1804. He resigned three years later after publishing a criticism of the college food called No. 1 of the New Milk Cheese. He studied law and passed his bar examination, but he turned to literature and writing after receiving a substantial inheritance (Kunitz and Haycraft 670).

He published The Culex of Virgil and a collection of Latin riddles in 1807, and in 1812, he wrote another volume of poems. His "Wreaths for a Chieftain" was sung at the Boston peace celebration of 1812. He wrote extensively for newspapers and became a visible member of the temperance movement, publishing The Temperance Tales in support of the cause (Kunitz and Haycraft 670). He wrote a series of weekly articles as an antiquarian for the Boston Evening Transcript. These were satirical sketches, entitled "Dealings with the Dead by a Sexton of the Old School" (Wilson and Fiske 68). At the age of seventy-five, he published The Ballad of the Abolition Blunder-buss, a harsh criticism of Emerson and other opponents of slavery. In 1842, Harvard conferred an honorary degree upon him in recognition of his service to the temperance and antiquarian fields (Kunitz and Haycraft 670).

Kunitz, Stanley J. and Howard Haycraft, ed. American Authors 1600 - 1900. New York: Wilson, 1938. 670.

Wilson, James Grant and John Fiske, eds. Appleton's Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Vol. II. New York: Appleton, 1888. 68.

Written by Stephen Rachman