Book Reviews

BOOK REVIEWS

Philadelphia in the Romantic Age of Lithography. An illustrated history of early lithography in Philadelphia wifh a descriptive list of Philadelphia scenes made by Philadelphia lithographers before 1866. By NICHOLAS B. WAINWRIGHT. (Philadelphia: The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1958. [xii], 261 p. Index. $10.00.) Here is a book that devotees of the American past have long been waiting and hoping for. The iconography of Philadelphia is richer, perhaps, than that of any American city. Yet far too little has been written about it, and there is an almost scandalous dearth of good Philadelphia picture books. Mr. Wainwright's book is more than good: it is a joy to behold and read. It is an outsized quarto volume, printed with meticulous care and taste. The no illustrations are all full-page in size, and they are so beautifully reproduced in lithographic offset that some of them could almost pass for original prints. These scenes of nineteenth-century Philadelphia are indeed roman- tically charming, as the title implies. But they are also honest in detail, and teeming with life and energy. They show the city hard at work, as well as having fun. This effect has been achieved by including a number of the large lithographed "trade cards'* of business firms—iron works, hat factories, hotels, harness shops, etc.—which were used as advertising posters, and often feature a busy array of customers, clerks, and passersby. There are so many delightful pictures here that it is hard to pick out favorites. This reviewer would certainly want to include the "Commis- sioners Hall, Northern Liberties" with its gay foreground scene of sleighing parties and snowball-throwing boys. "Railroad Bridge over the Wis- sahickon" offers a fascinating glimpse of an 1834 locomotive and two open- air passenger coaches rolling across the bridge at Manayunk. There is a wonderful peep into an 1830 oyster cellar, and two lively views of skaters on the Delaware. J. C. Wild's 1838 panorama of the whole city from the tower of Independence Hall is reproduced in all four of its views—east, west, north, south — the nearest thing to an aerial look that the period affords. In fact, one can find here almost everything that was amusing or interesting to look at in Victorian Philadelphia: steamboats, prisons, bridges and fountains, the Chinese Pagoda and the Fairmount Waterworks, hearses, ice wagons and handcarts, even a fancy dress ball and a parade of Civil War Zouaves. And, of course, a constant display of parasols and beaver hats. 95 $6 BOOK REVIEWS January No single volume could contain the whole pictorial record of the city. Mr. Wainwright has done an intensive job on one kind of art, lithography, and a limited period, 1828 to 1866, when lithographed views and genre scenes were at their best. He has written an absorbing account of the be- ginnings of lithography in Philadelphia, its early failures and its full tide of success, and the rapid technological changes in the industry to the end of the Civil War. He has brought together much new information on the leading printers and publishers: Cephas G. Childs, J. C. Wild, P. S. Duval, J. T. Bowen and others who made the city a headquarters for the production of handsome and popular prints. He makes it clear that Philadelphia lithography was quite a different matter from the crude "sentimentals" of New York's Currier and Ives. (Nathaniel Currier, incidentally, was a failure in Philadelphia, where he had his first business in the 1830's.) The Philadelphians, Mr. Wainwright says, "concentrated on making prints of artistic merit." They employed talented artists, including the famous deaf-mute Albert Newsam, who had no equal in portrait lithography. During this period the Philadelphia firms turned out many groups of prints which had national and historic importance: the Indian portfolios of McKenney and Hall, the Huddy & Duval plates of military organizations and uniforms, the octavo Audubon birds and quadrupeds, for example. A Philadelphia lithographer, Thomas Sin- clair, published the first colored view of San Francisco after the discovery of gold in 1849. Another, Duval, made the famous illustrations for Com- modore Perry's report of his expedition to Japan. Lithography became a sizable business in Philadelphia. In 1856 there were sixteen firms operating 177 presses, many of them driven by steam and using new processes for color printing that foreshadowed the early arrival of mass-produced chromos. This book is by far the best account of the many individuals and firms whose careers in lithography were centered in Philadelphia. As such it will have permanent value to historians and researchers everywhere. The same can be said of the "Print List of Philadelphia Views" which occupies more than half of the text pages. Here is a numbered list of 480 lithographed views and scenes, all within the time limits of the book, with descriptive notes on each, and locations for most. It is the longest list yet assembled of Philadelphia views for any period. This is a volume to be put alongside Stokes's Iconography of Manhattan Island, and the great compilations of Harry T. Peters, on any shelf of pictorial history. The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, which published the book, the Philadelphia firms that produced it, and the author who wrote it have every reason to be proud.

Hartwicky N. Y. ROGER BUTTERFIELD 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 97

Crane Hook on the Delaware, 1667-1699. An Early Swedish Lutheran Church and Community with the Historical Background of the Delaware River Valley. By JEANNETTE ECKMAN. (Newark, Del.: Published for the Delaware Swedish Colonial Society by the Institute of Delaware His- tory and Culture, 1958. xvi, 144, [vi] p. Illustrations,maps, bibliography, index. Paper, $3.50.) To form a congregation, build a church, and engage a pastor to preach and minister to them was an ambition held by many seventeenth-century settlers in the New World. Whether it was land, trade profits, or the quest for a "New Jerusalem" that brought them here, along with the building of cabins and blockhouses, the clearing of land, and the planting of a crop, the newcomers were equally concerned about the nourishment and security of their souls. But frontier conditions imposed numerous obstacles to the attainment of formal church organization and to modes of worship that were spiritually satisfying. Miss Eckman's account of the Swedish Lutherans who settled on the Delaware in the 1630's is a documentary description of a more than fifty- year effort to achieve a permanent religious establishment with an adequate edifice, a learned and eloquent pastor, and a congregation faithful in at- tendance and generous in support. From the familiar secondary sources the history of New Sweden is retold in several introductory chapters—discovery and exploration, the first settlements of the Swedes and Dutch, re- lations with the Indians, and the changing control of the region from Swedish to Dutch to English. Glimpses are given of the religious life of the settlers, in many ways reflecting the crude, rough, vigorous life they lived. Bibles, psalmbooks, and catechisms were few but well worn in the first places of worship, a log building at Fort Christina, a church at Tinicum, and another at Wicaco (Philadelphia). Respect and support to their pastors, Reorus Torkillus, the first Lutheran minister in America, Laurentius Carolus Lokenius, and Magister Jacobus Fabricius, were sometimes with- held or grudgingly given because of the poverty of the parishoners, ec- clesiastical factionalism, or the bizarre conduct of the men of the cloth. If the sermons of Lokenius and Fabricius reflected to any degree their secular actions—as pictured by contemporaries—they should not have wanted for full and attentive audiences on Sunday mornings. Turning to church records, court records, deeds and surveys, documents and letters in Swedish archives, and a 1731 Upsala University dissertation written by the son of a later pastor, the author stitches together the history of Crane Hook Church from 1667 to 1699. The location and acquisition of the church site is described through a tedious recital of surveys and property holders. Reference to the two maps prepared by Jeremiah Sweeney and Leon de Valinger at the back of the volume would have sufficed. The log church, built like a blockhouse, was erected under the eye of Pastor Lokenius who was described by two Dutch Reformed clergymen as "... a man of 98 BOOK REVIEWS January impious and scandalous habits, a wild, drunken, unmannerly clown, more inclined to look into the wine can than into the Bible. He would prefer drinking brandy two hours to preaching one; and when the sap is in the wood his hands itch and he wants to fight whomsoever he meets." But this is possibly slander uttered by men who lacked the Christian virtue of charity, for in other sources Lokenius, despite his crudities and quirks, is praised as a faithful and zealous clergyman. He was succeeded in 1688 by the elderly, blind Fabricius who had been serving at Wicaco. Lay readers, particularly Charles Springer, were the stalwarts who aided these pastors and looked after the church's material concerns, particularly real estate acquired over the years. Gifts of Bibles, psalmbooks, books of sermons, catechisms, and ABC books were made to the congregation by King Carl XII of Sweden. William Penn also presented the congregation with a chest of Bibles and other religious literature. In 1697 Swedish Lutheran authorities sent several young ministers to serve the Delaware congregations. Erik Bjork became pastor at Crane Hook and Andreas Rudman at Wicaco. Within a short time both congregations began constructing new, stone churches as more fitting monu- ments to the glory of God. That at Wilmington was located on a slope over- looking the site of old Fort Christina and named Holy Trinity (Old Swedes). Rudman's church at Wicaco was named Gloria Dei. Before the dedication of Holy Trinity on Trinity Sunday, June 4, 1699, the methodical Pastor Bjork listed the names of the one hundred twenty-five men who had given 1,083 days of free work, those who had contributed building materials, horses, and oxen, and those who had boarded masons and carpenters in their homes. Of all these willing hands Pastor Bjork singled out Charles Springer as his alter ego, the one who had given most generously and un- reservedly of time, means, and talents toward this proud achievement of an ambition held dear by two generations of Swedish Lutherans on the Dela- ware. The concluding chapters pursue the Springer theme with an account of the family in Sweden and a fitting eulogy to Charles Springer (1658— 1738) for the religious and civic leadership he gave the Swedish community. This volume is really a collection of source materials gathered and col- lated as a project of the Delaware Federal Writers' Project under the direction of Jeremiah Sweeney in 1938-1940. In more recent years Mr. and Mrs. Courtland B. Springer discovered and translated other documents in Swedish sources which were incorporated into the study. The Delaware Swedish Colonial Society and the Institute of Delaware History and Cul- ture have served local and church history by having Miss Eckman edit them, capably if not felicitously. Readability would have been enhanced by more attention to style and by summarizing or paraphrasing some of the lengthier, less important documents. The maps and illustrations are appropriate and well executed, but careless proofreading is evident on pages 59, 69, 88, 115, and 127. Hagley Museum NORMAN B. WILKINSON 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 99

Give Me Liberty. The Struggle for Self-Government in Virginia. By THOMAS J. WERTENBAKER. [Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 46.] (Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Society, 1958. x, 275 p. Illustrations, bibliography, index. $3.00.) The theme of this readable account of the colonial history of Virginia is the struggle of Virginians, or at least the ruling class, for the management of their own affairs, especially for the control of the purse. The reader meets, one after another, the royal governors, distinguished by individual char- acteristics, but all intent to some degree in promoting their own interests or those of the Crown. In either case they often came into conflict with the representative assembly, which was naturally more concerned with the welfare of its own members or of the people. Although the Virginians had various grievances against their governors, such as interference with the church vestries, attacks on freedom of the press, and the danger of having troops quartered in their houses, Mr. Werten- baker indicates that the real threat to liberty was "taxation without representation." He contends, moreover, that this principle was not new at the time of the Revolution, but that it had been stated in substance whenever Virginians resisted attempts to take their property without their consent. For the author's thesis the subjects of taxation and representation would appear to be of basic importance. Yet the author has not treated either of these topics fully enough to make his argument completely convincing; nor has he in every situation connected the two factors closely enough to make the reader certain that Virginians were actually protesting lack of representation and not just taxes. Mr. Wertenbaker includes quit rents, for example, in his broad definition of taxation, but supplies little information on this subject. In the case of a royal plan for increasing the value of payments he does suggest that the assembly protested the lack of legislative sanction (p. 115). But he does not mention the seemingly important fact that crown officials managed these rents, that payments from the fund were made on the basis of royal warrants, and that in the eighteenth century surpluses were regularly sent to England and used to supplement the king's civil list. Did the assembly ever object to these practices? And if not, what is the significance? The failure of the Virginia assembly to obtain control of the crown dues raised in that province stands in marked contrast to the success of the Jamaicans, for example, and would seem to call for comment in connection with a study of self- government. The subject of representation receives even more casual treatment; but possibly it is enough to know that after the earliest years suffrage was re- stricted to landholders (p. 27). The reader's feeling that representation needs further clarification may arise from the repeated use of the term "self-government," without explanation of the connotation which this term should have in any discussion of the colonial period. IOO BOOK REVIEWS January Other imprecise or exaggerated words or phrases tend to obscure the real nature of colonial government. Occasional use of the word "democracy" may easily create a wrong impression of political conditions. "Despotism," "tyranny," and "the Virginia Hitler" (applied to Sir Francis Nicholson) overdramatize situations, to say the least. In fact, the choice of words sug- gests an interpretation of colonial history with which many students would probably disagree. Throughout the book Mr. Wertenbaker appears to be pleading the cause of the assembly. He apparently accepts the assembly's interpretation of its own "rights," without taking account of the possibility that the Crown might have a different but legitimate point of view. Probably unintention- ally the author of Give Me Liberty creates the impression that the Crown had no rights in the internal government of Virginia as against the will of the assembly. This effect mars an otherwise useful narrative of political events in the history of this province. In the light of recent challenges to Wertenbaker's earlier interpretation of Bacon's Rebellion, readers may be particularly interested to know whether he adheres to the theories expressed in Torchbearer of the Revolution (Princeton, 1940). He does. In this most recent account he still makes Bacon the hero of a popular uprising in defense of liberty, and Governor Berkeley the villain in the piece. In support of his thesis he has added the Bath Papers to the many sources used for his earlier work. As far as English archives are concerned, Mr. Wertenbaker has relied heavily upon the Colonial Office Papers in the Public Record Office. Had he also explored the Treasury Papers and other records of that department, he might have enriched his data on the subject of the Crown's control of money raised in Virginia. Wilson College DORA MAE CLARK

Patrick Henry, Patriot in the Making. By ROBERT DOUTHAT MEADE. (Phila- delphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1957. xiv, 431 p. Illustrations, index. $7.50.) This is the first of two volumes that will provide the most exhaustive biography yet written of a figure who has always been something of an enigma in American history. Even his famous speeches are reconstructions based on contemporary reports and the memories of those who heard them. Most of our popular knowledge of Patrick Henry is based on the early nineteenth- century biography by William Wirt, a romantic and fabulous account that hardly ranks above Parson Weems's life of Washington for accuracy. To collect all the available data about Patrick Henry, Professor Meade has ransacked the archives of this country and Great Britain, and if he has made no startling new discoveries, he has brought together his evidence in 1959 BOOK REVIEWS IOI an orderly fashion and interpreted it in a way that puts Henry's life into perspective and corrects many old myths. The present volume brings the story down to the end of the First Continental Congress. Mr. Meade points out that under the spell of the romantic school, Wirt pictured Patrick Henry as "a mere child of Nature, and Nature seems to have been too proud and too jealous of her work, to permit it to be touched by the hand of art." Nevertheless, Wirt said, Nature gave "him Shake- speare's genius and bade him ... to depend on that alone." Believing no nonsense of this sort, Mr. Meade looked into Henry's background and discovered that he had a very good classical education. His father was John Henry, who spent four years at the University of Aberdeen before emigrat- ing to Virginia. His Uncle Patrick, after whom he was named, had an M.A. degree from Aberdeen. From his father young Patrick received a sound grounding in Latin, Greek, mathematics, and history. "Among the fathers of some distinguished eighteenth or early nineteenth century Virginians— Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Pendleton, Monroe, and Marshall," Mr. Meade observes, "none was so well educated as John Henry and none transmitted as much book learning to his son." This fact is worth emphasizing, for Patrick Henry has sometimes been pictured as an unlettered back-countryman who succeeded by his gift for demagoguery, and the back- country Scots have been characterized by a living colonial historian, who ought to know better, as ignorant barbarians. Patrick Henry was brought up in the frontier county of Hanover, Virginia, where he learned many things besides the knowledge in books. After trying his hand unsuccessfully at storekeeping, he turned to law and first won fame for his arguments in the famous "Parson's Cause." In this case, Henry "proved himself a master of the art of swaying a popular audience," says Mr. Meade. "And in attacking the tyranny of Church and State he had said, boldly and forcefully, what most of the people felt, yet had never heard expressed, at least in public assembly." In emphasizing the significance of this case as a turning point in Henry's career, Mr. Meade shows how he immediately became a popular hero and a leader of the backwoods group who were restive under the increasing restrictions of British authority. Less than two years later Henry was in the House of Burgesses denouncing the Stamp Act and making the first of the speeches which every schoolboy remembers: "Tarquin and Caesar had each his Brutus," etc. Mr. Meade provides an interesting discussion of the reaction of Henry's listeners to this speech and the precise words which they reported. The last chapter in this volume, headed "Public Crisis and Private Sor- row," describes Henry's journey to the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia and the fatal illness of his wife. The most critical portion of Henry's career is yet to be treated and the reader must look forward to the second volume for an appraisal of Henry's character in the light of any new evidence that Mr. Meade may have yet in store. Up to this point, the pic- IO2 BOOK REVIEWS January

ture one gets of Henry is that of a skillful manipulator of the emotions of an audience. If he is not a rabble rouser, he has some of the skill in that field of a Samuel Adams, and it is hard not to compare the two. This is a careful and workmanlike volume, but until the biography is complete, the reader cannot come to any conclusion about Patrick Henry's character or discern what Mr. Meade himself thinks about him. One could wish that he had made his "List of Principal Sources" more complete bibliographically. On the whole, however, the documentation is satisfactory and indicates a thorough search of all sources where information about Henry might be expected.

Folger Library Louis B. WRIGHT

The War for Independence. A Military History. By HOWARD H. PECKHAM. [Chicago History of American Civilization.] (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958. x, 230 p. Bibliographical notes, index. $3.50.) Scholarly, readable military studies of the American Revolution continue to flow from our presses. The latest one, a volume in the Chicago History of American Civilization series, is by Howard H. Peckham, Director of the William L. Clements Library at the University of Michigan. Indeed, most present-day scholars interested in the military side of the Revolution (John Alden, George Scheer, Willard Wallace, Mr. Peckham, and others) are demonstrating that solid monographs do not have to be dull, but can be well written, even exciting. Designed for the general reader, Mr. Peckham's book is brief, but he has skillfully managed to cover all important aspects of the fighting, from Que- bec to Savannah, from Boston to Vincennes. Yet he reminds us that it was a small war in comparison with subsequent conflicts—rarely did either army surpass the manpower of a modern division. Other recent surveys of the struggle say little about the activities of the American navy, but here the author devotes a chapter to this subject. He concludes that our ships, though few in number, were a continual source of irritation to the British by sinking and capturing 464 merchantmen and pinning down squadrons in various areas. Especially good are his accounts of combat in the West. Indian fighting, it should be noted, has long been of interest to Mr. Peck- ham, who has also written Pontiac and the Indian Uprising and edited Captured by Indians. Prospective readers may wish to know Mr. Peckham's stand on certain matters that have aroused differences of opinion: he maintains that Philip Schuyler was a "second-rate" general and implies that Congress was justi- fied in removing him from command of the Northern Army in 1777; he believes that Horatio Gates allowed Benedict Arnold to "take" Morgan's riflemen and Dearborn's light infantry to oppose the British at Freeman's 1959 BOOK REVIEWS IO3

Farm and that Arnold's part was large in bringing about the capitulation of Burgoyne; he sees Gates as being innocent of collusion against Washington in the winter of 1777-1778; he offers Charles Lee no sympathy for his part at the Battle of Monmouth; nor does he express a lenient interpretation of Arnold's financial ventures before turning traitor. On the question of French aid, the author is cautious. Whether Washington and his colleagues could have won independence without French support is "one of those im- ponderables of history." Yet without it the struggle would probably have become an endurance contest. In the final chapter, the reasons for American victory are concisely sum- marized. Although such British failings as a lack of sufficient troops to hold important posts when captured, an undue reliance upon the loyalists, and a divided command helped pave the way, they are not the main factors. For the Americans, too, had notable weaknesses: a people divided in their political sentiments; a Congress weak and jealous of its limited authority; and a host of officers inexperienced in warfare. (The best of Washington's generals were Greene, Knox, Morgan, Arnold, and perhaps Wayne.) The most important reasons, says Mr. Peckham, are found in the intangibles— "ideals, faith, self-sacrifice, determination." He lists them as follows: the dedication and perseverance of a few leaders; a solid core of soldiers who were better fighters than the British because of greater morale, men who fought for the right to be free instead of fighting for a king; and a George Washington to command America's military forces. The result of Mr. Peckham's effort is a good book that should fire the interest of the undergraduate or the literate layman to learn more about the War for Independence.

College of William and Mary DON HIGGINBOTHAM

This Glorious Cause . . . The Adventures of Two Company Officers in Washington*s Army. By HERBERT T. WADE and ROBERT A. LIVELY. (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1958. xiv, 254 p. Maps, appendix, index. $5.00.) That devoted band of readers to whom, from boyhood, the soldiers of the Continental Army have been heroes will be grateful to the authors of this book for sustaining their persistent admiration of the veterans of Long Island, Germantown, Valley Forge, and Monmouth Court House. Other readers, after these many years in which the fact that Washington did not head an army of plaster saints has been exploited ad nauseam^ may feel relieved to learn on firsthand evidence that although starvation, defeat, and hopes interminably deferred did produce some deserters, mutineers, and even traitors, "this glorious cause" was held by the Continental officers and soldiers in general to be worth not only the sacrifice of their lives but of the IO4 BOOK REVIEWS January welfare and even the bare existence of the wives and children they had left at home. The evidence produced in this book is incontrovertible. One of the authors, the late Herbert T. Wade, of Ipswich, Massachusetts, who died in 1955 at the age of eighty-two, spent the last ten years of his life in writing the history of his family: there have been Wades at Ipswich since 1632. Two of his great-great-grandfathers were Nathaniel Wade, a carpenter by trade, and Joseph Hodgkins, a cobbler. Captain and lieu- tenant, respectively, of the Ipswich company that marched to Cambridge in May, 1775, they are the protagonists of this illuminating book which Robert A. Lively has produced from Hodgkins' letters and those of his wife and from other family and official records collected by Herbert Wade. Nathaniel Wade's appearances in this book are infrequent, for he was often absent from duty on sick leave, and after serving from Bunker Hill through the battle of White Plains he left the Continental Army and became a colonel in the Massachusetts militia. Called out in emergencies, however, his career gives vivid glimpses of West Point at the time of Arnold's treason and of Lafayette in the Newport campaign. Hodgkins, on the other hand, continued to serve with Washington's army until January, 1779—four years, two months, and one day; and around extracts from his letters to his wife and her replies Mr. Lively has written a most interesting and adequate commentary of personal and historical background. In what the author calls in his preface "these hurriedly written pages," the necessity of condensation in covering the first four years of Washington's campaigns in one hundred and sixty-four pages has produced some mis- leading statements: calling von Steuben "fabulous imposter," for instance, and writing that in the Trenton-Princeton campaign Washington "played for ten days the irresponsible role of a field officer." The allusions to the battles of the Brandywine and Monmouth Court House and the comments on the strategy of both Washington and Howe would hardly have won the agreement of Joseph Hodgkins. But concerning Hodgkins and his fortunes the story is complete and invaluable. The Hodgkins letters, May 7, 1775 to January 1, 1779, covering seventy pages, form the rest of the book and are singularly rewarding. Written with entire disregard of the rules of capitalization, entirely without punctuation, and with an originality of spelling that often becomes a sort of shorthand, they present a record of quiet acceptance of hardship, danger, sickness, and bereavement that might be called stoical if it were not animated by an un- questioning confidence in the fundamental mercy of an omnipotent and omniscent God. Between Bunker Hill and the Newport campaign Hodgkins saw action at Long Island, Trenton, Princeton, and Saratoga, shared in the miseries of Morristown and Valley Forge, and learned that death by disease was more to be feared than death on the battlefield. When the absence of his captain threw the whole burden of his company on him, he nevertheless found time to turn to his trade and make boots for some of his brother officers. On receiving news of the death of his little son, 1959 BOOK REVIEWS I05 he wrote to his wife: "But it is god that has Dun it. ... I hope it will Please god to santifie all these outward aflictions to us. . . ." And he ended his letter with a message to his little daughters: "tell them to Be good galls and that Dady whants to see them." The frequent misbehavior of his men he evidently treated with calm and judicial severity. Only "Cursed Creators Called Torys" moved him to wrath. When one of them was hanged, he wished "Twenty more whare sarved the same." All in all, the book is singularly worth while. No other that I know of so clearly portrays the character and personality of the company and regimental officers who made the army with which Washington was able to maintain the war for nearly four years against vastly superior odds.

Princeton, N. J. ALFRED HOYT BILL

The Life and Works of Edward Greene Malbone, 1777-1807. By RUEL PARDEE TOLMAN. With an introduction by THEODORE BOLTON and a foreword by JOHN DAVIS HATCH, JR. (New York: The New-York Historical Society, 1958. xxiv, 322 p. Illustrations, bibliography, index. $12.50.) This is the long-awaited definitive biography of Malbone, almost a life work of its author, the late Director of the National Collection of the Fine Arts at the Smithsonian Institution. Mr. Tolman was himself an artist and miniature painter. His study of the art of the miniature has contributed much to the respect and affection in which he is held, and is now climaxed, four years after his death, by the publication of this book. The work contains a biographical sketch of Malbone's short life, an al- phabetically arranged descriptive catalogue of his paintings, followed by check lists of unconfirmed attributions and misattributions. A brief chrono- logy of the painter's life provides a key to his travels and will be useful in the further study of attributions. Two of his works are illustrated in full color, and 167 in halftone. Among the other illustrations are numerous facsimiles of documents, including all thirty-six pages of Malbone's account book, whose fortunate discovery by John Davis Hatch, Jr., Director of the Norfolk Museum, brought him into this project as one of its collaborators. Mr. Hatch not only made this major source available to Mr. Tolman, but has since presented the original manuscript to the Waldron Phoenix Bel- knap, Jr., Research Library of American Painting at the Winterthur Museum. This volume will stand, therefore, as permanent and primary. It is none- theless deeply disappointing. The long time given to it, twenty-five years or more, the number of persons involved, the pre-eminence of its subject and the greatness of the opportunity for a definitive work, all seem to have contributed to its disjointed character—presenting facts but failing to assimi- late them. It opens with a foreword by Mr. Hatch, a preface by Mr. Tolman, IO6 BOOK REVIEWS January

and an introduction by Theodore Bolton. In addition, Charles E. Baker, of the Historical Society's staff, has made some cautious editorial revisions. There are unimportant but unnecessary inaccuracies, such as the printing on page 17 of an incorrect reading of a document which appears in facsimile directly below. The sources of quotations are inadequately cited, and many small repetitions betray the lack of organization. The descriptive catalogue is strangely uncritical considering the time and labor given it. A major entry, for instance, is given to "Nicholas Brown," an identification admittedly someone's "guess" and controverted by sounder evidence. The miniature listed as "Jeremiah J. Kahler (1749-1830)" may be by Malbone, but it is unfortunate that the initials "M.S." and death date "1782" en- graved on the case have not been discussed. The whole has the aspect of a part-time effort whose participants, somehow, have gotten in one another's way. Worst of all, Malbone himself is treated in a pedestrian, unnecessarily defensive manner, with no clear revelation, save in the illustrations, of that glowing intensity of character, that self-dedication which was so pure an expression at once of puritanical and of romantic feeling. The background is not clearly or appropriately presented. The miniature had been peculiarly the art of romance, and had held a traditional place in the customs of mar- riage and betrothal. A miniature of the seventeenth or eighteenth century was painted, generally, for an audience of one or two persons only, and a miniature of these years must be judged in part upon the artist's success in endowing his work with a genuine sense of tenderness and personal devotion. In Malbone's day these little pictures were being worn more openly, and were soon to graduate from the lady's bosom to a place beside the gift book on her table. The change was being welcomed by the artists, though it was to mark the end of the private, devotional character of the miniature. Malbone appears at a climactic point in this story. He inherited the old romantic tradition of the miniature and he united it to the new romantic feeling in portraiture on canvas, best expressed by Lawrence in England, Sully in America. In his day, in Archibald Robertson's words, the miniature was becoming a "picture" rather than a "toy." It was a part of Malbone's greatness that he held the old feeling together with the new in a last, superb flowering of this subtle and delightful art.

Dickinson College CHARLES COLEMAN SELLERS

Verdict for the Doctor. The Case of Benjamin Rush. By WINTHROP and FRANCES NEILSON. (New York: Hastings House, 1958. x, 245 p. Il- lustrations, bibliography, index. $4.50.) In the introduction it is written, "The book is a profile in history. It is about an event: the men it concerned, and what took place." The event was 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 107 the famous trial in the suit brought by Dr. Benjamin Rush against the journalist William Cobbett for slander; these two were the men concerned. But why is the book called a "profile" ? On the dust cover of this volume a previous work by these authors concerning a day in the life of Benjamin Franklin is described as a novel. The two books are alike in the presentation of historical events and persons mingled with imaginary conversations and incidents. The result is neither strict history nor good red fiction. It tends to leave the naive reader uncertain as to what is supported by fact and what is added to carry the story. This applies especially as one passes from trivial chat to the lengthy quotes from the trial itself. It would seem better if the genre of a book were clearly stated: perhaps the term profile is supposed to do so. So much has been written about Rush and Cobbett and this trial that nothing new can here be expected. Each man was a vehement, colorful individual, and a clash between them was sure to set the sparks flying. Rush won the verdict and $5,000, and so was vindicated. No one can deny that his treatment of yellow fever by bleeding and purgation was heroic, but neither can anyone deny that he was honest and sincere, and doing his best according to the meager knowledge of his day. Cobbett was a prickly troublemaker who wrote under the appropriate name Peter Porcupine. He wrote well but with a sharp, bitter quill. His motives for attacking Rush may have been humanitarian, but there was a political bias, as his later troublesome career in England continued to reveal. Verdict for the Doctor is a readable, popular work. It can be recommended only to those unfamiliar with the event and the men concerned. Eight pages of illustrations picture Philadelphia at the end of the eighteenth century and the characters in this volume. An ample bibliography is appended; to correct a use of nomenclature, the Rush manuscripts are not in the "Phila- delphia Library/' but in the Library Company of Philadelphia.

Villanova O. H. PERRY PEPPER

Prophet of Liberty. The Life and Times of Wendell Phillips. By OSCAR SHERWIN. (New York: Bookman Associates, 1958. 814 p. Frontispiece, bibliography, index. $10.00.) Wendell Phillips was a gentleman by birth, an agitator by profession. Born and reared on Beacon Street, educated at Harvard for the practice of the law, in the mid-1830's he abandoned the life of a Boston Brahmin to become the leading orator of the Garrisonian branch of abolitionism. Un- fortunately, his golden voice did not survive the Gilded Age. The generation which had heard him speak produced several eulogistic studies of his life, but a twentieth century which had not been swayed by his eloquence has remembered him, if at all, merely as one of Garrison's lieutenants. For many IO8 BOOK REVIEWS January years Parrington alone among the major historians considered him of serious importance, not only as an abolitionist, but as a valiant fighter against all the injustices of the corrupt times in which he lived. Dr. Sherwin's first- rate biography now restores Phillips to the front ranks of American reform, where he spent almost fifty tumultuous years. Dr. Sherwin lets Phillips speak for himself. Excerpts from every important speech he made, each presented in a richly developed setting, vibrantly recreate Phillips and his world as he himself knew it. It is an exciting story, well constructed and well told. At the same time, it is an admittedly partisan account. Dr. Sherwin considers Phillips, in Phillips' own words written of Washington, "the bright consummate flower of our civilization and in all ways the incarnation of the highest American ideal." Dr. Sherwin writes with much of Phillips' own moral fervor. He also shares his magnificent inability to see more than one side of many questions. American historiography has traveled a long road since Appomattox, from the exorcism of "devils," both southern and northern, through the "irrepressible conflict" of the end of the nineteenth century to the "repres- sible conflict" of more recent times. The moralistic interpretation of causa- tion has given way before an infinite variety of other factors—economic, geographic, political, social, psychological. With Dr. Sherwin we are back to the "irrepressible conflict" position, defined in moral terms, positive Good in mortal combat with positive Evil. He is fully aware that "some historians [have] the notion that the Civil War was an avoidable war," but for him it was "a death grapple of irreconcilable ideas." Phillips declared: "We have not only an army to conquer, but we have a state of mind to annihilate. . . . The South is to be annihilated." Dr. Sherwin calls on Wilbur Cash in The Mind of the South to bear witness that though the war "smashed the Southern world, it ... left the essential Southern mind and will • . . entirely unshaken." The implications are as timely as the headlines in today's newspapers. Phillips fought for many causes, his emblem "the ever restless ocean, . . . only pure because never still." Prohibition, women's rights, the abolition of capital punishment, all claimed his attention at one time or another. For the last fourteen years of his life he was engrossed with the labor movement and even ran for office on the ticket of the Labor Reform Party which he helped to organize. Dr. Sherwin follows most of his predecessors, however, in his judgment of the relative importance of Phillips' various crusades, and devotes five sixths of his book to his antislavery activities. He dedicates his work "to the Colored Citizens of this Land, to whom Wendell Phillips was always a Friend." The parallel between Phillips' struggles for Negro equality in the last century and the battle for civil rights today is implicit in the text. That Dr. Sherwin has read widely in his subject is demonstrated in his excellent bibliography, which omits nothing of importance. Though his limited use of manuscript sources has provided no new information, he has diligently weighed the evidence offered by America's leading historians 1959 BOOK REVIEWS IO9 and has come to his own conclusions. Regretfully he has to report that some of his historical brethren are not on the side of the angels. Dr. Sherwin has no patience with the "sickly" spirit of compromise. Lincoln, Douglas, Clay, Webster, all cut poor figures in this biography. Though it must be assumed that Dr. Sherwin knows the political facts of life, he denies that honest men must reckon with them. It follows that he discounts the findings of Barnes and Dumond which raise Theodore Weld and his program of political action above Garrison and the moral suasion approach in assessing the strength of the antislavery crusade. Dr. Sherwin has written a forthright book. Within the acknowledged limits of his sympathies he presents an engrossing, full-bodied study of Phillips, which returns that devoted fighter for liberty to his proper place in American history. The work profits from the findings of a wide range of historical scholarship. It is Dr. Sherwin's own moral earnestness, however, which gives the book its special savor. Though he knows all that the scholars have to say about the sectional conflict in American life, he indicates no greater capacity for understanding the tragic implications of the Southern dilemma than that demonstrated by the most intransigent of the nineteenth-century reformers.

Lebanon Valley College ELIZABETH M. GEFFEN

The American Clyde. A History of Iron and Steel Shipbuilding on the Dela- ware from 1840 to World War I. By DAVID B. TYLER. (Newark, Del.: University of Delaware Press, 1958. xii, 132 p. $5.00.) The bibliography of the history of shipbuilding in the United States is fairly long, but there are few titles on it which do not represent the grinding of an axe of some sort. Books and pamphlets for and against public assist- ance for shipbuilding have been plentiful, and a number of shipyards have issued interesting and useful although understandably biased accounts of their own development. Professor David Budlong Tyler's history of iron and steel shipbuilding along the Delaware River from 1840 until the end of World War I is a welcome addition to the all-too-short list of books dealing with American shipbuilding without representing a special interest or a particular viewpoint. Before the publication of this book, Mr. Tyler had established a firm reputation as one of the ablest maritime historians in the United States. His book Steam Conquers the Atlantic^ his studies of naval and merchant marine history during World War II, and his Bay and River Delaware: A Pictorial History all represented work of outstanding merit. This book was written during a two-year sojourn at Newark as Visiting Professor of History at the University of Delaware, away from Mr. Tyler's regular post at Wagner College, Staten Island, New York. IIO BOOK REVIEWS January

This history of iron and steel shipbuilding on the Delaware over an eighty- year period is divided into a series of major epochs. The centers of Delaware River shipbuilding were at Wilmington, Chester, Philadelphia, and Cam- den, but Mr. Tyler has woven together his account of developments at the yards at these and other points in fairly strictly chronological fashion rather than taking them up locality by locality. He moves from the pioneer period when the "iron works" which had built steam engines and boilers turned to the business of building iron hulls, to the Civil War with its shipbuilding boom and enthusiasm for monitors and other "ironclads," and to the de- pression in iron shipbuilding which followed the war. The industry emerged from this state in the 1870*8 as iron and then steel became increasingly com- mon for the hulls of steamships and as the Navy in the 1880's turned to the building of steel vessels. These years were characterized by the aggressive development of such yards as those of John Roach at Chester and Charles Cramp at Philadelphia, the lively debate in Congress and out as to what policy the United States Government should adopt relative to shipbuilding, and a good deal of pulling and hauling for political favors and contracts. By the turn of the century, larger ships and larger capital requirements were responsible for the survival of a limited number of large yards, but the attempt to form a shipbuilding trust in the United States Shipbuilding Co. of 1902 was ill-starred. The industry along the Delaware continued to be somewhat precarious until the vast shipbuilding "boom" of World War I gave the region its greatest activity down to that time. For a subject so extensive, the 113 pages of text seem surprisingly brief. The author has allocated his space well, however, and he includes some description of changing construction techniques and of many outstanding or typical ships built on the Delaware in the period as well as the business affairs and political problems of the yards considered. The well-proportioned and attractively written account is certainly an excellent introduction to the broad field. Perhaps other and more detailed studies of particular yards or periods will be stimulated by this book. The "footnotes," which are inconveniently placed at the back of the book, reflect extensive use of newspaper files, professional and trade periodicals, government documents, and published histories, as well as the rather slender manuscript sources which are available. Apparently, no great collections of business papers regarding the Delaware yards have survived or were available for the study. There are a few errors of fact which have crept into the text, and the proofreader occasionally missed a printer's mistake. It is regrettable that photographs were not used to illustrate the text, or that a sketch map was not included. On the whole, however, this excellent little book will add luster to the author's already established standing in his field.

Pomona College JOHN HASKELL KEMBLE 1959 BOOK REVIEWS III

The Story of Susquehanna University. By WILLIAM S. CLARK and ARTHUR HERMAN WILSON. (Selinsgrove, Pa.: Susquehanna University Press, 1958. xii, 382 p. Illustrations, appendices, bibliography. $2.50.) The centennial history of Susquehanna University, here under review, is a book of two parts, the division being made at the year 1928, when Dr. G. Morris Smith became president of this institution. Accordingly, the second part, which is approximately equal in length to the first part, is a record of the long and successful administration of President Smith. Such a division implies that this book was written primarily for the Susquehanna family. Its influence, however, will be broader than that. It will be of considerable interest to the Lutheran denomination in America, and it will certainly help to ease the way of the historian who, in years to come, will write a compre- hensive history of collegiate education in the United States. Susquehanna University has a history not unlike that of many other American church-related colleges or universities that were founded between 1820 and i860. Like them, it is emphatically a product of the westward expansion of the American people, an expansion which confronted the Lutheran denomination no less than other Protestant denominations with the enor- mous problem of providing ministers for rising communities in the American West. Broadly speaking, the circumstances which gave rise to the American Protestant Home Missionary Movement account for the founding of Susquehanna University. Established in 1858 with the name of Missionary Institute, it became within a generation something more and something less than its founders intended. It became a Lutheran college, although, unlike many other collegiate institutions of similar origin, it retained its department of theology well into the twentieth century. In 1894 it adopted the name of Susquehanna University. During the present administration, it has achieved the form that it will probably long retain: that of a coeduca- tional Lutheran college which emphasizes liberal education and which has the courage to remain small. Students of American education who are not of the Susquehanna family will read the first part of this book, written by William S. Clark, with particular interest. Here they will find material for arresting comparisons. Here they will read of denominational discord, of community rivalries, of a long struggle with poverty, of efforts to make brick without straw, and of heroic sacrifices of a few persons. Here, too, they will read of the impact upon a struggling educational institution of the powerful forces which transformed the Old America of the nineteenth century into the New America of the twentieth century. Such experiences were not peculiar to Susquehanna Uni- versity. Yet colleges, like human beings, do not respond in identical ways to like stimuli. It is for this reason that histories of colleges are as eagerly sought after as are biographies of persons. The Story of Susquehanna has been written largely from sources and from personal observations. Happily, the records of Susquehanna University 112 BOOK REVIEWS January have been well preserved. Happily, also, the author of the second part of this book, Arthur Herman Wilson, has been a part of the history he has written. The work is adequately documented, and, to the gratification of critical readers, the notes which support the text are actually footnotes. A select bibliography, informing appendices, and well-chosen illustrations enhance the value of the book. It is regrettable that its usefulness as a work of reference is impaired because of the lack of an index.

Bucknell University J. ORIN OLIPHANT

Thunder at Harper*s Ferry. By ALLAN KELLER. (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1958. vi, 282 p. Illustrations, bibliography, index. $4-95-) The sun never broke through the clouds and mist on that Sabbath day of October 16, 1859. "Instead a raw wind blew through the Potomac Valley, driving low, scudding clouds across the sky and sending occasional rain squalls sheeting down upon Harper's Ferry and the surrounding countryside. It was a somber, depressing day, fit for the events that were to etch it in history" (p. 28). "Twenty-one followers and John Brown ate their Sunday meal without much zest, sensing that some of them might never again put their legs under a table to eat . . . and then silently attacked his fatback, potatoes, and cornbread" (p. 28). "A little after eight o'clock John Brown called the men together for divine services. He read a dozen verses from the Bible and then asked one of the Negroes to lead them in prayer" (p. 33). "Two by two, as though freshly risen from the grave, the marching men moved up and into the covered bridge. Death had come to join their ranks. With him also went futility, treason, and false hope but even that was not all. There too went Glory" (p. 37). "Despite the firing, none of the raiders had been pinked. John Brown himself was as cool as a cod on ice" (p. 74). "The colored men had not rallied to his banner. That was the first great blow. Now had come the second, penning him up in a tightening circle of steel. Once in North Elba a visitor to the Brown homestead discussed the head of the family with Watson Brown. 'He has the look of an eagle/ he said. "Now the eagle was in a cage. It could beat its wings against the bars and it could die bravely, but it could no longer soar away to the high summits of the Blue Ridge" (p. 89). This study is a popular presentation of the story of the exciting hours at Harper's Ferry almost one hundred years ago. The author makes John Brown and his followers the reader's companions through those fateful three days. Each chapter is filled with thrilling drama and excitement. John Brown's commanding presence is ably depicted. 1959 BOOK REVIEWS II3

The author is a staff writer for the New York World Telegram and Sun, but his research has been careful and the story is presented with facts, drama, and contemporary evidence. The countryside for which idealists struggled, the Wagner Hotel, the Gait Saloon, the rifle factory, the engine- house where John Brown surrendered are made important and interesting historical places. The author has made a real contribution to the saga of the Civil War. The book is composed of nineteen chapters, with no chapter headings, no table of contents, and no footnotes. It does have a short but selected bibliography and a satisfactory index.

Lehigh University GEORGE D. HARMON

Death of a Nation. The Story of Lee and His Men at Gettysburg. By CLIFFORD DOWDEY. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1958. xviii, 384, xii p. Maps, appendix, bibliography, index. $5.00.)

The Battle of Gettysburg. By FRANK A. HASKELL. Edited by BRUCE CATTON. (Boston: Hough ton MifHin Company, 1958. xx, 169 p. Maps, index.

There is much to be said for the assertion that General Lee's invasion of Pennsylvania in the summer of 1863 was "the largest commissary raid in the history of modern warfare." Poorly fed and poorly clad, the Confed- erate veterans moved northward in the hope of levying successfully on the rich Pennsylvania countryside. It cannot be doubted that Lee wished for more than merely a raid. He wanted to knock out the enemy. But President Davis doomed the invasion by stubbornly holding to the policy of "scattered defensiveness" in the face of his commanding general's importunities for a concentration to break the Union strategy of constriction. Richmond's stubbornness was not the only handicap the invader suffered. He was also burdened with some strange performances on the part of Lee and his subordinates. Mr. Dowdey, who believes the Confederacy died in Pennsylvania, offers the Battle of Gettysburg as a study of Lee's general- ship. Beginning with General Jeb Stuart, Mr. Dowdey puts his finger on the Confederate Army's essential fault. Stuart, a military dandy intent upon riding around General Joe Hooker, as he had ridden around General George McClellan on the Peninsula, submitted such a plan to Lee. Preferring "suggestion to command," the Confederate leader, hoping his cavalry chief would provide the intelligence that was needed, gave his assent and the vain Stuart dashed northward. Not only did he fail to make his ride around the Union Army, but worse still, he suddenly found himself hard pressed on the defensive, too busy to observe and report. Thus on July 1 as units of General A. P. Hill's Third Corps set out from Cashtown for Gettysburg to "get those shoes," they stumbled into the 114 BOOK REVIEWS January Army of the Potomac west of the latter village. The three-day battle was on. Shoes forgotten, the contest grew hot before Lee was ready. The Third Corps, with some help from General Richard Ewell's Second Corps, hurled itself against the Union force, stampeding it through the village streets. South of Gettysburg disordered Federals soon began reforming on Ceme- tery Hill. The moment for pursuit was at hand, but Hill, not the killer that Stonewall Jackson had been and thinking his men had done enough for the day, ordered a skirmish line extending onto Seminary Ridge, where other brigades were resting. Lee now turned to Ewell, sending him an oral order to assault Culp's Hill. This action was to be taken only if practicable and Ewell was to be careful not to bring on a general engagement. The object was to prevent General George Meade, now the Union commander, from reinforcing Cemetery Hill. Waiting for Ewell to begin, Lee was joined by General James Longstreet, First Corps commander. The latter at once advised his superior to throw the Confederate Army around Meade's left and "we shall interpose between the Federal army and Washington." Lee rejected this strategy of defense, but Longstreet, according to Mr. Dowdey, clinging to it turned into a surly and indifferent subordinate. Stricken with what is called a "paralysis of will," Ewell halted the attack on Culp's Hill, thereby losing the opportunity Lee had envisaged late on July i. Early the next day Longstreet, believing the offensive was not being assumed, became convinced his plan of defensive fighting had been adopted. But it had not. Lee's plan for that day called for all three Confederate corps to assault the Federals. Mr. Dowdey describes the action that ensued as "three separate small armies mismanaging three separate battles." Lee's command post, he asserts, was more like an "isolation post." The third day was immortalized by Pickett's Charge. To it the author devotes about one- third of his book, concluding that the second day's failures, notably Long- street's, made the action of the final day a necessity and contributed mightily to its failure. Mr. Dowdey succeeds in demonstrating that the loose type of command that had worked so well when Lee and Jackson were directing the Army of Northern Virginia was unsuited to the corps commanders at Gettysburg. His research has been prodigious and at times he seems to be trying to crowd all of its results into the pages of this book. Anecdotes and personal back- grounds, though interesting, detract from the main story. It is regrettable that there are no footnotes. Because there is no documentation, not even backnotes, one is often compelled to conclude the author is merely surmis- ing. Consequently, his severe treatment of Longstreet suffers. Frank A. Haskell, a Union officer who was literally under the guns during Pickett's Charge, wrote The Battle of Gettysburg within two weeks after Lee's army left Pennsylvania. He died before the war ended and therefore his account was not revised in the emotional atmosphere that followed Ap- pomattox. Though violently partisan, in the words of Editor Bruce Catton 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 115 "altogether too purple for modern taste," it offers an experience readers of Civil War books will find difficult to duplicate. They will come as close as anyone who was not there can come to feeling what it was like on Cemetery Ridge on the afternoon of July 3, 1863. Mr. Catton has written a helpful introduction and performs the other duties of an editor in a commendable fashion.

University of Georgia HORACE MONTGOMERY

Toward Gettysburg. A Biography of General John F. Reynolds. By EDWARD J. NICHOLS. (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1958. x, 276 p. Illustrations, maps, bibliography, index. $6.00.) There has long been a need for a biography of General John Fulton Reynolds, one of the ablest officers in the Northern Army during the Civil War and, at the same time, one about whom little is known. He died in action as he would have wished at the beginning of a three-day battle at Gettysburg that in many ways was a turning point in the struggle between the North and South. The results of this battle have tended to obscure both Reynolds' achievements on that day and a reputation as a soldier and a leader that had been growing rapidly. John Fulton Reynolds, born of a locally prominent family in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, was graduated from West Point in 1841 and for the next twenty years served in various parts of the country. He participated in the Mexican War with credit and in the months before the firing on Fort Sumter was commandant of cadets at West Point. He was strict in his discipline to such an extent that, as he wrote his sister, there was "great rejoicing among the cadets at their being relieved of me" (p. 75). Appointed a brigadier general and assigned to the recruitment and organization of Pennsylvania troops, his insistence on order and discipline soon converted raw recruits into soldiers who fought bravely and effectively in victory or defeat. They made a reputation for themselves as well as for their commander. Reynolds' first important engagement was at Gaines Mills in the Seven Days' battles, where, while making a reconnaissance after dark, he was captured. He was taken into Richmond, but was exchanged six weeks later and rejoined his command in time to participate with credit in the Second Battle of Bull Run. He was absent from the battle at Antietam, having been assigned the duty of organizing the Pennsylvania militia to help resist Lee's advance. Fortunately, however, these troops were not called on to do battle. Reynolds wrote: "I do not think much can be expected of them" (p. 135). At the Battle of Fredericksburg Reynolds was a major general commanding a corps in Franklin's "Left Grand Division." By the time of Hooker's appointment in place of Burnside, following the disastrous defeat at Fredericksburg, Reynolds was a potential candidate 116 BOOK REVIEWS January

for the command of the army. Hooker's failure at Chancellorsville again brought Reynolds to the front as a leading candidate to succeed him. That he was offered the command of the Army of the Potomac, either directly or indirectly, is not certain. Whether actually tendered or not, Reynolds was insistent that any successor to Hooker must be free from interference from Washington. President Lincoln and his advisers were not yet disposed to be told under what conditions such an appointment would be acceptable. Though there is no unequivocal evidence that Reynolds was actually offered the command of the army, the author, after carefully examining available evidence, concludes that the offer was made and was rejected because Reynolds did not believe he would be free from interference by Lincoln, Stanton, and Halleck. What history would have recorded had Reynolds been placed in command would probably have been favorable to him. Reynolds was a positive man who knew the army and its commanders and had a good idea of what was expected of him and of the character, ob- jectives, and skill of his opponent. Reynolds' friendly rival and associate, George Gordon Meade, was appointed in Hooker's place. Reynolds, as leader of the left wing of the army, interpreting his orders broadly, opposed the Confederate advance toward Gettysburg so vigorously that a pitched battle ensued, and he himself lost his life. This biography is based largely on a collection of Reynolds' letters to several of his sisters which cover the period from his entrance to West Point until his death. They are supplemented by official reports and regimental and specific accounts of that period. Reynolds was a man of few words who wrote few letters except to his family. In contrast to many "new" biographies of Civil War characters, the author here adequately presents an original account of the career of an able soldier about whom little is known. A few errors have been noted, none of them serious, but all of them unnecessary. There are several illustrations, a bibliographical note, and a good index. Locust Valley, N. Y. THOMAS ROBSON HAY

Prince of Carpetbaggers. By JONATHAN DANIELS. (Philadelphia: J. B. Lip- pincott Company, 1958. 319 p. Frontispiece, bibliography, index. $4.95.) Jonathan Daniels' Prince of Carpetbaggers is one of those unusual biographies in which the author has no admiration for his principal character. Mr. Daniels' dislike of General Milton Smith Littlefield of New York and Illinois is obvious by page 30 in a 229-page book, and it remains, clear and constant, to the end. Mr. Daniels does not carry this dislike to the extreme of blind prejudice. He can and does give his "hero" credit for personal generosity. On occasion, 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 117 Milton is held innocent of alleged wrongdoing. This makes the over-all picture of the man more authentic, and more damning, than would otherwise be the case. Milton Smith Littlefield was born July 19, 1830, in New York State. The family moved to Jerseyville, Illinois, about 1857. Milton took up school- teaching, the law, and Republicanism. He met Lincoln in 1858 and supported him for the Presidency in i860. Joining the Union Army as a captain of the 14th Illinois in 1861, Littlefield had a good war record and emerged a general at the age of thirty-four. In April, 1863, Lincoln sent him to the Sea Islands off the South Carolina coast to organize Negro troops. He was later sent to Florida to enlist Negroes and to help reconstruct the state. After the war, Milton became a lumber merchant in Philadelphia and a dabbler in North Carolina bonds and railroads. Handsome, genial, a confidence-inspiring man of small scruple, he found a fitting role in the saturnalia of corruption that characterized the reconstruction of the South. He was a lobbyist in the North Carolina constitutional convention of 1868 which re- constructed the state along prescribed radical lines. He became a North Carolina newspaperman, and prominent in the state's Union League. He formed an unholy alliance with scalawag George W. Swepson, the Raleigh banker, and acted as lawyer and lobbyist for a ring that had Swepson as its evil genius and Governor William Woods Holden as its tool. Littlefield later became involved in unsavory legislative corruption in Florida. He lost what- ever ill-gotten gains came his way, became bankrupt, and the last years of his life were spent in humble circumstances. He died March 7, 1899. Milton Littlefield's story is neither spectacular nor unique. It is, however, as dramatic as the story of a minor historical character can be, and Mr. Daniels relates it like the good journalist that he is. The author revels in the cryptic phrase. We are told that "peace was politeness at Appomattox"; our ears are titillated by the sound of "hobnail-ringing streets"; we are in- formed that Andrew Jackson Jones, member of the North Carolina legisla- ture and a railroad president, "liked high stakes and low women." Where Mr. Daniels cannot prove, he implies or infers, a procedure that sometimes comes close to innuendo. This is probably inescapable, for the story with which he deals is sordid, and the evidence he handles is not infrequently suggestive rather than conclusive. But it sometimes leaves the reader, like the author, suspended between cynicism and belief. The most serious criticisms that can be made of this book are twofold. First, the style is heavy, despite the author's attempt at lightness. The narrative's detail is sometimes wearisome, and the dramatis personae are so numerous- and often introduced so obliquely that at times they make for confusion in the mind of the reader. Second, the lack of footnotes limits the historians' critical judgment. Mr. Daniels relieves this difficulty to some extent by referring in the text to his sources, but it is often impossible to tell how far his judgments are based upon the Littlefield Papers provided by Helen Littlefield Gursky, J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton's Reconstruction in Il8 BOOK REVIEWS January

North Carolina, the supercharged and overheated journalism of the period, or other source or secondary material. Prince of Carpetbaggers is far from being great biography or great history. But it is a revealing, sometimes amusing, nearly always tragic depiction of a loose-principled man who lived and labored in an era of which Americans, north or south, have small occasion to be proud.

University of Rochester GLYNDON G. VAN DEUSEN

The Splendid Little War. By FRANK FREIDEL. (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1958. [vi], 314 p. Illustrations, bibliography. $8.50.) The Splendid Little War, the title used by Frank Freidel, Professor of History at Harvard University, was John Hay's designation for the Spanish- American War in 1898. Probably not altogether apt, the true nature of the war is not thus conveyed. Yes, the war was little—it lasted only four months —but its aftermath was a three years' war with the Philippines. And there was no splendor about a war which had in its train so many casualties from diseases like typhoid fever, yellow fever, malaria and dysentery. And there was also mismanagement. The war started as a result of the explosion of the Maine in Havana harbor, February 15, 1898, killing more than 250 men. Though the cry "Remember the Maine" was on everyone's lips, the goal was idealistic—to put an end to the misery suffered by Cuba for years and to give her independence. There were some, however, who thought the war uncalled for, since it was not known what or who caused the explosion. This book is nevertheless a tour de force in producing more than 300 excellent photographs, and drawings by celebrated artists like Frederic Remington, Howard Chandler Christy, and William J. Glackens. The author has made use of the National Archives largely. While there have been hundreds of photographs in books dealing with the war, they have often lacked the distinctness and sharp outlines of those in this volume. It is no reflection upon the above-mentioned artists to say that from the very nature of their work there could not have been the same degree of detail as is captured in the photographs, and that the latter are therefore more faithful to reality. In short, these photographs bring the events vividly before the reader and make him feel almost a spectator of the war scenes. And it is to the credit of the author who was not yet born during the Spanish-Ameri- can War that he has caught the spirit of it. As to the text, which occupies less space per page than the photographs, the author has chosen to give the history of the war, with comments upon the illustrative matter, through the mouths of participants and spectators as conveyed in reports, books, articles and private letters. He often intro- duces these by the unfortunate word "reminisces" (which has not been adopted in some dictionaries outside of Webster and really means "mentally 1959 BOOK REVIEWS II9 recalls")* but this is a minor matter. One approves the method Professor Freidel has adopted. As a distinguished biographer of F. D. Roosevelt, he has shown his ability in indulging in straight narrative and paraphrase. But here the reader finds himself satisfied with the use of quotations. As a matter of fact, historians have often felt themselves handicapped in handling battle reports. Should they closely follow the accounts with quotation marks, or so rewrite them as to court danger of not being altogether truthful? The only objection to this volume is not one of inclusion, but of exclusion. There are no pictures of the exciting scenes throughout the land as a result of the war, outside of scenes of enlistment or departure of troops. I note that a picture of the Victory Arch on Fifth Avenue when Dewey returned to America in September, 1899, *s giyen> but there are no pictures of the great parade itself. What the present reviewer, who was in his early teens in those days, misses above all are pictures of the great Jubilee Parade he witnessed on Broad Street in Philadelphia toward the end of October, 1898, when 25,000 men, led by General Nelson A. Miles, marched on one of the three days of celebration. The grandstands were crowded with spectators throwing sand- wiches, candy, cake and fruit to the soldiers, because they were reputed to have been starved. On the reviewing stand were President McKinley and many notables. Probably it is not possible to convey in a volume like the one under review the enthusiasm, excitement, and ebullition of spirits of the period as they were manifested in the bunting-covered city, by flag raisings, by bands playing "There Will Be a Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight/' "Good-bye, Dolly Gray," and "Break the News to Mother," by shouts of "Remember the Maine" and even by little girls singing "Spain, Spain, Spain, You Ought to be Ashamed." The fervor of those few months exceeded that of the three long wars in which our country has since engaged. And possibly not since the end of the Civil War, when in May, 1865, the armies of Grant and Sherman marched along Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, had there been a parade like the Jubilee Parade. One can only give echoes of the war madness of those days by mentioning the frenzy of joy when Dewey's victory at Manila Bay was announced— henceforth many advertisements made use of his name for their products, dogs were named Dewey, and the words "Dewey did it" became a proverb; or by referring to the rising fame of "Teddy" Roosevelt and the Rough Riders which made him governor of New York; or by reviving the name of the hero of the war, Richmond Pearson Hobson, who sank the collier Merrimac in Santiago harbor to try to block Admiral Cervera's escape with his fleet. Hobson was kissed publicly by numerous girls, which earned him the sobriquet of "Kissed Hobson," but which also sent him to Congress. Every boy knew the names of the commanding officers and the fact that they had fought in the Civil War; even the names of the captains of the war vessels were familiar. James Otis, the author of Toby Tylery was soon on I2O BOOK REVIEWS January hand with The Boys of yg8 (not mentioned in Freidel's bibliography), and a train of dime novels about the war became popular, among them those by a youthful literary aspirant, Upton Sinclair. All in all, it was a great thing for a boy to be alive in those days.

Philadelphia ALBERT MORDELL

History of the Progressive Party, 1912-1916. By AMOS R. E. PINCHOT. Edited with a biographical introduction by HELENE MAXWELL HOOKER. (New York: New York University Press, 1958. xii, 305 p. Appendixes, index. $7.50.) Avid Theodore Roosevelt fans will not like this little book. Published a few weeks before the hundredth anniversary of the Colonel's birth, it adds a discordant note to the acclaim which the 1958 celebration has provoked. Whether or not we agree with Mr. Pinchot's viewpoints and conclusions, we can be glad that he sat down in the early 1930's and wrote (although never fully completed) his eye-witness version of the rise and fall of the Progressive Party. His account is not impartial, but is useful as representing the reactions of a member of the "radical nucleus" who with intense fervor jumped into the Progressive Movement as early as 1909. Unlike his more famous older brother Gifford, Amos Pinchot became thoroughly disenchanted with Roosevelt's performance as leader of the new party. Damning T. R. with faint praise—"If he was not a great man he was at least a great gentleman"—he admitted that the former President tried to do what he thought was righteous. But Pinchot was convinced that the Colonel was superficial. "Roosevelt was vastly interested in society, just as he was vastly interested in big game shooting and football," he said. "Statesmen are dominated by ideas. Ideas merely harassed Roosevelt; he always could shake them off when necessary." Pinchot's basic thesis is that the United States Steel Corporation was out to control the Progressive Party. He does not charge Roosevelt with collusion or connivance, but pictures him as an innocent pawn of the J. P. Morgan interests. As Mrs. Hooker points out, Pinchot treats this hypo- thesis first as a suspicion but eventually as a proved fact, which it is not. In portraying Roosevelt in 1912 as a wobbler, who "oscillated from one opinion to another," Pinchot maintains that he always led the people "in the direction in which they desired to go." Mrs. Hooker has carefully edited and illuminated the manuscript with helpful footnotes. To throw the History into proper perspective, moreover, she has included an eighty-page biographical introduction of the author, which succinctly and adroitly emphasizes the salient facts of his life and philosophy. Pinchot, once described as an "underdog fancier," was an ardent enemy of government by special privilege. To him, the paramount issue was trusts. He was willing to speak as a champion of labor when it was not the fashion- 1959 BOOK REVIEWS 121 able thing to do. Averse to compromise, he was disillusioned by Progressives who straddled. The 1912 Progressive platform he described as a jumble of isms that contained everything * from the shorter catechism to how to build a birchbark canoe." Party principles, he insisted, were far more important than votes. His ideal of a third party was one founded on a single issue, with a program "which will be so obviously unacceptable to the interests that carry on the invisible government that they will have nothing to do with it." The erudite but politically innocent Pinchot is at his best when spinning anecdotes. In deflating such prominent persons as Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Henry L. Stimson, he seasons his neat phrases with frequent dashes of sarcastic humor. Pennsylvania State University M. NELSON MCGEARY

The New Jersey Shore. By JOHN T. CUNNINGHAM. (New Brunswick, N. J.: Rutgers University Press, 1958. 272 p. Illustrations, maps, index. IS-oo.) This is the fourth of a series of books on New Jersey, written by John T. Cunningham, to be published by the Rutgers University Press. In his earlier books the author wrote of New Jersey in general and of its industry and its agriculture. In this book he treats of the fast-changing coast of the state, the one hundred twenty-seven miles of beach, marsh, island and dune that is probably the best-known part of New Jersey to most nonresidents. Mr. Cunningham is exceptionally well qualified for the task he has set himself. A staff writer on the Newark Newsy where many of the articles included in this book first appeared, he has vacationed at many points along the shore; he has sailed the Inland Waterway from Bayhead to Cape May, and he has roamed many of the beaches and dunes he writes about. Although almost half of Mr. Cunningham's book is devoted to the various resorts which line the coast and occupy the fringing islands, it is not primarily a history of the area. It is, rather, a description that shows the shore as it was, as it now is, and as it hopes to be. The story of the origin of many of the more important resorts is told in some detail; the lesser resorts are very briefly, if at all, mentioned. The most interesting part of the book is the section in which the author discusses many aspects of life along the coast. Here one reads of the great hotels, the boardwalk life, the amusements, and the Atlantic City Beauty Pageant. There is much on the sea, on the great storms and the havoc wrought by them, on the many wrecks, and even on the United States Coast Guard. A lively description of a deep-sea fishing trip will be enjoyed by those who like this sport. Mr. Cunningham is at his best, however, in describing those sections of the area which he particularly loves. His ac- 122 BOOK REVIEWS January

counts of Barnegat Bay and of the Inland Waterway, of the beaches and dunes are touched with a nostalgia which will be shared by all those who are familiar with these fast-changing aspects of the shore. The book is written in a pleasant newspaper style that makes for easy reading. It is well illustrated and has good maps. Like all the productions of the Rutgers University Press it is well printed and bound. The book is not one for the historian, but it will be enjoyed by every resident of New Jersey who is interested in his state, as well as by those nonresidents who, like this reviewer, spend each summer at "the shore."

The Historical Society of Pennsylvania J. HARCOURT GIVENS

Industrial Medicine in Western Pennsylvania, 1850-1950. By DR. T. LYLE HAZLETT and WILLIAM W. HUMMEL. (Pittsburgh: University of Pitts- burgh Press, 1957. xviii, 301 p. Illustrations, appendices, bibliography, index. $6.00.) This volume achieves the goal set by the authors. It is a detailed, well- documented history of the birth and growth of industrial medicine in this one geographical area. As such, the book must inevitably have a very limited appeal to general readers. But the work is important because Western Pennsylvania, with its vast steel and coal industries, was the cradle of industrial medicine. As recently as 1912, in one of the large steel companies "first aid was provided by the gate watchman who usually kept iodine, bandages, arnica and Jamaica ginger in his office." The amazing change in the past few decades is well illustrated by what was done in Western Pennsylvania and is well described in this book. For the individual interested in the welfare of laborers, in industrial medicine and its history, this book will be useful.

Villanova O. H. PERRY PEPPER THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF PENNSYLVANIA

President^ Boyd Lee Spahr Vice-Presidents Boies Penrose Roy F. Nichols Charles Stewart Wurts Conyers Read William C. Tuttle Ernest C. Savage Secretary, Richmond P. Miller Treasurer, Frederic R. Kirkland

Councilors Isaac H. Clothier, Jr. Henry S. Jeanes, Jr. Harold D. Saylor William Logan Fox A. Atwater Kent, Jr. Grant M. Simon John H. Grady Sydney E. Martin Frederick B. Tolles Penrose R. Hoopes Henry R. Pemberton H. Justice Williams Counsel, R. Sturgis Ingersoll

Director, R. Norris Williams, 2nd

DEPARTMENT HEADS: Nicholas B. Wainwright, Research; Lois V. Given, Publications; J. Harcourt Givens, Manuscripts; Raymond L. Sutcliffe, Library; Sara B. Pomerantz, Assistant to the Treasurer; Howard T. Mitchell, Photo-reproduction; Walter Lockett, Building Superintendent. 9 9 9 9 Founded in 1824, The Historical Society of Pennsylvania has long been a center of research in Pennsylvania and American history. It has accumulated an important historical collection, chiefly through contributions of family, political, and business manuscripts, as well as letters, diaries, newspapers, magazines, maps, prints, paintings, photographs, and rare books. Additional contributions of such a nature are urgently solicited for preservation in the Society's fireproof building where they may be consulted by scholars. Membership. There are various classes of membership: general, $10.00; associate, #25.00; patron, #100.00; life, #250.00; benefactor, #1,000. Members receive certain privileges in the use of books, are invited to the Society's historical addresses and receptions, and receive The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography. Those interested in joining the Society are invited to submit their names. Hours. The Society is open to the public Monday, 1 P.M. to 9 P.M.; Tuesday through Friday, 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. The Society is usually closed during August.