Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1873-12-25
The Ways of Genius.

When a man begins life as back
woodsman, Injured to the toughest kind
of labor and privation, and ends it as a
celebrated painter whose works are
| cherished in hundreds of homes in Amer
| lea and Great Britain, his career cannot
| be devoid of interest or undeserying of
| record. Such a man was Chester Hard
| ing, one of the most eminent portrait
! painters whom America has produced,
| and connecting link between her earlier
and later artists. During the last years
of his life Mr.. Harding drew up an ac-
| count of his life, which after his death
was printed for his family and friends,
| but has never been published. 1t is an
interesting piece of autobiography, conf
| tanning a full but unpretending narrative
! of incidents which | have often heard
him relate and it graphically depicts
| that indomitable force of character
| through which he won competence and
| honor in the face of adverse circum-
stances. From this little work, supple
mented by my own recollections, the
| following sketch has been prepared.
Chester Harding, the son of very poor
parents, was born in Conway, Massa-
chusetts, on September LIST, 1892. His
father wasted his energies and impover-
ished his family by abortive schemes for
the discovery of perpetual motion. His
mother was noble woman, and he in
herited her striking common sense. He
was reared as other poor boys were at
that period, with very little education,
and at the age of fourteen the family
removed to Madison county in Western
New York, then an unbroken wilder
ness. They had hard struggle for eX-
istence, and Chester, besides helping to
clear the farm, which was covered with
heavy timber, worked with an elder
brother in making flag-bottomed chairs.
During the war with Great Britain he
enlisted for a time, and served as a
drummer at Oswego and Sackett's Har-
Dor. After his discharge he started forth
as a peddler of a patent spinning head,
the right of which he sold in Connect
cut, and toward the close of the war
embarked with younger brother in the
manufacture of chairs and furniture at
Caledonia, a small town in Livingston
county, New York.
At this period he fell desperately in
love, at first sight, with Miss Caroline
Woodruff, a beautiful girl of twenty.
She soon removed with her family to
distance of fifty miles, but, drawn by
her magnetic power, he twice walked
the whole distance to urge his suit. He
was at length accepted, and the we'd
ding day was fixed for February 18th,
1915. On the preceding day the bride
was making her last preparations the
guests had been invited, the wedding
cake was in the oven, and her brother
had been dispatched to neighboring
town for the white kid gloves and sash.
presently the bridegroom elect drove up
to the door in sleigh, and, after the
first salutations had passed, announced
that he had come to be married on that
day, for the snow was melting so fast
that if they waited twenty-four hours
they would not be able to get back to
Caledonia. So they were married tie
day beforehand. "And," Mrs. Harding
was accustomed to say,in allusion to her
husbands habit of quick and impulsive
decision, lit has been the day beforehand.
ever since"
Hardly had he married when business
troubles beset him. Proving unfortunate
in his trade, he tried tavern-keeping, and
fell into debt. His creditors became
pressing, and fearing to be thrown into
jail, he hastily and secretly babe adieu
to his wife and infant daughter, and
made his way to the head-waters of the
Alleghana, whence, when the river
opened, he took passage on raft and
worked his way down to Pittsburg.
The incident to which he owed his first
conception of what was henceforth TO
occupy his life will be best related in
his own words
"About this time fell in with a Dor
trait painter by the name of Nelson
one of the primitive sort. He had for
his sign copy of the Infant Artists of
Sir Joshua Reynolds, with this inscrip-
ton Sign, Ornamental, and Portrait
Painting executed on the shortest notice.
with neatness and Dispatch / saw his
portraits, and was enamored at once.
got him to paint me and my wife, and
thought the pictures perfection. He
would not let me see him paint, nor
would he give me the least idea how the
thing was done. / took the pictures
home and pondered on them, and won
dered how it was possible for man to
produce such wonders of art. At length
my admiration began to yield to an am
bition to do the same thing. | thought
of it by day and dreamed of it by night,
until was stimulated to make an at
tempt at painting myself. l got board,
and with such colors as l had for use in
my trade | began portrait of my wife.
l made thing that looked like her.
The moment | saw the likeness became
frantic with delight it was like the dis
eovery of new sense / could think of
nothing else. From that time sign
painting became odious. -Lippincott's
Magazine for January, 1874.