Daily Kennebec journal., 1896-07-03
Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Harriet bcecher stowe.
The death of Mrs. Harriet Beechel
Stowe calls away one of the greates
women of the century. The lovers Of
liberty in every land on the globe-ant
there are few of them where her ia.
nous Uncle Toms Cabin is unknown
will mourn her loss.
Mrs. Stowe came of one of the most
in many respects the most-distin-
suished families our country has ever
known-a distinctly American family
She was born at Litchfield, Conn.,, or
June Is, 1911. She was but four years
old when her mother died, and from
that time until her fathers second
marriage her home was with he,
grandmother in the town of Guilford
Conn. At an early age she mani
tested a great eagerness for books, and
read the prosy theological works of
her fathers library with an eagerness
only excelled by that with which the
pages of stray volume of the
Arabian Nights or Don Quixote'
were devoured. The early years of her
life We're spent in the intellectual at
mosphere of 14itchfield, which was a
famous resort for ministers. judges,
lawyers, and professional men of
culture and education. When about
Il years of age she went to Hartford.
where her sister Catherine had opened
a school. While here, she was known
as an absent minded and moody young
lady, odd in her manners and habits.
but fine scholar. excelling especially
in composition writing. In 1882, when
her sisters health failed, she went to
Cincinnati, to which place her father
had removed where they opened a
school. On the 5th of January, 1896.
she married Rev. Calvin Stowe. D. D..
professor of Biblical history in Lane
seminary, over which her father pre-
sided.
In her earlier married life Mrs. Stowe
wrote a few tales and sketches for the
magazines but she attempted nothing
of more Importance until 1850, when,
her husband having accepted the pro-
fessorship of Natural and Revealed
Religion in Bowdoin college, Bruins
wick, Me-, she contributed to the Ma
tional Era, an anti-slavery paper.
published at Washington, "Uncle
Toms Cabin" as q serial. When the
story was completed, she long and
vainly sought a publisher for it. until
a young Boston publisher finally con-
sented to bring it out in 1852 1t met
with unequalled success; 313, 900 copies
were sold in the United States within
three years and a half and in all, over
half a million copies, including German
edition prepared there. In Great
Britain its sale was enormous. 1t was
translated into 20 different languages,
including Welsh, Russian, Armenian.
AldDic, NiiieSe, dlu Japanese, lnere
were II different German and four diff
ferent French versions; and it was
dramatized in various forms. She
subsequently published "a Peep into
Uncle Toms Cabin for Children QS5S);
and "The Christian Slave: Drama"
founded on Uncle Toms Cabin QS55).
AS some of the statements of fact in
the work were denied, Mrs. Stowe pub
lished. in 1853, "A Key to Uncle Toms
Cabin" giving the original facts and
statements on which it was based. She
visited Europe in 1858. and the results
OF her observations were published in
1854, in Sunny Memories of Foreign
Lands" A little work entitled "Geog-
raphy for My Children" was published
in 1855, and the next year appeared her
second anti-slavery novel, "Dred: a
Tale of the Dismal Swamp" In her
subsequent works, Mrs. Stowe de-
the quaint old domestic life of
New England of fifty or a hundred
years ago. Her other published works
are Our Charley, and what to do with
Him" QS59); "The Minister'S Wooing"l
tale Of Newport, Rhode Island, in |
the latter part of the eighteenth CEN
tury QS59); "The Pearl of Orr's
Island" Q862); agnes of Sorrento"
dS62); Reply on behalf of the Women
Of America to the Christian Address OIL
many thousand Women of Great |
Britain" dS63); "The Ravages of a |
Carpet" Qs64); House and Home
Papers" dS6D: Religious Poems"
use5); "stories about Our Dogs" uss5) +;
Little Foxes" QS65): "Queer Little
People" QS67; ''Daisy's First Winter,