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Pundits proclaim that politics makes strange bedfellows, and the politics under Lincoln’s administration are no exception.  In one notable case, a series of letters discovered at the National Archives reveals that underneath the business of ordinary political patronage lay a web of relationships connecting several of the decade’s most prominent men that ultimately linked the century’s greatest president to one of the century’s greatest writers.

            For several years following the publication of his first novel in 1846, Herman Melville enjoyed a degree of financial prosperity.  The English and American sales of his first five books and the English sale of Moby Dick netted him an average of $1,600 per year.  After 1851 sales of his work began to slow. He continued to live off royalties for the next two years, but by 1853 Melville was forced to pursue other means of income.  Between 1853 and 1860 he supported his family on earnings from magazine contributions and lecture tours.  By late 1860, however, Melville “had almost no income from magazines, lectures, or books.”[1] Living almost entirely from the generosity of his father-in-law, he was in dire need of a job.

            At the suggestion of his brother Allan, Herman Melville set his sights on a consulship to Florence, hoping to escape the increasingly fractured United States for the European haven of art and culture.  In an effort to secure this appointment, Melville turned to a web of associations that ultimately linked him to Abraham Lincoln.  First his father-in-law, Lemuel Shaw, late Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, contacted Senator Charles Sumner, explaining that Melville “has suffered somewhat in his health, as his friends believe, by devotion to study and a life of extreme solitude.”[2]  Melville also tapped Julius Rockwell, his neighbor in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and a former U. S. Congressman and Senator, to write to Sumner.  Rockwell obliged, urging Sumner to “let his genius- his imperfect health - …his noble wife, and his four children – plead, with trumpet tongues for him.”[3]

            Rockwell was an inspired choice to lobby on Melville’s behalf, for he had connections not only to Sumner, but to Lincoln himself, a fact Rockwell was cognizant of as he asked Sumner to “say to the President as much as you can in my name, which I trust he may remember with some kindness.”[4]  Lincoln probably first met Rockwell through their mutual friend David Davis, judge of the Eighth Judicial Circuit and husband of Rockwell’s wife’s sister.  Lincoln’s regard for Rockwell grew as they served together as fellow Whigs in the 30th Congress to such a degree that, twelve years later, when Lincoln needed a small favor from a Massachusetts resident to facilitate his son’s entry into Harvard, Lincoln wrote to Rockwell, “I think of you more readily than any other citizen of Massachusetts, as one who would be willing to oblige me.”[5]

            Rockwell joined together with nine other prominent citizens of western Massachusetts to petition Lincoln on Melville’s behalf:

            We the undersigned respectfully beg leave to recommend Mr. Herman Melville for the office of Consul at Florence.

            Mr. Melville has done much to enhance the reputation of our national literature; is a gentleman of the most estimable character, and is highly qualified for the post we earnestly recommend and request may be given him.[6]

            To bolster his case, Melville went to Washington to plead his case to Senator Sumner in person.  On March 22, he attended a levee at the White House and later wrote his wife about the event: “A steady stream of two-&-two’s wound thro’ the apartments shaking hands with ‘Old Abe’ and immediately passing on…Of course I was one of the shakers.  Old Abe is much better looking than I expected & younger looking.  He shook hands like a good fellow – working hard at it like a man sawing wood at so much per cord.”[7]

Thus, in a curious footnote in history, the Great Emancipator came face to face with the author of Moby Dick…and ultimately denied him a job.  The handshake, three petitions, and one letter Lincoln received on Melville’s behalf were all in vain, for on March 27, Lincoln appointed T. Bigelow Lawrence of Boston as Consul to Florence.[8]  Lawrence, son of onetime Minister to England and prominent Republican Abbott Lawrence, was himself a seasoned diplomat by 1861, having previously served as Attaché to the U. S. Legation at London. 

Although Melville failed to secure a diplomatic post from the Lincoln administration, he eventually met with success in securing federal patronage.  In 1867 the collector of customs for the port of New York, Henry Smythe, nominated Melville for the post of Inspector of Customs.  Melville was sworn into his new, four-dollar-a-day, six-day-a-week job on December 5 of that year and served in the post for 19 years.[9]

[1] William Charvat, “Melville’s Income,” American Literature 15.3 (November 1943), 254-55.
[2] Lemuel Shaw to Charles Sumner, 21 March 1861, Record Group 59: General Records of the Department of State, 1789-1949, Entry 760, Letters of Application and Recommendation During the Administrations of Lincoln and Johnson, 1861-1869, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD.
[3] Julius Rockwell to Charles Sumner, 25 March 1861, RG 59, Entry 760.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Abraham Lincoln to Julius Rockwell, 27 July 1860, The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln: First Supplement, 1832-1865, vol. 10, p. 57.
[6]Petition of Julius Rockwell and others to Abraham Lincoln, 14 March 1861, RG 59, Entry 760.
[7] Quoted in Hershel Parker, Herman Melville: A Biography, Volume 2, 1851-1891 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002), 464.
[8] Appointment of T. Bigelow Lawrence as Consul to Florence, Document 233950, The Papers of Abraham Lincoln.
[9] Parker, 603-05.
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