Ottilie Assing to Frederick Douglass, April 14, 1870

OTTILIE ASSING TO FREDERICK DOUGLASS

Hoboken[, N.J.] 14 April 1870.

MY DEAR FRIEND:

To be sure, one’ room does not look as cheerful when entered after a dear guest has left it as it looked when he was in it, and yet there seemed to be left something in it as if it were in the very atmosphere—a little seasoned perhaps with the fragrance of cigars—that made it a better place than it would have been if that guest had not been in it. I feel rather inclined to enter on some details about that matter, but as I know that you would call them incendiary, I shall not say anything more except that I think it was a delightful time, admirably spent, thought it ought to have been at least one day longer in order to allow us to see Macbeth together. There being however no prospect of enjoying that pleasure in this season, I went on Tuesday with Mr. Lange^{1Johannes “John” Daniel Lange (1841–1916) was born in Lubeck, Germany, and immigrated to the United States in March 1863. Within a few years, Lange was boarding with Assing’s friends the Koëhlers in Hoboken, New Jersey, and working as a clerk. In 1870 he became a naturalized citizen of the United States and moved to Manhattan, where he continued to work as a clerk and bookkeeper for many years. In 1878, Lange married Alvina W. Bartels (1858–1944), with whom he had two children: Dr. Linda B. Lange (1882–1947), a specialist in the fields of bacteriology and immunology who taught at both Johns Hopkins and the University of Wisconsin Medical School, and Henry B. Lange (1885–1953), who was a mechanical engineer. Lange, who made frequent trips back to Germany, died there in 1916 while undergoing treatment for cancer in Berlin. 1870 U.S. Census, New Jersey, Hudson County, 42; 1900 U.S. Census, New York, New York County, 66B; 1910 U.S. Census, New York, New York County, 66A; Marilyn Ogilvie and Joy Harvey, eds., The Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science: Pioneering Lives from Ancient Times to the Mid-20th Century, 2 vols. (New York, 2000), 2: 748; Diedrich, Love across Color Lines, 275; “U.S., City Directories, 1822–1995”; “U.S., Passport Applications, 1795–1925,” Ancestry.com; “Reports of Deaths of American Citizens Abroad, 1835–1974,” Ancestry.com; Find a Grave (online); Smithsonian Institution, “A Finding Aid to the Sylvester Rosa Koehler Papers, 1833–1904,” aaa.si.edu.} and Mrs. Werpup.^{2Apparently a native of Bremen, Germany, Eliza Werpup (1815–?) was in all likelihood Christine Elise Schroder, the wife of Johann Diedrich Werpup, whose sole surviving child (christened Georgina Auguste Elwire Sophie Werpup) was born in that city on 12 August 1841. Mrs. Werpup was Ottilie Assing’s landlady in Hoboken, New Jersey, off and on for nine years, beginning sometime in either 1869 or 1870. Although it is probable that she resided there earlier, Mrs. Werpup, who is described as the widow of John Diedrich (or Diedrick) Werpup, first appears in the Hoboken city directory in 1868, residing at 74 Garden, which is where Assing was living in 1870. In 1874, Mrs. Werpup resided at 286 Bloomfield in Hoboken, but by 1880 she was living with her daughter’s family at 300 Washington Street, where she was still dwelling as late as 1905. 1880 U.S. Census, New Jersey, Hudson County, 32D; 1905 New Jersey State Census, Hudson County, 11B; Diedrich, Love across Color Lines, 291, 342; Lohmann, Radical Passion, 336, 363n; “U.S., City Directories, 1822–1995”; “U.S., Dutch Reformed Church Records in Selected States, 1639–1989,” Ancestry.com; “Deutschland Geburten und Taufen, 1558–1898,” FamilySearch.org.} Booth was splendid in it, equal to any of his other parts.^{3Edwin Thomas Booth (1833–93) was an accomplished Shakespearean actor who achieved critical acclaim and fame throughout the United States and Europe, most notably for his performances as Hamlet. Although Booth was famous in his own right, he is also known as the brother of President Lincoln’s assassin, John Wilkes Booth. He began his acting career alongside his father, Junius Brutus Booth, Sr., as a teenager in a production of Richard III. He later was manager of the Winter Garden in New York from 1863 to 1867, when the theater burned down. In 1869, he built Booth’s Theatre at 6th Avenue and 23rd Street in New York City. Despite his popularity, the business venture was unsuccessful, and he declared bankruptcy in 1873. He continued to tour in the United States and Europe, finding success in London in 1880–81. Booth formed The Players, a men’s social club for actors and authors, in 1888. He served as its first president and was a member until his death, dying in his office at the club in 1893. Edwin Booth performed in Macbeth in April 1870 alongside Fanny Morant as Lady Macbeth. New York Times, 3 April 1870; Finding aid for Booth-Grossman Family Papers, *T-Mss 1967-001, Billy Rose Theatre Division, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts; ANB (online).} One feature that I appreciate particularly in his performance is the tact and skill with which he knows to bring out all that is yet good and human in Macbeth, so that notwithstanding all his bloody deeds one cannot help feeling interested in him even attracted, nor is it possible to deny him pity with his sufferings. The effect would have been much greater yet if he had been more ably supported, but the others being altogether quite inferior actors, there was quite a painful contrast and Lady Macbeth was such an abomination that she kept me in constant indignation.^{4Fanny Morant (1821–1900) was born in England and performed at Drury Lane before settling in America in 1853. She worked steadily on the New York City stage for decades. Morant also played Gertrude opposite Booth’s Hamlet on numerous occasions. T. Allston Brown, A History of the New York Stage, from the First Performance in 1732 to 1901, 3 vols. (New York, 1902), 2: 409–13.} Such ugliness, such grimacing and raging, such utter lack of gracefulness can hardly be outdone by any other bad actress, whilst the only redeeming feature, the real deep love and affection she has for Macbeth, so that indeed the desire to see him great is the chief cause of her fall, this affection did not come to <the> light at all, or rather was utterly and entirely wanting, so that the whole character became merely a horrible and repulsive caricature. Does not that tragedy show more than any other the terrible power of women? a power that the right of suffrage can neither increase nor diminish. With a good wife by his side—though possibly warranted to kill at forty paces—Macbeth would very soon have

overcome the temptation thrown out by those bad women, the witches, and would have lived as a famous and happy man—might even live nowa-days if he had not died, to use the style of the fairy tales, and that is the “moralite” which I attach to it.—To me it appeared very objectionable too to see the witches performed by men. The witch—such has popular superstition and tradition have handed her down to us, is the very personification of all that can be bad, mean and repulsive in woman not in <human> nature generally, and therefore cannot be acted by men without damage being done to the conception. Other things that I utterly dislike are first the English custom of turning one’s back to the spectators—a real outrage according to German and French stage rule, and the coarse tastelessness of displaying wounds by smearing one’s face all over with red paint. It looks bad, but not natural. This is an article which—with some slight alterations might fill its place in a paper, but you know, I am almost an actor myself and imagine besides that the matter interests you somewhat and that you have time for reading. Of course, we should have talked it all over together, if we had seen it in common.

Another matter which certainly will interest you and give you pleasure is: that coming home on Monday I found a letter from Lewis^{5Lewis H. Douglass.} with a money order of 25 dollars and the promise to pay the rest in a month or so. He shows his good intentions anyhow, and does the best he can. I should like to know what figure a Border State^{6This was Assing’s private nickname for Anna Murray Douglass. Fought, Women, 213–14; Lohmann, Radical Passion, 363n; Diedrich, Love across Color Lines, 186.} will play. A pity that you won’t get any direct information about it and that we shall have to go merely by induction, to use a philosophical expression in a very unphilosophical affair.

Good night my Friend and everything good to you! I am now looking forward to Anniversary week;^{7According to Thomas Wentworth Higginson, this was a term commonly used before the Civil War to refer to interrelated reform movements premised on an expansive understanding of individual rights and the responsiveness of social organizations to deliberate change: antislavery, women’s rights, temperance, and tract or missionary societies. Because many people were committed members of multiple organizations, many of these organizations commonly met during “anniversary week” each year in the same city. Ronald G. Walters, “Abolition and Antebellum Reform,” History Now: The Journal of the Gilder Lehrman Institute (online).} you know I must have something to look forward too.

Yours ever

OTTILIA

ALS: General Correspondence File, reel 2, frames 532–34L, FD Papers, DLC.

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