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RE-ECHOES OF OLD COLLISIONS; REPLIES TO CRITICS OF BELA PRATT'S "HALE."
(This letter is reprinted from The Yale Alumni Weekly of January 17, 1913.) Editor Yale Alumni Weekly:
Sir :- I am constrained by my deep interest in the project to erect a statue to Nathan Hale at Yale, to answer the letters contributed to the Alumni Weekly of January 3d, by Thomas Young, '63, and Edgar A. Turrell, '67, and severely criticizing Bela Lyon Pratt's design, unanimously approved by the Committee on Memorials appointed by the Corporation of Yale and warmly commended by those members of the Corporation who have had the privilege of seeing the small bronze figure cast from Mr. Pratt's original sketch-model in plaster.
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BELA PRATT'S "HALE"
Mr. Young's view is so extreme, in his suggestion that Hale should be represented with a "halter around his neck," that I think his drastic comment may be ignored until a person qualified by a knowledge of Hale and a student of the art of sculpture is prepared to suggest just how the interest of any figure of Hale is to be concentrated upon the supreme moment of Hale's sacrifice unless the wrists are tied and the ankles are bound.
Mr. Turrell, after condemning Pratt's design as showing Hale with his "arms and legs bound, his neck bared for the halter and ready to be hung," points with approval to MacMonnies' "Hale" in City Hall Park. Why Mr. Turrell should decry Pratt's "Hale" for the reason that it represents Hale with his arms and legs bound, etc., and approve Mac- Monnies' "Hale," is difficult to understand, since MacMonnies' "Hale" is also represented with his arms and legs bound and with his neck bared. It is plain that Mr. Turrell has never really looked at MacMonnies' "Hale" except in the most casual way. So careless an observer can hardly carry much weight as a critic.
Yale graduates and others who are interested in Mr. Pratt's "Hale" certainly do not resent criticism of the design chosen, but they have a right to ask that it be fairly considered and judged and not abused.
I am free to say that, at first, it is painful to see Hale bound. To a fellow of Hale's high spirit, that must have been one of the most fearful moments of his brief but bitter experience. Upon the modest headstone erected in the burying ground at Coventry, by Hale's father, some years after his death, appears the following inscription :
"Durable stone preserve the monumental record-Nathan Hale. Esq. a Capt in the Army of the United States who was born June 6th, 1755, and receiv'd the first honors of Yale College 1773. resigned his life a sacrifice to his country's liberty at New York Sept. 22d, 1776. Etatis 22d."
This touching inscription tells the story in words. The statue must tell the same story in a different way.
There is no use in attempting to avoid recognition of the fact that Hale was hanged as a spy. Nothing is more certain than that Hale felt the ignominy of it beyond words. Edward Everett Hale once said that Hale's family felt that phase of his great uncle's death so keenly that Hale's name was rarely mentioned in the family circle even down so late as his own boyhood. This seems incredible. But we have Edward Everett Hale's word for it. It prepares us to believe that for Hale and his associates the word "spy" had.a terrible significance that we can scarcely grasp. We know that Hale's companions, notably Captain William Hull, endeavored, by every argument, to dissuade Hale from undertaking his perilous errand for the reason that if he failed he would be hanged as a spy. Hale was fully aware of this, and one of the brightest features of his martyrdom was his willingness to accept the service of his country on such terms. The supreme moment in Hale's life is the moment when, bound hand and foot, he "Resigned his life a sacrifice to his Country's liberty." In a sense, Hale's sacrifice is to be measured by his willingness to hazard being hanged as a spy. He is exalted and not degraded by the
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circumstance. What he accepted then, we may well accept now. To portray him merely in the act of declamation, begs the whole question and misses the point of his martyrdom. If he was willing to act as a spy he would not have shrunk from being so represented in the "house of his friends." It would seem to be sentimental and cowardly in us to avoid the representation in bronze of bonds which he in reality bore without flinching.
The question arises, what means may the sculptor of a "Hale" employ in his design to concentrate the attention upon the supreme moment if he is debarred from binding the hands and feet? There are in Hartford two statues of Nathan Hale, both representing him in his shirt sleeves, with outstretched arms as in the act of declamation. Both of them fail to convey the meaning intended. There is no suggestion in either case that the moment portrayed is the supreme moment. Both figures are too deficient in characterization to meet the high requirements of a statue to Hale.
Mr. MacMonnies, with insight and courage, saw that his figure would altogether fail of its object if he did not put aside false sentiment and conform to the fact of history. The beautifully modeled figure of his "Hale" is thrown into an extremely constrained position by the binding of the arms and feet,-entirely overlooked apparently by Mr. Turrell. Both Mr. Partridge and Mr. Pratt were obliged, as artists, to take the same view and represent Hale as bound. With the arms or wrists and ankles unbound, the designs of MacMonnies, Partridge and Pratt would fail to explain themselves and be without significance. It is no part of my object to discuss the designs of MacMonnies or of Partridge; nor even of Pratt, beyond saying that Mr. Pratt has succeeded in binding the hands and feet and constraining the figure, if you please, but leaving Hale's spirit self-poised and free.
Mr. Turrell calls for a Hale in "Continental uniform, as was done in the statue in front of the City Hall in New York." If I may venture to express an opinion, I think that MacMonnies' "Hale" is misleading in being far too elegantly costumed. "Continental uniform" is a vague term. Mr. Turrell's designation of the uniform worn by MacMonnies' "Hale" as a "Continental uniform" does not make it so. MacMonnies' "Hale" was, I believe, modeled in Paris. The costume seems to me to be that of a courtier rather than of a home-bred Connecticut boy in the simple garb of our Colonial period. But MacMonnies' "Hale" is unques- . tionably a fine performance and a superb example of modern sculpture as such. I refer my readers to the full-page reproduction of it in Lorado Taft's "History of American Sculpture," p. 332. Hale was brought into camp after an experience of two weeks in the open in the disguise of a schoolmaster. Certainly he could not have been wearing a Continental uniform as a spy. We know that he divested himself of his captain's uniform at Norwalk just before he crossed the Sound .* To have portrayed
* My present belief is that he assumed his disguise at Huntington, Long Island, after he had crossed the Sound accompanied by Hempstead, who then returned to Norwalk.
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BELA PRATT'S "HALE"
Hale in Continental uniform, as suggested by Mr. Turrell, would have belied the fact of history, unless the intention was to portray Hale with- out any reference to his martyrdom, rather than at the moment of it, as did MacMonnies. Mr. Pratt, desiring to avoid too much stress upon costume, has represented Hale as simply dressed in the ordinary garb of the period, and relies upon the expression of the head and figure for his effect.
To Mr. Turrell I would make the same reply that I would make to Mr. Young. When a competent critic suggests how Hale may be portrayed at the supreme moment without binding the hands and feet and baring the neck, and yet concentrate the interest, it will be time to decry Pratt's accepted design.
When MacMonnies' "Hale" was unveiled years ago in City Hall Park, a greatly interested friend of mine strongly objected to the figure for the reason, as he said, that it was painful to him to see Hale bound; but he lived to change his mind on the point. As time went on, it appeared that the newsboys on the street and many people hurrying by, stopped to ask why the figure was bound. That fact challenged their attention and caused them to stop and read the inscription on the pedestal and make inquiries, and thus get the story of Hale. When my friend saw that the very fact that the arms and feet of the "Hale" in City Hall Park were bound, was what arrested the attention and ultimately brought out Hale's story, he was satisfied that the artist was right.
In his youth, his personal beauty and athletic prowess, in his simplicity and straightforwardness of character, in his single achievement and early fate, Hale has for us something of the quality of a Greek hero-an unfading brightness which endears him to us doubly when he is bound, as we must always picture him, for his country's sake. It is inconceivable that a Greek sculptor would have represented Hale other than as bound for his sacrifice.
Mr. Pratt's aim was to represent Hale as youthful, unspoiled, country- bred. Posterity will judge of the merits of his design as a work of sculpture, but I think we of this generation may feel sure that he has produced a design well suited to the place which it is to occupy, and portraying with touching directness Hale's simple and manly spirit.
GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR.
New Haven, January 8, 1913.
(Reprinted from The New York Evening Post, of February 18, 1913.)
To the Editor of The Evening Post:
Sir :- Since Mr. John S. Wood's letter on the Nathan Hale statue for Yale, in the Evening Post of Saturday, February 8, was obviously intended as a reply to my letter on the same subject in The Yale Alumni Weekly of January 17, I venture to ask you to reprint my letter. Some significant facts, not yet published, so far as I am aware, I may mention here.
Mr. Pratt's "Hale," so distressing to the artistic sense of Mr. Wood,
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was unanimously chosen by the regular Yale Committee on Memorials, appointed by the Corporation of the University and consisting of Prof. John F. Weir, director of the Yale School of Fine Arts; the Rev. Anson Phelps Stokes, Jr., secretary of the University; Howard Mansfield, Esq., of New York; Mr. Grosvenor Atterbury, of New York, the well-known architect; and Prof. Wilbur L. Cross, of Yale.
Another phase of the subject merits consideration. Mr. Partridge has done no less than three statues of "Hale." Of these the first, originally designed by him, unsolicited, for Yale, was subsequently erected in the Middle West, I think in St. Paul. The second "Hale" designed by Mr. Partridge, is on view somewhere in the city of New York. It now appears from Mr. Wood's letter that Mr. Partridge will place his third "Hale" in Washington. Mr. Partridge's third "Hale," also intended for Yale, is the design which Mr. Wood refers to as having been "withdrawn." I cannot claim to have seen these three "Hales" designed by Mr. Partridge, but I am informed that they are alike in concept and that the arms are in each instance bound. This feature, so painful to Mr. Wood in Mr. Pratt's "Hale," does not seem to distress him at all in Mr. Partridge's "Hale."
The wisdom of erecting at Yale a design on view in substantially the same form in the West, in New York, and now to be set up in Wash- ington, may well be doubted. Many members of the Alumni body would not, out of a very natural sentiment, wish a virtual replica at Yale of any "Hale," however fine. Nevertheless, if Mr. Partridge's "Hale," now so long before the public, had been acclaimed as a great work of art or had touched the common feeling with regard to Hale (as, for instance, St. Gaudens' "Lincoln" at Chicago, a great work of art, touched the common feeling with respect to Lincoln) it seems to me that the Com- mittee on Memorials must have unanimously chosen Mr. Partridge's "Hale" when it was referred to them by the Yale Corporation, despite the drawback that two substantial replicas of it had already been erected elsewhere.
It is not my purpose to discuss Mr. Partridge's design or Mr. Pratt's design, but the propriety of representing Hale bound and at the moment of execution, as has been done first by MacMonnies, then by Partridge, in three different figures, and then by Pratt.
Mr. Wood in his letter places great stress upon the fact that Hale was a student and should be so represented. Hale is not being memorialized as a student, but as the supreme youthful hero of the Revolutionary War. Yale will erect Hale's statue in the old college yard, not because he walked those elm-shaded paths as a student, but because he was martyred for his country's sake. The whole point of our feeling about Hale is that in the service of his country he was hanged as a spy. Any other view of Hale begs the entire question, as I pointed out in my letter above referred to. My letter, I may add, was in reply to letters from Messrs. Young and Turrell, printed in The Yale Alumni Weekly of January 3.
GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR.
New Haven, Conn., February 13.
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PRESIDENT DWIGHT'S TRIBUTE
A Dedication Ceremony Dispensed With: Hale Left to Tell His Own Story
When the "Hale" statue was ready to be erected, the question of a dedication ceremony arose and I was honored with an invitation to make the address. But I urged that the formality of a dedication of the statue be dispensed with and that Hale be allowed to tell his own story without other introduction to the Yale undergraduate body. President Hadley concurred with my view and the statue was erected without any ceremony just before college came together in September, 1913. When the students came back they found Hale there in front of Connecticut Hall. At about this time I prepared the following article on Hale's friendship with the first President Dwight, with whom he was on terms of intimacy as an undergraduate. This article was printed in the Alumni Weekly on October 9, 1913, together with a poem written at my request by a gifted alumnus of Yale, Robert Munger, of the Class of 1907.
TIMOTHY DWIGHT THE ELDER AND NATHAN HALE
By GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR
One of the most interesting items known to have survived from Nathan Hale's scattered correspondence, is the letter addressed to him by his former tutor Timothy Dwight, after- wards to have a great career as a teacher and president of Yale College. Dwight and Hale saw much of each other during Hale's college course (1769-1773), since both were active members of the famous Linonia Society and both greatly interested in collecting books for its library. Hale, though famous as an athlete, was greatly interested in litera- ture. It was as much the thing then to be literary as it is now to be athletic.
At the age of nineteen Dwight, with youthful precocity, began a pompous epic in eleven books which he called "The
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Conquest of Canaan." Dwight finished the poem three years later. It is more than likely that Hale was in his confidence and knew about this poem. This is a reasonable inference, since otherwise it is unlikely that Dwight would have written to Hale in camp soliciting his assistance in the matter of procuring subscribers to the book. Dwight was too cautious to embark upon such an undertaking as the publication of his poem without being sure in advance that enough volumes would be taken to pay the cost of publication.
Dwight's manner of addressing Hale, then a lad of twenty, enables us to see how highly Hale was regarded by his tutor, who was already one of the most promising and admired young men of his generation. Indeed, I think that I do not go too far in saying that we have no contemporary document so well showing how highly Hale was regarded by his asso- ciates as this letter from Dwight to Hale. Hull's tribute to Hale is more carefully phrased and was written we do not know just how long after Hale's death. Dwight's letter follows :
TIMOTHY DWIGHT TO HALE IN CAMP
"Dear Sir,
The many civilities I have already received at your hands embolden me to trouble you with the inclos'd. The design you will learn from a perusal of it. As such a publication ["The Conquest of Canaan"] must be founded on an extensive subscription, I find myself necessitated to ask the assistance of my friends. To a person of Mr. Hale's character (motive of friendship apart) fondness for the liberal arts would be a sufficient apology for this application. As I was ever unwilling to be under even necessary obligations, it would have been highly agreeable, could I have transacted the whole business myself. Since that is impos- sible I esteem myself happy in reflecting that the person who may confer this obligation, is a Gentleman, of whose politeness and benevolence, I have already experienced so frequent, and so undoubted assurances. If you will be so kind, my Dear Sir, as to present the inclos'd to those Gentlemen & Ladies, of the circle with which you are connected, whoni you may think likely to honour the poem with their encouragement, and return it with their Names, by a convenient opportunity, it will add one to the many instances of esteem with which you have obliged your very sincere Friend,
and most Humble Servant
TIMOTHY DWIGHT JUN
Mr. Nathan Hale
Feb. 20, 1776.
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PRESIDENT DWIGHT'S TRIBUTE
Comp's to Capt. Hull, Mr. E. Hunt'g [Lieut. Ebenezer Huntington] & the rest of my acquaintance in Camp.
I would beg the favor of you to forward a letter which will be delivered to you by Capt. Perit for Doct Brackett of Portsmouth, as you have connections there you may probably do it without inconvenience."
It is a pity that Hale's reply to Dwight has not been preserved. We may be sure, however, that Hale engaged to do anything in his power to forward the undertaking. Prob- ably the war interfered with the project. At any rate Dwight did not finally publish the poem until 1785, when it was printed in Hartford with an elaborate and high-sounding dedication to General Washington. After the war Dwight injected into the poem tributes to several of its heroes. He did not rewrite the poem for this purpose but simply inserted the tributes without much, if any, regard to the con- text. In writing his tribute to Hale he perhaps had this particular correspondence in mind. If Hale secured some subscriptions for the book, the least Dwight could do was to preserve Hale's name in this way. The poem was received with tremendous applause and Dwight was thought to have rivaled the ancients in the field of epic poetry. Five years after the publication of the poem, Colonel David Humphreys, himself a poet, referred to Dwight as "the father of our epic song." But "Dwight's Homeric fire" "flashed in the pan" and to-day only a few antiquarians and students of early Ameri- can verse know that any such poem as "The Conquest of Canaan" was ever written. Probably but few copies of the little book are still in existence. The only thing that has saved the poem from complete oblivion is the ten lines which Dwight inserted after the war as a tribute to Hale. This tribute from "The Conquest of Canaan" follows :
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DWIGHT'S TRIBUTE TO HALE IN "THE CONQUEST OF CANAAN"
Book I.
"Thus, while fond virtue wished in vain to save, Hale, bright and generous, found a hapless grave. With genius' living flame his bosom glowed, And Science lured him to her sweet abode ; In Worth's fair path his feet adventured far, The pride of Peace, the rising hope of War ;
In duty firm, in danger calm as even - To friends unchanging, and sincere to Heaven.
How short his course, the prize how early won, While weeping Friendship mourns her favorite gone."
Dwight's letter and poetical tribute taken together form one of the best portraits of Hale that we have and help us to understand the regard and affection that he inspired in his friends, classmates, and companions in arms.
NATHAN HALE
UPON HIS STATUE ON THE OLD YALE COLLEGE CAMPUS
BY ROBERT MUNGER, YALE '97
So should you stand to us, as on that day !
The tranquil sadness in your steadfast eyes,
Meek and rejoicing that such proud emprise
Of Death should issue and your lowly way Be beautiful and valiant; the rich May Before your Summer, piteously, lies
About you here, while yet your sure surmise
Lights the swift moment that you may not stay.
Only one life! it was not measured so, Service and Faith and Spirit that you gave Spend not in such a scant and barren doom, Poor lad! high soldier! nay, you could not know Through your life, on how many a noble grave The Summer's mantle should forever bloom.
TRIAL ON YALE'S OLD CAMPUS OF THE PLASTER MODEL OF PRATT'S HALE BEFORE SENDING THE MODEL TO THE BRONZE FOUNDRY. (Reprinted from the New Haven Sunday Register of July 6, 1913.) A novel trial of a bronzed plaster model of the Yale Nathan Hale
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THE CAMPUS STATUE
statue was held on the campus last week, an exact duplicate being placed in position in order that those concerned could be assured that the statue and its pedestal would scale with their surroundings. Bela Lyon Pratt, the sculptor, was present.
George Dudley Seymour, explaining the trial, said: "Probably the great bulk of antique sculpture was cut in position. This is one reason for the superiority of most of the old work over the modern work. When cut in position, the sculptor is able to judge the scale of his figure and the influence of surrounding objects upon it. Furthermore, in the diffused light of out of doors, a piece of sculpture presents quite a dif- ferent appearance from what it does in the shadows and cross lights of a studio. The great bulk of modern sculpture is produced in studios and never tried out, so to speak, in the positions for which it is designed. For this reason modern sculpture is more often defective in scale and more often fails to harmonize with its surroundings than antique sculpture. It is now beginning to be recognized that in order to secure the best results in the field of sculpture there must be a return to the old practice.
Feeling that it was desirable that the Hale statue should be tried in position before being cast in bronze, so as to enable the effect of the figure to be judged in its relation to Connecticut Hall against which it is to be placed, and so that the height and character of the pedestal could be determined, it was arranged with Mr. Pratt at the time that he was given the commission to execute the statue, that the plaster model before being shipped to the bronze foundry, should be sent to New Haven and tried out.
For the trial, which took place last week, Mr. Pratt had sent the plaster cast of his final clay model and Mr. John Walter Cross (Yale 1900), the architect entrusted with the design of the pedestal, had sent several "dummy" pedestals varying in design and height. Mr. Pratt came on from Boston for the trial, and Mr. Cross came up from New York. A number of people specially interested in the statue had been asked to be present and express their views. The occasion was of particular interest as the trial of a statue in the plaster is somewhat uncommon in this country. The plaster figure had of course been bronzed so that it gave the appearance of the final work.
Mr. Pratt's "Hale" as thus tried out will ultimately be placed in the small oblong plot located between the two entrances of Connecticut Hall and will face the east. Connecticut Hall is the only college building which survives from Hale's time; it is believed that he roomed in the building while in college. There is no existing portrait of Hale and therefore Mr. Pratt's design is in no sense a portrait of Hale, but follows the accounts of Hale that have come down to us. The intention has been to represent Nathan Hale as belonging to the "Age of Homespun," without pose or self-consciousness, but simple, strong and natural.
A poem, first published in the February number of the "American Historical Magazine" of 1836, but "wrote soon after Hale's death" by a friend and companion of Hale during his student days at New Haven,
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gives probably the best picture that we have of Hale, though it partakes of the extravagance of the elegiac poetry of the period.
"Erect and tall, his well-proportioned frame, Vigorous and active, as electric flame ; His manly limbs had symmetry and grace, And innate goodness marked his beauteous face; His fancy lively, and his genius great, His solid judgment shone in grave debate; For erudition far beyond his years; At Yale distinguished above all his peers; Speak, ye who knew him while a pupil there,' His numerous virtues to the world declare; His blameless carriage and his modest air, Above the vain parade and idle show Which mark the coxcomb and the empty beau ; Removed from envy, malice, pride and strife, He walked through goodness as he walked through life, A kinder brother nature never knew,
A child more duteous or a friend more true."
Though the poem was not published until 1836, it is believed to have been written as early as 1785.
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