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10/4/24
It is exactly 2:00 p.m., and I have just finished reading "Christmas Hearths and Hearts," in the undated book, "Mrs. Partington's Knitting Work." I had felt, from a quick perusal, that it might have been written by Mathew Franklin Whittier. I was wrong.
This was co-authored by Mathew and Abby Whittier, probably a couple of years before they began writing "A Christmas Carol." The story not only takes place in 1836--the year of their marriage--I would say it was written in 1836. As they were married in August, I would guess they wrote it together earlier that year.
This morning, I wrote to a bookseller who had listed one of Mathew's books from 1834--"The Perils of Pearl Street"--for sale online (it costs several thousand dollars). He wrote back briefly asking for my evidence. I spent an hour carefully explaining each point as best I could, given that I did not have space to provide all the background, and he knew nothing about my work. He wrote back a terse line or two saying he wasn't convinced, and probably would not be changing his listing.
But Mathew Franklin Whittier's authorship of the obscure book, "The Perils of Pearl Street," is one of the easy ones. If I can't change a skeptic's mind about that one, I won't be able to change any skeptical minds about this one. I will have to fit it into my sequel somehow, though I'm not certain, as I write this, how deeply I'll go into it. I may not add it into my 110-page paper on the authorship of "A Christmas Carol," because there, one has to defend everything one says against the most adamant skeptics. Nothing I say is taken on authority--quite the contrary, I am assumed to be delusional. So it will not do to present something for which the evidentiary trail is somewhat weak, and very cold.
However, I am 100% certain, not only of Mathew's involvement in this story, but of Abby's. One would have to read the short stories that Mathew published for her posthumously, to see the obvious comparison. In fact, there are elements in this plot which strongly remind me of her story entitled "Wilderness Refuge," except that the saintly, otherworldly child who redeems her father is a boy in that story, and a girl in this one. There are also plot elements suggesting the first story in the series, "Mary Mahony," concerning a precocious girl who attains a late education. And yet, this is obviously also Mathew's story, inasmuch as it concerns a business which failed through the treachery of one of its senior members--a theme close to Mathew's heart, because he lived it. It so happens he also wrote about it in that very book, "The Perils of Pearl Street."
Frankly, I despair of ever being able to pierce through anyone's stubborn ignorance in this lifetime. Their glass is filled with ignorance--they have no room in it for new knowledge. They think they already know.
But I will leave you with my impressions. This is as though Mathew established the plot, set and setting; and then Abby ran with it and wrote the rest of the story. Or, about half way through she took it up and, seized by inspiration, she wrote out the rest of it on her own. I know how strange this will sound, but my impression is that this little story, which has been hidden away inside of a book published by Benjamin Penhallow Shillaber, the creator of "Mrs. Partington," is at least as good as "A Christmas Carol."
Now, to the question of how I'm going to insert this into my sequel, and how much evidence I want to try to bring to bear on the issue.
Sincerely,
Stephen Sakellarios, M.S.
