Armstrong, Jesse. He was purportedly a distant cousin of Clemens, but, as Wecter discovered, the events in this “biography” had no [begin page 344] relation to his life. Instead, they are based upon a sensational murder which took place in Hannibal in 1888 long after Clemens had left. The husband was Amos J. Stillwell, a prosperous businessman; the lover, Dr. Joseph Carter Hearne, twenty-three years Stillwell's junior and a prosperous surgeon. As in this account, the husband was murdered in the night with an axe secured on the premises, the widow's share of the inheritance was substantial ($40,000), and the pair married a year later. Followed to the train by a jeering mob, they moved to California. Dr. Hearne was tried and acquitted in 1895. It is possible that Clemens heard the details from his sister, since Stillwell had been associated with her husband's St. Louis firm in the 1850's. The incident may have been recalled to his memory some years after he wrote “Villagers,” during his visit to Hannibal in the spring of 1902. The following summer at York Harbor, he related to William Dean Howells and possibly outlined part of a story about an unspecified notorious happening in the town of his youth (MTB, p. 1177). In 1908 Minnie T. Dawson told the story in The Stillwell Murder, or a Society Crime, published in Hannibal.

Becky. Probably Becky Penn, since a later paragraph refers to a sister who has been identified as Arzelia Penn. “The long dog” was a minstrel routine.

Beebe, William B. He was a forwarding and commission merchant who shipped frequently between Hannibal and New Orleans. He carried on a traffic in slaves and probably was the hated “nigger trader” mentioned by Mark Twain in his Autobiography, I, 124. “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy” contains a character who resembles him and is a slave trader, Bat Bradish. Beebe figures again as a slave trader in the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” and his son Henry, under the name Henry Bascom, is portrayed as a schoolyard bully. A note for that piece reads: “Henry Bascom (Beebe) the bully new rich man and slave trader.” John Marshall Clemens and the elder Beebe had some complicated business dealings and in 1843 took their differences to court.

Blankenship, Woodson and Family. They were poor whites from South Carolina. Woodson, the father, worked briefly in the sawmill, but drank heavily and fed his family chiefly on fish and game. In 1845 Woodson was listed for tax delinquency amounting to twenty-nine cents. Benson (Bence), the oldest boy, six years the senior of Sam [begin page 345] Clemens, did odd jobs and a good share of the fishing: his kindness to the boys of the town perhaps was attributed to Muff Potter in Tom Sawyer. In Weggis in 1897 a notebook entry ran: “The boy's friend and loafer, Bence Blankenship.” Another reads, “Tom, Bence, etc.” During the summer of 1847 Bence helped a runaway Negro who was hiding on Sny Island off the Illinois shore, carrying food to him for several weeks: the incident probably was germinal to Huck Finn's helping Jim. The 1850 census listed other Blankenship children: Martha, 19; Nancy, 16; Sarah, 14; Elizabeth, 12; Mary, 6; Catherine, 5; Thomas, 19, no occupation. Tom (apparently Martha's twin) was a member of the gang to which Sam Clemens belonged, although several boys were forbidden to play with him. J. W. Ayres, younger than Sam but a fellow member of the Cadets of Temperance, testified that a Negro youth owned by Ayres's grandmother, and Tom “were naturally leading spirits and they led us younger ‘weaker’ ones through all our sports. Both were ‘talented,’ bold, kind, and just, and we all liked them both . . .” (SCH, p. 149). Twain in his Autobiography, II, 174, identifies Woodson as the town drunkard and Tom, “ignorant, unwashed, and insufficiently fed, but good-hearted” as the prototype of Huckleberry Finn. In 1902, the author heard that Tom was a respected justice of the peace in Montana. A “P.S.” to “Is Shakespeare Dead?” quotes a story from a Hannibal newspaper, dated 5 March 1909, recounting the death of Becca Blankenship (presumably Elizabeth) at the age of seventy-two. The author says he has a vivid memory of her when she was nine and he was “about eleven.”

Blennerhasset. Probably a fictitious name. No one bearing it is known to have lived in Hannibal, although John Marshall Clemens was a freethinker and may well have had unbelieving friends. On 5 March 1855 Clemens wrote to the Muscatine Journal about the St. Louis trial of Robert O'Blennis for the murder of Benjamin Brand. The attorney for the defense was Richard Blennerhasset. This Blennerhasset died of apoplexy, 25 December 1857 (SCH, p. 312, n. 23). Wecter's reasonable guess is that the account of the fate of this character was based upon tales of premature burial, popular during Clemens's youth, or upon a story, “A Struggle for Life,” by the humorist's friend, Thomas Bailey Aldrich.

Bowen, Captain Samuel Adams and Family. The Bowens married in Tennessee in 1821 and soon moved to Hannibal. He laid out [begin page 346] Bowen's Addition, and as early as 1839 he operated a tobacco warehouse in the town and was appointed the first tobacco inspector. In 1840 his brick house on the levee between Hill and Bird Streets also served as a warehouse. His primary occupation appears to have been as a fire-insurance agent. In Notebook 35 (1902) Clemens listed several sons—“Will, Sam, Bart, John Bowen”; the daughters were Eliza and Mary. Mary, a childhood sweetheart of the author, became the wife of lawyer Moses P. Green. Will (1836–1893), probably Sam Clemens's best boyhood friend, shared many of his adventures. He was one of the models for the character Tom Sawyer. In the spring of 1844, during a measles epidemic, Sam climbed into bed with Will to get the disease. Both, with others, rolled a big stone down Holliday's Hill and thereby did much damage. (See Innocents Abroad, chapter 58, and a passage discarded from Life on the Mississippi, chapter 53.) Both played Robin Hood games and together bedeviled Jimmy Finn, a town drunkard. The author often recalled the adventure with “the minister's baptizing robe,” (e.g., Notebook 35 1902, TS pp. 17, 18). The Reverend Barton Warren Stone, an eminent Kentucky preacher, was visiting Captain Sam, his son-in-law; Will and Sam, interrupted in a card game, hastily hid the deck in the sleeve of the divine's baptizing robe. During a baptism, a fine hand of cards floated out upon the water. In the course of the subsequent floggings, one of the boys said, “I don't see how he could help going out on a hand like that.” Will, like his father before him, became a riverman: Sam Clemens used Will's name as a reference when he was persuading Horace Bixby to take him on as an apprentice. Bowen in 1857 married Mary Cunningham, daughter of a Hannibal doctor. He left the river in 1868 and about 1870 moved to St. Louis, where he formed the insurance agency of Bowen & Andrews. The author heard about him during his trip on the river in 1882. Mrs. Bowen died in 1873. Will married again in 1876 and about 1880 moved to Texas to carry on the work of the agency there. He died in Texas in 1893. Over a period of thirty years, he and Clemens exchanged letters. (See Mark Twain's Letters to Will Bowen, ed. Theodore Hornberger. Austin, 1941.) Bowen visited the author at least once in the East. Samuel Adams Bowen, Jr., also was on the river. Sam was in the Confederate company with which Clemens served briefly in 1861. In 1867 Clemens asked Will to rebuke Sam for not calling when the author and Sam were in St. Louis at the same time. In an entry dated 21 April 1882 in Roswell Phelps's Secretarial Notebook (16a) a pilot is [begin page 347] quoted as saying that “Sam Bowen died of yellow fever in 1878.” This and a later note, TS p. 42, indicate that Bowen was buried at the head of Island 65 in the Mississippi. The author tells the story about Sam and the rich baker's daughter—differing in several details—in Life on the Mississippi, chapter 49, and in his Autobiography, II, 185–186. Carondelet, Missouri (scene of the marriage), was a small village on the Mississippi near St. Louis. In Notebook 16, TS p. 27, on 8 May 1882 Clemens wrote, “The histories of Will Bowen, Sam, and Capt. McCune and Mrs. B. make human life appear a grisly and hideous sarcasm.” On p. 35, he recalled joining the “Confederate army” with Sam. Barton Stone Bowen, another boyhood playmate of the author, was the third Bowen boy to go on the river. Clemens mentions him kindly in letters to Will dated 7 June 1867 and 25 January 1868.

Brady, Jenny. A schoolmate of Sam Clemens, she was the sister of his chum Norval “Gull” Brady.

Breed, Dana F. The son of Quaker parents, he was born in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1823. He attended Brown University and in 1842 went to Hannibal. He clerked until 1850, then with Thomas K. Collins opened a store which became the leading dry-goods store in Hannibal; it was operated by the partners until 1875. In that year, Breed bought his partner's interest. He sold out in 1878, but continued as a salesman. In 1851, he married Miss Elizabeth Foreman of Maryland, who bore him seven sons. When Clemens's mother died in 1890, Breed was one of those who met the author at his train and acted as a pallbearer in the burial services.

Briggs, William and Family. William Briggs had three sons, William junior, Carey, and John, and a daughter, Artemissa. The daughter, somewhat less than two years older than Sam Clemens, was one of his first loves. She rebuffed him and married William Marsh (not Richmond, as the author recalled in “Villagers” and in his Autobiography) a few months before Sam left Hannibal. Twain mentions her, along with several other people of the town, in Notebook 35 (1902). John, a year and a half younger than Sam, was a playmate, the prototype of Joe Harper in Tom Sawyer. He and Sam saw the widow in the Welshman's house on Holliday's Hill shoot the California emigrant. (MTA, I, 132–133, the typescript of which contains the note, “Used in—‘Huck Finn,’ I think.”) A fragment which was written as late as 1902 (DV20a in MTP) concerns a young Negro slave who took the blame [begin page 348] for some “shameful” act which John had committed and, to John's horror, as a punishment was sold down the river. Clemens saw John in Hannibal during the 1902 visit, five years before John's death. Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 13 has, “Draw a fine character of John Briggs. Good and true and brave, and robbed orchards tore down the stable stole the skiff.” William Briggs and his son Bill were among the Hannibal citizens who went to California in 1850.

Buchanan, Joseph Sylvester and Family. They were active in Hannibal printing and journalism. “Big Joe,” formerly a steamboat engineer, assisted Jonathan Angevine, proprietor, in running the Commercial Advertiser, the town's first newspaper, when it was founded in 1837. He was associated with it and other newspapers until 1850. In that year, he and his brother Robert joined the rush to California, leaving “Little Joe” (as devil), and Sam Raymond in charge of the Hannibal Journal. Robert Buchanan left the family piano for Pamela Clemens's use in teaching her “scholars.” In 1851 Orion acquired the newspaper and, it may be, the services of young Bob. Mark Twain's notation in DV71, probably intended for his Autobiography, reads, “The printing office—that was the darling place—Buchanan Journal (2 offices). . . .” Notebook 32a (1897), TS p. 60, has, “Ed, Joe, Charley and Big Joe Buchanan.” Since Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 2, has “Ed Buchanan plays Roman soldier in tin armor in St. Louis,” Ed may have been the pathetic frustrated thespian about whom Twain writes in chapter 51 of Life on the Mississippi. I have found no trace of 'Gyle Buchanan.

Carpenter, Judge, and Family. These are Judge John Marshall Clemens (1798–1847) and his family, with their names but not their initials changed. Joanna Carpenter was Jane Lampton Clemens (1803–1890). Oscar was Orion, born as the author says in Jamestown, Tennessee, in 1825, apprenticed to a St. Louis printer at seventeen, destined to die in December 1897, shortly after “Villagers” was written. The manuscript ends as Twain launches upon a comic account of his eccentric brother, such as he wrote often, e.g., in “Autobiography of a Damned Fool” (S&B, ed. Franklin Rogers, pp. 134–164). M. was Margaret (1830–1839). Burton was Benjamin (1832–1842). In a sketch concerning his mother written in 1890 Twain recalled an early vivid memory of kneeling with her by the side of his dead brother (“Jane Lampton Clemens” pp. 43.17–44.3 in this volume). In DV71, TS p. 5, [begin page 349] Twain wrote, cryptically, “Dead brother Ben. My treachery to him.” Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 21, has: “I saw Ben in shroud.” Hartley was Henry (1838–1858), the prototype of Sid Sawyer; Twain tells of his death in a steamboat explosion in Life on the Mississippi, chapter 20. Simon was Samuel, the author (1835–1910). Priscella was Pamela (1827–1904), the model for Tom Sawyer's Cousin Mary. The author makes her a year older than she was when she married. Judge Clemens was a righteous, stern, undemonstrative man, proud of his aristocratic ancestry. He was married in Adair County, Kentucky, as the author says, in 1823; the bride was a month younger than twenty. The story of Jane's previous engagement to the young medical student (Richard Barrett, rather than Dr. Ray) was a family tradition. There is some evidence for its truth, but because Jane first told it in 1886 when her memory was faulty, it is subject to doubt. The note, “The autopsy,” refers to a terrifying experience young Sam Clemens had, of which no explicit record has been left: through a keyhole he watched Dr. Meredith perform a postmortem upon the judge. The “Han” to whom the author refers was his brother, Pleasants Hannibal Clemens, who lived for only a few months. Carpenter's Slave. This would be Jenny, who moved with the Clemenses from Tennessee to Florida and later to Hannibal. She was a nurse for the Clemens children.

Collins, T. K. Thomas and Henry W. Thomas K. Collins, born in 1822, went to Hannibal in 1840 when he began to clerk in his brother's store. In 1850, he and Dana F. Breed in partnership established a dry-goods store. Henry W. Collins, a brother, settled in Hannibal in 1832 or 1833 and by 1837 was established as a merchant on Main Street. In 1842, he took John Marshall Clemens's I.O.U. for $290.55.

Coontz, Benton E. The son of storekeeper Rezin E. and Mary E. Holliday Coontz. His parents moved from Virginia to Florida, Missouri, in 1836, to Ralls County in 1842, and to Hannibal in 1843 or 1844. Though three years younger than Sam, he was a playmate. At twelve, Ben was apprenticed to a rope-maker; later he worked as a woodchopper. Between 1854 and 1856 he was a partner in a store in Cincinnati, Missouri; in 1855, at seventeen, he was also appointed postmaster there. In 1856 he graduated from Bacon College, Ohio. For two years, 1856 to 1858, he was a cub pilot. When he left the river, he became a partner in a grocery store. Later he was a leather-dealer, a steamboat agent, and a salesman for the Hannibal Printing Company, and held political office, [begin page 350] as well. He was at the railroad station when Clemens arrived in 1890 to attend burial services for Jane Lampton Clemens. There is no record of his having sent a son to West Point, but his son Robert E. Coontz (1864–1935) was an admiral and for a time Commander-in-Chief of the United States Fleet. In chaper 56 of Life on the Mississippi Twain tells of babbling in his sleep about a tramp who burned to death in the calaboose and Henry's subsequent conclusion that Ben was responsible. The episode had been germinal to a scene in Tom Sawyer. In working notes for the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” Ben's name is interlined with the words, “fool—½ idiot.”

Cross William O. An Irishman, Cross operated a common school on the public square facing Center Street. It was one of several schools which Sam Clemens attended. Cross was said to be the only person in Hannibal who knew French. The school and Cross both figure in the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger.”

Davis Family. One of Hannibal's Davises was a partner of Shoot (q.v.) in a livery stable; another operated a ferryboat on the Mississippi.

Dawson, J. D. He was a teacher with fourteen years of experience when he opened his school in Hannibal in 1847. Sam Clemens attended the school and depicted it in both The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and the play based upon the book, as Dobbins's school.

Draper, Judge Zachariah G. Judge Draper was born in South Carolina in 1793. In 1833 he was one of Hannibal's fifty inhabitants. In 1837, he was active in petitioning for the incorporation of Hannibal as a town. He was an ardent Whig who over the years held various offices, among them a judgeship in the county court and a membership in the state legislature. He married Eleanor Briggs; their daughter Sarah was born in 1845 and died in 1852. He was an intimate of John Marshall Clemens. With Clemens in 1841 he served on a jury which convicted a group of abolitionists; also with Clemens in 1846 he helped found the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad and the Hannibal Library Institute. When Clemens ran for the office of Clerk of the Circuit Court, the judge endorsed him. Draper died “without issue” in 1856.

Elgin, Col. William C. Operator of the City Hotel in Hannibal, Colonel Elgin was a friend of John Marshall Clemens. On one occasion he was shot at by McDonald, who mistook him for Clemens. As [begin page 351] Colonel Elder, he figures in “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy.” He died of cholera in 1851.

Field, Kate. Born in St. Louis in 1838 and baptized Mary Katherine Keemle Field, she was a prominent journalist and lecturer until her death in 1896.

Fife, Dr. Matthew He was associated as editor or proprietor with Hannibal papers—the Pacific Monitor, the Hannibal Journal and Price Current, and the Hannibal Journal and Native American. When the Journal was acquired by Orion Clemens, Samuel L. Clemens set type for it. In Notebook 32a (1897) Mark Twain recalled that Dr. Fife pulled Jane Clemens's teeth.

Foreman, Jim. I have no information beyond Clemens's statement to Mrs. Laura Hawkins Frazer (ca. summer, 1902) that “Jim Foreman is in one of the books, but you have not spotted him.” In the same letter Clemens added, “I saw Jim Foreman before I took the train for Hannibal” (TS in MTP).

Garth, David J., and John, Sr. and Jr. David J. Garth in 1905 was “a New York capitalist, now or late president of the Mechanics National Bank there.” He married the sister of Dr. Hugh Meredith. D. J. Garth & Co. in the 1850's was the leading packer of tobacco in Hannibal. Clemens's letter of 6 February 1870 recalled to Will Bowen how the pair attended David Garth's Sunday-school class and stole leaf tobacco from him on weekdays. John H. Garth, Sr., moved from Rockbridge County, Virginia, to Hannibal in 1844 and there engaged in the tobacco business. John Garth, Jr., was born in 1837 in Virginia and moved to Hannibal with his parents in 1844. He was a boyhood friend of Sam Clemens. He graduated from the University of Missouri and then joined his father in the tobacco business. In 1862 or 1863 he went to New York, where he carried on the same business for eight or nine years. Returning to Hannibal, he engaged in several enterprises—banking, the lumber trade, manufacturing—and became a leading citizen. The John H. Garth Memorial Library was named after him. In 1860, he had married pretty Helen Kercheval (q.v.), another childhood friend of Clemens; they were hosts to Clemens when he visited Hannibal in 1882. Garth died in 1899. The author mentioned John Garth affectionately in a letter to Mrs. Will Bowen, written from London on 6 June 1900.

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Glover Samuel T. He was indeed a “famous lawyer” in St. Louis, but it seems improbable that the people of Hannibal would ever have so misjudged his merit. Born in Mercer County, Kentucky, in 1813, Glover practiced law in that state for several years before moving to Palmyra, the county seat of Marion County, Missouri, which was twelve miles from Hannibal. He was admitted to the Missouri bar in 1837, and there is evidence that he and his law partner, John T. Campbell, represented Hannibal residents in several land cases. Clemens's reference to his subordinate relationship to T. K. Collins, who was his junior in years and a clerk in a dry-goods store, is therefore inexplicable. Glover moved to St. Louis in 1849, where he continued to practice law, and in 1852 Orion's newspaper reported his nomination by the Whigs for the state attorney-generalship. His prestige and the influence of his firm are attested to by the fact that he had been the counsel in thirty-five cases before the U.S. Supreme Court when he died in 1884. Twain may have learned of Glover's success during his Mississippi tour in 1882; in chapter 53 of Life on the Mississippi the narrator converses with a Hannibal townsman who insists that “a stupid ass,” a former resident of Hannibal, had become “the first lawyer in the state of Missouri” because the people of St. Louis never learned what a dunce he was. If Glover was the inspiration for this anecdote, Twain's fictionization is evident; the “perfect chucklehead” discussed in Life on the Mississippi was a man whom the townspeople had “known from the very cradle.” It was later said, however (Encyclopedia of the History of Missouri, ed. Howard L. Conrad New York, 1901, III, 66) that Glover in life was defeated twice when running for the office of U.S. senator, principally because “he was not a ‘mixer,’ as the phrase is; was often absent-minded, and sometimes was forgetful of faces or names.”

Green, Lawyer Moses P., a Hannibal lawyer, later city attorney, mayor, and member of the Missouri State Convention of 1861, figures in Clemens's 1855 notebook. A page-long entry in ink addressed to Orion Clemens and signed “M. P. Green,” gives him information about disposing of some property. Sam Clemens elsewhere in the same notebook reminds himself to ask Green a question.

H., Mrs. Mrs. Elizabeth Horr (q.v.).

Hannicks, John. He was listed in the 1850 census as a Negro, born in Virginia, aged forty. Orion Clemens's Western Union on 10 July 1851 identified him as a drayman. Mark Twain referred to him in chapter 4 of Life on the Mississippi as “a negro drayman, famous for his quick eye [begin page 353] and prodigious voice, who lifts up the cry, ‘S-t-e-a-m-boat a-comin'!’ ” which roused the sleepy village. In Notebook 22 (1887–1888), TS p. 43, the author wrote, “John Hanicks' laugh” and “John Hanicks' Giving his ‘experience!’ ” In Notebook 35 (1902), reminiscing of various Hannibal figures, the humorist jotted down Hannicks's name.

Hardy, Dick. No information.

Hawkins Family. This was an extensive clan, apparently, in Hannibal. In November 1846 a benefit supper for Hannibal's poor folk was held in Hawkins's Saloon. In May 1847 two visitors presented nightly demonstrations of “Human Magnetism” there. The group includes two—Jeff and Sophia—concerning whom no information has been discovered. Ben may have been Benjamin M. Hawkins, who served as a Second Lieutenant in the Mexican War in 1846. He was listed among the migrants to California in a newspaper of 1849 and was the Hannibal marshal in 1852, 1853, and 1855. In 1856 he was elected county sheriff on the Know Nothing ticket. 'Lige Elijah, Sr. was the father of Elijah, Jr., and Laura. Twain's intention of making further use of 'Lige is evidenced by the appearance of his name in the margin of the “Tupperville-Dobbsville” manuscript. Jameson F. Hawkins formed part of the Hannibal emigration to the California Gold Rush. He was an operator of Hannibal's ferryboat and husband of the sister of Major General Gustavus W. Smith of the Confederate Army. He was the uncle of Laura (more accurately, Annie Laurie Hawkins). Laura, born in Georgetown, Kentucky, in 1837, moved to Hannibal as a child and for a time lived across the street from the Clemenses. She was Sam's schoolmate and childhood sweetheart, and he frequently had dates with her when he was a printer's apprentice. During her teens, she attended Rensselaer Academy in Rensselaer, Missouri. In 1858 she married Dr. James W. Frazer. The author was wrong in believing her dead in 1897. In Hannibal in 1902 he dined with her, and in 1908 he entertained her in Redding, Connecticut. She died in 1928. Mark Twain gave her name to a character in The Gilded Age and portrayed her as Becky Thatcher in Tom Sawyer, as Bessie Thatcher in Huckleberry Finn, and again as Becky in the “Schoolhouse Hill” (Hannibal) “Mysterious Stranger.”

Hayward, Mr. and Mrs. Not identified.

Hicks, Urban E. He was a Hannibal printer, eight years Sam's senior. Orion's Hannibal Journal and Western Union for 27 March 1851 [begin page 354] told of a villager who had paid ten dollars to hear Jenny Lind sing in St. Louis and felt the experience was worth every cent. In the autumn of 1848 Hicks and another printer, Pet McMurry (q.v.), actively supported the Cadets of Temperance and composed a letter of thanks to the young ladies of Hannibal for the gift of a Bible to the organization. When a mesmerist came to town, Hicks allowed himself to be hypnotized; Sam pretended to be, and outdid Hicks in faked feats of telepathy. Two entries in Notebook 32a, probably written in Weggis in 1897, recall the incident (TS pp. 56, 58); so do several entries in Notebook 35 (1902). Twain recounted the story in his autobiographical dictation (MTE, pp. 118–125).

Holliday, Mrs. Richard. A Virginian (née McDonald), she proudly traced her ancestry back to a British general of the Revolutionary War period. Her husband, Captain Richard T. Holliday, owned the finest mansion in town. In 1844 he went bankrupt. He served an unexpired term as justice of the peace concurrently with John Marshall Clemens. He went to California during the Gold Rush and died there. When Sam was a pilot, Mrs. Holliday, who often traveled on the river, urged him to visit Madame Caprell, a famous fortuneteller in New Orleans. Sam recorded a visit to Madame Caprell in a letter of 6 February 1861. Mark Twain portrayed Mrs. Holliday as the Widow Douglas in Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, and “Hellfire Hotchkiss.” Notebook 17 (1883–1884), TS p. 20, has “Mrs. Holliday with 40 diseases and expected 4th husband and fortune-tellers.” The Holliday house burned in 1894. Purportedly Mrs. Holliday died in an insane asylum.

Honeyman, Lavinia D., Letitia, and Sam. They were the children of Sam Honeyman, a contractor and, for a time, a road overseer. Lavinia was born in 1836; in 1853 she delivered a flowery valedictory speech in the school operated by Misses Smith and Patrick. Letitia was three years Lavinia's junior. Sam was one of the Clemenses' playmates.

Horr, Mrs. Elizabeth and Lizzie. Elizabeth Horr, the wife of the village cooper, Benjamin Horr, kept a dame's school on Main Street. She received twenty-five cents per week for each pupil. In the mid-1840's her daughter Lizzie helped by teaching the upper grades. Sam was one of her pupils.

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Hunter, Ella, a native of Virginia, was the second wife of Dr. James A. H. Lampton (q.v.), a half-brother of Jane Clemens. Although she was a strong-minded woman, she was a favorite of her great-niece, Annie Moffett Webster.

Hurst. No information.

Hyde, Dick and Ed. Richard married in 1849. No other information has been found about these rowdy brothers, although Mark Twain frequently recalled the two men. In “Hellfire Hotchkiss” (1897) the brothers appear as Hal and Shad Stover and are attacked by Hellfire, who clouts them with a baseball bat. In revenge they spread untrue rumors about the tomboy's morality. In Notebook 35 (1902) the author twice made notes about them and their attack upon their uncle.

Hyde, Eliza. She married Robert Graham on 27 April 1848.

Jackson. No information.

Jones, Roberta. Clemens recalled her tragic trick several times—in chapter 53 of Life on the Mississippi, in three entries in Notebook 32a (1897), and in two entries in Notebook 35 (1905). In Life on the Mississippi, a townsman is said to have told Mark Twain that Roberta's victim spent thirty-six years in the asylum and died there. Huck tells the story in “Doughface.”

Josephine Penn?. No information.

Kercheval, Old William F. and Helen. They were the village tailor and his daughter. Before 1851 he was in partnership with Green. Later, he sold books, shoes, and ready-made clothing. Mark Twain recorded in his Autobiography that Kercheval's slave woman and his apprentice both saved him from drowning on separate occasions during Clemens's boyhood. Helen Kercheval, a childhood playmate of the author, married John Garth, Jr. (q.v.). Apprentice of Kercheval has not been identified.

Kribben, Bill. In a letter to his mother and sister from San Francisco, 20 January 1865, Clemens asks that an enclosed Territorial Enterprise sketch by him be given to Zeb Leavenworth or Bill Kribben, secretary of the Pilots' Association. In Life on the Mississippi Clemens said that the association failed after an officer in St. Louis “walked off with every dollar of the ample fund.” In Roswell Phelps's secretarial [begin page 356] notebook of 1882 Bill Kribben is identified as a steamboat man on the river when Clemens was, and two entries (TS pp. 7, 42) indicate that after his death from yellow fever in 1878 Kribben was buried at Island 68 in Arkansas.

Lakenan, Lawyer R. F. He was born in Winchester, Virginia, in 1820. His father died when the boy was six weeks old, and his widowed mother took the family to Fairfax County, Virginia. He was admitted to the bar in 1844 and moved to Hannibal in 1845. He and Orion were speakers at the Fourth of July celebration in 1847. Lakenan helped found the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad and for several years was a director and later was its general attorney. Except for 1861 to 1866, when he lived in neighboring Shelby County, he spent the rest of his life in Hannibal. He held several political offices, and his law practice thrived; he became Hannibal's richest citizen. His first wife, whom he married on 8 January 1850, died the following December. He married Mary Moss (q.v.), eleven years his junior, in 1854. When he died in 1883 he was survived by his widow and six children. Mark Twain told the story of his marriage to Mary Moss, with some variations, in a passage dictated in 1906 and published in his Autobiography, II, 181–182.

Lampton, Jim Dr. James A. H., and Kate. Dr. Lampton, the half-brother of Jane Clemens, was about the age of her older children, and he associated with them. As a youth, he lived near Florida, Missouri, and in 1839, when he was still a minor, he loaned John Marshall Clemens $747.13. At eighteen, he married; his wife died the next year. He became a physician and set up practice in St. Louis, where, in 1849, he married Ella Hunter. The couple visited the Clemenses in Hannibal in 1850. He became an agent in New London, Missouri, for Orion Clemens's newspaper. Notebook 4 (1866) has “Jim Lampton and the dead man in Dr. McDowell's College” (TS p. 20). Kate Lampton, born in 1856, was the daughter of Dr. Lampton. Clemens attempted to find her work as a typist in 1883 (MTBus, pp. 213–214).

League, Bill. League was a playfellow of Sam Clemens. In September 1851, he and a partner established the Hannibal Messenger. After his partner retired, League published the paper, first as a tri-weekly, then as a daily. It was League who bought Orion's daily Hannibal Journal in 1853. In a letter to Will Bowen from Buffalo dated 6 [begin page 357] February 1870, Clemens wrote: “What eternities have swung their hoary cycles . . . since we taught that one-legged nigger, Higgins, to offend Bill League's dignity by hailing him in public with his exasperating ‘Hello, League!’ ”

Levering, Clint, and Brother. These sons of Franklin and Alice Levering were boyhood friends of Sam Clemens. On 13 August 1847, swimming in the Mississippi with a group of boys, ten-year-old Clint drowned. Sam Clemens, aged twelve, a shocked witness, remembered the incident for years. He wrote about it in Life on the Mississippi and “The Mysterious Stranger.” Clint's brother, Aaron R. Levering, was born in Clark County, Missouri, in 1839 and was brought by the family to Hannibal in 1841. With Clemens, Aaron joined the Cadets of Temperance from which both later withdrew. At thirteen, Aaron began working in a hardware store; it was the beginning of an upward climb. Before he was twenty-one, he had his own hardware store, and by the time he ended his association with this store in 1871, he had prospered as a banker. He married Judge Gilchrist Porter's daughter. For more than thirteen years he served as a public-school director and superintendent of the Baptist Sunday school.

Lockwood, Lucy. No information.

McCormick, Wales. He was a printer's apprentice with Clemens. In the “No. 44” version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” Mark Twain modeled after him a character named “Doangivadam.” A huge, handsome, reckless, and gay youth, the older boy delighted young Clemens. On a lecture tour in 1885 Clemens reported to Livy that he had seen McCormick in Quincy, Illinois. The author wrote “Wales McCormick the apprentice,” in Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 22. He told about him at length (in Notebook 22 (1887) TS pp. 3–4 and in his Autobiography, II, 276–282), recalling Wales's setting up a sermon by the famed Alexander Campbell and changing “Great God!” to “Great Scott!” and “Father, Son and Holy Ghost” to “Father, Son and Caesar's Ghost,” abbreviating the Savior's name to “J. C.” and then when rebuked enlarging it to “Jesus H. Christ.”

MacDonald, McDonald, Angus An early solid citizen of Hannibal, he was a member of the town's advisory board in 1836, the owner of land along the Palmyra Road, and a Confederate brigadier general. He was the brother of Mrs. Richard T. Holliday (q.v.).

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MacDonald McDonald? R. I. Holcombe, the historian of Marion County, verifies the claim that he was a carpenter and tells the story about his fight much as Mark Twain does. Holcombe adds one detail—that “McDonald was trying to make Schnieter as he spells the name shoot himself with his own pistol.” Perhaps this is the William McDonald described in the 1850 Hannibal census as a “cooper, aged 35.” It has not been possible to identify a McDonald who was “the desperado (plasterer).”

McDowell, Young Dr. John. He was the son of Joseph Nash McDowell, a doctor who founded (in 1840) and taught in a St. Louis medical school and owned McDowell's Cave near Hannibal (McDougal's Cave in Tom Sawyer). The young doctor stated that his father's cruelty caused the Lamptons to adopt him. Notebook 4 (1866), TS p. 20, has: “Jim Lampton and the dead man in Dr. McDowell's College.” Annie Webster backed Twain's statement about the doctor and Ella Lampton and her daughter Kate. In St. Louis in 1861 Dr. McDowell treated Orion Clemens's little daughter, Jennie. Notes for “Schoolhouse Hill,” the Hannibal version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” deal with Dr. Terry, a fictional name for McDowell, Senior, “great surgeon/contempt for human race/rough, but at bottom kind.”

McManus, Jimmy Apparently he was a fellow boatman, since the humorist wrote of him in Notebook 16 (1882) when recalling other boatmen. The entry on TS p. 12 appears to be relevant to the note in “Villagers”: “McManus (Jimmy) robbed me of brass watch chain, and $20—and robbed old Calhoun of underclothes.”

McMurry, Pet T. P. He was a journeyman printer in Ament's shop when Sam Clemens was an apprentice there. He joined Sam and another apprentice, Wales McCormick (q.v.), in pranks. With another young printer, Urban Hicks (q.v.), in the autumn of 1848 he wrote a letter thanking the young ladies of Hannibal for the gift of a handsome Bible to the Sons of Temperance. In 1853 he married a girl from Louisville, Kentucky. Clemens told Livy in a letter of 23 January 1885 of meeting Pet in Quincy, Illinois, and contrasted the bewhiskered old man with the swaggering Hannibal youth. The humorist's Notebook 32a (1897), TS p. 60, cryptically recalls a prank: “Drinking Pet's bottle of medicine and re-filling it.” Clemens recalled him again by name in a notebook entry of 1902 (Notebook 35, TS p. 22).

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Meredith, Dr. Hugh and Family. Dr. Hugh Meredith was a Pennsylvanian, born in 1806, who for a time shipped before the mast. He was practicing in Florida, Missouri, however, when the Clemens family was there and moved to Hannibal when they did. In Florida he joined John Marshall Clemens in planning improvements for the town—the navigation company, the railroad, and the academy. In 1842, Clemens recalled long after in his Autobiography, the doctor saved Sam's life when the boy was seven. A man with literary interests, in 1843 the doctor helped Judge Clemens found the Hannibal Library Institute. One of the author's most disturbing memories was of seeing the doctor perform a postmortem on the boy's father in 1847. In 1849 the doctor and a son, Charles, joined the Gold Rush to California; they soon returned, no richer. Orion had him edit the Journal after Meredith returned to Hannibal and while Orion briefly went to Tennessee in connection with the settlement of his father's estate. When the doctor died in 1864, Clemens evidently said something unkind about him in a letter to his mother; Jane Clemens protested in a reply. Mark Twain's Notebook 32a (1897), TS p. 61, has “Dr. Meredith—hoarse deep voice.” The doctor is mentioned in Autobiography, I, 108; II, 272–274; and in a portion removed from the manuscript (DV355). The doctor's son, Charles Meredith, so Clemens recalled, once saved Sam from drowning in Bear Creek. He learned the printing trade with Orion Clemens. John Meredith was a member of the Cadets of Temperance with Sam Clemens. Sam recalled him pleasantly in his Autobiography, II, 185. In an 1897 notebook entry (32a, TS p. 59) and elsewhere Clemens recalled Orion's misadventure when he climbed into bed with two spinster sisters of the doctor. A detailed account is in the Autobiography, II, 272–274.

Moffett, William A. Born in Virginia in 1816, Moffett later moved to Florida, Missouri, where he worked in a grocery store. When Florida failed to flourish and the Panic of 1837 affected business, he moved to Hannibal. Later he moved to St. Louis, where he did well in the mercantile and commission business. During a visit to Kentucky, he again met Pamela Clemens (see Priscilla Carpenter), formerly a Florida and Hannibal neighbor. After a swift courtship, he married her on 20 September 1851. Moffett is said to have loaned Sam Clemens $100 in 1857 so that Sam might make an initial payment for his apprenticeship in river piloting. During his years on the river, Clemens stayed in the Moffett home whenever he was in St. Louis. Moffett died in 1865.

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Moss, Russell W. and Family. Russell Moss began business on the Hannibal levee in 1849 in the pork packing firm of Samuel & Moss. The firm, at one time said to be the second largest of its kind in the United States, employed a hundred men and often packed 30,000 head of hogs in a season. When the establishment was burned in 1852, the estimated loss included 14,000 pounds of bacon. That same year Moss represented Marion County in the Missouri General Assembly and served on a committee of six citizens whose duty it was to keep Hannibal alert concerning the issue of the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad. In his most prosperous days, Moss was one of the richest men in Hannibal. Neil Moss, a son, attended Yale and was badly treated when he returned to Hannibal. Some of his experiences were assigned to the false Tom Driscoll in Pudd'nhead Wilson, who returned to Dawson's Landing after attending Yale and adopting Eastern dress and Eastern ways. Mary Moss married R. F. Lakenan (q.v.) in 1854, and they had six children. A passage dictated in 1906 and included in the Autobiography, II, 181–182, tells the story of her marriage with some variations from that in “Villagers,” omitting any mention of the sleigh ride. It adds that the author met Mary in Missouri in 1902 when he went there to receive his LL.D. from the university. Clemens said that Mary was still beautiful “although she has grandchildren.” Notebook 35 (1902) TS p. 21, reads, “Ray Moss and Neil, Mary.”

N., Miss. Mary Ann Newcomb (q.v.).

Nash, Old Abner O., and Family. Abner Nash moved from Lynchburg, Virginia, to Maysville, Kentucky, remained there a year, and in 1831 moved to Hannibal, where he opened one of the town's first general stores. In 1832 he became one of the founding members of the First Presbyterian Church. He held several local offices, among them that of postmaster. In 1844 he went bankrupt; The Adventures of Tom Sawyer mentions “the aged and needy postmaster, who had seen better days.” Married twice, he died in 1859. Mary Nash had a reputation for wildness before her marriage in 1851 to John Hubbard of Frytown (not to Sam Raymond, as Clemens believed). She figures in “Hellfire Hotchkiss” and in some notes for “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy.” Her younger sister, Ellen, became deaf and dumb. Thomas S. Nash, who was the same age as Sam Clemens, was a playmate and also a member of the Cadets of Temperance. As the author recalls in his Autobiography, II, 97–99, in the winter of 1848/49 Sam and Tom went [begin page 361] skating on the Mississippi, heard the ice breaking, and raced for the shore. Sam reached safe ground, but Tom fell through the ice. The aftermath was a series of diseases, among them scarlet fever, which left him deaf and dumb. He was sent to the asylum at Jacksonville, Illinois, where he was taught to talk. On a visit to Hannibal in 1885 Clemens made the unexplained entry (Notebook 18, TS p. 21): “Tom Nash's confidential remark.” In notes for the “St. Petersburg Fragment,” the earliest version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” a character called Crazy Fields is said to have lost both his wife and his child after they contracted smallpox from a stranger taken into their home. Another entry concerns the results of Mrs. Nash's kindness to a homeless child: her children get scarlet fever, three die, and two become deaf. Twain tells of seeing Tom in 1902. Notebook 35 (1902) has three notations concerning him (TS pp. 13, 18, 21). That on p. 13 is cryptic: “Tom Nash—the great night of the breaking up of the ice. Tom blows up with powder-horn—scarlet fever, deaf and dumb.” He is mentioned by name in a note for the “St. Petersburg Fragment” of “The Mysterious Stranger.”

Newcomb, Miss Mary Ann. Miss Newcomb emigrated from Virginia to teach in Florida, Missouri. Shortly before the Clemens family, she moved to Hannibal to teach. She took some meals with the Clemenses as a paying guest and was one of the author's teachers; in 1902, he said that “she compelled me to learn to read.” Annually the students in her school had a May Day party with dances around the maypole, declamations, band music, and a picnic. In 1852 she married John Davies, “the Welshman” who owned a Hannibal bookstore. Clemens, in a letter to Will Bowen from Buffalo dated 6 February 1870, recalled “a rebellion” which the author and Will “got up” against her. She was pictured in “Autobiography of a Damned Fool” (published in Mark Twain's Satires & Burlesques) as a thin spinster, devoutly pious; she contributed details to the portrait of Miss Watson in Huckleberry Finn; Notebook 32a (1897) suggested that she and other teachers be introduced in some story; and she appeared in the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger.”

Ouseley, Owsley, William A haughty, dandified migrant from Kentucky and a well-to-do storekeeper, in January 1845 he shot and killed a farmer, Sam Smarr (q.v.), on the corner of Hill and Main, a few yards from the Clemens house. John Marshall Clemens, as justice [begin page 362] of the peace, earned a fee of $1.81 for administering oaths to twenty-nine witnesses and a fee of $13.50 for writing out depositions totaling 13,500 words for the case. Sam Clemens, aged nine, was greatly impressed by the incident, and he frequently recalled it—in a letter to Will Bowen dated 6 February 1870, in Huckleberry Finn (in Sherburn's shooting of Boggs), and in his Autobiography, I, 131. The aftermath was not as Mark Twain described it. The jury at Palmyra acquitted Owsley on 14 March 1846. He was still in business in Hannibal seven years later.

Pavey. Pavey operated Pavey's Hotel in Hannibal. On one occasion Jane Clemens scolded him for mistreating his daughter; thereafter he respected Jane. (See MTA, I, 118, and “Jane Lampton Clemens.” Chapter 31 of Roughing It has a scene based upon the happening. Fragmentary autobiographical notes, DV 243, have: “The Paveys. Aunt P. i.e., the fictional Aunt Polly, whose prototype was Jane Clemens protects a daughter. ‘Pigtail done!’ ” The meaning of the phrase is unknown. Notebook 22 (1887–1888), TS p. 37, has: “Old Pavey's negro preacher chopping wood back of the tavern: ‘Make yo’ callin' and election sure brethren and sistern.'” Notebook 32b (1897) refers to “the tavern gang—at Pavey's.” Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 21, has “Becky Pavey and Pole. ‘Pig-tail done’ tavern. Bladder-time. Weeds. Offal given away at porkhouse.” Pole (Napoleon Pavey) was listed in St. Louis directories for 1855 and 1857 as a steamboat engineer, “Second Class.” Clemens boarded with a Mrs. Pavey during his 1855 stay in St. Louis.

Peake, Dr. William Humphrey A Virginian, he was one of the few intimates of John Marshall Clemens in Hannibal. Long after knee breeches, buckle shoes, and the pigtail had gone out of fashion, the doctor still wore them. Mark Twain frequently recalled an episode involving Peake, which he wrote about for his Autobiography in 1903: pretending to be hypnotized by a visiting mesmerist, young Sam Clemens converted the dubious Dr. Peake by reciting details in the old man's past which the doctor did not remember the boy had heard him reveal (MTE, pp. 124–128). Peake figures in the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger” as Dr. Wheelright, “the stately old First-Family Virginian and imposing Thinker of the village.”

Pitts, Old James P. and Family. James Pitts, a native of Maryland, moved to Hannibal in 1836 and worked as a saddler there. He [begin page 363] figures in Huckleberry Finn and Life on the Mississippi as an enthusiastic greeter of steamboats. His son, William R. Pitts, born in Berlin, Maryland, in 1832, at fourteen was apprenticed in the harness-maker's and saddler's trade. By working overtime, he was enabled to end his apprenticeship three years early, at eighteen. He engaged in harness-making in the Hannibal firm of Jordan & Pitts. In 1853 he married Miss A. D. Combs, who bore him ten children. He bought his partner's interest in the firm in 1878. In a letter from Buffalo dated 6 February 1870 to Will Bowen, Clemens recalls their lying in wait for Bill in order to “whale him” and reports that he saw him “two or three years ago.” Notes for “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy” (about 1897) indicate that Mark Twain thought of using Bill as the model for a character.

Pomeroy, Benton and Co. No information.

Prendergast. No information.

Quarles, Jim James A. A first cousin of Clemens, Jim was one of the eight children of John Quarles. In 1848 he moved from Florida to Hannibal and, using three thousand dollars supplied by his father, started a firm advertised in the Hannibal Journal for 19 October 1848: “Geo. W. Webb & Jas. A. Quarles, Copper, Tin and Sheet Iron Manufactory, just opened for business.” There is some evidence that the author's account of Quarles's marriage to a minor was inaccurate.

R., Sam. Samuel Raymond (q.v.).

Ralls, Col. John He was a veteran of the Mexican War. In Ralls County in 1861 he swore in as private soldiers the members of the company to which Clemens belonged, although he was not empowered to give the officers commissions. Mark Twain tells of the incident in “The Private History of a Campaign That Failed.”

Ratcliffes (more properly the Radcliffs). They moved from Maryland to Hannibal in 1837, when Dr. James Radcliff became one of the town's three physicians. The doctor sat on the first municipal board of health. The census of 1840 indicated that he had one small son and two other sons in their teens. The census of 1850 indicated that none of his sons lived with him. In the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger,” Crazy Meadows (called Crazy Fields in some notes) is copied after one of the boys; a marginal note reads: “Crazy's history and misfortunes and his family and lost boy—Ratcliff.” [begin page 364] The homicidal boy also figures in “Clairvoyant.” I have found no details concerning Mrs. Ratcliff or the son who became a physician.

Ray, Young Dr., according to Clemens family tradition, actually was a young medical student named Richard Ferrel Barrett. In his letter to Howells dated 19 May 1886 the author told this story using Barrett's name and identifying him as a medical student.

Raymond, Samuel, became the senior editor of the Hannibal Journal when the older Buchanans went west in 1850. That same year he married not Mary Nash but Miss Helen Elizabeth Holmes of Hannibal. About 1852 he was on the editorial staff of the Hannibal Messenger. A puzzling entry in Notebook 32a (1897) TS p. 58 has: “The new fire Co—Raymond, whose real name was Buchanan.” Raymond figures as Captain Sam Rumford in “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy.” A note for “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy” reads: “Fire Marshall Sam Raymond (envied because said to be illegitimate) Rumford.”

Reagan, Jimmy. In a letter to Mrs. Laura Hawkins Frazer, probably written in the summer of 1902, Mark Twain indicated that “the ‘new boy’ it may well be in Tom Sawyer was Jim Reagan—just from St. Louis.” A text of the letter was published in the Hannibal Evening Courier-Post, 6 March 1935. In “Boy's Manuscript” (1870) Billy Rogers refers to him, evidently, as “Jim riley which I will lick every time I ketch him and have done so already.”

Rice, Rev. Mr. No information.

Richmond, Letititia Letitia? Possibly the daughter of stonemason Richmond; her father was the first Sunday-school teacher of Sam Clemens at the Methodist church. I find no evidence that she married Dana Breed.

Robards, Captain Archibald Sampson and Family. The father of the family was born in Mercer County, Kentucky, in 1797, the son of a native of Virginia. He won his military title in the Kentucky militia. In 1832 he married Amanda Carpenter. In 1843 he moved to Hannibal with his family and his slaves. He held a number of civic positions, among them the mayorship of the town. In 1849 he took a company of fifteen to California at his own expense. On his return he prospered as a flour miller (his product won a first premium in the New York Crystal Palace Exposition in 1851), and he became one of the wealthiest men [begin page 365] in the town. He was an elder in the First Christian Church and also a city councilman. He died in 1862. George Robards, his oldest son, several years older than Sam Clemens, was the only student of Latin in Dawson's school in the author's time there. He was the sweetheart of Mary Moss (q.v.). He went to California with his father and returned to Hannibal where he died in 1878. Twain told about him and his family at some length in Autobiography, II, 179–184, and gave Henry Bascom some of his traits in the “Schoolhouse Hill” version of “The Mysterious Stranger.” Clay (Henry Clay Robards) probably was a second son: Twain's Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 21, has: “George, Clay, John Robards, Jane and Sally Robards.” John L. Robards was born in Lincoln County, Kentucky, in 1838 or 1839; he moved to Hannibal with his family; and he went west with his father's party. He attended the University of Missouri and later studied law in Kentucky. He married Sallie Crump in 1861; they had three children. He was practicing law in 1861 when he and Clemens enlisted in the Marion Rangers. In 1876, at the author's request, he oversaw the transfer of the bodies of John Marshall and Henry Clemens from the old Baptist cemetery to the new Mount Olivet Cemetery. In 1890 he attended the burial services for Jane Lampton Clemens in Hannibal. John adopted the practice of capitalizing the b in his name; Mark Twain represented him as Dunlap, who called himself “d'Un Lap” in the “Private History of a Campaign That Failed.” An entry in Notebook 35 (1902), TS p. 21 indicates that John's wife, Sally Robards, was the woman whom the author saw in India and who revealed that years before she had seen him as a boy prancing around nude: “Sally Robards—pretty. Describe her now in her youth and again in 50 ys after when she reveals herself.” See also the Autobiography, I, 129–130.

Rutter, Dick. Probably he was a printer with young Sam Clemens in Hannibal, since his name is juxtaposed with those of other youthful printers of that era. I have found no record of him.

Schneider. Probably he was the Charlie Schnieter referred to in History of Marion County, Missouri, p. 914: “while John Marshall Clemens was serving as justice of the peace Charlie Schnieter and a carpenter named McDonald got into a scuffle on the sidewalk in front of Mr. Clemens's office. . . . Clemens commanded the peace, and not being obeyed he struck McDonald on the forehead with a stonemason's mallet.”

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Selmes, Old T. R., Tilden R He was the leading merchant of Hannibal who ran the Wild-Cat Store which in 1849 advertised goods “manufactured expressly for the western and California markets.” In 1852 as mayor of Hannibal Selmes headed a party which went down the river to invite Lajos Kossuth to visit the town. In 1853 he enlarged a three-story building, Benton Hall, named after his second wife. For many years the hall was the scene of festivals and social activities. In the 1860's one of Hannibal's ferryboats was named the “T. R. Selmes.” I have found no details concerning Selmes's daughter. A note for “Tom Sawyer's Conspiracy” is “Old Selmes (English).”

Sexton, Mrs. and Margaret. They were boarders with Jane Clemens in 1844, and Margaret, at least, was a friend of the family into the 1860's. The author sent a message to Margaret via Mrs. Clemens and Pamela Moffett from Carson City, 8 February 1862, and a picture of himself for her from Virginia City on 16 February 1863.

Shoot William and Family. They were joint owners and operators of the Shoot & Davis Livery Stable which burned in March 1852. On 9 May 1853 he became the owner of Brady House (renamed the Monroe House) which he operated in conjunction with Shoot, Jordan, & Davis Livery Stable. His wife, whom he married when she was thirteen, was Arzelia Penn. The roster of the Cadets of Temperance in 1849 contained the name, John A. Shoot, possibly a son.

Smarr, Samuel This farmer in the 1840's lived near Hannibal and came into town periodically on drinking sprees. During one of his visits, he shouted insults at William Owsley (q.v.), who, he believed, had cheated several of his friends. On a subsequent visit he again shouted accusations against Owsley outside the latter's store. A few days later, on 24 January 1845, Owsley shot him with a pistol. John Marshall Clemens took the depositions of the witnesses. Mark Twain based the shooting of Boggs by Colonel Sherburn in Huckleberry Finn upon the incident.

Southard, Lot. No information.

Stevens, Old T. B., Dick and Edmund T. B. Stevens advertised as a jeweler in the Hannibal Journal in 1851. Ed was a contemporary of Sam Clemens who figured in a rebellion of the pupils against Miss Newcomb and, at another time, led an insurrection which ended [begin page 367] with the destruction of Dick Hardy's stable. He was a corporal in the Marion Rangers; the author recalls him in Notebook 16 (1882), TS p. 35, his Autobiography, II, 219, and “Private History of a Campaign That Failed.” The author had two notes on him in Notebook 35 (1902). One merely mentions his name; the other reads, “First whipping—Ed Stevens. Sheepskin.” In a letter to J. H. Stevens of 28 August 1901 Clemens says that he and Ed were warm friends. I have found no information about Dick Stevens, but the author mentions him, Ed, a brother John, and a sister Jenny in a letter to Pamela dated 2 April 1887.

Stout, Ira. A speculator in Missouri land, Stout in 1837 built a row of buildings on the northwest corner of Hill and Main in Hannibal. In one of several real-estate transactions with Stout, John Marshall Clemens bought this property and occupied one structure as a hotel—the Virginia House. Dixon Wecter received from Judge Clark of the Missouri Supreme Court this interpretation of the financial transaction which Mark Twain has recorded: “John Marshall Clemens, as surety, was held responsible for the debts of Stout, who took bankruptcy. The judgment in bankruptcy relieved Stout of his debts.” Wecter thinks that the author may have confused an assignment under state law for federal action, but no records have been found in either the state or the federal courts. Wecter characterized Stout as a “dead beat” who became involved “in a web of litigation” with various other Hannibal residents.

Striker, the Blacksmith and Little Margaret. No information.

Strong, Mrs. No information. She probably was one of the Penn girls, since her history is told along with theirs.

Torrey, Miss. One of Sam Clemens's teachers in Hannibal. A letter to Will Bowen, dated 6 February 1870, from Buffalo recalls how the author and other students “got up a rebellion against Miss Newcomb . . . to force her to let us all go over to Miss Torry's side of the schoolroom. . . .” She is mentioned with other teachers in an entry in Notebook 32a (1897).

Tucker, Rev. Joshua P. From 1840 to 1846 he was the pastor of the Presbyterian church in Hannibal. The church was organized in [begin page 368] 1832; the building was erected on North Fourth Street in 1839. All the Clemenses except the judge became members of the church about 1843. The author attended Sunday school in the basement and from the age of ten or eleven listened to sermons on the first floor.

Ustick, Thomas W. He is listed in Morrison's St. Louis Directory for 1852 as “book and job printer, ne cor Locust and Second, ups.”

Wolfe, Jim. Sam Clemens's fellow apprentice printer, Jim Wolfe boarded with the Clemens family. He was the butt of many jokes played by Sam and other young printers until he gave Sam a bloody nose. The author's recollection was that he told his first oral humorous story about Jim Wolfe and the cats. He wrote it out and published it in 1867 and recalled it frequently—four times in Notebook 32a (1897) and twice in Notebook 35 (1902). He told another story about Wolfe's acute shyness in his autobiography (MTE, pp. 136–142). The earlier notebook also has (TS p. 60): “Jim Wolf and the wasps. They were put in the bed to see if they would turn to butterflies as Nigger Jim said. (Then they were forgotten?)” This, as Mark Twain noted elsewhere, was an idea for inclusion in a new book about Huck Finn; it was never used. Wolfe was pictured as Nicodemus Dodge in A Tramp Abroad. He attended Orion Clemens's funeral in December 1897.

Gravestone-Cutter's Daughter. Not identified. David Dean, James R. Garnett, and P. J. Saul had marble works in Hannibal, but nothing has been found about their families. In his Autobiography, II, 214, the author recalls a stonemason, Richmond, who was his Sunday-school teacher.

Hanged Nigger. This was probably “Glascock's Ben,” who, according to Holcombe's History of Marion County, on 30 October 1849 murdered a white boy, aged ten, then raped and murdered the boy's sister, aged twelve. After he was convicted, he confessed his guilt. His hanging at Palmyra on 11 January 1850 was the first legal execution in Marion County. Thousands gathered to witness the event. In Notebook 32a (20 June 1897 to 24 July 1897), TS p. 57, the author recalls the story in some detail: “Negro smuggled from Va in featherbed when lynchers were after him. In Mo he raped a girl of 13 and killed her and [begin page 369] her brother in the woods and before being hanged confessed to many rapes of white married women who kept it quiet partly from fear of him and partly to escape the scandal.”

The Minister. He was the Reverend Barton W. Stone, grandfather of Will Bowen (q.v.) and a noted Campbellite preacher. He stayed with the Bowen family when in Hannibal and died in their home in 1844.

Presbyterian Preacher. From 1840 to 1846 this was the Reverend Joshua T. Tucker (q.v.). For two years, and hence when John Marshall Clemens died, the church was served by supply pastors. In 1848 the Reverend Joseph L. Bennett was elected pastor; he served until Sam Clemens left Hannibal.

Rich Baker's Daughter. The purported mistress, then wife, of Sam Bowen, has not been identified. Elsewhere Mark Twain reminisces about baker Koeneman's daughter; but she married Dr. C. Spiegel of Palmyra in 1852. In another recounting of this story, the girl is a German brewer's daughter, and in another instance a ward of a rich, old, childless foreigner.

Showy Stranger. Unidentified.

Stabbed California Immigrant. The author told Albert Bigelow Paine that as a boy “He saw a young emigrant stabbed with a bowie-knife by a drunken comrade, and noted the spurt of life-blood that followed . . .” (MTB, p. 47). In some autobiographical notes written on cross-barred paper, Clemens recalled: “All emigrants went through there. One stabbed to death—saw him. Saw the corpse in my father's office.”

Stranger. The one who married Eliza Hyde in 1848 was Robert Graham, concerning whom I have found no other information.

Two Young Sailors. Not identified. But Mark Twain (Notebook 33 1900, TS p. 6) evidently had them in mind when he wrote: “Huck tells of those heros the 2 Irish youths who painted ships on Godwin's walls and ran away. They told sea adventures which made all the boys sick with envy and resolve to run away and go to sea . . .”