Henry Mills Alden, 19th Century Literary Power Broker

And A Founder Of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church

 

As a ninth generation descendant of Mayflower voyagers, John and Priscilla Alden, Henry Mills Alden was born of history and he made literary history in his own time. Born in Mount Tabor, Vermont, on November 11, 1836, he went on to graduate from Williams College in 1857, and then on to study at Andover Theological Seminary. Henry decided not to pursue ordination after graduating from seminary in 1860. His contemporaries would later describe him as a “deeply religious man” who had a “stabilizing influence” on those who worked with him.

 

            His early scholarship in literature was recognized by the Lowell Institute of Boston, where in 1863-64, he was invited to give twelve lectures on “The Structure of Paganism.”  It was shortly after this event that Henry moved to Metuchen, and became a founding father of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. In 1869, the year the cornerstone was placed on the Church, he was appointed one of the first vestrymen, a position that he frequently maintained over the next fifty years.

 

            In 1869 Henry was appointed managing editor of the very popular “Harper’s Weekly” magazine, and as “dean of  the American magazine writers,” he wielded great power in the literary world deciding on who would be published or not published. He remained in this position for over forty years. He contributed to “Harper’s Pictorial History of the Great Rebellion” (1862-65),  authored “The Ancient Lady of Sorrow,” a poem (1872),  a “Study of Death.” (1895), and “Magazine Writing and the New Literature” (1908).

 

             

                                    A verse from

                        “The Ancient Lady of Sorrow”

 

            The Alden Home in Metuchen

The marriage of Henry Alden to Susan Foster produced three daughters. Susan died around 1894 and the beautiful “Easter Lilly” window on the north side of the church is dedicated to her. At the age of 63 Henry married again. The society pages of the Saturday Metuchen Recorder  (February 24, 1900) reported that “Mr. Alden and his bride arrived in Metuchen on the early train, Thursday evening, the marriage having taken place at Washington, in the morning. Mr. Alden is to be congratulated, and Metuchen society will give Mrs. Alden a cordial welcome.”  The new Mrs. Alden was the former Ada F. Murray of Norfolk, and widow to Kenton C. Murray. They were married in the rectory of an Episcopal church in Washington, DC, on February 21, and chartered a private car in a train to transport them, and the new Mrs. Alden’s five children (ages 5 through 21 years) to their new home in the hamlet of Metuchen. Henry adopted all of the children and became a loving father to them all. One of his step-daughters, Aline Murray Alden, eventually married the poet, Joyce Kilmer, in a wedding ceremony here at St. Luke’s Church. 

 

            In 1906,on the occasion of Henry Alden’s 70th birthday, Harper and Brothers celebrated his life and accomplishments with a great dinner in Washington, DC, in the office of Franklin Square. The mere list of guests at this event suggests the celebrity and importance of Henry Mills Alden in the literary world. Due to a bad cold, one significant writer of the times could not make the party and sent the following humorous “roast” that was read to all assembled:

 

To Mr. Henry Alden:

 

ALDEN,--dear and ancient friend--it is a solemn moment. You have now reached the age of discretion. You have been a long time arriving. Many years ago you docked me on an article because the subject was too old; later, you docked me on an article because the subject was too new; later still, you docked me on an article because the subject was betwixt and between. Once, when I wrote a Letter to Queen Victoria, you did not put it in the respectable part of the Magazine, but interred it in that potter's field, the Editor's Drawer. As a result, she never answered it. How often we recall, with regret, that Napoleon once shot at a magazine editor and missed him and killed a publisher. But we remember, with charity, that his intentions were good.

 

You will reform, now, Alden. You will cease from these economies, and you will be discharged. But in your retirement you will carry with you the admiration and earnest good wishes of the oppressed and toiling scribes. This will be better than bread. Let this console you when the bread fails.

 

You will carry with you another thing, too--the affection of the scribes; for they all love you in spite of your crimes. For you bear a kind heart in your breast, and the sweet and winning spirit that charms away all hostilities and animosities, and makes of your enemy your friend and keeps him so. You have reigned over us thirty-six years, and, please God, you shall reign another thirty-six--"and peace to Mahmoud on his golden throne!"

 

Always yours

MARK

 

              

If you haven’t guessed already, this was from his good friend Mark Twain, whose short stories and essays were oft published in Harper’s Weekly. In part, Metuchen is known as the “Brainy Borough” because of the literary greats that would visit the hamlet, meet with Henry Mills Alden, and on many occasions worship at St. Luke’s.

 

            Henry Mills Alden died on October 7, 1919.

 

                                            

By Ted Latham