The Story about the Story
“Twas the Night before Christmas…”
By Mark Wharton Reid
Twas the night before Christmas, when all thru the house, not a creature was stirring not even a mouse. Well, not quite, there has been a stir of late, and an unfortunate one at that.
The controversy in question is over the authorship of the 18th Century children’s poem, "An Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas" or as it is more popularly known, “The Night before Christmas.”
Originally attributed to Clement Clarke Moore (1779-1863) of New York City, the origin of the poem is being challenged by the descendents of Major Henry Livingston.
Mary Van Deusen from Boston, MA, with much media fanfare has resurrected long dormant claims that her ancestor, Livingston, (1748-1828) of Poughkeepsie, NY wrote the poem around 1808.
Van Deusen brought in English Professor Don Foster of Vassar College, a self described literary sleuth, to authenticate her aspersions to Moore's authorship of the poem. Foster, whose book "Author Unknown" also unmasked Joe Klein, as the heretofore anonymous writer of the novel: "Primary Colors".
Van Duesen claims the original copy of the poem was destroyed by fire in Livingston’s daughter’s home in Kaskaskia, Wisconsin in 1859. Van Deusen contends that an early draft; or a version of the poem, made its way to the Moore homestead. Dr. Moore, a renowned literati, could have come across it and at some point touched it up a bit, making it his own
Livingston was the father of 12 children. He fought in the Revolutionary War, was a surveyor, justice of the peace and a farmer. Most of his poetry was lighthearted and fun loving in its nature. The fact is, that with all the clamor and fanfare over the release of the poem “Night before Christmas” in 1823; he never acknowledged the work was his. Poughkeepsie is just a stone’s throw away from Troy in upstate New York. Livingston died in 1828.
Moore was the only son of the Reverend Benjamin and Charity Clarke Moore. At the age of 19, Clement graduated at the top of his class from Columbia University. While there he studied oriental languages and enjoyed playing the violin. As a young man he compiled the first English translation of the Hebrew Lexicon; edited notes on John Deur’s scholarly work “Third Satire of the Juvenal” and organized drawings for the construction of St. Peter’s Church.
He was quite politically active in New York, writing an inflammatory article entitled "Observations" in which he reacted to Thomas Jefferson's "Notes on Virginia" accusing him of "subverting religion and establishing a false philosophy". Moore donated land from his Chelsea Homestead in 1821 for the construction of the General Theological Seminary. At the seminary, he was a professor of Greek & Oriental literature.
In addition to being a prominent biblical scholar, he was meticulous in planning the design for the Chelsea neighborhood. His intent was to break up NYC’s rapidly developing urban sprawl with parks, tree-lined avenues and ample green space. Dr.Moore also submitted the sixty page outline which became the blueprint for Greenwich Village.
According to Moore ‘lore, legend has it, that on a bitter cold and snowy Christmas Eve in 1822, Dr. Moore rode out from Chelsea on a sleigh driven by an older, jolly Hessian (German) gentleman. He was going to pick up some turkeys for a local church for distribution on Christmas Day for the poor and unfortunate.
Heading towards Jefferson's Market in the Bowery District, Dr. Moore was struck by the humor and lightheartedness of rotund, pot-bellied driver. As they galloped thru the snowline streets towards the lower eastside Dr. Moore began to compose some lines of verse to what would become the famous poem.
Arriving home he gathered his children together and recited his new poem. Undoubtedly, their warm faces were fire-lit as they listened with joy in front a roaring blaze in the family’s living room. The poem was especially composed for Dr. Moore's little girl Charity then age 6, who suffered from tuberculosis and was not expected to live long.
The following year while visiting the family, Dr. Moore's cousin Harriet Butler, heard the poem and wrote down the words. She then sent a copy to the editor of the Troy, NY Sentinel, who published the anonymous poem on December 23, 1823.
Dr. Moore had asked that the Christmas Eve story be kept within the household and was adamant that the poem was a "mere trifle" and was only meant for his family.
Moore had transformed the dour Saint Nicholas or as he was known in Dutch “Sinter Klaus”, from the mythical saint who rewarded the good children with presents and beat the bad kids with a cane, into a jolly, bi-speckled Santa Claus. He respectfully orchestrated St. Nick’s arrival on the night before Christmas, deflecting any potential furor over the Christian observance of Jesus’ birth.
The poem draws inspiration from his good friend Washington Irving's book, "A Knickerbockers History" which was published in 1809 and the 1821 poem "The Children's Friend” by William B. Gilley.
In 1997 Seth Kaller bought one of the four known manuscripts penned by Dr. Moore for $211,000 at an auction. He brought in his own detective Dr. Joseph Nickell of the University of Kentucky. In analyzing the poems, Nickell found “unequifically” that Moore was the author.
Controversy aside, the poem stands on its own accord, but it was the drawings of cartoonist Thomas
Nast (1840-1908) that sent Santa into superstardom.
Nast's portrayal of St. Nicholas was drawn specifically from the poem, as his wife read it to him,
constantly, because Nast, a German immigrant, could not read English.
Nast’s different caricatures of St. Nick appeared regularly in Harpers Weekly.
History unfairly, portrays Dr. Moore as a bit of a prude, a stodgy, moralistic curmudgeon, who lectured against the perils of wine drinking. In fact, he kept impressive collections of wines in the cellar of his home and had a benevolent generous nature.
He worked tirelessly to the benefit of others that had less then he, in addition to his numerous duties he also served on the board of directors of the first school for the blind in NYC. With his young, loving wife, Catherine Elizabeth, (1794-1830) and eventually nine children he most assuredly, loosened up a bit.
Unfortunately, sad times befell Chelsea in 1830 when Clement’s beloved wife Catherine Elizabeth died at a very young age and later that year his daughter Charity passed away at 14.
Dr. Moore was finally acknowledged as the author of “The Night Before Christmas” in the "New York Book of Poetry in 1837. The book's editor was Charles Fenno-Hoffman. He finally included "The Visit" in his own book of poetry in 1844 along with a beautiful prose dedicated to his late wife entitled "To Southy".
Moore wrote another poem about St. Nicholas in 1821 called "Old Santa Klaus" and edited the highly revered book, “Scanderbeg, King of Albania” in 1852. It was within this passion and love that Dr. Moore cherished in his family that he drew the inspiration from his mother for his own “mere trifle”.
In the midst of the British occupation in a city ravaged by years of war that Benjamin Moore married Charity Clarke on April 30, 1778. She was the beautiful and elegant daughter of Captain Thomas Clarke and; as it turned out, quite the closet Yankee.
In letters to her cousin in London, Joseph Jekyll, young Charity, a "Daughter of Liberty", flashed an exuberance for the American cause by calling on King George's Army; "What care we for your fleets and armies, we are not going to fight with them unless driven to it by the last necessity or the highest provocation". She continues, "The soul is fortified by virtue, and the love of liberty is cherished within this bosom".
It was during those bitter years that Hessian soldiers were stationed at the Moore home. The senior officer befriending the family and perhaps it was within this setting that young Clement may have created his old St. Nick or enlisted his mother's literary passion.
It was on the property he owned, that Captain Clarke built a lovely estate he named “Chelsea”. The homestead became the Moore family home until 1854. It encompassed more than 40 acres of rolling hills and orchards overlooking the Hudson River.
Unfortunately Dr. Moore’s vision of a tranquil green space within the confines of the ever encompassing urban sprawl was not shared by the lordly Vanderbilt family, who drove their burgeoning railroad empire right thru the heart of Chelsea, regulating it into what is now the transportation and warehouse hub of west Manhattan.
The senior Moore (1748-1816) was the last acting president of Kings College before the Revolutionary War and during the British occupation of NYC was Rector of Trinity Church, which was burned to the ground in 1776. Under his tutelage at Kings College were three of the principal framers of the United States Constitution, John Jay, Alexander Hamilton and Gouverneur Morris.
After the war and much provocation, he became the third President of Columbia University and participated in the inauguration of President George Washington. Washington and his wife Martha were parishioners at Trinity. On September 11, 1801 was consecrated Episcopal Arch-Bishop of New York City.
In "Author Unknown" Foster claims that Moore waited until 1844 to acknowledge authorship only after he (Moore) first checked with the publisher at the Troy Sentinel, Norm Tuttle, to find out if he knew who wrote the poem when he printed it anonymously in 1823.
Foster notes that Moore did this to make sure the "coast was clear". Livingston died in 1828 without ever stepping forward as the author of the poem.
Foster seems to foster much animosity and suspicion towards Moore, referring to him as "the Grinch". He didn't appear to take heed of the fact that claims of authorship brought forth by Livingston's own grandchildren were discounted by experts in 1865.
In 1830 the editors of the Troy Sentinel put some finishing touches of their own in, titling the poem “The Night before Christmas” and changing some of the reindeer’s names to make them rhyme. For Van Duesen, at best the wayward prose made its way into the Moore homestead and Clement finished it up. It seems odd that Livingston would never acknowledge or recognize “his” poem. The poem, like us, is a veritable melting pot. It is “Americanized”. It is a hodgepodge of everything and it has a little bit of everybody in it.
Also worth noting, like Moore who recited the poem for his ill daughter and had another mentally disabled child, the author of "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer", Robert Lewis May wrote his poem in 1939 for his little 4 year old daughter whose legs were crippled. May was an employee of Montgomery Ward’s Department Store entered his story in a charitable employee contest.
Moore passed away at his summer home in Newport, Rhode Island in July, 1863. His body was secretly brought back to New York City during the draft riots that summer and buried anonymously at St. Luke's Cemetery on Hudson Street.
Moore was reburied in 1890 at the Trinity National Cemetery, which was the former estate of John Audubon on 155th street. It is the site of the yearly procession, which leaves from the Church of the Immaculate Possession to the cemetery every Christmas Eve for a candle-light reading of the poem.
It is with a certain irreverence that his father Reverend Benjamin Moore almost slipped from the pages of history. If not for his intercession at the behest of a mortally wounded Alexander Hamilton he would have remained rather anonymous himself.
And no, the national treasure from the Nicolas Cage movie is not buried beneath Trinity Church!
