Jerrold/Smith autograph collection
Scope and Contents
The collection is organized into three series: Blanchard Jerrold Papers, Adolphe and Alice Smith Papers, and Third Party Letters and Other Manuscripts. All three are housed in one box.
Series I, Blanchard Jerrold Papers , is organized into two subseries: Letters to Blanchard Jerrold and Other Papers. The correspondence to Blanchard Jerrold is addressed both to him personally and to the Editor of Lloyd's Weekly. It includes letters from many of the leading figures in Victorian literary, artistic and theatrical circles. Letters from Clarkson Stanfield, Anthony Trollope, and John Forster concern a collection taken up by Jerrold for the actor Kenny Meadows in 1861. Several of the letters are addressed to Jerrold at the Reform Club, including one from William Gladstone. Also present are a letter to Douglas Jerrold and an autograph manuscript fragment of Blanchard Jerrold's The Life of Napoleon III.
Series II, Adolphe and Alice Smith Papers , is organized into three subseries: Letters to Adolphe Smith, Letters to Alice Smith, and Other Papers. The letters to Adolphe Smith document his involvement in the British and international socialist, communist, and trade unionist movements. His correspondents include prominent figures in the British labor movement, writers and activists in radical politics, Members of Parliament, and prominent international socialists and communists, as well as actors, artists, and physiologists. Letters to Alice Smith document her work as a literary critic for the Liverpool Courier. Most of her correspondents write to thank her for favorable reviews in that publication. Also present is the title page and flyleaf of an album (possibly the album from which the collection was removed), inscribed "Alice Adolphe Smith."
Series III, Third Party Letters and Other Manuscripts , consists chiefly of correspondence to various recipients from actors, writers, nobility, and others, but it also includes a small sketch of Thackeray, a manuscript poem fragment by Holloway, a manuscript titled "Extracts from Dr. Moore's Travels Thro Italy," and a list of names which may at one time have been represented in the autograph collection. A number of the letters are addressed to a Mrs and Miss de Fonblanque. A few of the letters were likely written to Jerrold or to Adolphe or Alice Smith, but have been included in this series rather than with their correspondence because the recipients cannot be conclusively identified.
Dates
- 1840-1928
Creator
Conditions Governing Access
Conditions Governing Use
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Extent
0.42 Linear Feet (1 box)
Language of Materials
English
Catalog Record
A record for this collection is available in Orbis, the Yale University Library catalog
Persistent URL
Overview
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
Adolphe Smith (1846-1925) was a British journalist and socialist. He was born at Headingley, Yorkshire, but at least one of his parents was French; he seems to have lived in France for part of his life, and fought in the Paris Commune uprising of 1870-71. He wrote frequently on contemporary public health issues, such as the cholera epidemics in France in the 1880s and the spread of smallpox in London. He served as an interpreter at conferences of the International Association of Medical Press, and was the official Anglo-French Interpreter at Congresses of the [Socialist] International between 1882-1910. Smith is best known today for the text accompanying John Thomson's photographs in Street Life in London, published serially in 1877-78, which documents the life of London's poor; other full-length books include The Biography of Charles Bradlaugh and Monaco and Monte Carlo.
Alice Jerrold Smith (1848-1882), Blanchard Jerrold's daughter, married Adolphe Smith in 1872. She wrote A Cruise on the Acorn, a children's book published in 1875 by Marcus Ward & Co., as well as literary criticism for the Liverpool Courier.
Processing Information
- Title
- Guide to the Jerrold/Smith Autograph Collection
- Status
- Under Revision
- Author
- by Ellen Doon
- Date
- December 1999
- Description rules
- Beinecke Manuscript Unit Archival Processing Manual
- Language of description note
- Finding aid written in English.
Part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Repository
Location
121 Wall Street
New Haven, CT 06511
Opening Hours
Access Information
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