:: :: University of Virginia Library

The sketches of Jackson and Stuart duly appeared in the New York Daily News under the title "Southern Generals in Outline / Personal Sketches and Anecdotes"; a footnote to the first, the sketch of Jackson, which appeared on Tuesday, October 24, 1865, established the spirit in which they should be read:

The design of the writer of these lines is to present a few familiar sketches of the more prominent Southern Generals, illustrated by characteristic anecdotes, many of them hitherto unpublished. His position gave him an opportunity of seeing in undress, so to speak, many of the most notable personages of the time; and these sketches may prove interesting, whatever the opinions or sympathies of the reader. They pretend to be nothing more than sketches. The fully finished portraits of the great historic figures of the recent contest cannot now be made; but the outline may be traced, and, perhaps, the likeness caught.

The sketch of Jackson is for the most part drawn from the articles that Cooke had published in February, 1863, in The Southern Illustrated News [6] of Richmond as well as from a three hundred-page biography of Jackson that Cooke was to publish later that year. Only a few details are changed, those which might possibly offend Northern readers. The description that Cooke gives of Jackson "moving about slowly and sucking a lemon (Yankee spoil, no doubt)"

241

is retained except for the parenthetical. Otherwise, the article has importance only as the intermediate step between the 1863 articles and the biography and the longer "revised" biography of 1866.

The second sketch, that of General J. E. B. Stuart, appeared in the News for Wednesday, November 22, 1865, and was signed "J. E. C." It was "puffed," as Poe might have remarked, by this notice on the editorial page, headed "General J. E. B. Stuart":

We publish today a charming sketch of this distinguished soldier, written by one who served under, and with him, and who knew him, and loved him; and whose skillful and graceful pen contributed to our columns the admirable sketch of Stonewall Jackson which we published a few weeks ago.[7]

For these sketches, John O. Beaty tells us,[8] Cooke "received ten dollars a column and the cash in hand was a godsend." The two sketches cover about seven columns and Cooke's pay for them must have been approximately $70, a little more than he expected. Without any doubt the newspaper thought that this was worthwhile for them: in the issue of October 25, 1865, they boasted that "The News has a larger circulation in the Southern States than all other New York daily papers together." The boast was addressed to the advertisers, for certainly a newspaper that carried articles on two of the South's heroes would appeal both to the Southerners and to the advertisers' sense of a potential market.

Along with the fortunate John R. Thompson and George Cary Eggleston, who both secured literary positions in New York, can be counted John Esten Cooke. He turned away from Richmond and Baltimore and dispatched his articles to the North where he was a bit more certain of a favorable reception. Indeed, of the thirty-one titles listed in the Cooke bibliography (Beaty, pp. 164-165), all but two of them were published outside the South: only Ellie, an early novel, and the 1863 biography of Jackson appeared under Richmond imprints. The other novels and biographies were issued from presses in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and even Toronto. Perhaps Cooke's letter to a friend concerning the forwarding of clothes suitable for the Virginia summer will allow us to modify an axiom too long automatically accepted.