Description:

O.W. Holmes Jr on "Dewey's exploit" Spanish American War to European Paramore, Fantastic Content

4pp, measuring 8" x 10", Boston, dated May 10, 1898. An autograph letter signed "OWH", addressed to Lady Clare Castletown "Hibernia", a female correspondent he met in England. Written on Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court letterhead, the lengthy letter contains revealing and politically-charged comments about a global conflagration and his hopes for a closer relationship with the United Kingdom. With flattened mail folds and faint edge toning. Minor soiling and foxing on the back page. Overall very good.

The letter reads in part:

"Your letter gave me deep joy--I leave you to remember why. Also it showed that there were some compensations for being a big moron…You will have heard about Dewey's exploit- it took some sand to sail in as he did. And now we are waiting expecting almost any hour to hear of another big fight. One imagines that there is an element of chance with modern explosives and so has a subterranean anxiety churning underneath all the time…I am glad that this war should draw our countries nearer together. I think we have a well-founded conviction that under all ordinary circumstances you will get your money's worth out of any dealing with us 0 but if there is to be a world's row then I hope with all my heart that we should back you and you us - to bring out the English speaking race on top. But I also hope there will not be a general war…I remember my good friend Bryce (M.P.) regarding me as quite behind the times when I said that government meant control of the bayonet and the club and nothing else - as a basis for not wanting to change the present regime and let in woman's suffrage. I can't write freely while you are away from home. I feel as if my letters might never reach you and I don't wish to edify the clerks of the dead letter office…I must leave you to go down into the Mart and try to buy a bond or two with a little money that must be invested. Men care for ideals more than for life - Property is an ideal. That is how it sacrifices lives - pleasing paradox - for which I make you no extra charge. I go - Goodbye - I bet you don’t know all that I have said in this letter."

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (1841-1935) was an associate justice of the Supreme Court from 1902 to 1932. Prior to this, he served as an Associate Justice and then Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Holmes had married childhood friend, Fanny Dixwell, in 1872, and although devoted to her in his own way, he also frequently sought out the company of other intelligent, charming women. Holmes was introduced to Lady Clare Castletown while traveling through England in the summer of 1889, whereupon a mutual infatuation ensued. Although the exact nature of their relationship is unknown, they continued to correspond, with occasional visits, up until Lady Clare's death in 1926. In an effort to keep the relationship a secret — both were married — Holmes destroyed most of her letters, but luckily, several of Lady Clare's own letters from Holmes still survive.

Holmes' references to war likely concern the Spanish-American War, which broke out on May 1, 1898. Commodore George Dewey of the USS "Olympia" initiated the conflict by engaging and defeating a Spanish squadron under Spanish Admiral Patricio Montojo. The United States intervened in the Cuban War of Independence and used its military force to support the Cuban rebellion. Despite both sides declaring war on each other, neither had alliances with other countries, which kept it from becoming a world war as it did in 1914.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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