JULIA WARD HOWE - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED 06/25/1887 - HFSID 43981

JULIA WARD HOWE
Howe handwrote, signed and dated this letter to Maria L. Chapin from Newport, Rhode Island in 1887, writing that she would hold a lecture at Chapin's club if it didn't conflict with another lecture date with a Mrs. Miriman.
Autograph letter signed "Julia Ward Howe". 3 pages, 4¾x8 ruled paper, 1 page folded, front and verso, with embossing of a capital building and "Congress" in upper left corner. Newport, Rhode Island, June 25, 1887. Addressed to Mrs. Maria L. Chapin. In full: "My dear madam: In reply to your kind letter, I will say that I am already engaged by Mrs Miriman for a lecture in Melrose, of which, so far as I know, the date has not been fixed. I shall be quite willing to speak to your club, but should wish to know, before 'saying when', the date of my other lecture in Melrose, as it would not be best, per-haps, to have them occur in near proximity of time, and Mrs Miri-man has the first choice. If it would not interfere with her wishes and ar-rangements, I would come to you on December 1st. Will you kindly communi-cate with her and ascer-tain this for our common guidance. Your's truly". Howe (1819-1910, born in New York City), a social reformer and poet, is best known for writing the poem The Battle Hymn of the Republic, which she was inspired to write after visiting army camps in Washington, D.C. during the Civil War. Howe's poem, first published in the February 1862 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, was later set to music to the tune of the popular antislavery song John Brown's Body and became the unofficial song of the Union Army. Howe later turned her fervor against slavery into a crusade for women's rights. She was a co-founder (1868) and first President of the New England Woman's Suffrage Association, co-led (with Lucy Stone) the American Woman Suffrage Association (1869) and founded the Women's International Peace Association (1871). In 1870, Howe assisted Stone and her husband, Henry Blackwell, to establish the Woman's Journal, and served as an editor and writer for the publication for 20 years. Howe, who also wrote poems for other women's journals and founded the Boston Authors Club, was the first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1908). Lightly toned, soiled and creased. Handwriting but not signature is lightly spotted and smeared in places but legible. Folded twice and unfolded. Lightly torn along right edges at folds. Pinholed on spine at folds. Otherwise in fine condition.