ENPages
p. 41
241.
[deemed bad policy, as the French corps was very attractive, and drew large and fashionable audiences. This company possessed a great deal of first-class talent; they were from New Orleans -their permanent adobe. It was their first visit to the North; and, such was the impression they had made on our public, that it caused the corps to repeat their visits for several summers afterwards, thus avoiding the unpleasant seasons at New Orleans, and profitably filling up their recess.
The eclat which attended the French company's most excellent representations, certainly had a dampening effect upon the opening novelties of Warren's season. The Gallic corps were very perfect as vaudeville performers. The neat and truly picturesque mode - always characterized by chasteness in all the accompaniments of a drama - in exact costume, business, and natural delineation of acting, could not be surpassed, and has hardly ever been equalled, on the English stage. The French comedy and lyric drama were certainly intellectual treats, particularly "Le Petit Chaperon Rouge" (Red Riding Hood); "La Pié Voleuse" (The Magpie and the Maid); "William Tell, " and, in after seasons, the very clever representations of the "Daughter of the Regiment," and the "Crown Diamonds;" the heroines of which latter pieces were most admirably sustained by the inimitable Calve. We have never seen these pieces so well put upon the stage since. We speak not so much of the musical part as of the acting, and their very neat stage business. This French invasion undoubtedly affected the early interests of the opening season of 1827 and 1828.
Mr. Warren had expended full $6000 in causing an importation of nearly a full stock company from England, and an immense number of orchestra solo-players from Germany, with a leader of reputation by the name of Braun.
Yet with all these uncommon efforts, Mr. Wemyss, Warren's stage manager and agent to England, who carried out all these stupendous arrangements with great zeal and good faith, following pretty closely (it would appear) the vast notions suggested by Mr. Richard Peters, in his quasi letters of instructions, (vide page 124 "Wemyss' Twenty-six Years of the Life of an Actor and Manager,") most candidly admits that "the receipts of the first week fell short of the nightly expenditure." How could it be otherwise? An active opposition, under Cowell & Simpson, was efficiently organized to meet the heterogeneous new tastes of the rapidly increasing population of the city, and a most unwise, uncalled-for and expensive numerical importation of stock performers was made, professedly to fill up the rank and file of the old Chesnut street stock, when that hiatus could have been equally as well filled here. Were the positions of Mr. and Mrs. Wood, Mr. and Mrs. Duff, and others we could enumerate, as well supplied, either professionally or privately? We opine a reply in the negative. We shall not derogate from the abilities of these imported artists, nor yet from their private deportment; we knew most of them personally, and shall speak of their merits, we hope, with justice. Our own stage had, at this period, begun to develope rich fruit. But a cry like huntsmen's echoes was made to resound against native attempts, and it was averred that there was a necessity of favoring all things exotic, which was pretty much like the foreign operatic cry is now. But jefferson, Duff, Wood, &c., were getting lame and old, and new faces must be had, if even of provincial celebrity; for the real London actors of the National Theatre stamp only came to us as stars for a few nights. We had, too, a great many of the "stars," who had played a night, perhaps, at one of the large houses, or may have acted at the minor theatres then springing into existence, before and after the monopoly was revoked by act of Parliament. They were palmed upon our easy credulity by the gross, for what they were not. The game at length is blocked. But yet prejudice does much, in some of our pretended bon ton circles, and that prejudice enlightened reason must continue to combat, and American native talent, if scientifically cultured, will eventually conquer it, even in the divinity of opera.
The assumed monopoly of the Park Theatre, in the starring policy, we think, should have been met by the Chesnut street management with opposition. Independence in trade is a maxim with us, as well as in our political institutions. Could a coalition have been effected as suggested, and indeed proposed by our friend Wemyss to Dr. Hart, the Bowery agent at London, and by him acceded to, viz: an exchange of stars, and other desired novelies, with each other, the arrangement would have proved a most politic and advantageous measure, as operating to defeat the American monopoly of the Park dynasty, which so imperiously dictated as to time and terms. But the habits, thouts and sentiments of Warren, were the reverse of those of Gilfert. The Chatham had sapped the popular base of the Park house, which advantage the first Bowery Theatre of 1826 and 1827 triumphantly consummated, and carried off that most stable support of all our public amusements, "the middle classes" or our communities. But the aristocratic fashionable circles still adhered to the old Park as the Mecca of foreign first-class talent. Thither did their prejudices go to bow in reverence at the royal shrine, while the people's natural impulses gushed forth at the altar of the Bowery temple, in hearty plaudits and huzzas! How is it now? Why, the charm of exlusiveness is broken, and the masses in general (adjunct aids to fashion) reign in triumph. The course and fate of the Park Theatre was that of the Chesnut Street Theatre here, and we may say of the old Federal Street Theatre, at Boston. That power which first militated against the Chesnut street house was the Walnut Street Theatre, which gradually arose from a circus to a regular theatre, and having ever the popular heart with it, abstracted the middling interests from its hallowed fane, and finally, in conjunction with the Arch street house, after many crazy managements, destroyed all the ancient prestige. If the erratic Gilfert had acted in good faith, and carried out the Dr. Hart and Wemyss treaty, "offensive and defensive," its end might, after all, have proved nugatory. Gilfert, with all his reckless daring, did not make the Bowery "the theatre!" The Park, with its walls literally deserted, still continued, in a measure, the metropolitan, until it was burnt down, under Hamblin, in 1848. Thus did it partially remain, in despite of all its opponents, great and small, who, like Cadmus' dragon's teeth, sprung up instantaneously and destoryed each other. Whether the Park would have resuscitated under Hamblin's guidance, had it not been destroyed, is a question hard to solve. The surrounding fashion and play-going people had all immigrated up town. The local supplies thus became destroyed.
On the arrival of Mr. Wemyss and his corps, he immediately marshalled his host, and announced the programme of the campaign.Wemyss had made one very judicious and useful musical engagement, in the person of Mr. Willis, a violin performer of great merit, who was very properly secured to lead the melo-drama department and other English musical pieces, as understanding the languate and the habits and the modes of that drama, which we have often seen embarrassed by a foreign leader, (although excellent on the instrument,) not being acquainted with the language. But, in connection with this vast importation of stock performers, a chimerical musical enterprize was entered into, and an immense band of musicians, of high reputation on various instruments, were imported from Germany - a scheme which the energetic foresight of Gilfert had not yet entertained, and the taste of our audiences was not capable to duly appreciate. Mr. Wemyss, it would seem, had no part or lot in these large Germanic engagements. The musical idea emanated from Mr. Warren's private advisers, or from the amateur management so puquantly pointed at by Mr. W. B. Wood, for certainly some of the simi-official instructions elaborated from that influential source (which furnished the funds) to Mr. Wemyss, on his departure to fulfil his mission, (in 1827,) were funny and fantastical. They were obviously not feasible, and if practicable, the entire objects were not required, for the reason that as good an invoice could have been procured here, the more especially as we had begun to manufacture theatrical "stock" as well as "star" material of an excellent quality, as was acknowledged by the unprejudiced and the unsophisticated people. But aristocratic prejudice said "No! go to England and bring out new faces - send the old ones adrift!" And, sure enough, the unfeeling and unnatural decree was carried out, to the letter, as the melancholy results proved to all concerned in his new dramatic speculation upon old-fashioned things.
If we may be allowed to quote from "Wood's Personal Recollections," (and none will gainsay that,) we may find something confirmatory of our meaning. On this subject this conservative author truly says -
"Arrangements were made of a very extensive character for fashionable performers from England. A considerable number of our own regular performers were discharged, not from any suggestion of either incompetency or decline, nor from any want of good conduct anywhere, but from the enormous expense which it was said the promised succcession of new English performers had involved."
The motives of this stupendous scheme to get out a crowd of English performers were quite obvious. Mr. Warren's letter of instructions to Mr. Wemyss on the subject of engagements (as given by the latter in his history of the stage) were reasonable and sensible. They were to supply certain vacancies. But the advice, the adjunct and semi-offical instructions of the amateur manager were crude and romantic, so far as they applied to the necessary wants and engagements contemplated. They were curiosities in their way, and the results only proved the folly of the ideas therein suggsted. The opening of the season was preceded by a concert, 28th of October, given at the Chesnut Street Theatre. The performers, instrumental and vocal, were as follows:
Mr. Braun, director, from the Vienna and Berlin theatres; Willis, violin; Wepfer, clario-]
p. 42
242.
[net; Krudger, violin; Madame Braun, the wife of the director, from the Vienna opera, &c.; Miss E. Jefferson, Miss Hester Warren, vocalists.
The orchestra consisted thus: - Braun, Willis, Wepfer, Dielman, (violin,) Kruger, J. Homman, Wheeler, (horn,) Norton, of the King's Theatre, Italian Opera House, and professor of music to the Royal Academy, and many others whose names we have not.
At this time Mr. Schmitz, musician, arrived from Germany for the Musical Fund School.
The theatre opened on the 29th of October, with "Romeo and Juliet." Mr. Southwell's first appearance in America as Romeo. He was announced as "from the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane." The cast was thus: - Paris, Mr. Drummond, (his first appearance these ten years,) Capulet, Mr. Horton; Mercutio, Mr. Wemyss; Benvolio, Mr. Darley; Tybalt, Mr. Heyl; Friar Laurence, Mr. Warren; Apothecary, Mr. Watson; Peter, Mr. J. Jefferson; Juliet, (her first appearance in that character,) Miss Warren; Nurse, Mrs. Francis. The receipts were about $600. Between the play and farce, an Italian air, "Hope Told a Flattering Tale," with variations, composed for Madame Catalini, by Mrs. Braun, from the theatres of Vienna, Prague, Berlin and Konigsberg, her second appearance in America.
A pas seul by Miss Hawthorn, from the Theatre Royal, Dury Lane and Covent Garden, (her first appearance in America.) To conclude with the farce called "Is He Jealous; or, A Peep into a Boudoir." Mr. F. C. Wemyss, stage manager.
The prices were, box, $1; pit, 75 cents; gallery, 25 cents.
On Tuesday, 30th, the comedy of the "Poor Gentleman," when Mr. Mercer, of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, made his first appearance in America as Frederick. The afterpiece was "Rosina," in which Mr. mercer appeared as Mr. Bellville, and Mr. Hutchings, of the Theatres Royal, York and New Castle, made his first bow here in Captain Bellville.
Mr. J. T. Norton, of the King's theatre, Italian Opera House, was announced as engaged for six nights only, and made a great sensation with his trumpet solos. Mr. S. Chapman, Miss Emery, Mrs. mercer, Master Mercer and Mr. Gaskell, were underlined as stock performers. The Chesnut street company may thus be enumerated for this season, embracing the old members with the new foreign ones, which presented a strong array of names:
Messrs. Warren, (lessee,) Wood, Southwell, S. Chapman, Brown, Jefferson, sen., Jefferson, jr., Mercer, Hutchings, Darley, Hathwell, Heyl, Drummond, Wheatly, Horton, Cartridge, Delarue, Eglee, Bignall, Murry, Parker, Lyons, C. Watson, Klett; Master Kerr, dancer; Lopez, prompter; Master T. Mercer, singer; F. C. Wemyss.
Mesdames Anderson, Francis, Darley, Roper, Jefferson, Murry, Mercer; Misses H. Warren, E. Jefferson, Emery; Miss Hawthorn, a danseuse; Miss Kerr, ditto; Misses H. L. and M. Hathwell.
Mrs. Wood, after many years' active service as a leading actress, had now withdrawn from the company. It would seem from this secession that this lady's services were no longer appreciated by the directors of the heatre. She was literally supplanted by the foreign and native young actresses. Time does not preserve the performer's honors in public opinion.
Mr. Southwell was a native of Dublin, and had all the humorous vivacity of his countrymen. He early became infected with the notion of acting,a nd joined a provincial corps of comedians in Lancashire, England, under the assumed name of Francis. When Mr. Wemyss went out to London for recruits to strengthen the Chesnut street corps, Southwell, who had made his debut at Drury Lane Theatre as Romeo, in 1826, and was then a member of it, had achieved some name as a promising juvenile actor. Such a performer was wanted for the Philadelphia house, and Mr. Wemyss, after some negotiation, secured his services. It would seem that Elliston (the then manager of Drury Lane) had set some value on his services, for he threatened to arrest Southwell for a breach of articles, by engaging with Mr. Wemyss. However, Southwell bade farewell to Albion's soil, and sailed for America, where he made his first appearance, as stated above. Mr. Southwell was a fine-figured young man, with very excellent requisites to sustain juvenile tragic characters, possessing a good deal of spirit and energy. He made a favorable impression in Romeo, but was not a John Duff, or anything of that calibre. He was very impulsive in his nature, and could have rendered very general aid in a company. He did not long remain in this company, as it soon became dissolved and scattered to the four winds. He acted subsequently at the various theatres throughout our cities, and finally went to the WEst Indies, where he died in 1841. He was married and had children. They accompanied him to this country. Southwell, like most of his countrymen, was a humorist. He once said in the Walnut Street Theatre - "Faith," said he, "when I came to America, I was the most elated and happy man in the world. I had been so impressed with the free institutions of the country and the happy chances of all reaching fame and fortune in it, that I could not help entertaining the idea, that my son, if he had the luck, would one day or other be the President of the United States."
Mr. Thomas Mercer was a very talented man, and, we think, one of the most able general actors that Wemyss brought out, if we except Rowbotham. He was originally instructed in music, and was attached to a theatrical orchestra in England, afterwards adopted the stage, and appeared first in the sentimental juveniles, evincing much cleaverness. He was a good-natured gentleman, of great utility in a company, perfectly au fait in the business of the stage in all its details, and with ease could assume an operatic, a genteel comedy, or even a tragic part, with pleasure to his audience. We have herein announced his opening characters with us in the Chesnut Street Theatre, with whose auditory he became a favorite. He was a long time a useful member of Drury Lane Theatre, where he made his debut in 1819. he now resides in Liverpool, England; we hope comfortably. Mrs. Mercer was a useful woman - we cannot say more - and Master mercer was found very serviceable in the operatic business, or in glees, quartettes, etc.
Mr. Hutchings was a tenor singer of no very great merit. he had been represented to be a pupil of Pearman's. Mr. Wemyss was required to procure a singing actor, or a vocalist of some kind; but that was found no easy thing, and as a dernier resort he engaged Hutchings. The latter made no impression here, and, we believe, soon returned to england. he was brought out to do the singing business, and heyl did nearly the whole of it through the season, at least the latter seemed more acceptable.
Miss Emery, from the Surrey Theatre, London, made her first appearance, Oct. 31st, at the Chesnut Street Theatre, as Belvidera, in "Venice Preserved," with great credit and applause - Jaffier, Southwell; Pierre, Mr. S. Chapman, who made his first appearance in this character in consequence of the sudden indisposition of Mr. Wood. Mr. Chapman did not make much of an impression in his first essay, although afterwards he became a great favorite.
Miss Emery was a very lare and rather coarse-looking woman, with commanding and expressive features; her physical powers were very great, and her acting was marked by vigor and unflagging energy; her voice was very powerful, but not unmusical. With tact and judgment to delineate, with cleverness, any of the tragic heroines on our acting list of plays, she wanted softness and a more polished mien. Most of the English tragedy ladies, of any note, it is most remarkable, have been all very largefigured women, exhibiting, in predominance, great physical force. The very large size of the two national theatres may have favored largefigured females. But the depths of tragic passion may be seated in the faculties of the dwarf, as in those of the giant. Miss Emery was applauded, but did not prove attractive until she created some excitement by her performances of Bianca and Evadne, and, in conjunction iwth the elite of the new actors and the best of the old corps, good and paying receipts were attracted to the house. The lowering clouds that heavily hung over the first nights of this season began to disperse, and sunshine for a time cheered its course.
The non-arrival of Mrs. Austin and the Slomans, who had been anxiously looked for from London, had thrown obstacles in the way of the planned campaign. The merits of Samuel Chapman were shown in Hamlet, Richard III., and of Miss Emery as Evadne, and the management then was compelled to resort to two extra star engagements, Mrs. Knight and Mr. C. Horn, the vocalists, who played a very successful engagement of three nights, to an average of $500, with a benefit of $1100. this engagement was renewed, with similar success, when the starts arrived from London, one of whom, Mrs. Sloman, shone for a while with immense splendor. Mrs. Knight and Horn made their exeunt.
A Mr. J. Brown, who bore a strong resemblance, in figure and manner, to Cooper, the tragedian, made his appearance in Virginius, and became a member of the company. Brown was one night playing Banquo to Cooper's Macbeth. In the 2d scene, 1st act, where the army advances over the bridge through the dispersing mists of the foul weather, Banquo precedes Macbeth. Brown entered thus with majestic port, and, looking so like the old tragedian, he was greeted with several rounds of strong applause, which he returned with several graceful bows. When the mistake was discovered, directly after, the audience only laughed at themselves. Brown had all the outward aspect of Cooper, but none of the internal stuff. He was something in the Bombastes Furioso style.
A new musical comedy was produced about this period, for the first time, called "Rencontre, or, Love will find out the Way" - Baron de Bonceur, Mr. Warren; Colonel de Courcy, Wemyss; Major Moustache, Jefferson; St. Leon, Hutchings; Pierre, Mercer; Landlord, C. Watson; Madame de Merville, Mrs. Anderson; Justine, Miss E. Jefferson. This piece was full of pleasing songs, duets and trios, and was very successful, in conjunc-]
p. 45
[b]
[References.
a First turnpike gate, kept by Mr. Hogeland. b Dwelling houses. c Position of the stage when stop. ped. d Public house. e Poplar trees. f Cedars and Buttonwood. g Spot where the horses were seized. h Fence to which the horses were tied. i Swamp Lane.]
[The Scene of the Robbery.
Particulars not detailed by any of the Witnesses.
The toll-gate near which the Mail Robbery was committed, is situated only a short distance beyond the new Penitentiary and the House of Refuge; and it is more than probable the three robbers, when proceeding at the dead hour of night to the commission of their crime, passed within sight of those buildings. The frowning battlements of the former, looking down in sullen grandeur upon their unholy errand, were well calculated to strike terror into the hearts of any but the most hardened and abandoned wretches, while the thought of the purposes for which it had been reared, would have snet a thrill of horror throught the veins of the innocent passenger. What the reflections of the three must have been, it is impossible for any but themselves to relate; it is sufficient for us to know they were not of that solemn character which would lead them to abandon their unlawful enterprise.
Mr. Hogeland, is the keeper of this toll-gate, a situation held by him for more than nine years. He was in bed when the stage passed on the night of the robbery, and had left the gate in charge of a young man, who has been repeatedly employed to relieve the keeper from the arduous duties of waiting upon passengers at all hours of the night, and has uniformly acquitted himself to entire satisfaction. The number of persons on horseback, in wagons, &c. constantly passing during the night, renders such relief to the keeper indispensibly necessary. When the latter retired to rest, knowing it to be about the hour for the Reading Mail to arrive, he left the gate open, as is usual with the keepers of many of the turnpike gates in the neighborhood of Philadelphia. He had fallen into a sound sleep when it passed through. Mrs. Hogeland appears, from all accounts, to have been the only individual in the house who was awake that night. She had, from some unaccountable cause, been unable to sleep, and heard, or fancied she heard the robbers rush against the building a little after midnight. She is quite certain she heard some persons walk in a hurried manner across the piazza of the house, and very naturally supposes it was them. This supposition is stregthened by considering that s they had already determined upon the spot where the Mail should be stopped, which was only a short distance from the toll-house, they passed across the piazza in order to ascertain if any, and how many persons were stirring in the house,- as, if they discovered no one stirring, to whom the stage passengers could call or apply for assistance, they might proceed more boldly on their perilous undertaking.
Mrs. Hogeland awoke from a kind of doze into which she had fallen, disturbed by the rattling of the stage wheels, which thundered over the hard turnpike in a clear December atmosphere. In a few moments afterwards she was startled by the furious approach of the stage in an opposite direction, followed by a loud and continued knocking at the door, and the hallooing of a dozen voices at the same time, all calling earnestly for immediate admittance. Cries of "The Mail is robbed!" - "Let us in for heaven's sake!" -"Open the door!" - "Help! help!" - with such other exclamations of terror and distress, as the scene might naturally be supposed to have elicited, were all mingled in one clamoros and alarming shout. The alarm immediately spread to every inmate of the house that the Mail had been attacked and the lives of the passenger endangered. All hads were up and dressed in a few minutes, and the passengers, trembling with cold and apprehension, were admitted to comfortable quarters in the toll-house. A light was called for; by some unforseen oversight, none could be then procured. Mrs. Hogeland at length found a candle - for the incoherent vociferations of the passengers, which almost induced her to believe that murder had been committed, completely bewildered her faculties - and she opened the stove door for the purpose of lighting it. But, though accustomed for nine years and upwards to all the perils and privations incident to her occupation, whe was so much overcome with fear at the suddenness of the alarm, that instead of lighting the candle, the threw it into the stove! At this the passengers redoubted their clamors, and called out with renewed feirceness for a light. After groping about into every room in the house, the cellar not excepted, she was unable to find a candle. Siezing a brand and lightingit, she again commenced her search - and here was a subject for the pencil fo the painter. Her hair in disorder - her garments hastily thrown on - dismay depicted in her usually calm and pleasing countenance - the group of shivering passengers - all formed a scene such as is but seldom witnessed! Few women under similar circumstances would have acquitted themselves with equal firmness. A light was now speedily procured, and the passengers proceeded to collect their scattered goods, each thinking himself fortunate that he had, amid the eneral search, been able to preserve even a small portion of his valuables. Mrs. Hogeland says she had never before seen such a collection of pale faces as all the members who composed this group presented.
The stage was quickly put to rights, and then ten passengers again got in and proceeded to this city, where intelligene of the outrage spread rapidly among the citizens, and has continued, from the day of the arrest of the robbers, to be a prominent topic of public conversation.
The engraving at the head of this article was drawn upon the spot where the robbery occurred, and has been made at considerable expense, in order to give the public a view of the ground itself. It may be depended on as being a faithful and accurate representation of all the adjacent premises.]