Autograph Letter to a close childhood friend

CLEMENS, S[amuel] L[anghorne]. ALS to close childhood friend John Garth, Hannibal, Missouri, signed "S. L. Clemens", with a two-line P. S., signed "SLC". 2 pp. (rectos only), 8vo, with added MS note by Helen Kercheval Garth & added MS note by Albert Bigelow Paine. Hartford, May 1, 1890.

A rare autograph letter to a childhood friend. The Berkeley, Mark Twain Project Online records only one other letter from Clemens to Garth, that one written in 1882. The online Project records a transcript of our letter as having appeared in the Southern Literary Journal, 11 November 1937. Written to John H. Garth (1837-1899), of Hannibal, Missouri, one of Clemens's closest childhood friends and one of the models for the character "Joe Harper" in "Tom Sawyer", and "Jack Stillson" in his unfinished "The Mysterious Stranger." Garth, his wife, Helen Kercheval Garth (m. 1860), and Clemens remained close friends the rest of their respective lives. They were students together at Mrs. Elizabeth Horr's school, and later that of J. D. Dawson. Helen Kercheval Garth (1838-1923) was described by Clemens as "one of the prettiest of the schoolgirls." It was at John Garth's father's tobacco store in Hannibal that Clemens bought his cheap cigars as a youngster. John and Helen Garth moved to New York at the beginning of the Civil War where John operated a tobacco-processing factory in Brooklyn. They moved to Baltimore in 1866 or 1867, before returning to Hannibal in 1871, where John built a career as a successful banker and businessman until his death in 1899. When Life on the Mississippi was published, Clemens sent a copy to the Garths, and when Huckleberry Finn was published, he had a copy of that book sent to them as well. When Clemens visited Hannibal in 1882 he stayed with the Garths at "Woodside", their 600-acre estate, and in 1902 when he visited Hannibal again, he visited Helen Garth and her daughter, and they took him by carriage to Mt. Olivet Cemetery to visit the graves of his family, as well as John Garth's. Late in life, speaking of long-time friends, Clemens said: "Only those of whom one has really loved mean anything all. Of my playmates I recall John Briggs, John Garth, and Laura Hawkins---just those three; the rest I buried long ago, and memory cannot even find their graves."-Mark Twain: Some Chapters from an Extraordinary Life, by Albert Bigelow Paine, Thirteenth Paper, Harper's Magazine, vol. 125 (1912), p. 930. For Garth see, Autobiography of Mark Twain, (2010), edited by Harriet Elinor Smith, Volume I, p. 401, and longer note, p. 613.

Clemens writes: "Dear John: I shall be in France during August & half of September [in the event, he didn't leave for Europe until the summer of 1891], but even if I were at home it would probably be next to impossible for me to make up my mind to prepare & deliver an address. I avoid all such efforts of late years…I have hung around the platform for twenty-four years now, & it is high time for me to leave it & take to the chimney corner & stay there. And that is what I have contracted with myself to do. Mr. Stephens's invitation is a compliment which I prize, & I sincerely thank him for it,...& your own invitation is another compliment which gratifies me, as showing that our friendship has stood the strain of fifty years without impairment…Sincerely Your friend S. L. Clemens." With a two-line P. S. signed with initials: "I have been away from home, or this letter would have been written sooner. SLC." Helen Kercheval Garth has penned a five-line MS note to Albert Bigelow Paine on the verso of page two: "Dear Mr. Payne [sic]. I came across this letter most unexpectedly this morning. It was written to my husband. Keep it & do not take the time or trouble to acknowledge it=I know what a busy man you are. Sincerely, H. E. G." Paine has written in pencil: "To John Garth. Given me by Mrs. Garth. A. B. P." For further information about the Garths and their long relationship with Clemens see, "Garth Woodside Mansion" online. Folded for mailing, there are a couple of short, insignificant, tears, and a small hole in blank portion. In morocco backed cloth folding case, with inner chemise.