218
A New Orleans Belle
doesn t do justice to her. She sang several
songs at the piano, brilliantly, her husband
accompanying her. Both of them were very
musical. Harris was a Baltimorean by birth,
a cotton-broken
by business, a
man of about
forty, with
blackish curl-
ing hair, a
moustache and
a shaven face,
the last marked
and wrinked.
He might have
been mistaken
for a musician
or an actor.
He was very
enthusiastic and
demonstrative in
[photograph]
Mrs Lizzie Harris.
[Gunn s diary continued]
manner, so
much so as
to get snub-
bed by his
wife, in
whom I de-
tected sundry
indications of
marital au-
thority. Both
were very
well-bred
persons with
the exception
of their in-
evitable ten-
dency to talk
abuse of Yankees and bore you about the insti-
tuitions and superiority of the South. My being
an Englishman put them at ease, and I didn t
protrude, though I didn t disaow my uncondi-
tional Tribune sentiments. Mrs Harris was a
New Orleans belle, a Creole and native of the
[unclear word]. She had known Gen. Butler very well| Page |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Twenty-One: page two hundred and thirty-six |
| Description: | Describes a visit to Harris and his wife in New Orleans. |
| Date: | 1863-02-10 |
| Subject: | Butler, Benjamin F.; Civil War; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Harris, Lizzie; Harris, T. Decatur; Marriage; Women |
| Coverage (City/State): | New Orleans, [Louisiana] |
| Scan Date: | 2010-11-18 |
| Volume |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Twenty-One |
| Description: | Includes Gunn's descriptions of his experiences as a war correspondent for ""The New York Tribune"" at New Orleans, Louisiana, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana; boarding house living; a visit to the Rawlings family; a fight with Mr. Blankman at his boarding house; his journey on the North Star with the Banks expedition; the re-occupation of Baton Rouge by Union forces; a visit to a sugar plantation in Louisiana; and Fanny Fern's daughter Grace Thomson's death. |
| Subject: | African Americans; Boardinghouses; Bohemians; Civil War; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Journalism; Military; Publishers and publishing; Transportation; Travel; Women |
| Coverage (City/State): | New York, New York; New Orleans, Louisiana; Baton Rouge, Louisiana |
| Note: | Thomas Butler Gunn was born February 15, 1826, in Banbury, England, and came to New York in 1849. During the Civil War he worked as a correspondent for the New York Tribune and the New York Evening Post. He returned to England in 1863, and died in Birmingham in April 1903. The collection includes twenty-one volumes of his diaries, including newspaper clippings, letters, photographs, sketches, and various other items inserted by Gunn. Diary entries date from July 7, 1849, to April 7, 1863, and include his experiences with the New York publishing and literary world, his descriptions of boarding houses, his travels throughout the United States, and his experiences traveling with the Federal army as a Civil War correspondent. |
| Publisher: | Missouri History Museum |
| Rights: | Copyright 2010 Missouri History Museum. |
| Source: | Page images, transcriptions, and metadata of the Thomas Butler Gunn diaries have been provided by the Missouri History Museum. |
