Individuals >> English, Thomas Dunn (1819-1902)

Playwright, Editor, Politician, Journalist, Poet, Lawyer.

Born into an old Quaker family near Philadelphia, Thomas Dunn English attended schools in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. He took his degree at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School where he completed a thesis on phrenology and gained his M.D. in 1839. English continued with his education and earned a law degree in 1842 before starting his literary career.

English edited the short-lived Aurora and the Aristidean, A Magazine of Reviews, Politics and Light Literature. At the latter publication he worked with Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman. He first met Poe while writing pieces for Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine and their relationship was contentious. After Poe satirized English in “The Literati,” which appeared in Godey’s Magazine in 1846, it became adversarial. English struck back in the pages of the Evening Mirror by charging Poe with forgery. Poe responded with a successful, though publicly unpopular, lawsuit. Charles Hemstreet mentions that much of the furniture in Poe’s New York home was purchased with the money won in the suit against English (163-4).

Emerging from the fracas with Poe in 1848, English undertook the publication of a weekly satirical sheet, John Donkey, which skewered Poe, Greeley, and others in the literary world. Unfortunately for English, those figures reacted with a flurry of lawsuits and the paper did not survive. Though English was identified in Charles Pfaff’s obituary as one of the “Knights of the Round Table” at Pfaff’s, he denied his association with the group ("In and about the City" 2). English did, however, move in some of the same literary and theatrical circles as Whitman, Willis, Brougham, Keene, and the major players of the day-- Sothern, Wallack, and Booth (English "That Club" 202).

Experienced in other fields besides journalism, English was once appointed weigher of the port of New York and he also practiced law in Virginia in the early 1850s. Venturing into the political arena, he was elected to the New Jersey legislature where he served from 1863-64, a stint which inspired him to try to resurrect a political magazine The Old Guard. He also later edited the Newark Sunday Call, but remained interested in politics and secured a Democratic Congressional seat in 1890.

A poet as well as a satirist and politician, English published the anti-capital punishment piece “The Gallows-Goers,” which was widely circulated. His “Ben Bolt” appeared in the September 2, 1843 edition of the New Mirror, a publication edited by G.P. Morris and Pfaff’s frequenter N.P. Willis. The poem proved popular with composers as well as readers, inspiring at least twenty-six musical versions.

English died at his home in Newark in 1902, nearly blind from his literary exertions. He was survived by his four children who took it upon themselves to perpetuate his legacy. His daughter Alice edited a collection of his poems The Select Poems of Dr. Thomas Dunn English (1894) while his daughter Florence English Noll edited his Fairy Stories and Wonder Tales (1897), and his son-in-law Arthur H. Noll collected English’s scattered periodical pieces and published them in 1904. Before he died, English himself published American Ballads (1880) and The Boy’s Book of Battle Lyrics (1885). He also penned over twenty plays including The Mormons, or Life at Salt Lake, which was produced at Burton’s Theatre in 1858.

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References & Biographical Resources

English, Thomas Dunn. "That Club at Pfaaf's [sic]." The Literary World. 12 Jun. 1886: 202. [more about this work]

English's "Letter to the Editor of the Literary World" is his attempt to disassociate himself with the Bohemians at Pfaff's. English states, "I was not a member of such an association, nor have I been connected with any social club in New York -- except, for a short time, with the Author's; nor was I ever in Pfaaf's, or Pfaff's, in my life. I am not quite sure where it was" (202).

English dissociates himself from Sothern, Clark, Butler, and Mackenzie. This letter was written as a reponse to "Our New York." [pages: 202]

Haynes, John Edward. Pseudonyms of Authors: Including Anonyms and Initialisms. New York, 1882. [more about this work]

This text identifies the following pseudonym: John Donkey (50). [pages: 50]

Hemstreet, Charles. Literary New York: Its Landmarks and Associations. New York: G.P. Putnam, 1903. [more about this work]

He is described as one of the subjects of Poe's harsh literary criticisms that were published in Godey's Lady's Book. English, "one of the criticized, believing himself ill-treated and his writings unjustly abused, sought vindication. His answer entirely overlooked the libel laws and he was promptly sued for damages by Poe" (161-2). English was twenty-four at the time of this incident.

According to Hemstreet, "a few years before, in 1843, [he] had been asked by N.P. Willis to write a poem for the New Mirror. The poem was written and sent to Willis with the suggestion that he either print it or tear it up as he thought best. Willis printed it, and though the writer became known as a poet, author, physician, lawyer, and statesman, the best known of his achievements were these verses of Ben Bolt (162).

Hemstreet mentions that much of the furniture that was in Poe's rooms in Poe's home in New York was purchased with the money won in the suit against English (163-4). [pages: 161-162, 163-164]

"In and about the City: Death of Charles I. Pfaff. Something about the Proprietor of the Once Famous "Bohemia."." New York Times. 26 Apr. 1890: 2. [more about this work]

The obituary identifies him as one of the "Knights of the Round Table" of the "lions of Bohemia." [pages: 2]

"Literary Notes." New York Saturday Press. 9 Jul. 1859: 3. [more about this work]

Lukens, Henry Clay. "American Literary Comedians." Harper's New Monthly Magazine. Apr. 1890: 783-797. [more about this work]

[pages: 793]

Parry, Albert. Garrets and Pretenders: A History of Bohemianism in America. New York: Covici, Friede, 1933. [more about this work]

English and Briggs were mentioned by Stoddard as Poe's Bohemian friends in "one of the first references, however indirect, to Poe as a Bohemian by any of his contemporaries" (3).

English, described by Parry as "the ancient author of 'Ben Bolt,' the song prominently figuring in Trilby" was celebrated in 1894 and 1895 when the theatrical version "bogus Bohemian" serial from Harper's was a hit. Evidently, he "was discovered by alert reporters to be in the slumbers of New Jersey. He was brought to New York and feted and toasted amid great gatherings" (105). [pages: 3,105]

Schreiber, Carl F. "Thomas Dunn English." Dictionary of American Biography. Base Set. American Council of Learned Societies, 1928-1936. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale, 2006. http://www.galenet.com/servlet/BioRC. [more about this work]

The biography discusses English's ongoing disputes with Poe as well as his journalistic and political careers.

Stylus. "Our New York Letter." The Literary World: A Monthly Review of Current Literature. 20 Feb. 1886: 64-65. [more about this work]

Mentioned in reference to the Bohemian Club, which may be a post-Pfaff's group of journalists, even though they are described here as frequenting "Pfaaf's" [sic]. See Thomas Dunn English's "That Club at Pfaaf's [sic]." [pages: 64]

Wilson, James Grant and John Fiske, eds. Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Volume II, Crane-Grimshaw. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1888. [more about this work]

From 1852 to 1857, English lived in Virginia, which would become the inspiration for "Long Grazier" and other poems describing that region. [pages: 358, 359]

Winter, William. Old Friends; Being Literary Recollections of Other Days. New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1909. 407 p. [more about this work]

When discussing "The Literati" identified by Poe and the ties and animosties that existed among them, Winter recalls the days when English was living and writing. Winter also remembers having seen him during those days (296). [pages: 296]

"[Notices]." New York Saturday Press. 23 Apr. 1859: 2. [more about this work]