NOTES

CHAPTER ONE / MY NEW FAMILY

1. Some brief reminiscences about Laurent Clerc in his old age were published in the periodical Silent World (Anon., 1871a). Also see Fox (1935, 3 [5]), p. 9; Hotchkiss (1913); F. Clerc (1885).

2. In the late 1860s, Samuel Howe, director of the Perkins School for the Blind, sparked a heated controversy by urging that sign language be prohibited in schools for the deaf. See Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1866, 1867), Howe (1866), Hubbard (1867), Sanborn (1867).

3. Clerc presented this defense of diversity in an address written for delivery on the occasion of a public examination of the pupils of the American Asylum for the Deaf, which he founded with Thomas Gallaudet in 1817 (Clerc, 1818b, pp. 11-12).

4. Clerc wrote an autobiographical sketch which appeared in Henry Barnard’s memorial tribute to Thomas Gallaudet (Clerc, 1852).

5. Louis Laurent Marie Clerc, b. La Balme, Dec. 26, 1785. Mother: Marie Françoise Clerc (née Marie Elizabeth Candy), d. Feb. 2, 1825 (Clerc [1852] gives May 1818). Father: Joseph François Clerc, b. 1747, d. La Balme, Apr. 4, 1816. Mayor of La Balme, 1780-1814. Paternal uncle and godfather: Laurent Clerc, businessman in Lyon, m. Louise Monet, Apr. 3, 1794, d. Jan. 22, 1827. Brother: François Clerc, businessman in Lyon. Two sisters. I am deeply indebted to the mayor of La-Balme-Les-Grottes, Pierre Montagnon, for the warm reception he accorded me, for a tour of Clerc’s home, recently purchased by the village, and for assistance in searching village records.

6. So states Clerc (1852), but Sicard was in hiding in the Paris suburbs to avoid deportation; see later. L.J.F. Alhoy (1755-1826) was the administrator in his absence, Sept. 1797-Nov. 1799. In the same autobiographical sketch, Clerc states that he entered the school for the deaf at the age of “about 12, that is, in 1797,” but school records reported by Karakostas (1981) show he was admitted 1 fructidor an 6 (Aug. 18, 1798).

7. See reminiscences of Jean Massieu by Sicard (1800), Clerc (1849); Itard (1821d), 1842 edition; and Berthier (1873). Esquiros (1847) gives Massieu’s name sign.

8. A history of the school building appears in Denis (1896), Chassé (1974), Bernard (1961), and, to a lesser degree, Valette (1867).

9. On Feb. 13, 1794, the National Convention ordered its committees on Alienation and Public Aid to place the deaf in the Seminary of Saint Magloire; the committee ordered the transfer on Mar. 5 and the move took place Apr. 1.

10. Bébian (1817) lists the staff and duties under Sicard’s directorship.

11. Peet (1852), Head (1855), Gallaudet (1870), Valette (1867), Du Camp (1877) give some details of the daily schedule. Also see Institution Impériale (1805) and La Rochefoucauld-Liancourt, 1792, cited in Weiner (1982), for contemporary accounts of daily life in the early period.

12. Peet (1852b), pp. 91-93; Karakostas (1981), pp. 128-144.

13. Appears in De Gérando (1827), v. 1, pp. 587-592.

14. Desloges (1779) pp. 13-14.

15. This account is based on Morel’s biography (1850b). Apparently the same man is the subject of an anecdote related by Clerc and reported in Chamberlain (1857), p. 69.

16. On the early curriculum see Paulmier (1821).

17. White bread and soup accounted for a third of the food budget in 1810; meat, one-fourth; wine, one-fifth; vegetables, one-sixth. No milk. See Bernard (1980b).

18. Woodbridge (1830), p. 335.

19. Mosaics came to France as a result of Napoleon’s Italian campaign, and the ministry created the mosaic shop at the school, for ten deaf pupils to learn the craft, in 1801.

20. The Journal des Savants and the Journal d’Agriculture according to a report by Prieur (reprinted in Bloch and Tuetey, 1911).

21. I am deeply indebted to M. René Bernard for giving me access to his unpublished study of life in the National Institution for Deaf-Mutes at the start of the nineteenth century (Bernard, 1980c). These vignettes come from that source; the pupils were Clerc’s contemporaries but not in the same class. Admissions from 1790 to 1800 are listed in Karakostas (1981).

22. Pain (1828). Clerc (1848) describes a visit to the Refuge.

23. I have used the term “deaf-mute” consistent with the practice during Clerc’s lifetime, although it has since fallen into disfavor for reasons examined in this book. More on the abbé Margaron: Karakostas (1981), pp. 120-122.

CHAPTER 2 / THE SHEPHERD AND THE SYMBOL

1. Bébian (1817) states, however, that the pupils never used manual French among themselves, preferring French Sign Language.

2. The visit is described in Institution Impériale (1805) and in Villenave (1893), pp. 335-336.

3. Bouteiller (1956) gives the history of the society. Also see Copans and Jamin (1978).

4. Autobiography of Jean Massieu. Lebouvier Desmortiers (1800) states (p. 252 of the 1829 edition): “Massieu prepared the sketch of his childhood to fulfill a request of Citizen Jauffret who had asked for it. This part was written 30 messidor an 6 [July 18, 1798]. It is all the more accurate as Massieu, in addressing Jauffret, was addressing one of his old friends. This deaf-mute was asked at a public meeting to name the persons most dear to him. He wrote on the blackboard in front of five hundred people, ‘My true teacher, Abbé Sicard, the First Consul, and my friend Jauffret.’” The author goes on to say that this history was read at a public meeting 30 pluviôse last (? Feb. 19, 1800) and inspired a lady to send Massieu a letter with questions. The history and the letter were read at a second meeting 5 germinal (? Mar. 26, 1800) and Massieu responded on the spot to questions. A record of the two meetings is to appear, he states, in the first volume of the Mémoires de la Société des Observateurs de l’Homme. Lebouvier Desmortiers then presents a summary from memory.

Since Jauffret was the permanent secretary of the Society of Observers of Man, it is not surprising that the autobiography was scheduled to appear in that society’s memoirs. These were never published in their entirety, although selections appear in Hervé (1911) and Copans and Jamin (1978). Jauffret published the history but not the questions and answers anonymously (with the assistance of P.A.M. Migier): La Corbeille des fleurs et le panier de fruits. La Corbeille des fleurs is often given as a citation in later reprintings of the history; however, it does not appear there but is in the second volume, Le Panier de fruits (pp. 72-86 of the second ed., 1819, Geneva-Paris [n.p.]).

The document appears next in quotation in Sicard (1808b), appendix, where it is joined by questions and answers, probably the ones to which Lebouvier Desmortiers referred, and the whole is attributed to “Madame V. C.” Clerc (1849) identifies her as Mme. Victoria Clo, although the name “Cellier” appears at the end of a reprinting by Sicard (1851). The version in the present work, including both the history and the questions and answers, is a translation of the appendix to Sicard (1808b). Occasional deletions from the earlier Jauffret version (1806) have been reinserted in place. The various publications of this autobiography are as follows: (1) 1806-1807, Jauffret, La Corbeille de fleurs et le panier de fruits. (2) 1808b, Sicard, Théorie des signes, pp. 625-647. (3) 1819, Jauffret, Le Panier de fruits, second ed., pp. 72-86. (4) 1821a, Akerly (transl.), Elementary exercises, pp. 329-342. (5) 1826, Bébian, Journal d’Instruction, pp. 333-335. (6) 1829, Rodenbach. (7) 1834, Richardin. (8) 1835, Rodenbach. (9) 1849, Clerc (transl.). (10) 1851, Sicard, Album d’un sourd-muet, 16 pp. (11) 1873, Berthier, L’Abbé Sicard, pp. 146-156. (12) 1976, Lane (transl.), Wild Boy of Aveyron, pp. 101-102 (abridged).

About a decade before his death, Massieu wrote another autobiography, which is excerpted in Berthier (1873), who gives as his source “Le Nord, 1838, published in that locale,” referring to Lille, where Massieu lived and directed a school. Leglay (1838), reporting on the graduation ceremonies at Massieu’s school on Aug. 29, 1838, states that Massieu read fragments of his autobiography at the graduation. Apparently, these were published in an issue of the Revue du Nord on or near that date and served as Berthier’s source. A diligent search in Lille, at the municipal library, the departmental archives, and the Institut départemental de Réhabilitation de la Parole et de l’Audition (successor to Massieu’s school), failed to unearth the manuscript autobiography or the relevant issue of the Revue du Nord. The national library does not have this newspaper and other municipal libraries in the département du Nord lack the relevant issue. I am pleased to acknowledge the assistance of Franklin Philip in this search. See chapter 9 for more on Massieu’s life in Lille.

5. See Fay (1886).

6. Reminiscences of Massieu appear in Sicard (1800), Itard (1821d), consult second edition, Clerc (1849), Berthier (1873).

7. Berthier (1873), p. 145.

8. Sicard (1800), p. x of the 1803 ed. In 1787, a year after opening his school and before Massieu was brought to his attention, Sicard wrote, “There is nothing more discouraging than the air of stupidity and confusion of these unfortunate beings whose education can begin only with tangible signs and literal representations” (p. 29).

9. Sicard (1808), p. 8. Also see Bernard (1980c), sec. VIII.

10. Sicard’s addresses, the question asked of Massieu, and his replies appear in Sicard (1795). Massieu was a teacher in a third sense: he wrote a basic French vocabulary list (Massieu, 1808) that Sicard incorporated in his classes and books, and that was thus a guide for vocabularies in schools in other lands. He also wrote a grammar, which, incomplete, was never published.

11. Report of the committee July 21, 1791 (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 738).

12. Massieu was named head teaching assistant on Apr. 4, 1790; confirmed by the Constituent Assembly July 21, 1791, National Convention Jan. 7, 1795, and the Ministry of the Interior Sept. 22, 1800.

13. Préseau (1872) says Sicard took the “minor oath” on Aug. 10, 1792, swearing allegiance to “Liberty and Equality,” and even contributed 200 livres to the revolutionary tribunal. Weiner (1982) says that Valentin Haüy, director of the School for the Blind, probably denounced him to the commune.

14. Among them was an instructor from his school, Abbé Laurent, according to Berthier (1838b), p. 181, but Massieu’s memoirs (cited in Berthier, 1873, p. 169) state that the abbé Laborde, “instituteur adjoint des sourdmuets,” was a victim of Sept. 2, 1792. Sicard also encountered a surveillantfrom the school, a M. Labranche (Berthier, 1838b, p. 182).

15. Sicard (1797). The original is quoted in Karakostas (1981), p. 195, from the Archives Parlementaires, 31 août 1792, p. 150.

16. Sicard (1797), p. 130.

17. On Sicard’s ordeal (1797) also see Tissot (1834); Hué (n.d.); Michaud (1858); Berthier (1838c); Tuetey (1890), v. 5, nos. 182, 183, 213, 214, 1060.

18. Landes (1876), p. 8, reprints a letter from Sicard praising Monnot.

19. Sicard was interrogated by the Revolutionary Surveillance and Safety Committee of the Arsenal Section (the school was at that time in the Celestine monastery on the Right Bank, next to the Armory) in September 1793 (Karakostas, 1981). See Tuetey (1890), v. 10, nos. 528, 534, 554, 555, 745, 747, 1076, 1085; v. 11, no. 165. He was apparently denounced by Valentin Haüy, instructor of the blind; their conflict arose in this way. The National Assembly had ordered the school for the deaf housed in the Celestine monastery (the order of execution was dated Aug. 24, 1790; however, Epée’s disciple the abbé Masse had given the pupils classes there beginning six months earlier, in February 1790). See Tuetey (1890) v. 3, no. 463. The blind were ordered to join the deaf on Sept. 28, 1791 (Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 458), but they were separated when the deaf moved to their present quarters on Apr. 1, 1794. See Tuetey (1890), v. 6, nos. 1556-1563. Haüy’s culpability is discussed in Karakostas (1981), pp. 75-76; Weiner (1982); l’Esprit (1917).

20. Crisis of 18 fructidor an 5 (Sept. 4, 1797).

21. Sicard’s second in command, Louis-François-Joseph Alhoy (1755-1826), took over during his absence: 18 fructidor an 5 to 18 brumaire an 8 (Sept. 4, 1797, to Nov. 9, 1799). When Sicard returned from exile, Alhoy left to become a hospital administrator.

22. Sicard (1800a).

23. Sicard (1800b).

24. Initially, a record of his public exercises (1774), expanded in 1776 and 1784. For English translations, see Arrowsmith (1819) and Epée (1776, 1784).

25. Ami des Lois, 21 brumaire an 6 (Nov. 11, 1797).

26. Bouilly (1800b), p. 7.

27. Massieu’s memoirs mention these facts. Cited in Berthier (1873), pp. 170-171.

28. Bouilly (1800b), p. 8. Bouilly sent a letter to the editor of the Courrier des spectacles (22 frimaire an 7 [Dec. 12, 1798]) to announce his new play. The notice ends: “May the public acclaim my new efforts! May they, above all, demonstrating the great importance of the institution founded by the abbé de l’Epée, incite respect and gratitude for those whom this great man has chosen as the heirs to his genius” (cited in Fournier des Ormes, 1851, p. 232).

29. Bouilly (1800a). First performed Dec. 14, 1799.

30. Nov. 9, 1799.

31. According to Massieu’s memoirs, cited in Berthier (1873), p. 171. See Bernard (1941), p. 164.

32. This account follows Bouilly’s description: (1835), p. 183ff.

33. Bouilly (1800a), p. 81.

34. Bouilly (1835) mentions Collin d’Harleville.

35. Bouilly (1800b), p. 10. Also in Massieu’s memoirs, cited in Berthier (1873), p. 171.

36. 22 nivôse an 8 (Jan. 12, 1800), Berthier (1852a), p. 142.

37. Described in Bouilly (1800b). It took place on 25 nivôse an 8 (Jan. 15, 1800). Two days earlier, Sicard wrote to Bouilly: “Enjoy your triumph, my dear colleague; I am back on the job since yesterday. Your modesty prevents you from claiming your proper share of credit for this victory. It is your play, acclaimed so beautiful, so moving, so absorbing, that put me back in the public eye” (Bouilly, 1800b, p. iii). Bernard (1941, p. 169) points out that (according to Massieu’s memoirs, excerpted in Berthier, 1873) Sicard told Massieu he was “becoming free again since the suppression of the Directory.” The coup d’état occurred 18 brumaire an 8 (Nov. 9, 1799) and Sicard’s interview with Massieu and the legislator who would intervene in his behalf was sometime later that month. But the first showing of Bouilly’s play was Dec. 14, 1799, so the play, Bernard argues, could not be responsible for freeing Sicard. However, Sicard’s letter to Bouilly (above) and Napoleon’s expression of thanks to the playwright for giving him the occasion to free Sicard (Bouilly, 1835, p. 213) suggest that the coup d’état merely allowed Sicard to move more freely out of his hiding place in the Faubourg Saint-Marceau and Bouilly’s play led to his definitive reinstatement as the head of the Paris school.

38. Some description appears in biographies of Sicard by Berthier (1873) and Hué (n.d.); the latter has a sketch.

39. Anon. (1822a).

40. Bouilly (1835), p. 203.

41. Bouilly (1835), p. 213.

CHAPTER 3 / HIGH THEATER

1. Sept. 20, 1742, according to most biographers, but Vaïsse (1844g) says Sept. 28. He was born in Fousseret.

2. Sicard took vows in 1765.

3. Cornié (1903).

4. Berthier (1873) states that the school was created in 1782, but Cornié’s exhaustive study (1903) of the school states that courses began Feb. 20, 1786; by the end of that year there were 22 pupils.

5. Sicard (1787a, b, 1789a, 1789b, 1790).

6. “You know very well that in the last two years you haven’t given thirty lessons to the pupils,” Saint-Sernin wrote to Sicard in 1790. “Massieu should be a daily reminder of what I have done and am capable of doing” (cited in Cornié, 1903, p. 34). For a biographical sketch of Saint-Sernin, see Valade-Gabel (1844). In the program for the public exercises at the Museum on Sept. 12 and 15, 1789, Sicard states that Saint-Sernin is charged with the basic curriculum, including grammar, arithmetic, astronomy, geometry, geography, and metaphysics (!), while he, Sicard, was responsible for religious instruction (Sicard, 1789b). During this period, Sicard was also a corresponding member of the Paris and Toulouse academies and of the Royal Literary Society of Bayeux.

7. Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets de Paris (1836).

8. Peet (1859a), p. 321.

9. Denis (1895a) describes the role of the abbé Masse.

10. Bloch and Tuetey (1911), p. 738, state that the “ancien garde des Sceaux” was a member of the commission to choose Epée’s successor, and Valade-Gabel (1844) says that Champion de Cicé became Garde des Sceaux. The former authors give Apr. 6, 1790, as the date on which the commission handed down its selection, but Weiner (1982) and Denis (1895a) state that Sicard was installed as headmaster on Apr. 1, 1790.

11. See Tuetey (1890), v. 3, nos. 459, 464-470. Baker (1842), p. 388, and Vaïsse (1844a) state that “Father Perrenet, an Augustine,” was a candidate and Weiner (1982) also gives his name. Tuetey (1890), v. 3, nos. 467, 468, gives Pernay, Salvant, and Sicard. Re: Salvan, see Montaigne (1829), p. 7, 1847 ed.

12. Blanchet (1850), Denis (1895a), and Bloch and Tuetey (1911) give Nov. 21, 1778, as the date. Morel (1846), p. 27, gives Jan. 21, 1778. Baker (1842), p. 388, gives amounts of subsidy. Denis (1895a), p. 246, doubts that the school ever received any money from the king and finds evidence only for some meager subsidies from several bishops. Denis (1895a), p. 8, gives the wording of the king’s orders. See Anon. (1785), Amclot (1778).

13. Anon. (1790), p. 4. Cited in Weiner (1982).

14. Chronology: Mar. 25, 1785—the king’s council assigns the vacant Celestine monastery as a permanent home for Epée’s school (Anon., 1785; Weiner, 1982, p. 9). Epée dies Dec. 23, 1789. Feb. 27, 1790—the Department of Public Instruction informs the Garde des Sceaux that the abbé Masse has opened a class with Epée’s pupils in the Celestine monastery (Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 463). Feb. 18, 1790—representatives of the Paris Commune appear before the National Assembly with a request for funds (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 113, fn. 1; Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 462). Apr. 6, 1790—Sicard nominated director (Karakostas, 1981). May 24, 1790—the National Assembly sends to its Committee on Mendicity a petition from Sicard (Morel, 1846, p. 27). Aug. 19, 1790—Sicard appears before the Committee on Mendicity with four pupils. The Committee suggests Sicard appear before the National Assembly to seek a decree providing funds (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 114). Aug. 24, 1790—Sicard and pupils appear before National Assembly (Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 480), which decrees that the request is referred to the Committee on Mendicity (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 116, fn. 2; Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 481; Blanchet, 1850, p. 237). Aug. 26, 1790—M. Prieur makes an initial report (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 120). Sept. 10, 1790—M. Prieur makes a further report (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 129). Oct. 22, 1790—the committee urges the city of Paris to take steps to rehabilitate the Celestine monastery (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 153). Nov. 1, 1790—Sicard appears before the committee to urge a decree to nationalize the school (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 162). Nov. 8, 1790—the committee repeats its exhortation of the city (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 176; Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 486). Nov. 17, 1790—the committee learns that the city has matched its provisional contribution of 1, 200 francs (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 188). Jan. 27, 1791—Sicard appears a second time before the National Assembly (Weiner, 1982, p. 14). Mar. 21, 1791; Apr. 27, 1791; May 2, 1791; May 19, 1791—further discussions in committee. July 21, 1791—in the name of the Committee on Mendicity and several others, the Prieur report is presented to the National Assembly and voted into law. Sicard addresses the Assembly (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, pp. 738-757; Tuetey, 1890, v. 3, no. 490). Sept. 28, 1791—the National Assembly confirms its decree of July 21, 1791, and adds details with respect to the blind, who are to join the deaf at the Celestine monastery (Bloch and Tuetey, 1911, p. 325; Blanchet, 1850, p. 240). Oct. 1, 1791—Legislative Assembly convenes.

15. Further dates in the legislative history of the school: May 12 and 14, 1793, a decree by the Convention nationalizes the school at Bordeaux, provides twenty-four scholarships, envisions that in Paris as a normal school, and plans the creation of six schools in all to serve an estimated 4,000 deaf (Maignet, 1793). Maignet also argues that the Celestine monastery is an unsuitable home for the Paris school; next to the arsenal, it is frequented by workers manufacturing arms. They move about in the building and their presence and materials outside prevent promenades for the deaf. He suggests instead the Saint Magloire monastery, a move which is authorized Feb. 13, 1794, and implemented Apr. 1, 1794. A decree of Jan. 5, 1795, increases scholarships to sixty each in Paris and Bordeaux, and makes children nine to sixteen eligible for five years’ schooling (Alhoy, 1795).

16. Tuetey (1890), v. 5, no. 2339, on poor conditions at Celestine monastery.

17. Hermiopolis (1822), p. 5.

18. Decreed Feb. 13, 1794, by the National Convention. Order of execution Mar. 5. The move actually took place Apr. 1, 1794.

19. Institution Impériale des Sourds-Muets (1805).

20. Institution Impériale des Sourds-Muets (1806).

21. Hué (n.d.). After Sicard’s death, King Charles X and the dauphin attended the exercises in 1828; Prince Louis Napoleon, President of the Republic, came in 1849 and Emperor Napoleon III in 1866 (Chassé, 1974).

22. Massieu (1815).

23. The size of the crowd is mentioned in Anon., “An account of the institution in Paris for the education of the deaf and dumb,” reprinted in Mann (1836). Other articles describing these demonstrations are: Berthier (1838a, 1873), Frank (1804), Institution Impériale (1805, 1806), de Jouy (1813), Kotzebue (1805), Meramia (1815), Meyer (1798, 1802), Michaud (1858), Pain (1828), Paulmier (1831), Weiner (1982).

24. See the Journal de Paris, Feb. 22, 1806, cited in Bernard (1952).

25. Lyman (1814), pp. 91-93. Sicard’s pupils, no less than his audiences, were subjected to his metaphysical bombast and grammatical theories. The abbé de l’Epée had chastised him a decade earlier: “You struggle and make your pupils struggle needlessly, trying to teach them a science that we never even teach our disciples.… By obliging your pupils to acquire at the outset what they should acquire through long use of language, you run the risk of alienating them” (letter reprinted in Berthier, 1873, p. 211). Sicard did not agree; he thought that, chalk in hand, he was endowing the deaf with language “as a mother teaches her hearing child” (Sicard, 1800, p. 9 of the 1803 edition).

26. In 1793 the existing academies of France were suppressed. In 1795, the Institut national des sciences et des arts was established, comprising three classes: sciences physiques et mathématiques; sciences morales et politiques; and littérature et beaux-arts. In 1803 the organization was modified and the Institut divided into four classes: sciences physiques et mathématiques; langue et littérature françaises; histoire et littérature anciennes; and beauxarts. In 1816 the older designation of “Académie” was revived, with four divisions: Académie française; Académie des inscriptions et belles lettres; Académie des sciences; Académie des beaux-arts. The fifth academy, Académie des sciences morales et politiques, was added in 1832. The Institut has successively had the names: Institut national des sciences et arts (1795); Institut national de France (1803); Institut de France (1806); Institut impérial de France (1811); Institut Royal de France (1814) (Library of Congress, National Union Catalogue, pre-1956 Imprints).

The institute had great prestige and influence under Napoleon, a member of the first class, who said he was a follower not of Christ but of the Institut (cited in Copans, 1978). The second class was the stronghold of the ideologists, the materialist psychological school founded by Condillac, and it was they who proposed the contest that De Gérando won. When Napoleon became emperor (1804), he had little sympathy for the revolutionary liberalism that the ideologues represented. Since Condillac’s philosophy inspired and guided the Société des Observateurs de l’Homme, it is not surprising that, when the society requested permission to add “impérial” to its name, Napoleon refused and it atrophied and died.

27. Michaud (1858), p. 287.

28. Bigot de Préameneu (1822).

29. The school was founded and Sicard appointed Oct. 30, 1794 (9 brumaire an 3). See Préseau (1812), Hué (n.d).

30. Nov. 9, 1804 (Weiner, 1982, p. 32). Sicard had a friend from the museum in Bordeaux, André Daniel Laffon de Ladébat (1746-1829), Protestant economist and businessman, who was a high civil servant in the Ministry of the Interior. He also had the trust of the minister himself, Jean-Antoine Chaptal (1756-1832); under the Consulate the former helped rescue him from prison during the Terror. Both probably aided his assignment to the administrative board of the Paris Asylum. (See Weiner, 1982.)

31. 1805-1822, according to Denis (1896), p. 69.

32. 1816. Michaud (1858), p. 287.

33. See Paulmier (1821a, 1834b) and Anon. (1815b) for a description of the celebration.

34. Leroy (1823) gave an oration on Sicard’s grave in behalf of the society; this was planned as an annual event.

35. Michaud (1858).

36. 1814. Berthier (1838a), p. 187; Anon. (1822a), p. 20.

37. 1814. Michaud (1858), p. 287; Anon. (1822a), p. 20.

38. In 1818. Michaud (1858), p. 287.

39. According to Weiner (1982), p. 37. Michaud (1858), p. 287, spells it Wasa and says the Queen of Sweden awarded it in 1815 or 1816. Berthier (1838a) also spells it Wasa.

40. June 1814. Anon. (1822a), p. 21, says the allied princes attended one of Sicard’s public exercises. Francis I of Austria did visit on May 11, 1815. Michaud (1858), p. 287, says Alexander gave Sicard the Order of Sainte-Anne and does not mention Saint Vladimir. Sicard was in favor with the Russian court. The empress Maria Feodorovna, mother of Czar Alexander I, founded a little school for the deaf near St. Petersburg which she placed under the direction of a Pole who had studied Epée’s system in Vienna, probably under his disciple there, the abbé Storck. At some point, Sicard sent the empress his Theory of Signs and she sent him a gift of a ring with a stone worth 30,000 francs. Then she wrote to ask Sicard for an instructor and he sent one of his hearing students, the abbé Jauffret, in 1810. See Landes (1876); De Gérando (1827); Berthier (1873). There was talk of sending Clerc but in the end only one teacher was to go and it was assumed he had to be hearing (Sicard, 1808).

41. Sicard did, however, take the “minor oath” on Aug. 10, 1792 (Préseau, 1872), and he made a personal contribution of 200 livres to the Revolutionary Tribunal two weeks before he was arrested.

42. The exact name is: Annales réligieuses, politiques et littéraires. Michaud (1858) p. 286, and Weiner (1982) say that Sicard was arrested under the general proscription of journalists 18 fructidor an V (Sept. 4, 1797) as editor of the Annales catholiques.

43. Clerc (1852), p. 107.

44. Berthier (1838a), p. 187.

45. Berthier (1873); Dubois (1894), p. 236.

46. Clerc (1815), Paulmier (1834a), p. 5.

47. Mar. 20, 1815.

48. Berthier (1838a), p. 187, says that Sicard’s decline into senility began when he was sixty, in 1802!

49. Berthier (1838a), p. 187. Anon. (1822), p. 21.

50. Anon. (1822a). Berthier (1838a), p. 187, states that Napoleon once had Sicard released from debtor’s prison and paid his creditors.

51. Gard reported that Saint-Sernin used the sign language of the deaf to communicate with his pupils and convey the meanings of these sentences. Sicard, however, never used French Sign Language, always chalk, or fingerspelling, or occasionally Epée’s methodical signs. See Berthier (1873), p. 12; also Berthier (1838a).

52. Hué (n.d.).

53. The most useful Sicard biographies are: Anon. (1822), Berthier (1873), Hué (n.d.), Michaud (1858), Weiner (1982).

CHAPTER 4 / A TALE BASED ON FACT

1. Bouilly offered to transpose the action elsewhere when threatened with a suit by a retainer of the Solar family but they settled on a mere change of subtitle: from Faits historiques (Historical Facts) to Comédie historique (Historical Play). The correspondence is described in Fournier des Ormes (1851). For the text of Bouilly’s play, see Bouilly (1800). It had 26 performances from 1799 to 1840 at the Comédie-Française, then moved to the Odéon. Berthier and Bélanger counseled actors for performances later in the nineteenth century. See Bernard (1941).

2. Etcheverry (1876b).

3. The boy was actually brought first to Cuvilly and given to a guardian while inquiries were made. After a month, the lieutenant-general of police, on the recommendation of the noble family of Cuvilly, Herault de Séchelles, had the boy brought to Bicětre. Of many accounts of the Solar story, the most authoritative and detailed is Berthier (1852a).

4. June 13, 1775.

5. Cited in Fournier des Ormes (1851), pp. 189-191. Also appears in Epée (1876).

6. M. Pavillon, prévôt de la mare chaussée de l’Ile-de-France.

7. Initially, in the late 1760s, there were only five or six pupils. Within a decade, however, there were thirty and by the year of Epée’s death, 1789, there were over sixty. When there were few pupils, classes were held on the third floor of the house (Epée’s brother occupied the second). As their numbers grew, Epée installed a chapel in the spacious rear building that doubled as a classroom. It was torn down in 1876 when the streets were widened to construct the Avenue de l’Opéra (Le Père, 1879, p. 23).

8. See E. Fournier (1877), pp. 169-171, who confirms the schedule of classes. The pensions were directed by M. Chevrot (also spelled Chevrau by some authors) for the boys and Mmes. Cornu, Trumeau, and Lefébure for the girls (Bernard, 1961, p. 30). Perrolle (1782) gives the names of sixteen of Epée’s pupils at the boys’ pension, including Solar, Didier (also spelled Deydier), Clément de la Pujade. About half the male pupils apparently could respond to sound by bone conduction. Perrolle saw Solar put his fingers in his ears when a very loud noise was made behind him. Pujade could hear bells. In 1777, the ages of the pupils ranged from six to twenty.

9. Epée (1776).

10. Condillac: Essay on the Origins of Human Knowledge (1746). Course of Study for the Prince of Parma (1775).

11. James Burnet, Lord Monboddo (1773).

12. Prince Doria-Pamphyli; Aug. 13, 1783.

13. See Berthier (1852a), p. 346.

14. Dec. 14, 1784. See Porter (1856a).

15. Joseph II (1741-1791) visited the school on May 7, 1777, and the church May 11, 1777. See Valade-Gabel (1875).

16. Joseph II visit to Epée: see Escoffon (1899), p. 110; Etcheverry (1876a), p. 15; Paganel (1853), p. 283; Arneth (1874), p. 63.

17. Berthier (1852a), p. 68; the letter is translated in Schara (1908).

18. Nov. 24, 1712. Some authors err on this date but Berthier (1852a), p. 336, reproduces the birth certificate.

19. Collège de Quatre Nations, Versailles.

20. The division was by then nearly a century old. The Jesuits were in the ascendancy in France; they persecuted the followers of this heresy, which had begun in Louvain but had spread rapidly throughout much of the French clergy. The Jesuits had the backing of Rome, which condemned Jansenism in four papal bulls (1656, 1665, 1705, and 1713), and the support of the Crown, which, concerned for national unity, ordered all bishops to require their clergy to sign the oath of Pope Alexander VII, contained in the second bull. The king made the first papal bull state law in 1664, and his order to the bishops was issued in 1666. When the Jesuits broke up the Jansenist order at Port Royal, where Pascal, Arnauld, and Nicole had walked and studied, the Jansenists took refuge in Holland and established an independent church, which still exists, with the seat of its episcopate in Utrecht.

21. Bélanger (1886) gives July 13, 1733, as the date of his admission to the bar; Arnaud (1900) gives 1731. It was Msgr. Christophe de Beaumont (1703-1781), known for his love of discipline, the severity of his moral principles, his harsh criticism of Rousseau’s Emile, and his intolerance of Jansenism, who refused to admit Epée to the priesthood.

22. Bébian (1819).

23. Bishop Jacques Bénigne Bossuet (b. 1654), nephew of the famous Jacques Bénigne Bossuet (1627-1704), bishop of Meaux, appointed Epée subdeacon of Fouges Mar. 31, 1736; deacon, Sept. 22, 1736; canon of Pougy Mar. 28, 1738; priest, Apr. 5, 1738. (Berthier, 1852a, p. 12).

24. Fauchet (1790), p. 9.

25. Tronson de Coudray was ordered deported to Guiana, along with Sicard and various journalists, in the famous instruction of 18 fructidor. Sicard, as we have seen, went into hiding in the Paris suburbs; Tronson de Coudray died in exile (Clair and Clapier, 1823).

26. The order was issued Apr. 20, 1779.

27. Decision of June 28, 1781.

28. Epée (1776), p. 98. Cited in Bébian (1819), p. 56.

29. Vaïsse (1878) explains that Father Simon Vanin, purveyor of the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine, was affiliated with the Convent of Saint-Julien des Ménétriers (rue Saint-Martin) and not with the monastery under the protection of Saint Charles, which was located in rue des Fossés Saint-Victor. Vanin’s pupils, however, lived in the latter street, as Clerc (1816d, p. 33) confirms: the twins “lived opposite the Society of the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine … [to which] the abbé de l’Epée had formerly belonged.” Father Vanin died Sept. 19, 1759, and Epée’s first public demonstration was in 1771, so he met the deaf women in the 1760s. Epée tells us that Vanin had been dead “a rather long time”; thus he began his instruction of the deaf in the late 1760s. However, Sicard (1789b), p. 18, states that Epée began “thirty years ago.” Vanin apparently began teaching the deaf in the 1740s. He also taught the distinguished pupil of Pereire, Saboureux de Fontenay, knew Pereire well, and sought his advice.

30. Epée (1776), p. 8.

31. Epée (1776), second letter. Romans 10:17; Saint Augustine continues: A man born deaf is incapable of learning to read, which would lead him to the faith (quoted in Peet, 1851d).

32. Raffon (1794). Cited in Blanchet (1850), pp. 250-253. Perhaps Epée and Sicard failed to recognize the status of French Sign Language in part because the French have always had difficulty in believing in the adequacy of any language other than their own, especially if it was not written. The philosopher and encyclopedist Denis Diderot, a contemporary of Epée, suggested that the study of the French language would reveal the universal principles of thought, since the order of words in the French sentence revealed the order of ideas in the mind (Diderot, 1751). Likewise later, Sicard, criticizing Epée’s method for its failure to teach French syntax, wrote: “What kind of sentences could a man write in a foreign language who knew only the meaning of each word without knowing its syntax, above all if he had as a native language only the language of nature, the language of the peoples of Africa, the language of the deaf and dumb. We know the sentences of the Negroes; we can judge those of the deaf and dumb, who are even closer to nature” (Sicard, 1790, pp. 15-16).

33. Condillac (1746), part I, sec. iv, ch. II. This is why Massieu was at pains in his autobiography to tell us that, before receiving Sicard’s instruction, “I saw cattle, horses, mules, pigs, dogs, cats, vegetables, houses, fields, grapevines, and after considering all these objects, I remembered them well.”

34. Condillac (1775), part I, ch. I.

35. Destutt de Tracy (1798), pp. 238-450; he later retracted this claim: (1803), p. 388 of the 1817 edition.

36. John 20:31.

37. The idea probably came originally from John Locke’s Essay on Human Understanding, first published in French in 1700, which had a profound influence on Condillac. Locke wrote: “It was necessary that man should find out some external sensible signs, whereof those invisible ideas which his thoughts are made up of, might be known to others. For this purpose nothing was so fit, either for plenty or quickness, as those articulate sounds with which so much ease and variety he found himself able to make…. Words … came to be made use of by men as the signs of their ideas; not by any natural connexion that there is between particular articulate sounds and certain ideas, for then there would be but one language amongst all men; but by a voluntary imposition whereby such a word is made arbitrarily the mark of such an idea.” See Locke (1690), book 3, ch. 2, sec. 1 (v. 2, p. 8, Dover 1959 ed.).

38. Epée (1776), part 1, ch. IV, p. 36.

39. Clerc visited France in 1820, 1835, and 1846. See Clerc (1848). Also see Valade-Gabel’s article on the notebooks in Bélanger (1886), pp. 24-30.

40. Epée (1784), pp. 16-17.

41. The abbé Sicard later replaced Epée’s Latin constructions with conceptual ones but they were long constructions nonetheless. Slavishly following Condillac’s precept of analysis, Sicard concluded that if a peach, for example, is the union of a color, a taste, and a texture, then the sign for a peach must contain the signs for yellow, sweet, fuzzy, and so on. Thus each French word was paired, in his system, not with a sign from French Sign Language, nor even an invented sign, but rather with a lengthy description comprising many signs and even pantomime. This is the great error of Sicard’s dictionary, which he published in his Theory of Signs. Here, for example, is how Sicard requires the expression of the word “Providence”: “Make the signs for all living things, be they vegetable or animal, receiving life and all that preserves it. Depict an immense being, occupying all space, looking down with care and concern on all living things so that none will perish through disregard. Compare this benevolent being with a mother whose heart looks after her son whom she has been forced to send far from home. Represent manually all the daily miracles of the Providence which commands the waters of the sky to moisten the earth, the sun to warm it, man to cultivate it, and which undertakes alone to make the trees fecund and the fields fertile. All of these details require only three signs that convey the high points, and they are: first, the signs of plants and animals, living; second, the Creator granting them, since they lack the essentials of life, all the daily blessings required for their survival; third, that eternal eye discovering all needs, as would a caring mother, leaving none unsatisfied” (Sicard, 1808b, pp. 217-218). Peet (1859a) contrasts Epée’s sign for “believe” (p. 292) with Sicard’s (p. 327); Puybonnieux (1846) contrasts French Sign Language HATE with Sicard’s prescription (p. 218). In French Sign Language, the concept of “Providence” is conveyed in a single sign, just as it is conveyed by one word in French: the signer holds his hands in front of him (as if pressing against a wall) and nods them twice. Ironically, it was a commonplace to view these signs as defective since they were brief, “reduced” by contrast with pantomime, and thus less pictorial. See De Gérando (1827). Yet the reduced sign is invariably easier to produce, is more regular from one person to the next, allows more rapid conversation, and evokes the associated idea more surely than the pantomimic one chosen by Sicard or Epée.

42. Epée (1784), part III.

43. Cited in Valade-Gabel (1900), p. 101.

44. Cited in Sicard (1800), p. xli, 1803 ed. See also Bébian (1819), pp. 54-56.

45. Critiques of Epée’s methods will be found in: Morel (1846), p. 83; Magnat (1896); Peet (1859a); Bébian (1827), pp. 191-207; Sicard (1790); Berthier (1840c), p. 44; (1852), p. 31.

46. See Barnard (1835), p. 389; Peet (1857a), p. 339; Williams (1893), p. 22. The contact between the oral language community and the sign language community, particularly the presence of bilingual speakers, leads to the spontaneous development of varieties of sign language between ASL and manual English (and in France between FSL and manual French). Increasingly, these varieties are called Pidgin Sign English in the United States (Woodward, 1973; Woodward and Markowicz, 1975), although in a helpful discussion of the issue Battison (1978, ch. 3) prefers the term Sign English. On the contemporary French scene, Pidgin Sign French is generally called Français Signé (Moody, 1983), which invites confusion with prescriptive signing systems invented to capture grammatical features of French, including Epée’s system of methodical signs.

47. Bernard (1961), p. 30.

48. The reference here is to the Revolution of 1789. There was a second revolution in 1830.

49. See Clerc (1851c), p. 65.

50. Other French disciples (cited in Bernard, 1961, p. 31): Salvan from Riom, Huby from Rouen, Delinière and Dumourier from Le Mans, Dubourg from Toulouse, Ferrand from Chartres, Pernet de Foncine from Epinal, and Masse from Paris. In his dictionary, Epée (1896) states that there were fourteen disciples from France or abroad who came for his lessons. He started work on a kind of dictionary of methodical signs to assist them when they returned to the cities from which they had come. It was finished in 1787 but no funds were available to print it until 1896.

51. See Bélanger (1886), p. 33, for a list.

52. Schara (1908). On May and other disciples, see Scagliotti (1823).

53. Hervás y Panduro (1795), pp. 31, 53, of the 1875 French translation.

54. Daras (1856) gives a useful chronology but seems to be in error on the founding of the Madrid School, which he dates in 1765. See De Gérando (1827), p. 213.

55. On Borg, see Piroux (1843b).

56. Sources on the growth of European schools: Valette (1867); Bélanger (1886); Pitrois (1912); Scagliotti (1823). On the professions of the French deaf in 1835, see Berthier (1852a), p. 240.

57. On the number of schools, the Association Review, 1901, p. 397, reports 196 in 1850 and 327 in 1857, virtually all in Europe and America. The American Annals of the Deaf, 1869, p. 63, reports 28 American schools for the deaf that year. Talbot (1895) states that there were 115 American teachers of the deaf in 1857, 41 percent of them deaf; McGregor (1893) gives the same percentage. Clarke (1900a) reports 187 American teachers of the deaf in 1870, the same fraction deaf themselves. Thus, in America there were about 6.7 teachers per school. With some 200 schools worldwide, these ratios yield an estimate in line with that attributed here to Clerc; some 550 teachers of the deaf in 1869.

58. Michaud (1858), p. 509: 7,000-12,000 livres. Anon. (1863b): 400 pounds sterling; Baker (1842), p. 383, says 300 livres were about 12 pounds sterling. Bazot (1819), p. 51: 10,000 francs. Berthier (1852a), p. 76: 12,000 livres, corresponding to 7,000 or 8,000 francs. DeLand (1917), p. 44: 3,000 dollars. Valette (1857), p. 21: Epée received 7,000 or 8,000 francs according to his niece, the comtesse de Courcel. H. P. Peet (1859a), p. 295, gives 14,000 livres or 2, 600 dollars.

59. The daughter of Louis XIV is buried in Saint Roch, as is the philosopher Holbach and the writer Piron. Bossuet’s funeral was held here, as was the baptism of Molière’s child. Epée is buried in the chapel named for Saint Nicolas, which belonged to his family. It was violated in 1793 and the lead of his coffin converted to cannon balls to hold off the enemies of the Revolution. In 1838, Epée’s remains were recovered and reinterred. In 1841 a monument was placed over the tomb and the following year a statue erected at Versailles (Berthier, 1874).

60. Tronson de Coudray, the eloquent barrister who had successfully defended Cazeaux, became the friend of Jean Nicolas Bouilly and presented him to the bar in 1787, before he began his career as a playwright (Bouilly, 1835, p. 141). References on Solar affair: secondary sources—‘A’ (1800); ‘A’ (1964); Bernard (1941); Berthier (1852a); Bouilly (1800a, 1835); Clair and Clapier (1823); Dubief (1891); Dubois (1894); Etcheverry (1876); Fournier des Ormes (1851); Jubinal (1866), contains text of ‘A’, 1800); LePère (1879); Marechalle and Constant (1831); Préseau (1872); Rodenbach (1829); primary sources—de la Cretelle (1780); Elie de Beaumont (1779 a, b, c, 1780); Eude (1799); Moreau de Vorme (1799); Moreau de Vorme and Tronson de Coudray (1779); Tronson de Coudray (1779, 1780a, b).

CHAPTER 5 / THE SECRET

1. De Gérando (1827).

2. Beda Venerabilis (733), book V, ch. ii.

3. Rudolph Agricola (1433-1485); Agricola (1528).

4. Jérěme Cardan (1501-1576). Mullet (1971) also calls Cardan an egomaniacal scalawag.

5. John Wilkins (1614-1672).

6. Kenelm Digby (1603-1665); Digby (1644).

7. They implicated rather than named Bonet. See later.

8. Juan Pablo Bonet (1579-1629?); Bonet (1620).

9. George Dalgarno (1626-1687). See: Dalgarno (1680); Anon. (1817); Stewart (1812).

10. Francis Van Helmont (1618-1699).

11. George Sibscota (1670). On the plagiarism, see Guyot and Guyot (1842), p. 483.

12. John Bulwer (1644). Bulwer (1614-1684).

13. La Rochelle (1882) has written the definitive biography of Pereire. A rather more colorful and partisan account comes from Edouard Séguin (1847); both had access to private family documents. There is also a more terse biography by Hément (1875). Also see Coste d’Arnobat (1803) and Bernheim (1981). I have conjectured that Clerc and Marois met.

14. La Rochelle (1822), p. 344.

15. Cited in Valade-Gabel (1839), p. 30; attributed to Deschamps.

16. La Rochelle (1882), pp. 126, 127.

17. She entered Pereire’s tutelage May 2, 1756, along with Marie Le Rat Magnitot, also seven.

18. Quoted in Séguin (1847), p. 116.

19. Mar. 15, 1771. She was presented along with Mlle. Le Rat and Me. de la Voute. It is described in Séguin (1847), p. 137.

20. Georges Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707-1788); his 44-volume Histoire Naturelle was published between 1749 and 1804.

21. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778).

22. Hément (1875), p. 44.

23. Alphonse Laurent de Blois went to interview Marie Marois when she was eighty in 1829; he was the father of a deaf boy and the author of several books on the education of the deaf. A summary of his interview appears in: Laurent (1831a), pp. 13-16; Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets (1832), no. 3, pp. 240-241. On the use of signs, also see Séguin (1845), p. 336; La Rochelle (1882), p. 49.

24. Séguin (1847), p. 211, quotes a letter from her to this effect.

25. Quoted in Séguin (1847), p. 316.

26. When Pereire’s daughter-in-law thought to revive the name and the methods of the great teacher, Marie Marois wrote from Orléans, “The narrow circle in which I have lived until now, and the separation from society which my condition has always imposed and imposes even more so today, are powerful reasons to prevent me from participating in your plan…. The years that weigh heavily on me have weakened the skills that my illustrious teacher taught me and, through disuse of his art and method, have left me only a few scanty notions.” Quoted in La Rochelle (1882), p. 521.

27. Bonet (1620).

28. Holder (1669).

29. Amman (1692, 1700). Sibscota (1670) was also cited.

30. The post of interpreter to the king was awarded Pereire in 1765.

31. Roth (1932).

32. Apr. 11, 1715. The first Jews admitted legally in France, by ordinance of King Henry II (1549-1559), were called New Christians or Portuguese Jews, but they were not necessarily Portuguese. This and Pereire’s ancestry are no doubt responsible for the widespread misattribution of his nationality. He was not Portuguese but Spanish, a matter of some importance, as will appear.

33. La Rochelle (1882), p. 2, cites evidence that Beaumarin was born deaf, and on p. 240 he cites Pereire’s affirmation that the deafness was “absolute.”

34. Some writers say he owned or operated five large farms, but this is a misunderstanding. The term was applied after 1664 to provinces that had accepted the abolition of internal customs barriers ordered by Colbert.

35. La Rochelle (1882 p. 23), Hément (1875, p. 16), and Pereire’s contract with M. d’Etavigny (Séguin, 1847, pp. 23-270) state that his son was born deaf; Pereire (1768, p. 514) says he was “perfectly deaf.” Kilian (1885, pp. 9-10) says, however: “We can believe that for Heinicke, Van Helmont and Amman, whoever did not speak was deaf. This explains the speed with which they obtained their results; [they were] not with pupils born deaf but with retarded children, semi-idiots, semi-deaf, like d’Agy [sic] d’Etavigny, a famous pupil of Pereire, a child who had spoken until perhaps the age of nine or ten.”

36. At Beaumont-en-Auge.

37. An intimate of the king, and a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, the duke of Chaulnes, whose duchy lay just thirty kilometers away, went with his sister to the abbey to interview the old monk in writing in 1733. This duke did not meet Pereire for another seventeen years, but when he did he became the most important person in his life for he gave him a pupil (his deaf godson, Saboureux de Fontenay), who became so erudite he astonished France and its king and challenged the abbé de l’Epée. Etienne Defaye (also spelled de Fay) taught at the Abbey of Saint-Jean-d’Amiens. A copy of the original interrogation appears in Séguin (1847), pp. 244-247. Séguin states (p. 248) that Azy d’Etavigny was at this school five years but Cazeaux (1746, cited in Valade-Gabel, 1875, p. 40), a contemporary and more reliable source, says he spent “seven to eight years in the school (from 1735 or 1736 to 1743).”

38. See Denis (1887), who gives as an estimate of his date of birth the year 1670.

39. André (1746), pp. 341-342.

40. Dated June 14, 1746. See Pereire (1747), reprinted in Séguin (1847), pp 23-27; also La Rochelle (1882), p. 25, gives excerpts. The text says La Rochelle is the site, but that is an error; Pereire was to go to Beaumont-en-Auge and did so.

41. Nov. 22, 1746. Pereire (1747), p. 335, and Séguin, p. 38, list the members present.

42. Bishop of Bayeux, Msgr. Albert de Luynes. The syllabification appears in the report of the commission, Pereire (1747), reprinted in Séguin (1847), p. 38.

43. Pereire arrived at the college on July 13, 1746, and the testimonial was dated May 6, 1747. It is published in Séguin (1847), p. 43ff.

44. Hôtel d’Auvergne, Quai des Augustins.

45. Quoted in La Rochelle (1882), p. 37.

46. Mar. 4, 1749, Hôtel de Bourgogne, rue de Savoie.

47. June 11, 1749. Pereire (1749).

48. Buffon (1749), p. 350; p. 182, 1818 ed.

49. Coste d’Arnobat (1803), who knew Pereire personally, gives the report of the commission, other documents, and a summary list of d’Etavigny’s skills.

50. Herder (1785), book 9, ch. 2, p. 233, of the 1800 translation by Churchill.

51. Misspelled Ramires de Cortone.

52. The letter is reprinted in La Rochelle (1882), p. 64ff.

53. In Ganges, near Montpellier. He was born in 1738. Heinicke (1781), p. 25 of the 1968 English translation, mistakenly states that Saboureux was deafened at age eight. All authors and Saboureux himself in his autobiography state he was born deaf (Saboureux de Fontenay, 1764, p. 295). Pereire (1768), p. 511, says he is not profoundly deaf.

54. Saboureux de Fontenay appeared before the Royal Academy of Sciences on Jan. 27, 1751.

55. Seven months after they began, a cleric was sought in Paris who knew some sign language; this casts some doubt about Saboureux’s abilities in French, at least at this early stage in his education. Whom should they find but Father Vanin, the very priest who was, at about the same time, teaching the history of the saints to the two deaf sisters that Epée was fatefully to encounter. Incidentally, Saboureux makes it quite clear in his autobiography that Father Vanin used engravings to teach religion, and sign language to explain the engravings and the words printed beneath each. Thus his instruction of the deaf sisters who would become Epée’s pupils was no doubt in sign. Both Defaye and Vanin, then, preceded Epée in using sign language to instruct the deaf. Father Vanin and Pereire became friends as well as collaborators, and the priest was later responsible for sending him an additional pupil, named Le Couteux.

56. Lebouvier Desmortiers (1800), p. 226.

57. Epée (1776), I, p. 7; II, pp. 27-28.

58. Diderot (1751).

59. Pereire (1768).

60. Pereire (1768).

61. Saboureux de Fontenay (1779). Deleau proposed a system of phonetic fingerspelling in 1830 which he said originated with Pereire (La Rochelle, 1882, p. 265). Gaussens (1872), pp. 79-80, judges that Pereire’s dactylology had 25 handshapes for the letters of the alphabet, 34 shapes for pronunciation of basic sounds, and 22 elements for letters that change pronunciation according to context, for a total of 81 elements. In addition, iconic gestures specified accents, pausing, abbreviations, numbers, etc. Laurent (1831a) claims that the phonetic elements in Pereire’s alphabet correspond to syllables. In another letter, explaining the principles of five different methods of teaching the deaf, Saboureux states that the method of Ponce de León and of Pereire was the manual alphabet.

62. Pereire (1768), p. 509.

63. Condillac (1775), introduction, v. 1, p. 406, 1947 ed.

64. Buffon (1749) v. 5, p. 194, 1818 ed.

65. Braille invented his alphabet in 1829. Haüy (1745-1822); Braille (1809-1852); see Weiner (1974).

66. Rousseau (162), book 2, p. 146, 1939 ed.; p. 138, 1979 English translation.

67. Vaïsse, quoted in Congress on Deaf—International—First (1878), pp. 478-479.

68. Desloges (1779a), pp. 31-32. Desloges stated in an interview with Pereire that his publisher, whom Saboureux knew well, was the abbé Copineau, canon of the Church of Saint-Louis-du-Louvre. La Rochelle (1882), p. 408.

69. Quoted in Séguin (1847), p. 217.

70. Quoted in Séguin (1847), p. 224.

71. Others who tried to guess Pereire’s secret were Père Y.-M. André (1746) of the Caen academy, who wrote a book about it; Dubois, Marois’s confessor (cited in Séguin); Recoing (1823) gives a manual alphabet based on syllables.

72. Epée (1784), p. 159.

73. Harvey Peet, Clerc’s colleague and head of the New York Institution for the Deaf and Dumb, is the source for these remarks.

74. Yebra (1593). Melchor Yebra (1524-1586).

75. Petersson (1956).

76. Digby (1644), pp. 307-309, 1645 ed. Also see DeLand (1920).

77. Di Castro (1642), cited in Farrar (1890), p. 41; Saint-Simon (1788) and Morhoff (1732), cited in Denis (1887d). Also see Braddock (1975), pp. 126-128.

78. Louis de Rouvroy, duke of Saint-Simon (1675-1755), wrote celebrated Mémoires (1694-1723) about the life of the court. (He was an ancestor of Claude Henri de Saint-Simon, philosopher and economist, who influenced Séguin, among many others.) This passage is cited in Denis (1887d), p. 202. The court of Louis XIV went into mourning for two weeks when the prince of Carignan died. Victor Emmanuel, king of Italy, was his direct descendant.

79. Ramirez de Carrion (1629). De Gérando, possibly on Antonio’s authority (1788), says de Carrion was born deaf, and many authors following him have repeated this error. None of de Carrion’s contemporaries mention such a thing and his work as an oral teacher of the deaf and secretary to a deaf man make it most unlikely.

80. Alfonso Fernandez de Cordova y Figueroa, Marquis de Priego.

81. Cited in Farrar (1890), p. 39.

82. Many writers—e.g., A. Valade-Gabel (1875)—call Ramirez de Carrion’s disciple Pierre de Castro. De Gérando (1827), p. 326, calls him “the first physician of the Duke of Mantua who taught the son of Prince Thomas of Savoy.” Farrar (1890) argues that this is a misattribution. Chaves and Soler (1975) state that di Castro’s works carried the first name Ezechiele in 1642 and Pietro thereafter.

83. Di Castro (1642), cited in Farrar (1890), p. 41.

84. Cited in Farrar (1890), p. 55. Also related by A. Valade-Gabel (1875, p. 40ff), who seems to have gotten it from Perolle (1782, pp. 24-27), who got it from Epée in person, who got it from a Dr. Sachs of Lewenheim; Sachs (1670).

85. His publisher was Juan Bautista de Morales, cited in Chaves and Soler (1975). Digby never stated that he taught Luis de Velasco, or anyone else, for that matter. Nor did Digby claim Bonet was the de Velascos’ teacher, although virtually everyone has taken it for granted, since Bonet was in the Constable’s employ and had indeed written a book, which Digby said Luis’s teacher had done. Digby also said, however, that the teacher was a priest who was still alive and in the service of the prince of Carignan. Now, neither Bonet nor Ramirez de Carrion was a priest, but only the latter was still alive in 1644, when Digby published; Bonet had died about the time the prince was born, more than a decade earlier.

86. Saint-Simon (1788), cited in Denis (1887d), p. 204. This hypothesis is confirmed by a contemporary of Luis de Velasco’s son, Pedro, who became the Spanish ambassador to England. That observer wrote that Pedro’s “father, born deaf and mute, had learned to make himself understood, to read, write, etc., along with the prince of Carignan, in 1638 at Madrid, through the efforts of a Spaniard named Emmanuel Ramirez de Carrion.” Also note that Braddock (1975), p. 104, says Don Luis (1604-1664) became deaf at age two.

87. Four years before Kenelm Digby’s book appeared, the founder and first secretary of the Royal Society, John Wilkins (1614-1672), recorded that one unidentified man had taught the deaf to speak, first by having them write the name of any object he pointed to and “afterwards provoking them to such motions of the tongue as might answer the several words.” The teacher had also trained the deaf with sign language. We do not know how Wilkins learned the story and whether he was referring to Ponce de León (1520-1584) or Bonet (1579-1629) or Ramirez de Carrion (1579-?). Wilkins noted “what dialogues of gestures passed between persons born deaf and dumb,” by which they communicated “as directly as if they had the benefit of speech.” See Mullett (1971), p. 124.

88. Translated in A. Valade-Gabel (1875), p. 51; Peet (1850b), p. 119; and Farrar (1890), p. 28. It was originally unearthed and published by the abbé Feyjóo y Montenegro (also spelled Feijóo), 1753, v. IV, carta 7. The document is dated Aug. 24, 1578. The reference to Aristotle is apparently to his History of Animals, book 4, ch. 9, sec. 8, Arnold (1888). p. 5, translates the relevant passage: “Those who are born deaf all become speechless. They have a voice but are destitute of speech.” The Creswell 1891 translation (London: Bell, 1891) is: “All that are born dumb and all children utter sounds but have no language.” The D. W. Thompson translation (Oxford: Clarendon, 1910) is: “Men that are deaf are in all cases also dumb; that is, they can make vocal sounds but they cannot speak.” Hodgson (1953), p. 62, also attributes to Aristotle the statement, “Those who are born deaf all become senseless and incapable of reason.” Bender (1970), p. 21, states that this is a mistranslation and gives Peet’s (1851d) explanation of the source of the error: “Among the Greeks, the same word (kophoi), denoting primarily dull of mind (like our dumb), was used both for the deaf and for the dumb” (p. 106).

89. Castañiza (1583), cited in Hervás y Panduro (1795), v. i, p. 301; Antonio (1788), p. 228; De Gérando (1827), p. 310; and in Farrar (1890), p. 32. On the search for Ponce’s manuscript: (1) Guyot and Guyot (1842) state: “According to an annotation made by M. Ramon de la Sagra during a visit to the Institute for the Deaf at Groningen July 9, 1838, there had just been found in the library of a Spanish convent (the monastery of San Salvador at Oña) the original work of Pedro Ponce. See also, Ramon de la Sagra, Cinque Meses en la America del Norte, pp. 23-29, P. Ponce, and by the same author Voyage en Hollande et en Belgique, Paris, 1839, v. 1, p. 152, where the author says of Ponce’s manuscript that Dom Barth. Gallardo had cited it in his circular of Jan. 19, 1838, giving the titles of very precious Spanish works. See Carton, Le Sourd-Muet et l’Aveugle, v. 2, 1838, p. 128, which states that M. De Gérando was hoping to receive a copy. According to de la Sagra, Ponce got his idea from the old pantomime dances; Hernandez says from the book written by Beda.” (2) Hernández (1814) says Ponce used a manual alphabet. If so, this is consistent with the case that Bonet’s methods were taken from Ponce. (3) Leroy (1842), p. 12, says Ponce’s manuscript has been found: “They are in the hands of a deputy to the Cortes, a friend of M. Ramon de la Sagra, who has promised a copy to the administration of the Royal School of Paris. (4) Bébian (1826a), p. 126, says Gall cites a passage from Ponce’s book communicated by Emmanuel Nuñez de Taboada and “an ecclesiastic whom I know and who stayed in this monastery during the emigration had occasion to see the manuscript.” (5) Gall and Spurzheim (1810), v. 1, pp. xxiv-xxvi, publish a letter from Emmanuel Nuñez de Taboada acclaiming Ponce’s discovery and citing his contemporaries but without information on the manuscript. (6) Chaves and Soler (1975) give additional details on the unsuccessful search for Ponce’s manuscript, and confirm that José Gallardo, deputy and librarian to the Cortes (parliament), had read the book and had a copy made in Seville in 1823 that was lost. The author of Don Quixote also seems to be crediting Ponce when he tells of a monk who came to Valladolid and succeeded in making a deaf man hear and speak (Cervantes, 1614, cited in Farrar, 1890, p. 32).

90. Aristotle, book 4, ch. 9, of the 1891 translation.

91. Vallès (1587), p. 78, 1592 ed.

92. Baltasar de Zuniñga, cited in Chaves and Soler (1974).

93. Morales (1575), p. 38, cited in Hervàs y Panduro (1795) and Farrar (1890), p. 30.

94. Hervás y Panduro (1795) states that the constable who employed Ponce, Inigo Hernandez de Velasco, was the father of the constable who employed Bonet, Bernardino Hernandez de Velasco. However, Farrar (1890) indicates that he was the grandfather, as does Braddock (1975, p. 103), probably on Farrar’s authority; Chaves and Soler (1975) show Farrar correct.

95. El Mudo (1526-1579). See Braddock (1975), pp. 123-126.

96. Code of Justinian, bk. iii, tit. 20, 7; bk. vi, 22, 10; see Arnold (1888), Manual, p. 17; Peet (1857).

97. A fellow monk at Oña, Lasso, wrote a treatise for the de Vélascos on the aspects of Spanish law that no longer restricted them since they were no longer dumb. See Farrar (1892). Vaïsse (1844b), p. 4. The first de Velasco of record is Pedro Hernandez, count of Haro, whom the Spanish king Henry IV made constable, vice-king in effect, in 1473, although he was not of royal birth. Pedro had two sons; one, the duke of Frias, had no children, so the title of constable passed to the other, Inigo. He had two sons at the dawn of the sixteenth century: Pedro, third constable of Castile, who had no children, and Juan, the marquis of Berlanga by marriage, who had eight, five of them deaf. The two hearing daughters married counts, while a hearing son, Inigo, was tutored at home. The three deaf daughters were sent to convents and the two deaf sons to the monastery of Oña. This not only kept the deaf scions of the family out of sight of society but also prevented them from reproducing. The youngest son, Pedro, was Ponce de Leon’s amazing deaf student who could sing the plainchant with a congregation of monks, keeping time and tune, as one of their number reports; he died when he was twenty. Ponce’s education of the oldest son, Francisco, was called “marvelous,” “miraculous,” “unheard of”; he was “the first deaf-mute in the world who spoke through the ingenuity of man.” Before this miracle, however, the title of constable had passed to the only hearing boy, Inigo, from his uncle Pedro, who died in 1557. If Inigo had died or remained childless, the title would have passed to Francisco if he could speak, or out of the family if he could not. But Ponce’s pupil was not put to the test, since Inigo had a hearing son, the fifth constable, Juan, who died young. He left two sons, Bernardino, who became the sixth constable and Bonet’s employer, and Luis, the deaf pupil of Ramirez de Carrion whom Kenelm Digby announced to an astonished Europe and whom the king named the marquis of Fresno. Once again the family’s fortunes potentially hinged on speech: if Bernardino died childless, the title would pass to Luis if, thanks to Ramirez de Carrion, he could speak. Again, the problem did not arise. The title passed to a hearing son of Bernardino and Luis’s son Pedro became merely the second marquis of Fresno and ambassador to England.

98. Translated in Farrar (1890), p. 69.

99. Antonio (1788) also suggests Bonet’s book was not an original work but based on what he learned in the de Velasco family.

100. Sachs (1670).

101. Coste d’Arnobat (1803), p. 30.

102. Feyjóo y Montenegro (1730).

103. In a letter to Desloges, published in Deschamps (1780), Saboureux cites his prior autobiography (1765); his letter on music in the Journal de Physique, July 2, 1773; a sketch of his early ideas published by an anonymous author in a collection, Antilogie et fragments philosophiques; and his memoir on meteorology presented to the Royal Academy. Deschamps (1780).

104. Saboureux de Fontenay (1779), p. 35.

105. La Rochelle (1882), p. 406ff. The interview took place on Oct. 31 and Nov. 6, 1779.

106. The Journal Encyclopédique de Bouillon; see Anon. (1780). Reprinted in De Gérando (1827), pp. 449-450. Translated in Braddock (1975), p. 46. Desloges was born in 1747 at Le Grand-Pressigny, near La Haye, Tours diocese.

107. Amman (1700), 1873 translation, reprinted 1965, p. 10.

108. He taught speech much as Ponce did, and Bonet described, by showing a letter, teaching the articulatory configuration to sound its “reduced” value, then showing his pupils how to write the letter. However, he also taught lipreading. A few years before publishing his book, Deschamps came to Paris to consult Pereire and afterward kept up a brisk correspondence with the master demutizer. Deschamps (1779).

109. Desloges (1779a), pp. 14-15.

110. Deschamps (1779), p. 32.

111. Anon. (1780).

112. Epée (1896). The plan for the work appears in Epée (1784) but it was published posthumously.

113. Sicard (1808b).

114. De Gérando (1827), p. 590.

115. Desloges (1779a), p. 28. Deschamps (1779), p. xxx.

116. These letters and programs constitute the second part of his 1776 book. The first part is a description of his method and a critique of Pereire’s. The work was revised for publication in 1784. Here he drops the attack on Pereire and theologians, and adds some new means of instruction. Appended to the 1784 version are two other “parts”: an essay on speech teaching and an account of his dispute with Heinicke. The essay on speech teaching was edited and published separately by Sicard in 1820, along with an introduction and a eulogy by Bébian. In 1827, Bébian reprinted the work in his two-volume course of instruction for the deaf. Arrowsmith translated Epée (1784), including the essay on speech, into English in 1819, and Green did likewise in 1801, reprinted in 1860.

117. Epée (1776), part II, p. 8, (1771 letter).

118. Epée (1784), p. 215 of the 1819 English translation. Likewise in the 1773 letter, “The congenitally deaf can speak as we do when they are taught” (Epée, 1776, part II, p. 56; 1773 letter). Also see: Epée (1776), part I, p. 55; part II, pp. 24, 57 (1772 and 1773 letters). Epée’s pupil Louis Clément de la Pujade recited a Latin discourse of five and a half pages at one of his public exercises (however, Louis could detect the sound of bells, as well as the ticking of a watch placed between his teeth) and at another exercise debated the definition of philosophy with his fellow student Francis Deydier, who accompanied the count of Solar on his journey. Epée also taught another scholar to repeat aloud the twenty-eighth chapter of the Gospel according to Matthew and to recite the morning service on Sunday. The British philosopher Lord Monboddo reports on a vists to Epée’s school in 1773: “He had brought some of his scholars a surprising length; and one of them I particularly remember, a girl who spoke so pleasantly I would not have known her to be deaf. On Clément de la Pujade, see Perolle (1782), cited in Valade-Gabel (1875). He could also detect shouting through an ear-trumpet applied to his temple. The discourse is published in Epée (1776), part II, p. 127. On the scholar who recited the gospel: Epée (1784), p. 256 of the 1819 English translation. See the “Notice” in Epée (1774). Also see Burnet (1773), p. 192.

When Abbé Sicard was appointed to the national college for teacher training, he presented a pupil, according to the stenographic record, “who loudly and clearly pronounces the words corresponding to signs that are made to him” (Sicard, 1795, v. 1, p. 252; v. 3, p. 266). This pupil, Peyre, also read aloud Massieu’s written answers to questions from the audience. Sicard, almost as transported as his audience, then affirmed that Peyre was better than any of Pereire’s pupils. History has not passed down to us the degree of his deafness or his age at onset.

119. Epée (1776), part I, p. 24.

120. Epée (1784), p. 257 of the 1819 (Arrowsmith) translation.

121. Sicard (1795), v. 4, pp. 267-269 (Apr. 10, 1795). On Sicard’s low regard for teaching speech to the deaf, also see T. Gallaudet (1818b), p. 132.

122. Epée (1776), part I, p. 33.

123. Epée (1776), part I, pp. 37, 154.

124. Saboureux de Fontenay (1765), p. 428.

125. Cited in La Rochelle (1882), p. 16; Epée (1776), part I, p. 119.

126. Quoted in Epée (1776), part I, p. 119.

127. Pereire, July 7, 1777, cited in Séguin (1847), pp. 154-161.

128. Saboureux de Fontenay (1780).

129. Amman (1700), pp. 8, 10, 1965 éd., 1873 English translation. Johann Conrad Amman (1669-1724), born Schaffhausen, Switzerland.

130. Amman (1700), p. 2, 1965 ed., 1873 English translation.

131. Amman (1700), p. 12, 1965 ed., 1873 English translation.

132. Amman (1692), p. xxvi, 1972 ed., 1694 English translation. Also see letter to John Hudde in Amman (1700), p. xvii ff, 1873 English translation.

133. Amman (1700), p. 52, 1965 ed., 1873 English translation.

134. Amman also knew nothing, he said, of the work of Francis Mercurius, Baron Van Helmont, who had affirmed in print twenty-five years earlier that Hebrew is the natural language of man, that its characters depict the positions of the vocal organs required to make the corresponding sounds, and that with this discovery he had taught a deaf child to lipread in three weeks. The pupil reportedly proceeded on his own to read books, and to learn Hebrew by comparing German and Hebrew translations of the Bible. Consequently, when Van Helmont read Amman’s book, he went to see him to explain how he, not Amman, was the first teacher of the deaf. Van Helmont’s brother was the famous physician and chemist who discovered carbonic gas and invented the thermometer. Van Helmont (1667).

135. See L. W. Kerger (1704). Reprinted in German with the work of Raphel in 1801. Carton (1847), p. 55, states that De Gérando is in error in affirming that Entmuller taught a deaf-mute. The person who did the teaching was Kerger, who—at Entmuller’s request—informed the Academy of Natural Curiosities of his method. The first teachers of the deaf to follow him were in Silesia. L. W. Kerger and his sister acknowledged their debt to Ponce, Bonet, Wallis, as well as Amman, but denied that speech was indispensable to mental culture and preferred to teach written language with the aid of sign. Next, George Raphel (1673-1740), a compatriot of Kerger, a pastor and a Greek scholar with three deaf daughters, published an account of how he taught the eldest to speak, following Amman. Like Kerger, he gave great weight to reading and writing and did not hesitate to communicate with his children in some form of sign language (no doubt, the “home sign” that would develop naturally in a family with several deaf children). See Raphel (1718).

136. Heinicke (1723-1790); Heinicke, 1782, pp. 43-44, of the 1968 English translation. Epée revised his 1776 book in 1784. By then he was under attack from another quarter, Samuel Heinicke. He updated his method, added his essay on teaching speech, presented his dispute with Heinicke. He deleted the material designed to convince theologians and philosophers that the deaf could be educated through sign—that, by the grace of God, was no longer necessary. And as nothing more had been heard from Pereire or Saboureux in the eight years since publication of the first edition, he deleted the critique of them, believing that was no longer necessary either.

137. Heinicke, 1782, p. 42, 1968 English translation.

138. Rae (1848c).

139. Kilian (1885), p. 6.

140. Saboureux de Fontenay (1765), p. 429. The dispute between Heinicke and Epée arose in this way. The Seven Years War found France and Austria on one side and Great Britain and Prussia on the other: Austria was opposed to the rising kingdom of Prussia in a struggle for supremacy in Germany, while the two other powers fought mainly over the new colonies in America. Thus, Joseph II, head of the ruling house of Austria and Holy Roman Emperor, was led by his military alliance with France as well as his ties to its king, his brother-in-law, to turn to the abbé de l’Epée to help him found the first state school for the deaf. As we have seen, he sent him the abbé Storck, who returned to Vienna eight months later and opened a school there. Hearing of this Franco-Austrian alliance in the education of the deaf, the German Heinicke wrote to Storck assailing Epée’s methods and praising his own. It was then that Storck volunteered to come see for himself and Heinicke repelled the attack on his secrecy by demanding his exorbitant fee. (Kilian, 1885, p. 8). When Epée received a copy of Heinicke’s letter to Storck, he shot off a rebuttal, which earned him one in turn, to which he replied. After a third and final exchange, Epée approached several scientific academies to arbitrate the dispute and the Zurich Academy accepted.

Heinicke’s first letter stated two main objections to Epée and instruction by sign: hearing cannot be replaced by sight; and abstract concepts cannot be taught through written language and methodical signs. In his reply, Epée tells how his pupils have mastered grammar and can write virtually any sentence in French, proving Heinicke’s objections invalid. In his reply, Heinicke explains that written words represent sounds; hence they cannot stay in the congenitally deaf man’s memory. When they are in front of him he can think of the things to which they refer, but when they are removed, he cannot remember the words. Heinicke’s pupils, on the other hand, have learned to articulate, their written language rests on their spoken language, so they can retain it. Epée replied that Heinicke’s method was like Pereire’s and had the same disadvantage, leaving pupils for more than a year in articulation training, without mental development. The deaf should be taught to speak after they have a knowledge of words and things, not before. This was the case with his pupils, who, without any speech, used more than a thousand French words in a month’s classes and discussed matters as abstract as religion. Heinicke’s last letter contained the remarks about secrecy quoted earlier; he is not prepared to say any more except that his method is based on articulation, uses some fingerspelling, and taste—not sight—replaces hearing. In his final response, Epée warned that fingerspelling a French word is merely transcribing it and nothing more. He mocks Heinicke’s careless claim that “taste replaces hearing”; presumably he meant that he taught his deaf pupils to attend to the sensations of touch in their mouths while they wre articulating.

The Zurich Academy examined pupils trained with Epée’s methods by his disciple Ulrich in Zurich and gave the day to Epée, ruling that his pupils transformed written words into signs as hearing people do into speech. Thus, the deaf think not in letters but in signs. This settled matters for Epée, who published a full account in his final work. Storck could not find peace so promptly. The editor of a leading Viennese newspaper rendered his own verdict, in favor of Epée, and Heinicke returned to the attack in a series of twenty letters to the editor. Next Storck was accosted by a professor Nicolai, a member of the Berlin Academy, who asked permission to strike his breast while a deaf pupil chosen at random described the event. The pupil wrote: “Hand lie on heart” and Nicolai, who said he intended to convey the idea of solemnly affirming, went away satisfied that sign could not convey abstract ideas (Berthier, 1840c, p. 70). Probably Nicolai was a poor mimic, who lacked facial expression. In any case, a deaf person would have signed “affirm” (in ASL, probably the sign that can be glossed TRUE-BUSINESS) and that would not have been ambiguous. Nicolai published a book extolling Heinicke and assailing Epée (among other things, he called him “soft in the head”). When Nicolai’s critique appeared in the German and French papers, Epée lodged a rebuttal and invited the Berlin Academy to judge who was right, “in the interests of present and future deaf people” (Berthier, 1852a, p. 72; De Gérando, 1827, v. 1, p. 500). Epée’s reply appears in the Journal de Paris (Epée, 1785). Nicolai sidestepped the debate with Epée, saying he had criticized Storck, not Epée, and Storck should reply; he never did.

Two of Heinicke’s contemporaries, German teachers of the deaf, deserve mention for completeness. Benjamin Lasius published a book in Leipzig, three years before Heinicke’s school opened there, giving an account of the education of a congenitally deaf young woman. The emphasis was on writing—no speech or fingerspelling, little sign (Lasius, 1775). Johan Arnoldi (1777), a Lutheran minister, taught the son of a Hessian noble, among others. His pupils’ sign language and pictures were his main means; he also taught sham speech to pupils who could profit by that instruction. Also see Peet (1859a), Rae (1848c).

141. In 1783. Cited in Blanchet (1850), p. 34.

142. 1788. After the school was temporarily moved to the royal castle Hohenschönhausen, it was converted to a royal institution in 1798, and a site was chosen for it in the city (Hartmann, 1881, p. 131).

143. John Wallis (1616-1703); Wallis (1653).

144. Anthony Wood (sometimes à Wood), 1632-1695, English antiquary. See Wood (1691).

145. John Aubrey (1626-1697). Quoted in Mullett (1971), p. 133. See Aubrey (1696), p. 160, 1949 ed.

146. Letters dated Dec. 30, 1661, May 6, 1662, reproduced in Boyle (1700), pp. 453-455 of the 1772 edition.

147. Wallis letters dated Mar. 14, 1662, not published until July 18, 1670.

148. May 14, 1662. Journal Book of the Royal Society, I, pp. 60-61.

149. William Holder (1616-1698). See Holder (1678). Holder’s labors had begun in 1659 when Popham was ten. Because the boy’s mother had been frightened in pregnancy, Holder explained, his pupil’s head was distorted, the passage in the left ear was far too small, that in the right far too large. However, with one end of a taut lute-string between his teeth, the youth could perceive any strong sound. Now Wallis had witnessed the instruction of Popham two years before he accepted Daniel Whaley as a pupil, Holder protested, and his first letter to Dr. Boyle should have mentioned it. Moreover, by the time Wallis wrote his second letter to the Royal Society, making it appear he had endowed Popham with speech, Holder had published two accounts of his prior labors: a letter to the Society, and a book on the elements of speech, one much like Amman’s, with claims for the superiority of vocal language, an inventory of its phonetic elements, and practical advice on how to teach (Holder, 1668). The letter (1668) only discusses the boy’s hearing but the book (1669) goes into teaching sham speech. Before Holder and Wallis, John Bulwer wrote several books on the nature of gesture (1644, 1648), in which he also discussed Digby’s report and advocated schools for the deaf. He did not teach any deat people nor apparently have any impact on the education of the deaf. In short, it is reasonable to speculate that Wallis knew he was not the first English instructor of the deaf, or even of Popham, but he kept this a secret to glorify his accomplishment.

150. Wallis (1678).

151. Aubrey (1696), v. 1, p. 404. Wood (1691), v. 2, p. 816.

152. Purver (1967).

153. Reported in Purver (1967); Wilkins (1641).

154. Aubrey (1696).

155. Wallis (1696, 1698).

156. Watson (1949). Dalgarno mentions in the introduction to his book that he knew Wallis; Dalgarno (1680). The Edinburgh Review (Anon., 1835, p. 416) says Wallis “plundered” Dalgarno. See note 5-182.

157. Defoe (1720).

158. Porter (1848a), p. 182. Abernathy (1959) states that Dalgarno (1680) was the first English writer to advocate a manual alphabet for the deaf and that the two-handed alphabet now in use in Great Britain first appeared in an anonymous work, Digiti Lingua, published in London in 1698, and then later figured in Defoe’s book (1720).

159. Wallis (1698).

160. De Gérando (1827), p. 313.

161. Hubbard (1891) says Braidwood was “an elocutionist,” and Mullet (1971) says “a writing master” but I know of no evidence for these claims.

162. Burnet (1774), book I, ch. XV, pp. 192-194.

163. Stevenson and Guthrie (1949) mention this.

164. Quoted in Watson (1949), p. 23.

165. Herries (1766).

166. Herries (1767).

167. Anon. (1769).

168. Johnson (1775), p. 383. In the same passage, Johnson mentions another oralist, a contemporary of Braidwood, name Henry Baker (1698-1775), who had told him he would soon publish a book on his method. He never did and had no lasting impact. Baker tutored the three deaf children of a London attorney, then opened a school for the wealthy deaf, where he followed Wallis’s methods, that is, Ponce-Bonet. He required a one-hundred-pound bond of each pupil not to reveal the secret of his method, married Daniel Defoe’s daughter, published erotic rhymes and two books on the microscope, and became a member of the Royal Society. Arnold (1888) discovered Baker’s manuscript and discusses its contents. H.P. Peet (1859a) says Baker taught “Lady Inchiquin and her sister.”

169. Pennant (1776), pp. 256-258. Edinburgh Institution (1819).

170. Arnot (1779), pp. 425-426.

171. The move occurred in 1783. John died in 1798. Bender (1970, p. 113), apparently on the authority of Hodgson (1953, pp. 143, 148), states that John Braidwood was not Thomas’s son but nephew and son-in-law; Watson (1949) also uses the latter term. Syle, however, a reliable source, studied the Braidwood genealogy and calls John Thomas’s son (reported in Fay, 1878). Bell’s (1918) account of the genealogy is the same as Syle’s (but may be based on it). Moreover, Thomas Braidwood Jr. (quoted in T. Gallaudet, 1818c, p. 127) states “Watson was instructed in this art by my grandfather and father” (i.e., Thomas Braidwood and son John).

172. Geikie (1900); Watson (1949), p. 29.

173. Porter (1848a), p. 43. Kinniburgh resigned in 1847 after thirty-six years as headmaster (Watson, 1949, p.71.)

174. About 1814. Thomas died 1825.

175. The timetable of the founding of British schools for the deaf is: London, 1792, Old Kent Road, later moved to Margate; Edinburgh, 1810; Birmingham, 1814; Liverpool, 1825; Manchester, 1825; Exeter, 1827; Doncaster, 1829. The first school to adopt the “German System” was at Yorkshire, 1876. Government support of schools for the deaf came only in 1893 under the Elementary Education Act.

176. The school was founded through the efforts of two Church of England clergy: John Townsend and Henry Cox Mason. It opened with six pupils. See Gilbert (1873) and Townsend (1831). Concerning the cost of tuition at a Braidwood school, Anon. (1822b) gives 100 pounds a year. Townsend (1831), p. 36, and H.P. Peet (1859a), p. 312, speak of a woman who spent 1500 pounds for her deaf child, presumably 300 per year. Geikie (1900) gives 114 dollars a year as the fee charged for instructing his uncle in 1806.

177. Joseph Watson stated that the method of instructing the deaf he learned from his uncle, Thomas Braidwood, was based on John Wallis’s letters to the Royal Society (Watson, 1809, p. 23; p. 83ff). Thus, he affirmed, he started by learning signs from his deaf pupils in order to teach them, as Wallis did (Millar, 1827, p. 205). Likewise, a historical sketch published by the Edinburgh school says that Braidwood had applied to the instruction of Charles Shirreff the plan given in the proceedings of the Royal Society “and thus many of the superior classes of society in this country were made acquainted with the possibility of teaching the deaf and dumb to understand written language.” Note the words “written language.”

178. Cited in Watson (1949), pp. 48-50. Speech gradually dropped from the Braidwood curriculum, according to Charles Baker, quoted in Chamberlain (1867b) and E. Gallaudet (1867), p. 49. The Glasgow school under Duncan Anderson followed Bébian’s methods; the Aberdeen school was directed by a disciple of Sicard; the teacher in the Edinburgh Day School for the deaf was deaf himself (Watson, 1949, p. 53). Sign language remained the primary vehicle for the instruction of the deaf in Scotland throughout the nineteenth century. Dugald Stewart (1753-1828), who founded the Scottish common-sense school of philosophy, was a professor at the University of Edinburgh, and he watched Braidwood’s school develop in that city (Stewart, 1812, p. 322). Stewart also called from relative obscurity to public attention a Scottish writer on education of the deaf, George Dalgarno (1626?-1687). Dalgarno was eclipsed by Wallis, in part because his book (1680) was confined to principles. He read Digby and Bonet, says he counts Wallis as a friend and may have been the person who communicated Bonet to Wallis. Dalgarno places emphasis on the manual alphabet and written language. He also believed that speech and lipreading could not be mastered sufficiently to be of practical use. Anon. (1835c) presents the case that Wallis also plagiarized Dalgarno (p. 416).

179. Porter (1858a), p. 120.

180. Quoted in Syle (1887), p. 12.

181. Lowe was with Watson from age six to eighteen. He was admitted to the bar in 1829. See Braddock (1975) and H.P. Peet (1859a), p. 312.

182. Fox (1935, 3 [5]), p. 4.

183. Quoted in Anon. (1896), p. 33. Also see Bass and Healy (1949), p. 25.

184. Association Review, 1900, 2, 36-42.

185. Green (1783). Credit for the first American publication on the education of the deaf goes to Francis Green; Boston Magazine in December 1784 and January 1785 gave reviews of his Vox Oculis Subjecta, published in England in 1783. Green’s letter of 1781 to Richard Bagley, health officer of the port of New York, did not appear in print in America until 1804. The first work on the education of the deaf actually written and published in America was by William Thornton (1793), who was the first head of the U.S. Patent Office and architect of the first capitol in Washington. A brief sketch of Thornton’s life and work by A. G. Bell will be found in the Association Review, 1900, 2, 113-118. Bell suggests that Thornton knew of Braidwood’s and Epée’s schools and methods, since he was graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 1784 and then continued his medical studies in Paris.

186. Cited in Bell (1900a). Also see Bell in Clarke School (1893a), pp. 53-54.

187. Hubbard (1898), p. 5.

CHAPTER 6 / SUCCESS AND FAILURE

1. On Berthier: Bernard (1080a), p. 7. Cuxac (1980), p. 149, states that Berthier “became profoundly deaf before the age of three.” Braddoclc (1976) states that Berthier was deafened “in early childhood,” but Paulmier (1834), p. 382, states that his pupil was born deaf. Berthier refers to himself as congenitally deaf (“sourd-muet de naissance”) in L’Ami des Sourds-Muets (1840, 2, 143-144). Berthier had two hearing teachers who were also responsible for his successful education, and both were gifted signers. The first was Roch-Ambroise Bébian; the other was Louis Paulmier, the oldest disciple of Sicard, who had attended one of his demonstrations while still an artillery officer, and had seen the light, bee Berthier (1873), p. 227, on Paulmier.

2. Paulmier (1834a), p. 382.

3. Denis (1895b), p. 43; Clerc quoted in Chamberlain (1857a). Bernard (1980a), p. 7, gives these dates: Berthier entered 1811, moniteur, 1819, répétiteur, 1824, professor, 1829.

4. Berthier (1852b), p. 31.

5. Société Universelle des Sourds-Muets, founded 1838. Karakostas (1981) states that the sign language in use in Paris outside the national institution was relatively isolated from, and distinct from, that used within the institution. Some of Berthier’s articles recording the struggle of the deaf are: (1836, 40c, 46, 40a); his 1840 rebuttal of Itard (1821d) was published (1852b).

6. First welfare organization of deaf: Société Centrale des Sourds-Muets de Paris.

7. Clerc (1857a). If Berthier was considered Clerc’s successor, then Alphonse Lenoir was Massieu’s. Likewise a pupil of Bébian, Lenoir was careful, calm, imperturbable, full of great good sense, a beautiful soul, according to his contemporaries. He had a taste for art and was often to be found in the Parisian galleries. He published an interesting collection of brief tales by and about the deaf (Lenoir, 1850).

8. Pélissier (1846a), p. 13. Cuxac (1980), p. 152, mentions Pélissier’s bilingualism. Also see Braddock (1975).

9. Pélissier (1856). Brouland (1855) and Lambert (1865) provide illustrative iconographies and Puybonnieux (1846), p. 217, gives some verbal examples of reduced signs. Grosselin and Pélissier published sign vocabulary cards in 1857 that I have been unable to locate. Probably this is an alternate format of Pélissier (1856). See the review of the cards by Valade-Gabel (1859). Other dictionaries of French or American Sign Language prior to the spate in the present decade are, in order of date of preparation, Epée (1896), Sicard (1808), Blanchet (1850) (these are all verbal); Lambert (1865, 1870), Hutton (1900), Long (1918), Michaels (1923), Higgins (1923), Riekehof (1961), Stokoe, Casterline and Croneberg (1965), Oléron (1974).

10. Blanchet (1850) describes Forestier (1810-1891) in these terms. Cuxac (1980), p. 120, fn. 1, states that Forestier was profoundly deaf at birth. In response to Itard’s slander of the character of the deaf, Berthier published some of Forestier’s letters to show that deaf people have the same kind of emotional reactions as do hearing people.

11. Société Centrale (1842), p. 46.

12. Forestier (1854).

13. Peet (1859), p. 330.

14. R.A. Bébian, born Aug. 4, 1789; died Feb. 24, 1839.

15. Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets (1842): Berthier calls Bébian the only hearing person who really mastered sign. Bébian (1817) states in a letter to Sicard that he learned sign mainly from Laurent Clerc.

16. Sicard cited in Berthier (1873), p. 246ff. Sicard’s letter is dated Mar. 1819.

17. Bébian (1817, 1819). On methodical signs and sign systems based on French or English, see: Aléa (1824); Bébian (1820, 1826b, 1834, p. 38); Berthier (1839, p. 7); Bornstein (1973); Burnet (1854, 1855a, b); Clerc (1857b); Cochrane (1871); Gustason et al. (1972); the exchanges between J.A. Jacobs and H.P. Peet; Keep (1871); Markowicz (1975); I.L. Peet (1853, 1868); Reich and Bick (1976); Sicard (1808b); Talbot (1872); Valade-Gabel (1862b); Valentine (1870, 1872).

18. Recounted in Esquiros (1847), p. 411.

19. Directors elsewhere in this era who came from Paris institution (+ = deaf): Chazottes, at Toulouse; Piroux, Nancy; Carton, Bruges; Fleury, Saint Petersburg; Riviere, Rodez; Desongnis, Arras; Dessagne “dans le cantal”; Valade, Bordeaux; Massieu-I-, Lille; Georges+, Mons; Bertrand+, Limoges; Platin+, Pay; Professors elsewhere: Clerc+, Hartford; Benjamin+ and Godfrey+, Lille; Ackerman+, Esquermes (near Lille); Maupin+, Besançon; Richardin+, Nancy (Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets, 1839).

20. See Bébian (1826a), p. 164ff.

21. This is substantially Peet’s evaluation. (H.P. Peet, 1859a). Bébian’s manual (1827) was completed in 1822 but awaited commercial publication for a government subsidy that never came.

22. Bébian (1827a), p. 8.

23. Bébian (1825). The classes that Bébian’s system transcribes are movements, handshapes, locations, relative hand positions, and facial expressions. He distinguishes simple, curved, circular, and oblique movement vectors traveling in one of two directions in one of three planes. Eight other forms of movement (e.g., wavelike) and eight movement diacritics (e.g., stressed) are specified—a total of 67 transcriptions. Each movement symbol has a form appropriate to its referent, as do the 26 symbols presented for various head and body locations. Handshape symbols are schematic drawings of the contours of the hand: only two configurations are illustrated but in many orientations for both hands separately, yielding 54 transcriptions. Fourteen symbols are proposed for specifying the position of one hand in relation to the other. Twenty symbols are listed for ten opposing pairs of expressive states (e.g., pleasure-pain). Also see G. Hutton (1869) and J.S. Hutton (1870, 1874).

24. Bébian (1826a).

25. Bébian (1831).

26. Berthier et Lenoir (1830).

27. Bébian (1834).

28. Bébian (1826a), p. 195.

29. De Gérando (1827), p. 572, says “signs of reduction” (i.e., French Sign Language) “are currently the principal means of instruction at the National Institute for the Deaf.” Carton (1847), p. 63; Blanchet (1850), p. 158.

30. Barnard (1835), p. 389.

31. New York Institution for Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb, Reports (1834), p. 29.

32. Karakostas (1981), p. 112, states that Massieu was accused of soliciting a minor in the Paris woods and that this contributed to his leaving the Paris school. On Massieu’s activities after leaving Paris: Rodenbach (1835), Clerc (1849); Leglay (1847); Berthier (1873), p. 162; Lefebvre (1858); Kelkun (1888). Massieu’s school opened Oct. 1, 1834, promptly received a subsidy from the city council, and gave its first public exhibition in 1836. Scholarships were awarded by the département du Nord beginning 1838. Massieu retired on pension a year later when the brothers of he order Saint-Gabriel took charge of the male pupils, and the sisters of Sagesse took charge of the females. Massieu died July 23, 1846.

33. History has not passed down to us the name of the student whose accident led to Itard’s intervention nor the precise day on which it occurred in the year 1799.

34. Bouteiller (1956); Copans and Jamin (1978); Stocking (1964). Sicard was a member of the society, as were the baron De Gérando and another member of the administrative boad at Saint-Jacques, Mathieu Montmorency. In addition to linguists and philosophers there were the first psychiatrist, Philippe Pinel; Baron Georges Cuvier, who founded comparative anatomy; various naturalists; doctors—Itard would become a member; archeologists, historians, more than a dozen explorers, some sixty members in all.

35. To get the wild boy brought to Paris, the abbé Sicard appealed to the minister of the interior, Lucien Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother. At first, Sicard thought he was unsuccessful in his request; he wrote to Baron De Gérando on Feb. 26, 1800: “As I no longer have any hope of getting my savage since a family has been found for him,” I can arrange for you and your party to attend one of my demonstrations. He asked for the size of the party, since tickets would be needed. The letter appears in Berthier (1873), appendix.

36. Jean-Marc Itard (1774-1838). See Lane (1976).

37. Itard (1801), p. 134, 1964 ed.

38. Bonnaterre (1800), pp. 256-275.

39. Sicard (1800), p. x, 1803 ed.

40. Porcher (1938), p. 115, says the school physician earned 800 francs a year in 1838. Unskilled labor in the early nineteenth century earned two to three francs a day; the figure is now (1981) about 100. Using this guide to the change in purchasing power, we can estimate that Itard’s salary at the end of his career was the equivalent of a current 32,000 francs annually. At a typical exchange rate of five francs to the dollar, this income corresponds to some $6, 500 a year.

41. Itard (1801), p. xxiii, 1964 ed.

42. Itard (1808, 1821a).

43. Itard (1801), p. 163, 1964 ed.

44. De Gérando (1848), translated in Lane (1976), p. 144.

45. Itard (1807), p. 229, 1964 ed.

46. De Gérando’s letter is dated July 13, 1810, cited in Puybonnieux (1846), p. 145.

47. Virey (1817), p. 269.

48. In 1811 the government proposed sending to Saint-Jacques another youth who had been living in the wild for some years. Sicard and the board were horrified: it would be fruitless for the boy and dangerous for the other pupils. No sense in repeating the experiment with Victor, which had shown the difficulties and even the uselessness of such efforts (Bernard, 1980c, p. 60).

49. Itard (1825). The baron Cuvier went to the Paris school and tried his hand on the remains of yet another former pupil, but equally without success.

50. Luigi Galvani (1737-1798), published in 1791.

51. Cited in Corone (1960).

52. Itard (1821d), p. 342, 1842 ed. “In Itard’s time, the principal causes of deafness were hydrocephalus, brain fever, scarlet fever, measles, dentition, convulsions, inflammation of the lungs, colds, smallpox, and whooping cough” (Hodgson, 1953, p. 191). For other related articles on medicine, see: Académie Impériale de Médecine (1853), Ackerknecht (1967), Adelon et al. (1812), Blanchet (1853a), Cartwright (1851), Corone (1960), G.E. Day (1836), Deleau (1826, 1828), Dunglison (1833), Ganière (1964), Houdin (1853), Husson (1833), Itard (1802, 1825, 1829a, b, 1827a, b, c, d, 1829), Lebouvier Desmortiers (1801), Ménière (1853), Volquin (1853).

53. “A host of pupils,” wrote Itard’s successor, Dr. Ménière, “were subjected to the most painful, barbaric, absurd and useless treatments.” One pupil even had her skull pierced to give sounds more direct access (1853, p. 47). Also see Varjot (1980).

54. Cited in Esquiros (1847), p. 412. Also see Itard’s regrets in Hoffbauer (1827), p. 181, and the negative evaluations of later physicians cited in Bernard (1980c), p. 62.

55. Quoted in Houdin (1855), p. 14.

56. Kitto (1848), cited in Batson and Bergman (1976), pp. 170-171, 204.

57. Itard (1821b), p. 212.

58. Itard (1821d).

59. Berthier published a hundred-page book to refute this broadcast defamation (Berthier, 1852b. The refutation was written in 1840.) Bébian also attacked it in the pages of his journal (Bébian, 1826a, p. 14).

60. “Of all the staff at the school, Itard was the most prejudiced against the deaf.… He wanted to banish sign language, of which he learned none during thirty years at the institution” (Blanchet, 1850, p. 95).

61. The idea came to him, he recounts in his Treatise, when he was invited by the abbé Sicard, in the winter of 1802, to witness some acoustical experiments performed on his pupils. A physicist brought several sound-making instruments of his own invention and generated sounds so piercing that many of the pupils seemed to hear them. Itard suggested that the pupils be blindfolded and told to raise their hands for each sound they could hear. To his amazement, a few more hands went up each time the shrill sound was made. He had the experiment repeated with a softer and duller sound. Fewer hands were raised, of course, but again repeated stimulation of the ear seemed to increase its sensitivity. These results shocked Itard “like a dazzling flash of light that showed me the route I must follow to bring a paralyzed sense to life…. Four successive years of caring for and experimenting with a child found in the woods had taught me ways of awakening the sense organs” (Itard, 1821d, pp. 355-356, 1842 ed.).

62. Itard (1827), p. 179.

63. Chesselden (1728); Académie Royale des Sciences (1703).

64. Itard (1808); Halle and Moreau (1808).

65. Hoffbauer (1827), p. 179.

66. Itard (1808), p. 75; (1802), pp. 534-535, no. 6.

67. Among the pupils whom Itard exhibited, the most accomplished speaker was indeed his protégé Allibert, who had the least possibility of signing: entrusted entirely to Itard, who put him in the care of a hearing governess, Allibert was cut off from the signing community (Itard, 1821d, p. 390, 1842 ed.).

68. Husson (1833), p. 138, 1894 ed.

69. Allibert quoted in Ménière (1853), p. 186.

70. Berthier (1852a), p. 85, identifies Eugène Allibert as one of Itard’s early speech pupils. Vaïsse (1848b), p. 34, reports his nomination for the post of professor and calls him a rapid and brilliant scholarly success. Itard describes his hearing (1824) and cites him in his will (Petit, 1859). His predilection for signing is discussed in Académie Impériale de Médecine (1853), p. 975, and Ménière (1853), p. 299.

71. Itard (1826), p. 256.

72. Itard (1821d), p. 391, 1842 éd.; Itard (1824), p. 9.

73. Itard (1824), p. 11.

74. Itard (1827c), pp. 181, 190.

75. Itard (1821a), p. 12.

76. Itard (1827c), pp. 202-203.

77. Reported in Berthier (1852b), p. 89.

78. Itard (1826b), pp. 6-8.

79. Gall and Spurzheim (1810, p. 125) also hypothesize a deaf society with these results.

80. Itard (1821d), p. 325, 1842 ed.

81. Itard (1821d), pp. 327-329, 1842 ed. Matters were not that simple. Massieu came from a family of peasants, Clerc from the bourgeoisie. Massieu had Sicard for a teacher but Clerc had Massieu. Comparing his medical files from his first years as resident physician at the institution with those from a period two decades later, Itard found that the earlier pupils were unable to respond properly to written questions such as “Are you completely deaf? Can you hear a little? Were you born deaf?” Similarly, their handwritten explanations of the illnesses for which they came to see Itard were often unintelligible or, worse, misleading. But by the time Itard wrote his Treatise, the level of general education was much higher; the knowledge of French, acquired through the mediation of manual French following Sicard’s methods, was much greater; and these problems of communication had practically disappeared (Itard, 1821d, p. 330, 1842 ed.). The first inquiry was in 1813, the second in 1831 (Blanchet, 1850, p. 98).

82. Jean-Jacques Virey, a fellow member of the Society of Observers of Man, wrote a natural history of the human species (including a long dissertation on Victor of Aveyron) in which he espoused the prevailing view, which divided the human races into beautiful and white, on the one hand, and ugly and brown or black, on the other (Virey, 1801, v. 1, p. 145). The former are to be found in temperate climes, appropriate for civilized people. Another member of the society noted that the perfect beauty of Apollo and Venus belong to the first category whereas the traits of the Negro are more like those of the orangutan. See Bouteiller (1956). As if the savages themselves realized this similarity, “orangutan” meant “wild man.” For the society as for De Gérando, savages, wild children, and the deaf were all debased forms of human life and all equally interesting. I have related how the society brought Victor to Paris, studied him, and tailed to see the significance of the things Victor could do well on his own. (Lane, 1976). It heard several communications on sign language, particularly from Sicard and Massieu, and sponsored Sicard’s so-called sign dictionary, to allow “communication with the deaf but also primitive peoples” (Copans and Jamin, 1978). (The dictionary could serve for two unrelated groups because it contained pantomime, not sign.) The society also organized all-day nature walks with lectures in a rustic setting, and on one Sicard appeared among the bushes and harangued the troop on the education of the deaf. Much more could be learned, however, from studying an entire primitive nation than a collection of deaf people or a single wild boy. Thus the society planned a major expedition to Australia, which sailed in October of 1800 with the largest contingent of scientists that had ever embarked. To prepare and guide the scientists on the expedition, the society’s distinguished anatomist, Baron Georges Cuvier, wrote a memoir on anatomical differences among the races with instructions on how to collect skulls and other bones and pack them for shipping. De Gérando wrote a counterpart memoir on the behavior of primitive peoples and how to study them. De Gérando was very much in the tradition set down by Condillac, as were Pinel, Itard, indeed the entire Society of Observers and the French Institute. The science of man should use the methods of the natural sciences: the first stage is careful observation, the second comparison, the third induction of general laws. Savages were particularly suitable objects of study because they are subject to fewer modifying influences.

De Gérando begins by explaining that we are so ignorant of other cultures because prior observations were made so improperly. Worst of all, De Gérando says, prior observers failed to learn any of the native tongue, so they could not understand the inhabitants’ customs, ceremonies, history, or even what they did with various tools and artifacts. They could not report on the natives’ language, and describe the grammatical rules it obeyed, if any. They could learn nothing of the inhabitants’ ideas and opinions, unless they learned to communicate with them. “How else could one appreciate their manner of seeing and feeling, [or record] the most secret and essential traits of their character?” What this expedition should do, then, he argued, is to learn Sicard’s system of methodical signs for the deaf in order to establish initial communication with the tribes.

83. De Gérando (1800a), p. 163, 1978 ed.

84. De Gérando (1820), p. 8, 1832 English translation.

85. De Gérando (1820), p. 96, 1832 English translation.

86. De Gérando (1800b), p. 460.

87. De Gérando (1800b), pp. 464, 460.

88. Bayle-Mouillard (1846), p. 34; Morel (1843), p. 19.

89. Biographies of De Gérando: Bayle-Mouillard (1846), Beugnot (1842), Boulatignier (1842), Mignet (1854), Morel (1846), Peabody (1861), E. Peet (1851).

90. Quoted in Le Pére (1879), p. 60.

91. Bébian (1834), Gondelin May-Sept., 1822.

92. De Gérando (1827), p. 572. Recoing (1829). Valade-Gabel (1894), p. 158ff.

93. Morel was born Dec. 5, 1805; he joined the Paris institution Nov. 19, 1824 at the age of forty-two. He was in charge of Itard’s high class (1845) and was to stand in for the director in his absence. Before coming to the Paris school, he was secretary in the government audit office for nineteen years and business manager of the institute for the blind for three years. He founded the Annales de l’Education des Sourds-Muets et des Aveugles (1844-1852) and edited the four circulars published by the Peris school between 1827 and 1836. In 1850 Morel was made director of the Bordeaux school for the deaf, succeeding Valade-Gabel, and in 1857 he died at the age of fifty-one. Gineste (1981), p. 326, states that Morel was forty-two when he joined the Paris school in 1824 but this is evidently an error as the eulogy by one of Morel’s collaborators at Bordeaux (translated in Porter, 1858b) gives his birthdate as Dec. 5, 1805.

94. Perrier, July 18, 1823-June 29, 1827; Borel, June 30, 1827-Nov. 14, 1831.

95. The Conseil de Perfectionnement had five members: Reynuard, Remusat, E. Ordinaire, F. Cuvier, Feuillet. The administrative board comprised the baron De Gérando, the duke of Doudeauville, peer of France, the count Alexis de Noailles, Minister of State and deputy in the Legislature, Dr. Gueneau de Mussy, director of the National Teacher Training College, Baron Rendu, an attorney general, the count of Breteuil, former prefect and a peer, and Frédéric Cuvier, inspector general of universities. None of them knew anything of the deaf and their language.

96. Dupont (1897), pp. 25-26.

97. Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets (1832), p. 83ff. The closest the new director had ever been to the deaf before was when he visited the Besançon school and tried to give the pupils a few lessons based on what he had seen in Germany. He knew nothing of the sign language he was so opposed to—not even that it had nouns and verbs. “I will provide a new proof,” he wrote “Doth of the sterility of sign language in all that concerns the external world and of its great defects arising from its false and exaggerated claims.” The proof had to do with milking cows. “When the sign of milking is for the pupil the sign of milk, what then is the sign for milking? … There you see what the richness and power of sign comes down to—for truly, whenever the sign language has the asset of calling a certain object to mind, it always does so by creating the confusion I have illustrated” (Ordinaire, 1836, p. 194). Pélissier’s dictionary gives the signs for lait (milk) and traire (to milk) used at that time, and they were quite different, as they are here in America as well (Pélissier, 1856, plate 3, no. 10, and plate 7, no. 22). “Since these kinds of mimic signs can never have the variety and precision of written language no matter what we do,” Ordinaire wrote, “it would be a mistake to give them much use in instructing the deaf” (Ordinaire, 1836, p. 206).

98. The first group had been presented to the Faculty of Medicine in 1808. See Halle and Moreau (1808). This report will be found in Husson (1833), and it is reprinted in the 1842 edition of Itard (1821). Itard’s three reports to the administration are: (1821a), (1824), (1826).

99. Bébian (1831), p. 10, says the money, 3,000 francs, was never used, but Houdin (1855), p. 117, Blanchet (1853a), and otners say the class was taught by Valade-Gabel, which he seems to confirm (1894, p. 158). Hervaux (1911) gives a biography of Valade-Gabel. See Cornié (1903).

100. This system was called rotation but meant adherence. See Puybonnieux (1846), (1857).

101. Bébian (1834).

102. Bébian (1834), pp. 20-21.

103. Institution Royale des Sourds-Muets (1832), p. 257ff. Also see Bébian (1834).

104. Puybonnieux (1843), p. 61.

105. Blanchet (1850), p. lxxii.

106. Bébian (1834).

107. Esquiros (1847); Morel (1843), p. 25; Puybonnieux (1843), p. 61, (1857).

108. Bébian (1834).

109. De Gérando (1827), p. 572.

110. When the abortive attempt at imposing the majority language ended and the avenue of a teaching career was reopened to the deaf, the faculty proposed that unusually gifted pupils be kept on after their six-year course to receive supplementary training and then go on to an apprenticeship with a teacher (Morel, 1845, p. 95). Itard left in his will six scholarships for pupils in this supplementary course, but he specified that it must be conducted in French so that the deaf man can “cease to think in his inherently defective and abbreviated language” (Itard, quoted in Morel, 1845; English translation, Lane, 1976, p. 272). Itard died believing French Sign Language was a truncated form of manual French and not a language in its own right, that it was useful in the early stages of instruction but not at the most advanced levels. Itard bequeathed 8,000 francs for the supplementary course: “an absolute requirement for its implementation ought to be to exclude the use of sign language.” In an effort to prepare some students for this enterprise, the articulation class was revived under Puybonnieux and taught intermittently for four years. When Edouard Morel then started Itard’s supplementary course, however, he found that it had to be conducted in writing. Clerc visited it not long after and found communication in sign and written French (Clerc, 1848; Esquiros, 1847; Séguin, 1847, p. 318; Académie Impériale de Médecine, 1853, p. 1012).

History of the articulation class: begun in 1828 at Itard’s insistence, seconded by the Academy of Medicine, which had reviewed his physiological training of hearing and speech, the class was taught first by J.J. Valade-Gabel. It was canceled in 1832 in the backlash from Ordinaire’s attempt to impose total oralism on the school. The class resumed and was taught intermittently by Puybonnieux from 1839 to 1843. With Itard’s will endowing an oral high class, the articulation class became essential, was restored by ministerial decree in 1843, and was taught by Vaïsse one hour daily for seven years. In 1850, J.J. Valade-Gabel, having returned to Paris from Bordeaux, took over the class. His son André taught it from 1851 to 1852, when the director doubled class time to two hours daily—as always, for those who showed some profit by it. Then Hector Volquin taught the course (1852-1857), succeeded by André Valade-Gabel. See Dupont (1897); Académie Impériale de Médecine (1853), p. 850. When Clerc visited the articulation class he found it had about a fifth of the students, taught one hour a day by Léon Vaïsse, who told his visitor that “the most promising pupils might at least be able to make themselves understood” (Day, 1845, p. 95). Valade-Gabel, fired from Bordeaux for mysterious reasons, returned to Paris and took over the articulation class. Vaïsse took charge of Itard’s supplementary course, where he used sign extensively—he called banishing it “acting like a blind man’s teacher who refuses to speak” (Vaïsse, 1854, cited in Petit, 1859, pp. 29-30).

111. Franck (1861); Magnat (1896), p. 75.

112. Blanchet (1856); Magnat in Congress on Deaf—International—First (1878), pp. 409-410; Day and Peet (1861), pp. 99-100. In 1848 Blanchet called the speech of the deaf “the result of constraint and even violence; a temporary achievement, an accident, an anomaly, not the product of knowing how to move the speech organs naturally” (p. 21 of the 1850 ed.). On the other hand, sign language “can reflect and convey all the feelings in man’s heart, all the ideas in man’s mind” (p. 75).

113. Blanchet (1853a), Houdin (1853), Ménière (1853), Volquin (1853a), Académie Impériale de Médecine (1853).

114. Berthier (1853), p. 2.

115. Quoted in Ménière (1853), p. 186.

116. See Drouot (1911), Franck (1861), p. 13. Dubois’s school, founded in 1837, merged with the Paris institution in 1856. He was asked to choose two of his six pupils, who were selected at random from the Paris school, and teach them to speak. In 1849 the pupils were examined by a commission including Blanchet (resident physician at the Paris school) and E. Morel. In 1855, Dubois’s father died, the pupils were transferred to the National Institution, and Dubois and his two sisters were given teaching appointments to instruct the classes. In 1859 the female pupils were all transferred to Bordeaux and the three Duboises left the professorial corps to work in families with very young deaf children. See Congress on Deaf—National—French (1881), pp. 165-166.

117. Séguin (1875), p. 62.

118. Vaïsse (1848b). See his biography by Magnat (1885).

119. De Gérando (1839), p. 521.

120. The will is quoted in Petit (1859), pp. 5-9.

121. The French had then, even more than they do now, a single idea of what it was to be a Frenchman. France was the soil in which the Enlightenment flowered, in which democracy took root. Frenchmen spoke French, the language that was the vehicle for the most advanced literature, government, philosophy, and science. The new order had no place for other languages. Shortly after the founding of the new republic the legislature was told: “Federalism and superstition speak Breton; emigration and hate of the republic speak German; the counterrevolution speaks Italian and fanaticism speaks Basque” (Archives Parlementaires, 1ère série, v. 83, p. 715 [Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1961], quoted in Certeau et al., 1975, p. 11). “Governments do not realize, or do not feel keenly enough,” a deputy expostulated, “how much the annihilation of regional speech is necessary for education, the true knowledge of religion, the ready implementation of the law, national happiness and political tranquility” (Grégoire, quoted in Certeau et al., 1975, p. 21). The renowned Encyclopedia defined a patois as “a degenerate tongue such as is spoken in almost all the provinces.… The language of France is spoken only in the capital” (Diderot, 1765, p. 992 of the 1778 ed., quoted in Certeau et al., 1975, p. 51). The representatives voted to place a French-speaking schoolteacher in every community where “the inhabitants speak a foreign idiom.”

In these circumstances, members of French society who were fundamentally different from the rest had two possibilities—exclusion or assimilation. The mentally ill and retarded were sent outside the city and walled up—they were called aliénés, estranged—and the deaf were excluded in a walled enclosure, a miniature city and farm on top of Mount Sainte-Geneviève. But you could leave the savage state if you could learn to speak French. If you spoke French normally you could leave the asylum for the retarded and mentally ill at La Salpětrière, you could leave Saint-Jacques, you could go to the schools where the new governing classes were being trained, you could be a person at law, you could marry and have children who spoke French. In the panoply of new branches of knowledge there was even one specially devoted to performing this transformation. It was so new then that it had yet to be baptized but it was the lawful child of the new medicine wed to the philosophy of Condillac, and so it was soon called la médecine morale, mental medicine; one of its chief proponents was Jean-Marc Itard. Assimilation or exclusion—Itard was a victim of this antithesis. A doctor, he was charged by his society to alleviate problems that were not medical but rather, in Berthier’s terms, “lofty questions of humanity.”

The legislature passed a second law requiring French as the exclusive language of all official acts and contracts, even in the private sector (Decree of 2 thermidor an 2). The law was not put into application, however. The abbé Grégoire, a member of the Committee of Public Instruction and possibly the best-known “patriot curate” of postrevolutionary France, presented to the legislature the results of a massive investigation of the diversity of languages in the land; it was entitled On the Necessity and Means of Destroying the Patois and Universalizing the Use of French. This fear of linguistic diversity had not diminished in France over eight decades later, even though the new institutions had become secure. In 1864 the Minister of Public Instruction repeated the Grégoire investigation. “Are there schools in your sector where instruction is in the patois?” he wrote to public school inspectors in the provinces. “What can be done to change this state of affairs?” (Bulletin Administratif du Ministère de l’Instruction Publique, nouvelle série, 1864, 1, 395-406, quoted in Certeau et al., 1975, p. 270).

The quotation on drapetomania is from Cartwright (1851), cited in Chorover (1979).

CHAPTER 7 / FORTUNE AND MISFORTUNE

1. Strakhovsky (1970).

2. Nicholas Morris of Boston University has kindly prepared the following report on Count Machwitz. Sometime between 1800 and 1803, Czar Alexander I began an affair with the Princess Marie Antonova Naryshkina, born in Poland as the Princess Czetwertinski and established in Russia as the wife of the wealthy Prince Naryshkin. Alexander had many liaisons before, during, and after his attachment to Naryshkina, but she was to become the one true passion of his life and endure as his mistress until 1822 (Almedingen, 1964, p. 32; Valloton, 1966, p. 288). Florinsky (1967, pp. 631-632), states: “Alexander I, fair, tall and handsome, was slightly lame, having been thrown from his horse in 1794, and early in life he became affected with progressive deafness.…This relationship [with Naryshkina] pursued its uneven course until 1819 and resulted in the birth of several children whom Alexander recognized as his own, although he was aware that Mme. Naryshkin had other lovers.” According to Almedingen (1964), p. 85, Naryshkina bore Alexander a child in 1803 and “in the summer of 1804 … Naryshkina came to her villa at Peterhof and soon the world heard of her second pregnancy.” A third child, a girl, was born to this couple in 1808 (Valloton, 1966, p. 288). In a letter dated June 27, 1810, from Alexander to his sister, we learn that yet a fourth child of Alexander and Naryshkina, a girl, had recently died (Alexander, 1975). If Clerc’s pupil, Count Alexander Machwitz, was indeed the natural son of Czar Alexander, as Clerc claims, he may well have been Naryshkina’s child born in 1803 or the one born in 1804; he would then have been about twelve when Clerc left for America in 1816, which is consistent with the age for studying at the Paris institute and the touching departure scene that Clerc describes. There seems to be no record of other illegitimate children of the czar. Alexander might have embraced as his own a child born to Naryshkina from one of her other liaisons (Gribble, 1931) but those occurred too late for a son to be of school age in 1815, and the boy could not have inherited Alexander’s deafness. Brian-Chaninov (1934, p. 298) states, however, that Naryshkina bore the czar only one son, in 1813. From the preceding, we cannot confirm Clerc’s claim but neither can we reject it.

3. Landes (1876).

4. Sicard (1808a). Clerc Papers no. 2. The Clerc Papers at the Yale University Library include an incomplete inventory that assigns numbers to letters and other documents in the collection. The abbé Sicard wrote: “I have reflected on Clerc’s desire to accompany M. Jauffret and for the reasons Clerc urges I approve of the journey. But I want Clerc to retain his position at our institution and he must therefore request a leave of absence for six months when it appears that he can leave… It will be necessary to keep the greatest secrecy about this trip, even as regards Massieu. Clerc must consult his family. In writing to them, he must not ask leave until Her Majesty the Empress shall have answered my proposal….” Sicard had chosen Jean-Baptiste Jauffret (1771-1828) because he was on intimate terms with his brothers. The oldest was the Bishop of Metz and had edited with Sicard the Annales Religieuses for which the abbé had been ordered deported and was forced into hiding. Another brother was the secretary of the Society of Observers of Man and a good friend to Sicard and Massieu. In truth, Jauffret had been head of a secondary school in Paris and did a creditable job heading the school in St. Petersburg, which was installed in a large house on the right bank of the Neva. Czar Alexander gave him the order of Saint Vladimir (which he had given Sicard), and when he died not long after, one of his disciples succeeded him. See Bébian (1826c); Gallaudet (1818d); Anon. (1896), p. 34.

5. Hamilton (1858); Braddock (1975); Clerc (1858a).

6. Clerc (1858a), Braddock (1975).

7. Sicard (1814).

8. Reprinted in Berthier (1873), p. 243.

9. May 20, 1815. Massieu (1815), p. 123.

10. Handbill dated June 16, 1815, in Clerc Papers no. 40, Yale University.

11. Anon. (1822b), p. 394.

12. The second series ran from June 22 to July 3. Since Gallaudet attended lectures on July 8 and 10, these were apparently part of a third series. Root (1941), p. 69, lists some dignitaries; others are cited in Massieu (1815).

13. Massieu (1815).

14. Massieu (1815), pp. 7, 111.

15. Massieu (1815), p. 93. Also in Clerc (1815).

16. A great many are reprinted in Paulmier (1834a), pp. 312-319.

17. Massieu (1815), pp. 9-10.

18. Massieu (1815), p. 171; Clerc (1818b), p. 3.

19. Clerc (1852); T. H. Gallaudet (1818c), July 8, 10. Also in T. Gallaudet (1815g).

20. Berthier (1873), p. 244. Sicard plans to leave London July 25 and to arrive in Paris by the end of the month.

21. Sicard (1816), Clerc Papers no. 17.

22. Bébian (1826d), p. 357. Clerc Papers no. 10, Yale University.

23. Clerc (1816a).

24. Feb. 14, 1816. T. Gallaudet (1818c).

25. Gallaudet (1816n).

26. Gallaudet (1816n).

27. Clerc Papers no. 20 are a record of an English lesson with Mr. Robertson. The date is uncertain. Massieu (1815) also mentions Clerc’s English study prior to the London trip.

28. Beecher (1848). See Stevens (1876). The children of Mary Austin Ledyard (1775-1849) and Mason Fitch Cogswell (1761-1830) were: Mary Austin (1801-1868); Elizabeth (1803-1856); Alice (1805-1830); Mason Fitch (1807[9?]-1865); Catherine Ledyard (1811-1882). See note 7-40.

29. When the Gallaudets came to Hartford, they moved to what is now 90 Chapel Street (Crofut, 1937).

30. Pierre Elisée, b. Mauzé (near La Rochelle), settled La Rochelle. Son Thomas, b. circ. 1724, d. circ. 1772, m. 1750 Catherine Edgar, b. 1725, d. 1774. Son Peter Wallace, b. N.Y., Apr. 21, 1756, d. Washington, D.C. May 16, 1843, m. Hartford, Feb. 27, 1787, Jane dtr. Capt. Thos. and Alice (Howard) Hopkins (who d. Oct. 1797 and Apr. 30, 1778, respectively) b. May 8, 1766, Hartford, d. New York, Nov. 20, 1818. Son Thomas Hopkins, b. Philadelphia, Dec. 10, 1787, d. Hartford, Sept. 9, 1851. On the Gallaudet family, see Hayden (1888); E.M. Gallaudet (1888); Boatner (1959a, b); Dexter (1911), v. 5, pp. 149-157.

31. Walker (1884). Strong (1748-1816): Yale (1769), tutor (1772-1773), ordained (1774), chaplain Revolutionary Army, Connecticut Evangelical Magazine (1800-1815), Connecticut Missionary Society (1798-1806).

32. Perkins (1817).

33. By Isaac Watts, cited in Osborn (1928), p. 336.

34. Goodrich (1857), v.2, p.118.

35. Larned (1874).

36. Ebeneezer Devotion (1714-1771). James Cogswell was installed Feb. 19, 1772.

37. Dexter (1911); Bacon (1882).

38. S. Cogswell (1790).

39. Root (1941), p. 37.

40. Strong (1807). For Cogswell genealogy, see Jameson (1884): James, July 1746-Nov. 20, 1792; Alice, Dec. 1749-May 9[11?], 1772; Samuel, May 1754-Aug. 24, 1790; Septimus, Aug. 1769-Oct. 1773; Mason Fitch, Sept. 1701-Dec. 10, 1830. See note 7-28.

41. The diary is excerpted and commented upon in Root (1941), pp. 22-33; Bacon (1882); Trumbull (1886), pp. 600-602.

42. The diary records several visits to “Col. Trumbull’s,” that is, to Joseph Trumbull. Jonathan Trumbull (1740-1809) was Washington’s chief of staff, member of congress in 1789, Speaker of the House in 1791, senator in 1794, and then governor in 1798. His brother John (1756-1843) was a famous portrait painter; his brother Joseph (1737-1778) was the first commissary general of the Continental Army; his daughter, Faith, married Daniel Wadsworth. His father, Jonathan (1710-1785), was Connecticut’s governor (1769-1783) during the Revolution.

43. Root (1941), p. 36. On Apr. 13, 1800, Mason Fitch Cogswell married Mary Austin, only daughter of Col. Austin and Sarah (Sheldon) Ledyard of Hartford. See Root (1941), Stevens (1876).

44. Root (1941).

45. Beecher (1848).

46. Knight (1838); Sumner and Russell (1890).

47. Cunningham (1942), p. 211. Cogswell (1824).

48. Crofut (1937). Barber (1836).

49. Sheldon (1865).

50. Howard (1943), p. 201, states that in 1793 the Courant serialized a burlesque to rival the Mercury’s Echo, called the Versifier, probably by Mason Cogswell.

51. The physician Lemuel Hopkins was chiefly responsible for the Anarchiad, a dozen serialized poems that chanted the dangers and difficulties of the new federation—the most famous political satire of its time. The aide was David Humphreys. John Trumbull, second cousin to the portrait painter, wrote McFingal, satirizing the position of the British loyalists in New England at the outbreak of the revolution. It went through thirty editions and was considered to “set a new tone in American letters” (Trumbull, 1886). Oliver Wolcott became governor. Richard Alsop was a bibliophile, a naturalist and a linguist. Theodore Dwight was Alsop’s brother-in-law, a member of Congress, and an editor; he published the Courant for many years and founded the Mirror, known all over the United States for its vigilant and sharp-tongued defense of federalism. Dwight worked with Mason Cogswell and Richard Alsop on the Echo, and a wrote a hymn that was America’s national anthem until displaced by the “Star-Spangled Banner.” Noah Webster is the remaining member of the later Wits. On Hopkins: Trumbull (1886), p. 601; Parsons (1936). On Barlow: Morgan (1904), v. 2, p. 305; Sheldon (1865); Parsons (1922), p. 36.

52. A friend and sometime collaborator of these later Wits was a third physician, Elihu Smith, who contributed to the Echo and published the first American anthology of poetry but died at twenty-seven of yellow fever.

53. Other sources on the Wits: Parsons (1936), Howard (1943), Goodrich (1857), Harrington (1969). John Trumbull (1750-1831), Joel Barlow (1754-1812), Lemuel Hopkins (1750-1801), David Humphreys (1752-1818), Richard Alsop (1761-1815), Theodore Dwight (1764-1846), Mason Cogswell (1761-1830), Timothy Dwight (1752-1817), Elihu Smith (1771-1797), Noah Webster (1758-1843), Oliver Wolcott (1760-1833).

54. Dunglison’s dictionary of medical science, published in Boston in 1833, gives “spotted fever” as a synonym for typhus. The term has also been used as a synonym for Rocky Mountain spotted fever and meningococcal meningitis. See North (1811).

55. Mary Cogswell (1814); Hamett Cogswell (1816).

56. Weld (1848), p. 9. The brothers and sisters of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet (1787-1851): ii, Edgar (1779-1790); iii, Charles (1792-1830); iv and v,—and Catherine (b. and d. Dec. 1793, twins); vi, James (1793-1856); vii, William Edgar (1797-1821); viii, Ann Watts (1800-1850); ix, Jane (1801-1835); x, Theodore (1805-1885); xi, Edward (1808-1847); xii, Wallace (1811-1816).

57. Boatner (1959a); Goodrich (1857), v.2, p.126; Anon. (1891b).

58. T.H. Gallaudet (1849).

59. Humphrey (1857), pp. 20-23.

60. Yale: Dexter (1911); Morgan (1904), v. 4, p. 237; Steiner (1893). Yale had changed since Mason Cogswell’s day, twenty-five years earlier. There were more students, over two hundred, more buildings in Brick Row, two more professors, and a broader curriculum. Benjamin Silliman, the great pioneer in chemistry, had joined the faculty to teach the physical sciences, Jeremiah Day, future president of the college, taught mathematics, and the current president, Timothy Dwight, met with the seniors five days a week to teach theology, logic, and rhetoric. Dwight was a brilliant orator, his form erect and full of dignity, his face beaming with intelligence and virtue, his whole appearance imposing. Students in tall hats and swallow-tailed coats debated before him such topics as: Are novels beneficial? Are theaters beneficial? Both questions received a negative answer under President Dwight.

61. Barnard (1852).

62. E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p.26ff.

63. Simpson (1859); Sprague (1857), v. 2, pp. 609-615.

64. When Thomas Gallaudet completed his divinity studies and was licensed to preach, in the spring of the following year, he refused an offer from Daniel Webster and others to serve as their pastor in Portsmouth, N. H. He gave poor health as his reason but he devoted much of the ensuing winter to teaching Alice how to read and write, and it seems he sensed another calling. Gallaudet (1818b).

65. Cited in Haight (1930), p. 58.

66. Cited in Haight (1930), p. 111.

67. Sigourney (1851), pp. 252-253.

68. Sigourney (1851), pp. 254-255. Sigourney has run together in her book letters from different periods. The letter beginning (p. 256) “Mr. Gallaudet gone to Paris” must have been written between Mar. and June 1816. The next, after Dec. 25, 1816, when Reverend Strong died. I do not know the date of the New Haven visit (pp. 255-256) or of the final letter here (pp. 256-257).

69. Sigourney (1854), p.241.

70. Sigourney (1845), p. 239.

71. Sigourney (1866), pp. 222-223.

72. Oct., 1827, Sigourney collection 2, 6. Cited in Wood (1972), p. 166.

73. Russell (1895), p. 218; Trumbull (1886), p. 163; Parsons (1922), p. 71; Dwight (1866); Perkins (1895), p. 199. I am particularly indebted to Wood’s insightful article (1972). Charles Sigourney: b. July 21, 1778, m. (1) Jane Carter, who d. Jan. 24, 1818; (2) Lydia Huntley, June 16, 1819. She d. June 10, 1865. He d. Dec. 30, 1854. On Sigourney see also: as educator, Sheldrick (1971); biography by Haight (1930); life in Norwich, Perkins (1895); Sigourney home, Lowell (1870), Osborn (1928); her social circle, Beecher (1865); her poetry, Duyckinck (1856).

74. Sigourney (1851), p. 259.

75. Green (1783); Epée (1784). Gallaudet (1818b) states that Mason Cogswell had read Epée, and the Library of Congress holdings in the Gallaudet collection include a copy of Francis Green’s (1801) translation inscribed “To Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet from M.F. Cogswell, July 1, 1817.” H. Barnard (1852) was probably mistaken when he wrote that Mason Cogswell consulted Sicard’s works initially.

76. Morgan (1904), v. 2, p. 319; v. 3, pp. 43, 391; S. Gilbert (1839).

77. M.F. Cogswell (1811).

78. Mason subsequently wrote to Gilbert, who responded the following spring with expressions of gratitude. “I now feel a strong confidence that before a very distant period we shall have a school established for these unfortunate children—God knows how much it is wanted!” Of his thirteen children, he wrote, five were deaf (one later attended the Hartford school). To remind the clergy of their promise to conduct the census and to excite public interest, he had written an article, which he hoped Mason would give to the publisher of a Hartford newspaper (S. Gilbert, 1812). The article was indeed published in May in the Connecticut Courant, which Theodore Dwight then edited. The article is reprinted in Association Review, 1901, 3, pp. 134-135.

79. M.F. Cogswell (1812).

80. Association Review, 1900, 2, p. 263ff.

81. Reprinted in E.M. Gallaudet (1888).

82. Kimball (1814).

83. Trumbull (1886), p. 602; E.M. Gallaudet (1913).

84. Parsons (1922), p. 109.

85. Trumbull (1886), p. 598. Daniel Buck was, like Woodbridge, a merchant. Major John Caldwell was a shipbuilder and legislator and a partner of Daniel’s father in the insurance business (Morgan, 1904, v. 4, p. 218). Henry Hudson, a prominent businessman who later became mayor, was there, as was a Mr. Joseph Battel from Norfolk (all others were from Hartford).

86. This quote appears in T.H. Gallaudet (1824a).

87. On Apr. 20, 1815. The meeting was held Apr. 13. Moores (1978), p. 50, describes discrepancies in dates given by various authors for the date of the meeting and of Gallaudet’s sailing. Thomas Gallaudet’s son and biographer, E. M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 49, gives April 13, 1815, for the meeting, as does Cogswell’s biographer (Bartlett, 1899, p. 612). Gallaudet’s letters from the ship (1815c, d) show that he got on board May 19, 1815, and that sailing was delayed five or six days. Lewis Weld, the second director of the American Asylum, states that the ship left May 25, 1815, a fact confirmed by E. M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 56. Weld also confirms that Gallaudet agreed to go to France on April 20, 1815 (the date is also given in Gallaudet’s journal), but it seems he is in error in stating that the subscribers’ meeting took place after that accord, on May 1, rather than before it, on April 13, as E. M. Gallaudet (1888) and Bartlett (1899) would have it. E. M. Gallaudet (1886b) gives March 13 for the meeting and April 25 for the sailing (pp. 131-132); it seems he predated both of the events by one month, an error he corrected in his biography of his father.

88. T.H. Gallaudet (1815c, 1815d).

89. T.H. Gallaudet (1815b). A month later, Gallaudet wrote to Cogswell again (T.H. Gallaudet, 1815e). He was still on board the Mexico. He had written another letter to Alice, enclosed, and Hymn at Sea, which was sung on board at the worship service. See T.H. Gallaudet (1815a).

90. T.H. Gallaudet (1815f).

91. T.H. Gallaudet (1818c).

92. T.H. Gallaudet (1818g).

93. Cited in Goodrich (1857), v. 2, p. 222.

94. See Humphrey (1857), P. 57. Anon. (1818a) estimates 15,000, half of them children (p. 226).

95. T.H. Gallaudet (1818c). The other primary sources for events in London are Gallaudet’s letters in the Library of Congress, in E.M. Gallaudet (1888), and in Humphrey (1857). On the meeting of the trustees, see Anon. (1822b), p. 40; Arrowsmith (1819), p. 14.

96. T.H. Gallaudet (1818c), p. 2.

97. T.H. Gallaudet (1815g). Thomas Gallaudet took up lodging at his brother James’s, where he found a letter from Alice Cogswell: A. Cogswell (1815b). Also see A. Cogswell (1815c).

98. T.H. Gallaudet (1818c).

99. Bracketed expressions in “Monday 10th” are quoted from T.H. Gallaudet (1815g).

100. Bell (1918). Mrs. Braidwood had just written to her son John in Virginia: “We were very much surprised and rather alarmed lately by the application of a Mr. Gallaydet [sic].… Having flattered ourselves that you were long ‘ere this established … we have recommended his making application to you.” It is unlikely that John Braidwood received the letter. It is reprinted in the Association Review, 1900, 2, 396-397.

101. T.H. Gallaudet (1815i).

102. Thomas described him in a letter to an Andover friend: “There is something most engaging about him.… Dignity, benevolence, modesty, nay, childlike simplicity, combined with great ease and elegance and when I saw him, softened almost into tenderness, somewhat like melancholy—and I thought, how would some of our self-conceited, ostentatious, confident, domineering, conversation-engrossing, literary, scrap-puffing, oracular, dogmatical, would-be great folks hide their diminished heads and blush at their petty greatness if they could see the chaste modesty of one of the greatest scholars and philosophers of Europe!” Cited in Humphrey (1857), pp. 45-47. The interview is also mentioned in T.H. Gallaudet (1815i).

103. Stewart (1812).

104. E.M. Gallaudet (1888), pp. 52, 88. T.H. Gallaudet (1815i).

105. Sources on Brace: Gallaudet (1815m), Woodruff (1849), Weld (1837). Also see Howe (1857); Schwartz (1956). On Mitchell: see Stewart (1812) and the biography in Porter (1848b).

106. A. Cogswell (1815e). John Gordon (1816) was on the governing board of the Asylum and James F. Gordon (1818) was its secretary. Gallaudet visited the former, fruitlessly as it turned out. See his letter to Mason Cogswell: T.H. Gallaudet (1815i).

107. Joseph Turner entered the Edinburgh Institution at age twelve in 1811. Further mention of his communicating chiefly by sign appears in the school report for the annual exercise of the following year (Edinburgh Institution, 1817, pp. 55, 65).

108. Hannah More (1745-1833).

109. Zachary Macaulay (1768-1838), editor of the Christian Observer (1802-1816) and father of Thomas Babington Macaulay, English historian, invited Thomas to spend Sabbath at his house in Clapham some four miles from town (T.H. Gallaudet, 1816c).

110. Macaulay (1817).

111. Macaulay (1818a). His denial also appears in J.F. Gordon (1818); see T.H. Gallaudet’s rebuttal (1818g).

112. Macaulay (1818b). History shortly tested the honesty of these disclaimers. A Dublin physician, C.E.H. Orpen, started a subscription to open a deaf school and applied to Watson for a qualified instructor or permission to send one for training; he was refused. Next he applied to Thomas Braidwood’s grandson, then head of the Birmingham institution, “but he would not teach anyone without being well paid and without an engagement not to teach anyone else (as teacher) for some years” (Barnard, 1852, p. 77, 1859 ed.). Finally, Orpen approached Kinniburgh, who decried the fact that the English “still act on the same illiberal plan,” but explained that his bond to them forced him to refuse also (reprinted in Humphrey, 1857, p. 82). So the Dublin school opened with untrained teachers. Shortly, Kinniburgh’s bond to London expired and the Dublin principal could finally receive his instruction—on condition that he pay Kinniburgh 750 pounds for three months’ tuition and swear never to give instruction to any who might set up a rival institution in Scotland! See Syle (1887), p. 13; Barnard (1852). The restriction was ultimately removed.

113. T.H. Gallaudet (1816e).

114. T.H. Gallaudet (1816f).

115. T.H. Gallaudet (1816g).

116. In T.H. Gallaudet (1818c) Gallaudet says he is to receive daily private lessons from Massieu, but in T.H. Gallaudet (1816n) Massieu proposes that he and Clerc alternate in giving Gallaudet lessons. In T.H. Gallaudet (1818b), he states that he received daily lessons “from Massieu and Clerc.” Clerc (1852) says he taught Gallaudet three times a week. Boatner (1959a) and Booth (1881) also mention that Gallaudet took some lessons from Sicard’s hearing collaborator, Paulmier.

117. T.H. Gallaudet (1818a).

118. Macaulay (1818c); H. More, cited in E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 105.

119. A. Cogswell (1815f).

120. A list of contributors appears in Fusfeld (1922). Also see E.M. Gallaudet (1886a); M. Cogswell and Woodbridge (1815).

121. M.F. Cogswell and Woodbridge (1816a).

122. The second Monday of June, 1816. At the same place, on June 26, by-laws were adopted and officers appointed (Barnard, 1852, p. 130 of the 1859 ed.).

123. T.H. Gallaudet (1816g).

124. Clerc (1852).

125. T.H. Gallaudet (1816h). Gallaudet made his proposal on May 20, 1816, and wrote this letter on May 21.

126. Clerc (1816b).

127. Bebian (1826d), p. 357, says Clerc was paid 500 francs at the Institution. Clerc’s contract with Gallaudet states he is to be paid $500. There were five francs to the dollar then as, approximately, now (1981).

128. Clerc (1816b).

129. Sicard (1816).

130. Reprinted in E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 97.

131. T.H. Gallaudet (1816l). Translated and excerpted in Lane (1976), pp. 216-217. A Mr. Upson, a friend of Mason’s and Wilder’s trading partner in America, introduced Gallaudet and Wilder (T.H. Gallaudet, 1816h). Gallaudet went to see Sicard in Paris bearing a letter of introduction from Zachary Macaulay and he was accompanied by S.V.S. Wilder, who was known to Sicard. It was Wilder who, on the illness of the American ambassador, represented the United States at Napoleon’s marriage to the daughter of Francis I, emperor of Austria. Wilder was president of the American Tract Society and fond of broadcasting Bibles throughout France. See Root (1941).

132. Sicard (1817). On Gallaudet’s goodbye to Paulmier, see E. Booth (1881). Gallaudet’s letter of thanks to Paulmier is reprinted in Paulmier (1834a), pp. 339-340.

133. T.H. Gallaudet (1816b). The letter is in: A. Cogswell (1816a). The pupil Gallaudet came to know best at Kinniburgh’s school was Helen Hall. He wrote about her (1816d) to Mason Cogswell, urged Helen to write to Alice, which she did (T.H. Gallaudet, 1816b), and Helen’s father wrote to Mason enclosing another exchange between their daughters (J. Hall, 1816).

134. T.H. Gallaudet (1816i).

135. The passport issued to Clerc for return from his second trip to France in 1835 is among the Clerc Papers no. 21 bis, Yale University Library. Clerc lists the date of his departure as June 18, 1816 (Clerc Papers no. 67).

CHAPTER 8 / SPREADING THE WORD

1. Clerc (1816c).

2. Locke (1690), book 3, ch. 2, sec. 1 (v. 2, p. 8, Dover 1959 ed.).

3. Macaulay’s letter of Nov. 7, 1818 (reprinted in E. M. Gallaudet, 1888, p. 106), states: “The luminous account you gave me of the superiority of the French mode of instruction over the deaf and dumb you will have already seen in the pages of the Christian Observer.”

4. “B” (1818).

5. As Thomas sailed toward America, Alice wrote a brief essay on his homecoming in Lydia Sigourney’s class: “Mr. Gallaudet gone to Paris.—Come back with Mr. Clerc—Teach deaf and dumb, new words, new signs.—Oh, beautiful.—I very afraid wind blow hard on Ocean—turn over ship.—Alice very afraid.—Mr. Gallaudet will pray God to keep, not drown.—Wind blow right way.—I very glad.” Reprinted in Sigourney (1851), p. 256.

6. Anon. (1818b).

7. “B” (1819).

8. T.H. Gallaudet (1819a).

9. Arrowsmith (1819), p. 85.

10. Arrowsmith (1824), p. 487.

11. Anon. (1822b).

12. Rémi Valade published a grammar of French Sign Language: Valade, Y.L. Rémi (1854b). Also see: Lane and Grosjean (1980), Klima and Bellugi (1979). The discussion of fallacies was inspired by Markowicz (1977), and see Baker and Padden (1978). For other articles on sign language before 1900, see: Anon (1863, 1865); Akerly (1824); F.A.P. Barnard (1834, 1835); Bébian (1817, 1825, 1826a, b); Bell (1898); Berthier (1852b); F.W. Booth (1902, 1905a, b, 1909); Caldwell (1912); Cary (1851); Chambellan (1887); Critchley (1939); Crouter (1894); De Gérando (1827); Fay (1892); Francis (1859); Frishberg (1975); Fusfeld (1958); T.H. Gallaudet (1859); George (1890); Haerne (1875); G. Hutton (1869); J.S. Hutton (1870, 1874); Keep (1857, 1869, 1871a, b); Kinney (1859); Knowlson (1965); Kroeber (1958); Lambert (1865); H. Lane (1976, 1978a, 1980); Markowicz (1977); Mottez (1975); New York Institution (1838), p. 21, (1845); H.P. Peet (1851b, 1867); I.L. Peet (1887); Porter (1846); Rambosson (1853); Sibscota (1670); Sicard (1808); Stokoe (1960); Syle (1873a), p. 158; Turner (1859); Tylor (1865); Vaïsse (1854); Valade (1854a, b); Weeks (1890); Wilkins (1694); Williams (1898); Woodbridge (1830); Woodward (1973, 1976, 1978a); Woodward and Erting (1975); Woodward and De Santis (1977).

13. T.H. Gallaudet (1816j) wrote to Mason Cogswell on sighting land. Clerc gives this date (Clerc Papers, no. 67). For Clerc’s impressions of New York, see Clerc (1852), pp. 110-111.

14. The letter by Nathaniel Moore is reprinted in E.M. Gallaudet (1888), pp. 112-115.

15. T.H. Gallaudet (1816k).

16. American School (1816c).

17. The letter is reprinted in the Association Review, 1902, 4, 20-21.

18. Also with Dr. Edward Miller. Samuel Latham Mitchill (1764-1831), often misspelled Mitchell. The letter is reprinted in the Association Review, 1900, 2, 66-68. It was written in 1781, published in 1804.

19. See: Bell in the Association Review, 1901, 3, 439-451; Sommers (1835).

20. Currier (1893), p. 10.

21. Samuel Hopkins, b. 1721, grad. Yale 1741. Edwards was then 39 and Timothy Dwight’s mother, 8. See Hopkins (1854).

22. Cited in Grant (1978). Twain came to Hartford in January 1868, and again in June 1869, but did not settle there until 1871 (Boatner, 1959a, p. 117). Clerc gives the date of his arrival in Hartford as August 22, 1816 (Clerc Papers no. 67). Rugoff (1981), p. 568, states that in the 1850s Hartford had the highest per capita income in the United States.

23. See Clerc (1816c), p. 13.

24. Boston: arrived Sept. 4, 1816. Lectures to men at Boston Atheneum Sept. 7 and 9, to women at New Court House Sept. 10. See Clerc (1852) for texts. Clerc (1816d) is a copy of the coverage in Boston Intelligencer on Sept. 14 and Columbian Centinel Sept. 18. Barnard (1852), p. 154, 1859 ed., lists contributors by city.

25. M.F. Cogswell (1816d).

26. Salem: address Sept. 24, 1816. Clerc (1816d) recopies coverage in the Salem Gazette for Sept. 27, including text of address. New Haven: address on Oct. 18. Clerc (1816d) recopies coverage in the Connecticut Journal for Oct. 22, including text of address and questions and answers. Also cited in Courant: Anon. (1816).

27. M. Cogswell (1816c).

28. T.H. Gallaudet (1816m).

29. New York: M.F. Cogswell (1816d).

30. New York: M.F. Cogswell (1816e). This third meeting took place on Monday, Nov. 4, in the mayor’s office and the fourth on Dec. 6 (New York Institution Reports, 1816).

31. Albany: M.F. Cogswell (1816f). They left New York City on Wednesday, Nov. 6, and arrived Albany Thursday, Nov. 7. Address on Saturday, Nov. 9. Clerc (1816d) copies coverage in the Albany Daily Advertiser for Tuesday, Nov. 12, including the text of the address and questions and answers.

32. M.F. Cogswell (1816g).

33. Currier (1893), p, 10 New York Institution Reports (1816), p. 429 of the 1901 reprinting. New York City: the group left Albany on Monday, Nov. 18, and arrived in New York the following day (M.F. Cogswell, 1816h, i). Mason Cogswell went directly to the post office and found a letter from Alice: “My very most dear Pappa—I think and I afraid you never come back here Hartford. I want you here all family …

“I want see Mr. Clerc I want see signs very many Mr. Clerc tell signs I love very much see signs Mr. Clerc same very beautiful signs Mr. Gallaudet …

“How many days before you come back here in Hartford,—My mama and my Sisters and My Brother all family says me give love you very much give you,—My very most Dear Papa very kind and I love you very much much I give kiss you, Most affectionate Daughter, Alice Cogswell” (A. Cogswell, 1816b).

34. Hallam (1816). Hallam’s letter indicates that Mason had written to Braidwood a second time in the fall of 1816, enclosing his letter with one to Hallam.

35. Bell Association Review, 1905, 7, 50.

36. Bell Association Review, 1905, 7, 50.

37. American School (1816c).

38. Philadelphia: Gallaudet and Clerc left New York on Friday, Nov. 23 (Cogswell, 1816i). The address was on Saturday, Dec. 7 (Clerc, 1816d). The latter source copies coverage in the Philadelphia Gazette for Dec. 11, including the text of Clerc’s address and questions and answers. Also reprinted in Clerc (1817a). The meeting is also reported in the Courant on Dec. 24; see Clerc (1816e).

39. American School (1816); Gard (1816).

40. Burlington. Clerc Papers no. 66: Notice from Burlington Dec. 16; Clerc and Gallaudet will demonstrate the extraordinary success that has attended the education of the deaf and dumb in France—come to the Academy (T.H. Gallaudet, 1816m). Clerc and Gallaudet returned to New York by way of Burlington, N.J. A town meeting was held with the ex-governor presiding: they made a favorable impression. The largest subscription was $500 from the good father Boudinet and the smallest from a little girl who gave fifty cents anonymously. Boudinet urged them to call for a subscription on Joseph Bonaparte, the ex-king of Spain, who had retired to the United States after Waterloo. They waited a day at Bordentown to see him but he did not return from a trip, so they left him a letter and a subscription paper, fruitlessly, as it turned out.

41. New York: Clerc (1817b); New York Institution Reports (1817); A. Cogswell (1816c). The fifth meeting took place on Jan. 14, 1817. The fifth report of the N.Y. Institution states that there were ten wards by the time of a sixth meeting on Jan. 23, 1817. The census tolled 66 deaf and dumb residents of the city, seven wards reporting, population of 120,000. Reprinted in Association Review, 1905, 7, 65-70. H.P. Peet (1852c), p. 7, states that the population was 100,000. Alice wrote from Hartford (A. Cogswell, 1816c).

42. M.F. Cogswell (1817a, b, c).

43. E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 118.

44. Turner (1870); Barnard (1852), p. 21 of the 1859 ed. Clerc gives the opening date of the school in the City Hotel as April 17, 1817 (Clerc Papers no. 67).

45. Barnard (1852); Dutton (1852), p. 426; Booth (1881); Sprague (1857); Rae (1854).

46. T.H. Gallaudet (1818a).

47. E.M. Gallaudet (1886a), p. 426.

48. Boatner (1959a).

49. Morgan (1904), v. 3, p. 151; Dooey (1938); Waldo (1818). Boatner (1959a) states that Morgan’s coffeehouse was opened by Joseph Morgan, grandfather of J. Pierpont Morgan.

50. Lane (1978b); Goodrich (1857), v. 2, p. 127.

51. Many authors mistakenly give the second home of the asylum, on Prospect Street, as its first. However, Stansbury (1817a) described the school on Main Street while living there and Weld (1848), the second principal, confirmed this. Also see Russell (1895); Barnard (1852), p. 194, 1859 ed.

52. W. Turner (1853b).

53. Dillingham (1816).

54. S. Gilbert (1812, 1816).

55. Backus had taught at the Central New York Asylum, founded in 1822. Mr. William Reid went to the New York Institution to prepare himself for its direction. In 1832, Peet went there and proposed a merger, which was declined. In 1836, the legislature forced the merger and Backus acquired the Radii (Fox, 1932).

56. Cited in Braddock (1975), p. 5. His example was followed by Edmund Booth, editor of the Eureka, and by James George (1825-1876), editor of the Richmond (Ky.) Messenger, acquired 1861.

57. A. Cogswell (1817).

58. T.H. Gallaudet (1818b); Root (1941), p. 71.

59. Clerc (1818b). J. Williams (1893a) states that, of the first 100 pupils, 28 came from 23 families, in which there were 48 other deaf. In this group, one-half were born deaf, another third were prelingually deafened. Their average age was eighteen. The average stay grew gradually; by 1835 the minimum was five years. Names and statistics appear in the 71st report of the American School.

60. J. Williams (1893a).

61. J. Turner (1885); Anon. (1871a).

62. New York Institution Reports (1838); H.P. Peet (1857a).

63. Stone (1867), p. 27; J. Williams (1893); Peet (1857), p. 359; Moores (1978), p. 214.

64. Williams (1882), p. 56. Also see the second report of the American School.

65. Barnard (1852); Barber (1836); Woodbridge (1830).

66. T.H. Gallaudet (1821a).

67. Cited in E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 121. And an early report from the school states that its original design was to make it “the gate to heaven for those poor lambs of the flock who have hitherto been wandering in the paths of ignorance, like sheep without a shepherd” (third report of the American School, cited in E.A. Fay, 1917a).

68. Barnard (1852); Peet (1852); J. Harrington (1852); Conference of Executives (1888).

69. E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 123.

70. Root (1941), p. 71; Syle (1887), p. 18; a sketch appears p. 22. The building was at 15, later renumbered 48, Prospect Street. Clerc (1825); in 1818 there were 115 scholars.

71. De Witt Clinton was an admirer of Mitchill’s, according to Gross (1861). The histories of the New York Institution in Currier (1893) and the school’s fifth report do not contain an accurate record of the meetings leading up to its incorporation. These were: (1) at Rev. Stanford’s home; (2) at Tammany Hall; (3) at the mayor’s office, Nov. 4, 1816, Mason Cogswell attending; (4) at the mayor’s office, call for census, Dec. 6, 1816, Laurent Clerc present (Clerc, 1817b); (5) at the mayor’s office, report on census, Jan. 14, 1817; (6) at the mayor’s office, report on constitution, Jan. 23, 1817 (see Association Review, 1901, 3, 438); (7) a meeting leading to petition to the legislature for Act of Incorporation, submitted Apr. 15, 1817; (8) first board meeting, May 22, 1817.

72. Stansbury (1817b). Several of the female pupils urged Clerc to chat with them after school in the ladies’ sitting room. He felt it an innocent request he should endeavor to grant since their chief business at the asylum was to acquire language and his language was the foundation for all their improvement. Mrs. Stansbury considered that the young ladies were in her charge, that Clerc was too attentive to them, and that he must not join them in the sitting room (T.H. Gallaudet, 1817b, c). After this and many other incidents, Thomas Gallaudet asked the board to request the Stansburys’ resignation. This they did, but the superintendent argued that there were no grounds for dissatisfaction and that if Thomas “could not get along with him,” as he was reported to have said, then Thomas did not have to board in the house, he could board elsewhere. The matter was left there and Stansbury crowed in a letter to his brother that he had “defeated the machinations of a malignant enemy” (Stansbury, 1817c).

73. Currier (1893).

74. Clerc (1818a).

75. Superintendents in this era at the American Asylum: Stansbury (1817-1818); Samuel Whittlesey (1818-1824). Title changed to Steward: H. Peet (1824-1881); W.W. Turner (1831-1847). See Barnard (1852).

76. W.C. Woodbridge was hired Dec. 4, 1817. See T.H. Gallaudet (1818b). Alcott (1861) gives a biography.

77. T.H. Gallaudet (1817d).

78. Barnard (1852), p. 75, 1859 ed. Stone (1867) gives a garbled account of names and dates. Barnard has the facts straight. It is ironic that a few years earlier Woodbridge had received a pressing invitation from the Birmingham school to succeed its director, Thomas Braidwood, who had died. They wanted someone from Hartford since they wished to supplant sham speech with education through sign language; when Woodbridge refused because of his health, they hired a Swiss Protestant who was a follower of Epée’s method.

79. W. Turner (1853b); Braddock (1975).

80. Braddock (1975). Whiton and Loring were assistants in 1825 and instructors beginning in 1826.

81. E. Booth (1881); F. Booth (1975c).

82. E. Booth (1905c); Sagra (1837), p. 444; Braddock (1975).

83. E. Booth (1953). Booth, his wife, and his brother-in-law had the pleasure of finding themselves denoted in the census of 1840 as “deaf, dumb, blind, idiotic, insane, and colored.” The reason this entry was made for Anamosa was that the returns of the census were grossly perverted in the interests of slavery, to create the impression that a far greater proportion of the free blacks of the North suffered from various physical infirmities than the slaves of the South. (The French Annals of Public Health then cited these false census results, among others, as proving that blacks tend to marry relatives and have defective offspring. See Fay, 1876, p. 207.) According to H.P. Peet (1852c), quite the reverse was true: a lower incidence of deafness among blacks than among whites in the North. Figuier (1863), p. 339, cites the fake census figures from Iowa and concludes: “In the colored population, in which slavery facilitates consanguineous and even incestuous union, the proportion of deaf-mutes was ninety-one times higher than in the white population, protected by civil, moral, and religious law.” For more on tampering with the 1840 census to safeguard slavery, see Jarvis (1855).

84. Clerc (1852), p. 114; Turner (1870); E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 132; Carlin (1885). Thomas Gallaudet found Clerc’s absence a further burden (T.H. Gallaudet, 1818c, p. 132).

85. Root (1941); E.M. Gallaudet (1886a, b, 1888); Weld (1848). The application to Congress was Jan. 25, 1819; the board voted thanks on Mar. 19, and petitioned the General Assembly for a change in name in May 1819. About a year after the school opened, Clerc took forty-two pupils to Center Church, where he gave an address and conducted a public examination before the governor and both houses of the legislature (Clerc, 1818b).

86. Sicard (1817).

87. Contract dated Apr. 25, 1820. Clerc Papers.

88. E.M. Gallaudet (1888), p. 130; Moores (1978), p. 76, also mentions the salary inequity.

89. E. Booth (1881).

90. Sicard (1820).

91. Chester (1820); Root (1941), p. 89.

92. T.H. Gallaudet (1821b); G.O. Fay (1899); Burnet (1835); Barber (1836), p. 32.

93. Carlin [n.d.], p. 2. Crofut (1937).

94. Williams (1882).

95. Stone (1866).

96. Barnard (1852), p. 92, 1859 ed.

97. T.H. Gallaudet (1824a); Stone (1867), p. 23; Anon. (1824).

98. Morse (1933), p. 176.

99. Anon. (1835a).

100. Report of the New York Institution for 1843, cited in Barnard (1852), p. 92, 1859 ed. Also see Clarke Institution (1893a), p. 15.

101. H.P. Peet (1857a).

102. Cited in Bell, Association Review, 7, 53-60.

103. Akerly (1821a); F.A.P. Barnard (1834). Akerly then wrote to Cogswell stating that Stansbury had persuaded them Hartford was ill-disposed toward them, even jealous, but now that he was gone, there could be a rapprochement. He enclosed a copy of a textbook he had written to replace Watson’s. Mason Cogswell answered huffily that their success placed them above jealousy; Hartford had been ill-disposed to the New York school in view of the way they began, the principal they chose, and their mode of instruction (Akerly, 1821b; M.F. Cogswell, 1821).

104. Currier (1893); H.P. Peet (1857a); N.Y. State Senate (1827).

105. Clerc (1827); the school replied in its ninth report.

106. New York State Department of Public Instruction (1828).

107. H.P. Peet: Part I, 1845b; Part II, 1849b; Part III, 1850a.

108. Fay et al. (1873); Jones (1922). Harvey Prindle Peet (1794-1873).

109. Vaïsse had come to Saint-Jacques as instructor in training, on the recommendation of the duke of Doudeau-ville, directly from school in Versailles when he was nineteen. In a year he was placed in charge of the entering class and in three he was sent to New York, where he worked with Harvey Peet for six years. When he returned to Paris, he took over Itard’s supplementary class of instruction (for the most advanced students). Itard had specified in his will that it was to be taught orally but Vaïsse realized that was impossible, so he used sign, but he did start a little articulation class: one hour a day for those who could profit. “It is only by means of signs that we can put the deaf man in possession of another language,” he wrote, “and instill in him the various branches of knowledge” (Vaïsse, 1848b, p. 10). Vaïsse visited the oralist schools in Switzerland and Germany that had so impressed Ordinaire, and he criticized them roundly. He found that children were expelled for lack of speech, that only a few pupils could be assigned to each teacher, that general education and training in trades were preempted by speech training. “It is above all with the intermediary of gestures, and often only by this means,” he wrote, “that we can make enter into the deaf pupil’s intelligence by eye what enters ordinary pupils’ intelligence by ear” (Vaïsse, 1844b, p. 650). But he believed that articulation was an important complement and wrote monographs on how to teach speech (Vaïsse, 1838, 1853). Also see Magnat (1885) and Gineste (1981).

110. Anon. (1831); Anon. (1832a). Peet convened the first Convention of American Instructors of the Deaf in 1850.

111. F. Booth (1905c), p. 229; Wilson and Fiske (1888); F.A.P. Barnard (1912); Davenport (1939).

112. Keep (1880), p. 59. Also see J. Williams (1882); I.L. Peet (1875); E.M. Gallaudet (1884).

113. Bartlett (1853); Moores (1978), p. 190.

114. Bartlett’s most famous pupil was Henry Winter Syle, the first deaf American to become an Episcopal priest. After losing his hearing from scarlet fever when he was six, Syle enrolled in Bartlett’s school, then the American Asylum, next at Cambridge University, and finally he received master’s degrees from Yale and Trinity. To be ordained, he had to pass a rigorous examination in history, philosophy, church doctrine, and classical languages, and to overcome the prejudices of his time. Fortunately, his bishop thought it as appropriate to ordain a deaf man to teach in sign as an Indian to preach in Cherokee. See Gannon (1981), pp. 181-183; Davidson (1890).

115. Patterson (1877).

116. See Moores (1978), p. 52; Gerson (1978).

117. Gerson (1978); Pennsylvania Institution Reports (1821, 1822).

118. Pennsylvania Institution Reports (1822), pp. 7-9.

119. Clerc (1823); Weld (1826); Pennsylvania Institution (1823); Foster (1876).

120. Abraham Hutton (1798-1870); Wilson and Fiske (1888); Barclay (1870).

121. H.P. Peet (1851d).

122. Pyatt (1868).

123. Clerc quoted in Pyatt (1868).

124. Albert Newsam (1809-1864); Wilson and Fiske (1888).

125. Carlin (1867).

126. John Carlin (1818-1891); Domich (1939); Braddock (1975); Wilson and Fiske (1888); E.M. Gallaudet (1884).

127. Carlin (1847).

128. Burnet (1835).

129. Nack (1827).

130. Braddock (1975), p. 7; Gallaher (1898), p. 18; Anon. 1894. On publications by deaf authors, see also: Ballin (1930), Batson and Bergman (1976), E. Booth (1953), Burnet (1835), Calkins (1924), Eastman (1974), E.M. Gallaudet (1873, 1884), Gannon (1981), L. Jacobs (1974), Kitto (1848, 1856), E.J. Mann (1836), Nack (1827), Panara, Denis and McFarlane (1960), Remy (1893), Sandham (1812), Spradley and Spradley (1978), Syle (1873b), Tidyman (1974).

131. Pélissier (1844). Clerc brought this volume with him when he returned from France in 1847 (Braddock, 1975, p. 49).

132. Beauchamp (1970).

133. McClure (1923).

134. H. Peet (1870).

135. Fosdick (1893); Jacobs (1852).

136. A key to the controversy over methodical signs: Jacobs (1853); Burnet (1854); Jacobs (1855a); Burnet (1855a); Jacobs (1855b); Burnet (1855b); Jacobs (1855c), (1856); Burnet (1856); Jacobs (1857); Peet (1858); Jacobs (1858); Burnet and Porter (1858); Peet (1859b); Jacobs (1859); Peet (1859c); Talbot (1872). Burnet (1835), p. 100.

When Jacobs got to Danville, Mitchill resigned, returned to New York. He married the deaf assistant matron at the New York School, Mary Rose, then became head at Canajoharie, but he died in the year that Peet went there to propose a merger (H. Peet, 1853a). His widow later married the first deaf teacher at the New York School—a skillful native signer—Nathan Totten. They went to teach at the North Carolina school and then at the Illinois school when it opened—and there Totten died at the early age of thirty-five, leaving a twice-bereaved widow. Jacobs’s school thrived until the Civil War, for Kentucky became one of the battlegrounds, held by one side, then the other. Parents were afraid to send their children to a school far from home in a war area. Jacobs’s son, William, and his nephew entered the Union army, from which William—handsome, intelligent, lovable, destined to succeed his father—did not return. Kentucky was also the site of an early oral school (1844-1854) founded by a Baptist minister, who came from Virginia in 1818. At one point he returned there to consult with Rev. Kirkpatrick, Braidwood’s associate in Manchester. When he died, the project ended (McClure, 1899).

137. Stone (1853b); E.M. Gallaudet (1886b).

138. Willard, Danfort E. Ball, Clarissa Morse. See Burnet (1835), p. 107.

139. H. Peet (1853b).

140. 1863-1866; a teacher was promoted: G.L. Weed. Then G.O. Fay took over the direction (1866-1880). See Patterson (1893). Stone died in Hartford in 1870 from the blow of a locomotive.

141. Castleman (1852).

142. Bass and Healy (1949).

143. Doyle (1893).

144. Hallam (1818).

145. Bell, Association Review, 1900, 2, 257-519; Bell (1918). Stone (1866), p. 19.

146. A note on enrollments. In 1852, Barnard estimated that 3,000 pupils had been educated in schools for the deaf since 1817. The year before, 1, 100 were enrolled in 13 schools with the sponsorship of 23 states. He estimated the whole number of deaf in the United States at 10,000, the number of school age, 3,000, and thus a delinquency rate of two-thirds. In 1867, Stone reported that some 1, 500 pupils had graduated from the American Asylum alone and 130 teachers were exercising their profession. In 1857, Peet gives the size of the New York school at 315 enrollments, Hartford, 200, Paris, 180, Groningen, 180.

147. The first Convention of American Instructors of the Deaf (CAID) was held in 1850. One-fourth came from Hartford. The American Annals of the Deaf was launched in 1847 by the American Asylum and then undertaken by CAID (H.P. Peet, 1859a).

148. Sagra (1837), p. 442. Barnard (1852), p. 100, 1859 ed.

149. Quebec school founded 1831, Mexico City school, 1865. For descriptions of schools for the deaf, consult the index under the name of the school and the city in which it was located. For articles describing several schools, see: Anon. (1853), Ackers (1874), M.E. Adams (1896), Addison (1908), Banerji (1897), H. Barnard (1878), Bebian (1826a, c, d), Chapin (1846), E.P. Clarke (1900a), Clerc (1848), Daras (1853a), G. Day (1845), G. Day and Peet (1861), H.E. Day et al. (1928), Ely (1854), Fay (1886), Ferreri (1908), Fornari (1904), E.M. Gallaudet (1867a, b 1876, 1897), Greenwood (1839), Hansen (1908), Haycock (1923), Heidsiek (1899, 1900), Hitz (1907), Hobart (1899), Laishley (1885), E.J. Mann (1836), Palluy (1829), H.P. Peet (1852b), Peet and Campbell (1849), Porter (1846), Rae (1852), Rogers (1873), Ryerson (1868), Sagra (1839), Valade-Gabel (1875), Volta Bureau (1902), Watteville (1845), Weld (1845), Wilkinson (1893a, b), Yale (1883).

CHAPTER 9 / CONCERNING WOMEN

1. Quoted in Braddock (1975).

2. Quoted in Root (1941), pp. 75-76.

3. Cogswell genealogy in Root (1941), p. 115ff; Jameson (1884), pp. 244-246, 402-404. Weld left Hartford to succeed Clerc at Philadelphia only to return to succeed Thomas Gallaudet on his retirement. He and Mary Austin Cogswell had five children, the first named after Mason, the last after Alice. Alice’s second sister, Elizabeth, married a Hartford judge, grandson of the governor. Her brother, Mason Fitch, settled in Albany, where he married a descendant of the governor of the Plymouth Colony, had two children, and was commissioned major and surgeon in the Union army. Alice’s youngest sister, Catherine Ledyard, married a Presbyterian minister who helped to found the theological seminary at Princeton; they had seven children.

4. Morse (1933); Sumner and Russell (1890).

5. Sumner and Russell (1890).

6. Perkins (1895); Beecher (1848). The Beechers and the Cogswells were friendly; see Rugoff (1981), p. 103.

7. The Sigourney poem appears in Beecher (1848) and in Holycross (1913), p. 61, with an extract of an accompanying letter. Beecher implies that it was she who was by Alice’s side throughout her final illness. It is likely, but unconfirmed, that Clerc was also present.

8. A. Cogswell (1816c). The Gallaudet letters were T.H. Gallaudet (1815k), (1816c). He also wrote a report for Stewart; T.H. Gallaudet (1815m).

9. Primary sources on Julia Brace: Weld (1837), L.H. Woodruff (1849), Burnet (1835).

10. Blackstone quoted in Howe (1857), P. 386.

11. Mrs. Laurent Clerc (née Eliza Crocker) (1792-1880). They had six children, three boys and three girls. See T.F. Fox (1935, 3 [5]).

12. Osborn (1928); Russell (1895).

13. Moeller (1909), p. 318.

14. Clerc (1858b).

15. Fay (1898), p. 14; Clerc (1852); Clerc Papers no. 42.

16. Turner (1868).

17. Weld (1848); Turner (1848); D. Peet (1856).

18. Bemiss (1858); Fay (1898), p. 106; Morris (1861).

19. Fay (1898); Moores (1978), p. 81ff; Fraser (1976).

20. Turner (1848), p. 32; Morris (1861); Fay (1898), pp. 18, 102, 134. Turner also stated (1868), “Every consideration of philanthropy as well as the interests of congenitally deaf persons themselves should induce their teachers and friends to urge upon them the impropriety of such intermarriages” (p. 96). Bell cites this quote in his Memoir (1883b) and in Bell (1890a). Turner is here speaking of marriages between two congenitally deaf persons. From a sample of 740 persons who visited the American Asylum over some years and provided familial information, Turner counted 24 families with both parents congenitally deaf; in nine of these, there were one or more deaf-mutes, an incidence he labeled three-fifths. Of course, his sample would tend to include families that had deaf children. Fay (1898, p. 134) found in a sample of 3,000 marriages with one or both partners deaf that 335 had both partners congenitally deaf and one-fourth of these had deaf children. The incidence is about the same, whatever the deafness of the parents, if both have deaf relatives. For more on this topic see chapter 11.

21. T.H. Gallaudet (1847).

22. Nash and Nash (1981), p. 24.

23. See several studies reviewed in Mindel and Vernon (1971).

24. Mindel and Vernon (1971), p. 96.

25. Paulmier (1834a), p. 381.

26. Barclay (1870), p. 30.

27. Berthier (1842b). Also discussed in H.P. Peet (1857b), p. 38, and H.P. Peet (1867), 11, p. 254. Berthier (1837a, 1840b). See, further, the case reported by Piroux (1842d), also discussed in H.P. Peet (1857b), p. 41. Anon. (1869b) describes a sign language wedding in New York. On the law and the deaf before 1900, see: Anon (1838, 1839, 1840, 1861), Bébian (1826a, e, f, 1827b, c), Bélanger (1901a, b, c), Berthier (1837a, 1838c, 1840b, 1842a, b), Breton de la Martiniere (1800), Chambeyron (1838), Chazal (1893, 1894), Clerc (1858a), Deming (1854), Desessarts (1773), Fay (1912), Forestier (1838a), E.M. Gallaudet (1872), Itard (1827c), Morel (1838), H.P. Peet (1857b, 1867), Piroux (1838a, b, c, 1839a, b, e, 1840a, b, 1841a, b, 1842a, c, d, e, f, g), Puybonnieux (1856, 1858b, 1859), Seiss (1887), Tillinghast (1902), Vaisse (1844a), Van Bastelaer (1890), Vive (1796).

28. Genealogy in Hall (1883), p. 17. Also see Griswold (1933, 1938).

29. T.H. Gallaudet (1818d). Also see Conference of Executives (1888), p. 72; and S. Fowler (1818).

30. Anon. (1913). Rev. T. Gallaudet (1857).

31. Draper (1877); Barclay (1870), p. 26, also lists members of the Gallaudet family.

32. Stokes (1914); Dexter (1911), v. 5, pp. 749-757.

33. Dutton (1852).

34. Rae (1851); Barnard (1852), p. 95.

35. Chamberlain (1869a). Bell (1883b), ch. 4, traces deafness in this family in detail.

36. Quoted in Braddock (1975), p. 6. Also see Chamberlain (1886).

37. Braddock (1975), p. 59; Groce (1980, 1981); Huntington (1981); Poole (1983). On other island deaf communities, see Washabaugh (1979, 1981).

38. Rae (1851); Turner (1870); Syle (1887), p. 28.

39. Convention of Deaf-Mutes (1853).

40. Anon. (1895) says Chamberlain (1832-1895) was deafened at age eight.

41. New England Gallaudet Association (1854).

42. Chamberlain (1857a, b, 1858).

43. Flournoy et al. (1856). For a note on the Flournoy family, see Association Review, 1900, 2, p. 499, fn. 1.

44. Itard (1821d), p. 331 of the 1842 ed.

45. Richardin (1834).

46. Rae et al. (1854); Pyatt (1868), p. 84.

47. E.M. Gallaudet (1907a).

48. H.P. Peet (1852a, 1851a); Carlin (1853); Draper (1900); Columbian Institution (1864).

49. Boatner (1959b); Columbian Institution (1870).

50. E.M. Gallaudet (1912a).

51. E.M. Gallaudet (1907a), p. 35.

52. Draper (1872). The graduates in the first class became a principal of the Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, the principal examiner of the U.S. Patent Office, and a professor at the National Deaf-Mute College. The name was changed to Gallaudet College in 1894 in honor of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. See Atwood (1964), Gallaudet College Alumni Association (1964). On the first graduation, see Chamberlain (1869c) and Clymer (1869).

53. E.M. Gallaudet (1912a).

54. E. Booth (1881); Draper (1877); Boatner (1959a).

55. F.J. Clerc (1885).

56. Turner (1870).

57. Lewis Weld (1796-1853). Turner (1854); Barclay (1870), p. 34; Pyatt (1868), pp. 27-31.

58. Williams (1887); J.W. Jones (1922).

59. Clerc Papers no. 30; Porter (1858). Clerc retired in May 1858 (Clerc Papers no. 67). Clerc (1858b) gives the exact date: April 28, 1858.

60. Chamberlain (1869b).

CHAPTER 10 / A DANGEROUS INCURSION

1. Massieu (1815), p. 171. Likewise, Harvey Peet, his son Isaac, and Gilbert Gamage found, on a trip to France, that they could communicate with Vaisse’s pupils. At the end of the trip, Harvey Peet’s son Isaac conveyed a detailed account of the tour to the pupils at Saint-Jacques, as verified by the essays they wrote out afterward. Perhaps this is not surprising considering that French Sign Language is the parent of American; Peet indeed confirms that they had the most success in manual communication in France, somewhat more difficulty in Italy and Switzerland (H.P. Peet, 1852b, p. 143; Braddock, 1975, pp. 17-19; Barclay, 1870, p. 13). Similarly, Reverend Stansbury recounted to his colleagues in New York that when he visited St. Petersburg, he told a short story in sign and the pupils wrote it correctly on their slates. The founders of that school, you may recall, spoke French Sign Language. A Chinese young man passing through Hartford who knew no English was brought to Clerc one day though he knew no Chinese. Clerc learned many interesting facts about his origins, his parents, his former pursuits, his residence in the U.S. and his ideas concerning God and a future state. After a while, his informant caught on and started using a lot of pantomime himself (Reported in T.H. Gallaudet, 1819a, p. 648; Humphrey, 1857, p. 147). Lewis Weld had a similar experience with another Chinese man in Philadelphia (Barclay, 1870, p. 13).

2. Thomas Gallaudet took an interest in the problem of the slaves. Because of him, a Moorish prince sold into slavery in this country was manumitted and returned to Africa with his family (Stone, 1869, p. 107; Boatner, 1959a, b; Anon., 1891b; Rae, 1854; T.H. Gallaudet, 1828b).

3. ASL and Indian signs similar: Porter (1846), p. 505; T.H. Gallaudet (1824d); Akerly (1824); James (1823).

4. Huet secured the support of the emperor Dom Pedro II in 1855; the emperor created a governing board for the school, which opened Jan. 1, 1856. I am indebted to the Instituto Nacional de Educaão de Surdos for giving me access to their library. The Grande Encyclopédie Delta Larousse, published in Rio de Janeiro in 1978, states that E. Huet’s brother, Adolphe Huet, founded the sister institution in Mexico City, but Mexican documents provide no evidence for this.

5. I am deeply indebted to Professor Maria de Jesus Silva and Professor Sabino Cruz of the Instituto National de las Communication Humana, Mexico DF, for the warm reception accorded me. Dr. Cruz provided much useful information on Edward Huet, who was apparently at the Paris Institution in the same era as Clerc. There is, however, no proof that they corresponded after Clerc went to America, Huet to Brazil, then Mexico.

6. Cited in Heath (1972), whose treatment of the language situation in Mexico has been very helpful to me.

7. Cited in Heath (1972), p. 83.

8. These issues are discussed in Grosjean (1982).

9. New York Institution, Twelfth Report, 1828, pp. 13-14.

10. American Asylum, Annual Report for 1836.

11. J.W. Howe (1876), p. 115.

12. Schwartz (1956), pp. 5, 156.

13. It moved to South Boston and changed its name to Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind in 1829 (Winsor, 1881, p. 273).

14. Winsor (1881); Sanborn (1891), p. 126; Schwartz (1956), p. 52; H. Barnard (1862); Noyes (1911). Also see: Haüy (1786). Haüy (1745-1822). I am full of admiration for Weiner’s masterly detective work and skillful synthesis in describing the lives of Haüy and Sicard and their relations: (1974, 1977). H. Barnard (1862) reports Fisher’s Parisian studies and goal of emulating Haüy.

15. Hall (1881), p. 243, states that Laura Bridgman was deafened at age twenty-six months.

16. Richards (1936); Sanborn (1891), p. 146; Schwartz (1956), p. 67; Laura Dewey Bridgman was born Dec. 21, 1829. Howe had visited Julia Brace in 1834. Laura’s parents brought her to Howe’s institution on October 4, 1837. For more on the deaf and blind, consult index under Brace, Bridgman, Keller, Mitchell; and: Bébian (1826), v. 1, pp. 55, 102, v. 2, pp. 1, 12; Berthier (1837b); Burnet (1835), pp. 120-143; Forestier (1838b); Fuller (1892); Howe (1873, 1875); I.L. Peet (1851); Porter (1848b); W.R. Scott (1844), p. 27; Stone (1867), p. 35; Wade (1900); Weiner (1974); Winsor (1881); Woodruff (1849).

17. Howe (1909), p. 54.

18. Richards (1936); Howe (1857).

19. Howe (1857), p. 376.

20. Howe (1875).

21. Quoted in Noyes (1911), p. 762.

22. Dickens (1898), pp. 33-52.

23. Hall (1881), pp. 237-276.

24. Howe (1873); Richards (1936), p. 90.

25. Stone (1867), p. 35.

26. Caswell, deafened at age three, was born in 1829 and went to Perkins at age twelve. Lucy Reed, born 1827, deafened at age three, arrived at age fourteen. Caswell learned some hundred nouns and a few adjectives. Reed learned less, became a seamstress.

27. Howe’s report, written in 1842, reprinted in Howe (1873), p. 4.

28. Howe (1909), p. 55.

29. Richards (1936), p. 4.

30. Cited in Schwartz (1956), p. 73.

31. Fenner and Fishburn (1968), p. 54. On Mann, see Downs (1974) and Tharp (1953).

32. Quoted in Schwartz (1956), p. 98.

33. Massachusetts House of Representatives (1843); Schwartz (1956), p. 276ff. The two children were Frank and Susan Worcester. “Neither of them ever spoke a word nor, to my knowledge, ever attempted to speak.” See Rogers et al. (1912), p. 421; Schwartz (1956), p. 276ff. Several authors say Howe taught deaf pupils but this is an error. See Rogers et al. (1912).

34. Tharp (1953), p. 196; Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867), p. 321.

35. Messerli (1972), p. 393.

36. Downs (1974), p. 96.

37. Mann (1844a), pp. 75, 79, 81.

38. Webster (1789), p. 171.

39. Kilian (1885), p. 13. Hodgson (1953) states (p. 138) that on Heinicke’s death his widow and son-in-law, Reich, “carried on at Weissenfels.” Later he refers to the “institution at Weissenfels which had been created by Samuel Heinicke” (p. 215). Likewise, Bender (1970), possibly on Hodgson’s authority, refers to Hill’s entering, in 1830, “the old Heinicke institute at Weissenfels” (p. 132). However, all other sources, including several German ones (see Hoffman, 1901; Rae, 1848c; Arnold, 1888; Kilian, 1885) and Bender herself (1970, p. 103), concur that Heinicke was called to Leipzig by Frederick Augustus, prince of Saxony, to found a school for the deaf, which began in 1778 with nine pupils. Heinicke’s immediate successors at Leipzig were his widow and son-in-law, Eschke (d. 1811), according to Kilian (1885), who were succeeded in turn by Petschke (d. 1822) and Reich. There is no disagreement that Hill went to the school in Weissenfels in 1830. Day (1845) states that it was founded in 1829 (p. 191) and confirms that Reich was director at Leipzig (pp. 107, 123), not Weissenfels.

40. Jäger (1830).

41. Hill was trained by Eschke’s successor and former collaborator, Ludwig Grasshoff, who became director with permission of Heinicke’s family after Eschke’s death.

42. Frederick Moritz Hill (1805-1874).

43. Johann Baptiste Graser (1766-1841).

44. Hill (1858), translated in Gordon (1885a), p. 126. Weld (1845), p. 85, and Day and H.P. Peet (1861), p. 99, also give negative reports.

45. Day (1845), p. 99.

46. Howe written 1842, reprinted in Howe (1873), p. 4. On the trip, also see Richards (1936), p. 135.

47. H.P. Peet (1867), p. 230.

48. Turner relates these events in the Conference of American Instructors of the Deaf (1850), pp. 141-143; as does Porter (1846), p. 505. The case came up during the hearings of the Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867) and a letter from Whipple appears in the appendix to those hearings. Further details will be found in Clarke School (1893a), pp. 27 and 31-32.

49. T.H. Gallaudet (1844). Letter to Mann.

50. I regret that a quote from this unsigned article was mistakenly attributed to Woodbridge rather than Peet in Lane (1980a), p. 144. See H.P. Peet (1844a).

51. Mann (1844b).

52. Weld (1845); Day (1845); H.P. Peet (1852b); Day and Peet (1861).

53. Quoted in Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867), p. 75.

54. Stone (1866), p. 21, reports that, in 1845, a professor Dahlerup, having visited several schools in Germany, urged the Copenhagen institution to adopt the German method, but the rest of the faculty refused and the school continued on the French system.

55. Haug quoted in Morel et al. (1849).

56. Weld (1845), p. 188.

57. Letter from Morel to Weld quoted p. 72 of Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867).

58. See Kilian (1885), p. 23.

59. Morel, Haug, and Wagner (1849), p. 58. Negative reports on German oralism: Day (1845); E.M. Gallaudet (1867b); Morel, Haug, and Wagner (1849); Vaïsse (1848b); Weld (1845).

60. Quoted in Day (1845), p. 112.

61. Hill, cited in E.M. Gallaudet (1867b), p. 29. Day cited in Puybonnieux (1846), p. 193: “Speech is not a general means of instruction, even in Germany.” O.F. Kruse affirms that most schools conducted on the German plan—those in Berlin, Dresden, Vienna, Prague, Augsburg, Munich, Bern, and Basel—use sign “constantly”; only Weissenfels, Leipzig, and Zurich are excepted (quoted in Académie Impériale de Médecine, 1853, p. 865). In England, articulation gradually sank in prestige after Braidwood’s death at the turn of the century. By mid-century, only his original school, relocated in London, was teaching speech and lipreading and then only as a complement and by means of sign language. See the 1844 report of the London Asylum, cited in Porter (1848a), p. 42. Also see Farrar (1923), pp. 71, 74; Syle (1874), p. 736; Day (1845), p. 90. Likewise Swiss, Italian, and Belgian schools were conducting their instruction of the deaf in sign language: Swiss (Syle, 1874, p. 736), Italian (ibid,; Volquin, 1853a), Belgian (Blanchet, 1851, p. 14). In America, the signing society evolved rapidly up to Clerc’s time: Syle (1874), gives forty institutions, averaging 115 pupils, five hearing teachers and three deaf.

62. Peet (1868a).

63. American Asylum 29th Report (1845) and 39th Report (1855).

64. American Asylum 43rd Report (1859).

65. Chamberlain (1888b).

66. Anon. (1868b).

67. New York Institution (1847), 28th Report, for the year 1846; Syle (1873), p. 151. For Mann’s self-defense, see Mann (1865), p. 290.

68. Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1866), pp. lii-lviii.

69. DeLand (1912b), p. 518, implies that Howe was also behind a petition to the Senate in 1861 that led to a resolve to explore state education of the deaf; the initiative was killed in the House (Massachusetts Senate Committee on Education, 1861).

70. Massachusetts House of Representatives Joint Special Committee (1863a, b).

71. Sanborn (1891), p. 228; DeLand (1908), ch. 16; Yale (1931), p. 63.

72. DeLand (1908), ch. 14; Bruce (1973b), p. 83. Gardiner Greene Hubbard (1822-1897). Hubbard was the son of a Massachusetts Supreme Court justice with ancestry reaching back to the Mayflower. His paternal grandfather was a prosperous merchant, his maternal grandfather one of the wealthiest men in Boston. Hubbard went to Dartmouth, then to Harvard Law School; he married the daughter of a rich New York banker and settled in Cambridge. Hubbard was a resourceful man and a promoter. He wanted quicker transit between his home in Cambridge and his law office in Boston, considered others would, too, and organized the first street railway outside of New York City. He also created the Cambridge Gas and Light Company. He was a patent lawyer much interested in the promise of telegraphy. The Hubbards lost their first child, a son, to illness, then came five daughters, the last dying in infancy.

73. DeLand (1908), p. 63; Yale (1923).

74. Bruce (1973b), p. 87.

75. Rogers et al. (1912).

76. Dudley: DeLand (1908), ch. 15.

77. Conference of Executives (1868), pp. 70, 72, 75.

78. Massachusetts Senate Committee on Public Charitable Institutions (1864). Initial report Apr. 12, 1864; final report May 11, Senate document 287.

79. Yale (1910).

80. DeLand (1908), ch. 14.

81. Bruce (1973b), p. 90. Henry Lippitt became governor of Rhode Island in 1875. DeLand (1912b).

82. Rogers et al. (1911); Lippitt (1947), pp. 35-40.

83. DeLand (1908), p. 126.

84. Henderson (1939); Bruce (1973b), p. 66; the three other participants at Mrs. Lamson’s home, Nov. 7, 1865, were John D. Philbrick, Henry M. Dexter, and James C. Dunn.

85. To offset the high tuition, Hubbard raised a subscription of one thousand dollars: Henry Lippitt contributed, as did the Honorable Thomas Talbot, who was a member of the Massachusetts Governor’s Council (1864-1869) and Harriet Rogers’s brother-in-law. Talbot’s fellow council member, the Honorable Francis Bird, considered the most powerful politician in the state then, also gave. Talbot was lieutenant governor, 1872; governor, 1872 and 1878-1880.

86. Porter (1871).

87. Stone (1866).

88. Howe (1866).

89. Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1866), p. lviii.

90. Howe (1875). Keep (1866, 1867).

91. DeLand (1908), ch. 11; Sanborn (1891), p. 306.

92. Schwartz (1956), p. 280.

93. Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867), pp. 1-2.

94. Sanborn (1912), p. 583.

95. Sanborn (1867a, b). Sanborn pursued the campaign with an anonymous article published in the North American Review and in the Nation. In it he gives a highly selective history of the oral education of the deaf, culminating in support for the plan currently before the legislature. He repeats the arguments for oralism—dispersion and economy—and implies that Harriet Rogers’s school would be the beneficiary of the state funds if the legislation were passed. Also see: Burnet (1867); Chamberlain (1867a, b); Carlin (1867).

96. Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1867), pp. liii-lxxiv.

97. Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1867), p. 173.

98. Rogers et al. (1912)

99. DeLand (1908), p. 63; Rogers et al. (1912); Sanborn (1912), p. 580. Josiah Quincy Jr. was mayor of Boston from 1846 to 1849. His father, Josiah Quincy, was called the “great mayor” (1823-1829). The son also served seven years in the state senate, where he was president in 1843 and 1844, while his father was president of Harvard College.

100. DeLand (1908), p. 60.

101. Hubbard (1898).

102. Massachusetts Senate Committee on Education (1861). DeLand (1912b), p. 518, implies that Howe was also behind this initiative. Smith and some other deaf persons from Boston submitted a petition six years earlier to the Senate Committee on Education with the same proposal Howe and Hubbard subsequently made to the legislature. His friendship with the two Boston potentates undoubtedly goes back some way.

103. Richards (1928), p. 128; Howe (1868); Elliott and Hall (1903), p. 24.

104. Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867), pp. 197, 200.

105. Massachusetts Senate Joint Special Committee (1867), pp. 205, 206.

106. DeLand (1908), p. 69; Rogers et al. (1912); Leonard (1918).

107. Ch. 311, Act of 1867.

108. Schunhoff (1957), p. 16. The Clarke Institution opened Oct. 1, 1867. At his death, John Clarke’s property was valued at $200,000. He had originally planned to bequeath his estate to the Clarke school but he was so dissatisfied with the arrangement under which the school rented property from Lewis Dudley that he later reduced the award to $120,000 and made it contingent on the school’s never purchasing its facilities from Dudley. It appears that Dudley both championed the cause of the school before the legislature and received personal gain thereby (Chamberlain, 1869e).

109. DeLand (1908), p. 60.

110. Bruce (1973b), p. 80; Bell (1872a).

111. DeLand (1908), pp. 80-81.

112. Clarke School Report (1882).

113. This account of the trip is based on E.M. Gallaudet’s diary (1867a) and published report (1867b).

114. On the failure of the Blanchet plan: E.M. Gallaudet (1867b), p. 44; Varjot (1980); and its German counterpart, the Graser plan: Weld (1845), p. 8off; G.E. Day (1845), p. 99ff; Day and Peet (1861), pp. 99-100 of the abridged version; Day (1861); J.C. Gordon in National Education Association (1885).

115. Conference of Executives (1868), p. 77.

116. Massachusetts Board of State Charities (1868), p. lxxi.

117. E.M. Gallaudet (1868b), p. 47.

118. Alexander Graham Bell Association (1892c), p. 299.

119. Although Carlin ridiculed them in the silent press. See Carlin (1868a, b), Anon. (1868d).

120. Sanborn (1869); Lane (1980a), p. 148.

121. Clarke School (1893). The school was first gathered in 1864 under Bernard Engelsmann.

122. DeLand (1908), p. 160; Hubbard (1898); Rogers et al. (1912), p. 476.

123. The name was changed to the Horace Mann School in 1877. It opened with nine pupils, Nov. 10, 1869 (Greene, 1893).

124. Cited in Bruce (1973b), p. 58.

125. Root (1941), p. 68. A memorial plaque has also been placed in the town hall at La-Balme-Les-Grottes. Obituaries: Chamberlain (1869d), Bartlett (1869).

CHAPTER 11 / THE DENIAL

1. See Currier (1912); Mc Gregor (1896), pp. 44-45.

2. Fay (1913a).

3. Veditz (1907a), p. 16.

4. Addressing the Third Convention of Articulation Teachers, June 1884. Quoted in DeLand (1922a), v. 24, p. 418.

5. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 154.

6. Quoted in Waite (1961), p. 141.

7. Bell (1884), p. 52.

8. Lane and Grosjean (1980); Klima and Bellugi (1979).

9. National Education Association (1885), p. 9.

10. According to his biographer: Bruce (1973b), p. 382; (1973a), p. 148. Bruce’s scholarly and comprehensive biography of Bell, although somewhat partisan to its subject, is enormously valuable for the student of deaf history.

11. National Education Association (1885), p. 21.

12. Conference of Executives (1884), p. 178.

13. Bell (1894b), p. 21.

14. Bell (1884), p. 39. Also Bell (1872a), p. 166: “All intelligent deaf-mutes acquire the power of mechanical speech.”

15. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 369.

16. See Mackenzie (1928).

17. Osborne (1943), p. 17; Bruce (1973b), p. 61; Watson (1913), p. 9.

18. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 161.

19. Anon. (1869a). See the retirement petition, Clerc Papers no. 30; Sept. 4, 1856.

20. Bruce (1974), p. 3. L. Grosvenor (1950), p. 44.

21. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 379. Also see Fairchild (1923), p. 196.

22. Mackenzie (1928).

23. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 309.

24. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 308.

25. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 323.

26. Ballin (1930), p. 66; Bruce (1973b), p. 321.

27. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 380.

28. Bell (1906-08).

29. National Education Association (1885), p. 62.

30. Bell (1910b).

31. Mayne (1929); Bruce (1973b).

32. Bruce (1973b), p. 14.

33. Curry (1906). Alexander Melville Bell (1819-1905).

34. Hitz (1905), p. 423.

35. Other sources on Alexander Melville Bell: DeLand (1908), p. 189; Bruce (1973b), p. 19; Mackenzie (1928).

36. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 33.

37. Deland (1908), p. 193.

38. Hull (1865); Deland (1915).

39. Henderson (1939).

40. Bruce (1974), p. 4.

41. Bruce (1973b), p. 80.

42. DeLand (1908), p. 200.

43. Bell (1894b); Winefield (1981), p. 55.

44. Bell (1872b).

45. Schunhoff (1957), p. 26.

46. Bell (1883a); Waite (1961).

47. DeLand (1922); Murphy (1954).

48. Waite (1961), p. 49.

49. Bruce (1973b), pp. 90, 100.

50. Nearly fifty years later, Mabel discovered in some family papers that she had suffered a hearing loss when she was five and had never lost her ability to speak. She had always believed she was deafened younger and had lost all speech. Had the truth been known before the fall when she first met Bell, he might have had less faith in the possibilities of teaching articulation and lipreading. As a model of deaf people Mabel misled him in other ways as well, since she was not only a native speaker of English but also bookish, rich, and averse to other deaf people. Winefield (1981), p. 169.

51. Bruce (1973b), p. 257.

52. M.H. Bell (1908).

53. Initially, there was a great demand for teachers trained in Visible Speech and Bell organized a convention, held in Worcester: Bruce (1973b), p. 100. First Convention of Articulation Teachers, Worcester, Jan. 1874. Concerning the failure of Visible Speech at Clarke: Yale (1927c); Yale (1931), pp. 56-58. Hubbard and Rogers were more optimistic at first, however: Fay (1874), pp. 176-177.

54. American Asylum Fifty-seventh Report; Fay (1874), p. 179.

55. Bender (1970), p. 158; Séguin (1880), p. 81; Bruce (1973), p. 77.

56. Congress on Deaf—International—Second (1880), p. 89. See the critique by Greenberger (1874).

57. Bell (1888); Jenkins (1890b).

58. Moores (1978), p. 267, 1982 edition.

59. Mitchell (1971b), p. 350; Moores (1978), p. 71, 1982 edition.

60. DeLand (1908), pp. 164, 201.

61. Yale (1931), p. 69ff.

62. Gordon (1892a), nos. 21, 567 and 21, 570; DeLand (1922a), ch. 25, p. 37.

63. Conference of Executives (1884), p. 158.

64. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), pp. 181, 183.

65. Bruce (1973b) discusses the exact wording.

66. E.M. Gallaudet (1907a), pp. 105-106. For a sketch of Draper’s career, see Boatner (1959a), p. 77.

67. Bruce (1973b), p. 197. Also see Field (1878), Osborne (1943), DeLand (1908, 1922), Watson (1913, 1926).

68. Hofstadter (1944).

69. Bell (1914).

70. Bell (1891c).

71. See the helpful discussion in Bruce (1973b), ch. 31.

72. American Genetic Association (1906), p. 11; Jordan (1908), p. 201.

73. Bell (1923); Woods (1923).

74. Bell (1920), p. 341. On restriction of immigration by racially biased intelligence testing, see Chorover’s brilliant book (1979) on social control; American Genetic Association (1912a), p. 1; Henderson (1909), p. 227; Goddard (1917), p. 271.

75. Bell (1906-8); Bruce (1973b), p. 413.

76. Bell (1910c).

77. Fay (1916b), p. 283.

78. A.G. Bell to David Fairchild, Nov. 23, 1908, Bell papers, Library of Congress. Quoted in Winefield (1981), p. 184.

79. Bell (1884), p. 66.

80. Bell (1883b). Read to the National Academy of Sciences, Nov. 13, 1883.

81. DeLand (1912a).

82. Quoted in DeLand (1922a), ch. 24, p. 415.

83. R.H. Johnson (1918), p. 6.

84. Ballin (1930), p. 74.

85. Olivier and George (1893).

86. Bell (1888), p. 184.

87. Quoted in Mitchell (1971b), p. 355. Also see Fay (1916b).

88. Veditz (1907a). National Association of the Deaf Proceedings (1907).

89. Bell et al. (1908b).

90. American Genetic Association (1912), p. 3.

91. Haller (1963), p. 133.

92. Chamberlain (1888a, b).

93. Olivier and George (1893).

94. Seliney (1888a, b). The vice-president of the National Deaf-Mute College, Edward Fay, undertook a more complete and detailed study of family deafness with financial support from Bell; it is considered the soundest study of heredity in the nineteenth century. Fay found that deaf people generally have hearing children: only 9.7 percent of deaf marriages did not, and only 8.6 percent of the children from deaf marriages were themselves deaf. There was no greater likelihood of a deaf child if both parents were deaf than if only one was. Fay also found that marriages among the deaf were happier than mixed marriages, less likely to end in divorce or separation. And banishing sign and residential schools apparently would not help avoid deaf intermarriage, because about three out of four deaf marriages involved two deaf partners, no matter whether the partners had gone to residential schools teaching in sign or residential schools exclusively oral or oral day schools. The shared friends, the shared struggle, and the shared language were no doubt responsible for these figures (Fay, 1898).

95. Bell (1906-8).

96. Fraser (1976); Brown et al. (1967).

97. Lloyd (1968).

98. Bell (1891c); also see Bell (1908a, 1916). See the exchange between Bell and Gillett: Gillett (1890a, b, 1891); Bell (1890b); E.M. Gallaudet (1890); Fay (1884, 1885).

99. Cited in Bruce (1973b), p. 399. Bell was abashed: Cited in Winefield (1981), p. 202.

100. Arrowsmith (1819). The translation appears to be the same one that was published in 1801 and reprinted in 1860 in the American Annals of the Deaf, where it is attributed to F. Green. Also see: Bartlett (1853).

101. Wisconsin Phonological Institute (1893). On Bell and day schools, also see: DeLand (1922a), p. 361; Bruce (1973b); Bell (1883c, 1885a, b, d, 1894a, 1897a, b); Watson (1949), p. 156. On day schools, see: Anon. (1826b), p. 750; Anon. (1896), pp. 49-50; Bartlett (1853); Bingham (1899); DeLand (1908), pp. 156-7, 174, 266-9; Gordon (1885a, b); Jack (1907); Jones (1918), p. 194; Moeller (1909), p. 319; Moores (1978); National Education Association (1885); Odegard (1939); Rae (1854), p. 37ff; Spencer (1893); Ward (1936); Wesselius (1901); Williams (1885); Wisconsin Phonological Institute (1894).

102. National Education Association (1885).

103. Way and Whipple (1891). This outcome also owed much to a deaf woman, Miss Daisy Way. Deafened at age five, she had studied in an oral school, received instruction from a private articulation teacher and her mother, entered the public schools in Iowa, graduated from high school there, and gone to business school in Milwaukee. The WPI arranged for her to meet many legislators, and to urge the day-school movement on them. Her fluent speech, intelligence, and grace captivated the legislators and paved the way for Bell’s campaign—although the law in question would not give other deaf children Daisy Way’s experience of coeducation with the hearing, which was agreed by all sides to be generally impossible.

104. Wisconsin Phonological Institute (1894).

105. Quoted in Bruce (1973b), p. 395.

106. Bruce (1973b), p. 394; DeLand (1908), p. 120.

107. Draper (1904).

108. Bruce (1973b), p. 395; Ballin (1930), p. 74.

109. Wesselius (1901).

110. Bingham (1899).

111. Fay (1913a).

112. Ballin (1930); also see Anon. (1826b, 1896); Fay (1886); Carlin in Rae (1854), p. 37.

113. Bell quoted in DeLand (1922a), ch. 25, p. 94.

114. Bell quoted in DeLand (1922a), ch. 25, p. 147.

115. Conference of Executives (1884), p. 178.

116. Boatner (1959), p. 106.

117. Ackers (1874).

118. Quoted in Fay (1889).

119. Elliott (1911).

120. E.M. Gallaudet Gallaudet (1895c, d). Edward Gallaudet favored a deaf person’s taking a hearing spouse, on the model of his mother (Anon. 1890c).

121. Fay (1887); E.M. Gallaudet (1907a).

122. J.C. Gordon (1892a).

123. Royal Commission (1886), p. lxiii.

124. E.M. Gallaudet (1895c, d). Note that the plan recommended by the Conference of Principals starts the education of most deaf children with a failure, which hardly seems psychologically or pedagagically sound. The commission was not interested in ending the age-old British practice of refusing education to deaf children for lack of sufficient charitable contributions; while it was meeting, nearly half the applicants to the London school, for example, were refused admission. Instead of recommending public education of deaf children, which many schoolmasters feared would deprive them of their lucrative private pupils, the commission proposed an annual government grant of fifty dollars per pupil. Bray (1893).

125. A.G. Bell Association (1884a), p. 132.

126. DeLand (1919); McClure (1950).

127. G. McClure (1961), p. 105.

128. DeLand (1913), Bruce (1973b, 1974). The name of the association was changed in 1956 to the Alexander Graham Bell Association.

129. E.M. Gallaudet (1894a, b); Convention of American Instructors of the Deaf (1893).

130. E.M. Gallaudet (1895c).

131. Eyewitness description by McClure (1950).

132. E.B. Boatner (1946); Drake (1940), Gannon (1981), p. 19.

133. For biographies of deaf teachers see Gallaher (1898); of the 148 biographical sketches about a third appear under the professional rubric “teacher”; also see Braddock (1975), Panara and Panara (1984). More on teachers and teacher training prior to 1900: Bell (1884, 1885a, b, 1891a, b), Boatner (1946), E.P. Clarke (1900a, b), Conference of Executives (1884), Dobyns (1893), Drake (1940), Draper (1899), Ferreri (1908), E.M. Gallaudet (1891, a, b, 1892b, 1909), Gannon (1981), Gordon (1892a, b), P. Hall (1908), Harris (1933), Javal (1887), Jones (1918), Lane (1980b), Ligot (1893), Logan (1877), McGregor (1893), Moores (1982), Newman (1971), H.P. Peet (1853b), I.L. Peet (1893a), Talbot (1895), Thollon (1907), Tillinghast (1908, 1909, 1917a), Tyler (1856), Veditz 1893), Volquin (1856).

134. B. Talbot (1895).

135. McClure (1950); Boatner (1959), p. 131.

136. Quoted in Winefield (1981), p. 114.

137. Bell and E.M. Gallaudet (1891a), Committee on Appropriations, Jan. 27, 1891.

138. E.M. Gallaudet (1891d); address to the Minnesota School for the Deaf. Also see E.M. Gallaudet (1907a), p. 160.

139. E.M. Gallaudet (1891c); Gordon (1892d).

140. Quoted in Winefield (1981), p. 94.

141. A.G. Bell Association (1910); DeLand (1908), p. 94.

142. E.P. Clarke (1900b); E.M. Gallaudet (1891a); Fay (1899).

143. E.P. Clarke (1900a); Moores (1978), p. 22, 1982 edition.

144. E.M. Gallaudet and Hall (1909), pp. 46, 48.

145. Ballin (1930).

146. Grosjean (1982).

147. Newman (1971). The quoted remarks have been abridged.

148. Lane and Grosjean (1980); Bellugi and Studdert-Kennedy (1980).

149. Klima and Bellugi (1979).

150. Bellugi and Studdert-Kennedy (1980).

151. Bell (1884). Also M.H. Bell (1895), p. 167.

CHAPTER 12 / THE INCURABLE DEAFNESS

1. Jacob Rodrigues Pereire (sometimes spelled Pereira) (1715-1780) had two sons, Jacob-Emile (b. 1800) and Isaac (b. 1806); they became railroad barons and financiers. Their friend and relative Olinde Rodrigues converted them to the theory of social regeneration preached by Saint-Simon. Both were elected deputies to the National Assembly. Isaac’s son Eugène (b. 1831), trained as an engineer, entered family banking concerns and was elected deputy to the National Assembly in 1863. Beau de Loménie (1963), pp. 166-168; Vapereau (1893), v. 2, p. 1232; Hoefer (1863), pp. 574-575.

2. The Pereire school opened Aug. 15, 1875, with nine pupils. Magnat (1882a, 1896); La Rochelle (1882), p. 557, (1886), p. 4; Hément (1885a); Hément and Magnat (1881); Royal Commission (1886), number 483.

3. Dubois’s school opened 1837, joined the national institution 1856, separated 1868. Saint-Hippolyte-du-Fort founded 1856. Hugentobler was in charge of the Geneva school, founded by Renz in 1866, from 1869 to 1872.

4. I am indebted for this observation and many more, which I have signaled where they occur, to the brilliant doctoral dissertation of Christian Cuxac (1980).

5. Magnat (1882b).

6. Etcheverry (1876a).

7. Franck (1861a).

8. In 1872. Lane (1976); Séguin (1875), pp. 6162.

9. La Rochelle (1882), p. 553; Fay (1879a).

10. La Rochelle (1882), p. 561; Arnold (1888), p. 428; Druot (1911).

11. Congress on Deaf—International—First (1878). The resolutions concerning method are translated in Gordon (1900).

12. I am indebted to Cuxac (1980) for this observation. Congress on Deaf—National (1879).

13. Banchi (1891).

14. Arnold (1888).

15. E.M. Gallaudet (1867b), p. 36.

16. Farrar (1923).

17. Royal Commission (1886), numbers 455, 482. Anon. (1895) states that the Hirsch pamphlet also directly affected Tarra’s practices and that the founder of his school, Count Taverna, wrote Hirsch in Aug. 1868.

18. Cesare Castiglione, the head of the administrative board at the Royal Institute of Milan, also went to Germany and Switzerland about this time and published his findings on return. On Dec. 28, 1869, the minister of public instruction, C. Correnti, ordered “pure oralism” at his school. However, the director was apparently opposed and simply extended articulation training.

19. With T. Denis. See Denis (1886).

20. Claveau (1880).

21. Forestier (1880).

22. Denis (1882); Magnat (1896), p. 80.

23. Denis (1887c), pp. 81, 104.

24. Limosin (1886a), p. 68.

25. Cited in Mindel and Vernon (1971), p. 102; also see Schein and Delk (1974).

26. Hull (1880).

27. Elliott (1911), p. 241. But see Marchio’s (1881) and Hull’s (1881) defense of the fairness of the meeting, and Gallaudet’s rebuttal (1881e).

28. Magnat (1880), p. 84.

29. Marchio (1881).

30. Denison (1881), p. 45.

31. E.M. Gallaudet (1881f).

32. Elliott (1882, 1911)

33. E.M. Gallaudet (1881c).

34. Elliott (1882), p. 155. One writer claimed that Tarra rejected nineteen out of twenty applicants, but he vigorously denied the charge (Tarra, 1883b).

35. I.L. Peet in New York Institution (1881), p. 68.

36. Stoddard and Gallaudet (1881), p. 117.

37. Elliott (1882).

38. Denison (1881), p. 4.

39. Peet (1881); Elliott (1911).

40. Franck (1880), p. 29; Elliott (1911). Facchini and Rimondo (1981). Tarra (1878), p. 103.

41. Hodgson (1953), p. 232. Fay (1880b).

42. Fay (1881a, c).

43. E.M. Gallaudet (1881c).

44. E.M. Gallaudet (1881c), p. 8.

45. La Rochelle (1880), p. 16; Congress on Deaf—International—Second (1880a), p. 155; Fay (1881b).

46. Congress on Deaf—International—Second (1880a), p. 78.

47. Tarra translated in Vaïsse (1881b). Also see Dubranle (1889). Speaking of Tarra’s school, a few doors down the same street, Ghislandi, head of the Royal School, said “the contest is warm between the purists and non-purists; I am of the latter who agree with the congress of Siena.” Quoted in Séguin (1880), p. 77ff.

48. Houdin (1881a); I.L. Peet (1881).

49. Denison (1881).

50. E.M. Gallaudet (1881d), p. 57.

51. Arnold (1888), p. 428.

52. Veditz (1933).

53. Veditz (1933). The meeting was held in Cincinnati, August 25-27, 1880.

54. McGregor in Holycross (1913); Gannon (1981); Veditz (1933).

55. Buxton (1883), pp. 44-47.

56. Tarra (1883a).

57. Cited in Winefield (1981), p. 206.

58. Bell (1896a), p. 12.

59. Houdin (1881a); Fay (1881d).

60. Franck (1880), p. 30.

61. Congress on Deaf—International—Second (1880a), p. 200.

62. Franck (1861), p. 24.

63. Limosin (1886b).

64. Quoted in Cuxac (1980).

65. Dubranle (1889). Drouot (1911), p. 177; Vaïsse (1881a). Elliott (1911), p. 303. Currier (1894).

66. Javal (1887).

67. Mottez (1975).

68. Gentile (1973). Reported in Moores (1978), p. 297, 1982 edition; also see Mindel and Vernon (1971), pp. 87-105, for a discussion of earlier studies.

69. Cuxac (1980). Also see Moody (1983): “We must have the courage to recognize and affirm that the deaf today in France are massively and profoundly undereducated.” The untiring labors of a few Americans in Paris to engender a renaissance of French Sign Language—notably the interpreter-dramatist William Moody and his collaborators, and the sociolinguist Harry Markowicz, go some way in repaying to France the vast debt of signing Americans.

70. Quoted in Cuxac (1980), pp. 263-265. The cost per pupil was estimated at 15,000 francs.

71. Binet and Simon (1910), pp. 24, 30.

72. Deltour (1892).

73. Ladreit de Lacharrière (1894).

74. Cited in Cuxac (1980), pp. 259-260.

75. Cited in Cuxac (1980), pp. 255-256.

76. Tarra (1878), p. 104ff. Also see Tarra in Congress on Deaf—International—Second (1880a), p. 100.

77. Vaïsse (1883). I want particularly to thank Brian Lancaster for his skillful search for the original French article at the Bibliothèque Nationale with only scanty information as a guide.

78. Congress on Deaf—National—French (1881).

79. Congress on Deaf—National—French (1884).

80. This meeting also considered itself the Third National Conference but was, in fact, the fourth. Held 1885.

81. Congress on Deaf—National—French (1885), p. 89.

82. La Rochelle (1886).

83. Congress on Deaf—International—Third (1883ab); Hodgson (1953), p. 245. Elliott (1911), p. 417; La Rochelle (1884).

84. Limosin (1886a), p. 32.

85. Limosin (1886d, 1885a).

86. Limosin (1885b).

87. Chambellan (1884), p. 18.

88. Congress of Deaf—International—First (1889).

89. Congress of Deaf—International—Second (1893a, b).

90. Congress of Deaf—International—Third (1896).

91. Bell (1900c).

92. Ladreit de Lacharrière in Goguillot (1889), pp. 19-21. Also see E.M. Gallaudet (1907a), p. 171.

93. E.M. Gallaudet (1907a), p. 171; Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1900a), p. 222.

94. Congress of Deaf—International—Fourth (1900b), p. xiv. Deaf section. For an exchange with a deaf leader, see Ladreit de Lacharrière (1899a, b); Camplo (1899).

95. Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1900a).

96. Quoted in Cuxac (1980), p. 7bis; p. 13, 1983 edition.

97. Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1900a), p. 6; Ladreit de Lacharrière (1900c).

98. E.M. Gallaudet (1900d).

99. Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1900a), p. 114.

100. E.M. Gallaudet (1900d), p. 420.

101. McGregor quoted in Holycross (1913).

102. Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1901b, d).

103. Congress on Deaf—International—Fourth (1900b), pp. 332-336.

104. F.W. Booth (1900a).