Richard Penn Smith

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Richard Penn Smith
Born(1799-03-13)March 13, 1799
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
DiedAugust 12, 1854(1854-08-12) (aged 55)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Resting placeLaurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Occupationplaywright
Signature

Richard Penn Smith (March 13, 1799 – August 12, 1854) was an American playwright who wrote twenty plays. He created a controversy by writing a largely fictitious account of events leading up to and at the Battle of the Alamo, which was presented as the diary of Davy Crockett.[1]

Life and career[edit]

Smith was born on March 13, 1799, in Philadelphia[2] to Ann Rudolph[3] and William Moore Smith.[4] His grandfather was William Smith, the first provost of the College of Philadelphia. He was educated in local schools and by private tutors. In 1818 he studied law in the law offices of William Rawle and joined the Philadelphia bar in 1820.[5] During that time, he began writing a column called "The Plagiarist" for a local newspaper. He purchased The Aurora in 1822 and worked as editor until 1827.[4] The next year his first play, "Quite Correct", was produced at the Chestnut Street Theater. That same year, he sold The Aurora and returned to legal practice to support his theatrical work. He wrote twenty plays and fifteen were performed.[2] He was married twice and had 5 children with each wife. Only 1 survived from the first marriage, but all 5 from the second remained alive. He died at his home in Philadelphia in 1854.[6] He was initially interred in a mausoleum on his estate but was reinterred along with 14 family members to a plot at Laurel Hill Cemetery.[7]

Historical Hoax[edit]

In 1836, a sensation was created by a new book titled "Col. Crockett's Exploits and Adventures in Texas: wherein is contained a full account of his journey from Tennessee to the Red River and Natchitoches, and thence across Texas to San Antonio; including many hair-breadth escapes; together with a topographical, historical, and political view of Texas ... Written by Himself". It was published by "T.K. and P.G. Collins" (actually Carey and Hart, who had published some of Crockett's authentic, though heavily edited, writings). They falsely claimed that it was Crockett’s journal, which had been taken from the Alamo by Mexican General Manuel Fernández Castrillón and later recovered at the Battle of San Jacinto, where the General was killed. It became a huge best-seller. For over a century the book had a profound influence on the public's view of the Texas Revolution and Davy Crockett's career, despite the fact that the author's true identity had been revealed in 1884.

List of Plays[edit]

Reasonably popular at the time, modern criticism has judged Smith to be a competent craftsman of little originality, as most of his plays were based on earlier works. He was considered to be part of the "Philadelphia School" of dramatists.

  • Quite Correct (1828)
  • The Eighth of January (1829)
  • The Disowned: or The Prodigals (1829)
  • A Wife at a Venture (1829)[8]
  • The Sentinels: or The Two Sergeants (1829)[8]
  • William Penn (1829)[8]
  • The Triumph at Plattsburgh (1830)
  • The Deformed: or Woman's Trial (1830) (based on The Honest Whore, Part II (c. 1606) and The Italian Father (1799))
  • The Water-Witch (1830)
  • Caius Marius (1831) [9]
  • Is She a Brigand? (1833)
  • The Daughter (1836)
  • The Actress of Padua (1836)
  • The Bombardment of Algiers (?)[8]
  • The Last Man: or The Cock of the Village (?)[8]

References[edit]

Citations

  1. ^ Published as On to the Alamo : Col. Crockett’s Exploits and Adventures in Texas, Richard Penn Smith ; edited with an introduction and notes by John Seelye. Penguin Classics, 2003. ISBN 0-14-243764-6
  2. ^ a b Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1951). The Literature of the American People: An Historical and Critical Survey. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts Educational Division. pp. 469–470. Retrieved 7 May 2024.
  3. ^ McCullough 1917, p. 1.
  4. ^ a b Simpson, Henry (1859). The Lives of Eminent Philadelphians, Now Deceased. W. Brotherhead. p. 899. ISBN 978-0-608-40097-6.
  5. ^ McCullough 1917, pp. 1–2.
  6. ^ The Life and Writings of Richard Penn Smith, with a Reprint of his Play, "The Deformed," by Bruce Welker McCullough, George Banta publishing company, 1917.
  7. ^ Smith, Horace Wemyss (1880). Life and Correspondence of the Rev. William Smith, Volume 2. Philadelphia: Ferguson Bros. & Co. p. 449. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  8. ^ a b c d e The Sentinels & Other Plays, by Richard Penn Smith; edited by Ralph H. Ware and H. W. Schoenberger.Princeton University Press, 1941.
  9. ^ Caius Marius; a Tragedy. Edited and with an introd. by Neda McFadden Westlake. University of Pennsylvania Press (1968)

Sources

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Richard Penn Smith
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