The Biographical Dictionary of America/Bancroft, George

BANCROFT, George, historian, was born at Worcester, Mass., Oct. 3, 1800, son of Aaron Bancroft, a Congregational-Unitarian minister and author of a "Life of Washington." His childhood was passed in an atmosphere of cultivation, and he early developed a love of study. Between the ages of eleven and thirteen he attended Phillips Exeter academy, and thence proceeded to Harvard, where, during his first year, he had Edward Everett for his tutor. Mr. Everett, being appointed professor, went to Göttingen to further fit himself for his office, and from there wrote to Harvard advising that some brilliant young man should be sent to Germany to study, in order that the teaching at Harvard might be strengthened. Young Bancroft, on his grad nation in 1817, was chosen and sent. At Göttingen he had Eichhorn, Blumenbach and Heeren for his teachers. Heeren was the greatest historical critic in Europe at that time, and his influence is traceable in Bancroft's political course as well as in his historical writings. Mr. Bancroft received the degree of Ph. D. from Göttingen in 1820 and proceeded to Berlin, where he studied under Schleiermacher and Savigny, and under Schlosser at Heidelberg; having thus made the round of the German universities, he travelled in France, Italy, and England, and during his tour met Cousin, Constant, Humboldt, Manzoni, Bunsen, Niebuhr, Göethe, Byron and other distinguished men. He then went back to his tutorship at Harvard, but finding himself trammelled in his attempts to introduce German methods of instruction he resigned, and in company with Dr. Cogswell founded the Round Hill school at Northampton, Mass., which was a success educationally, though not financially. Here he prepared text-books for the pupils, and labored faithfully to carry out his educational theories; published a volume of poems and gave to American literature translations from the German, notably Heeren's "Politics of Ancient Greece" and his "History of Political Systems of Europe." In 1834 the initial volume of his great work was issued, and exhibited in a lucid and philosophical manner the principles of American history for the first time. It was received by those who had waited for it with satisfaction — a satisfaction which was augmented when the second and third volumes made their appearance. In 1838 Mr. Bancroft was made collector of the port of Boston, and in 1844 was nominated for governor of Massachusetts on the Democratic ticket, but was not elected; in the following year he became secretary of the navy under President Polk and established during his short term of office the naval academy at Annapolis, as well as instituted various other reforms, proving himself, in this as in all other undertakings, both able and efficient. During the war with Mexico his orders alone compassed the acquisition of California by the United States and he also, while acting secretary of war, gave the order to General Taylor to march into Texas. In 1846 he was sent as minister to England, where his learning and literary achievements greatly enhanced the respect with which he was received—a respect which was not abated upon a more intimate acquaintance; statesmen and men of letters vied in paying him attention, and counted it a pleasure to afford him every facility for prosecuting his historical researches. Archives were everywhere open to him, and during his residence in that country he gathered a rich store of material. Lord Lansdowne allowing him to use freely the papers left by Lord Shelburne, then in the former's possession. Before his return to America in 1849, the University of Oxford gave him the degree of D. C. L. When he reached home he took up his residence in New York, and for eight years devoted himself to the continuation of his great historical work. His life was methodical and regular. He had settled hours for work and for relaxation or exercise, and pursued an undeviating system as to the disposal of his time; he was thus enabled to get through an enormous amount of work, writing and publishing volumes five to ten during the years 1850 to 1874. An ardent patriot during the civil war, he was chosen by Congress to deliver a eulogy on Abraham Lincoln. In 1867 he went as minister to the German Empire. As such he negotiated with Bismarck, mainly through his great personal influence with that statesman, a treaty by which German citizens settled in America were relieved from compulsory military service in Germany, and allowed to throw off their allegiance to that country on becoming citizens of the United States. England followed Prussia's lead in forbearing to claim perpetual allegiance from those who had left her soil. In 1868, just fifty years after his taking the degree of Ph. D. from the University of Bonn, that institution bestowed upon him the degree of LL. D.,upon which occasion he received congratulations from all parts of the world. Mr. Bancroft performed other valuable services during his diplomatic career in Germany, and was recalled from that country in accordance with his own request in 1874. By this time the tenth volume of the history had been issued from the press, and he assumed with unabated ardor the completion of the task he had set himself, in producing an exhaustive history of what he considered a "a nation among nations." Almost half a century of persevering and unremitting labor had already been given to the research necessary for such a work, no possible source of information being allowed to go unexplored, Mr. Bancroft having travelled from state to state in search of documents necessary to confirm the facts he so faithfully endeavored to set forth in their right complexion. Although there are many adverse opinions as to the quality of Mr. Bancroft's production, it is on all sides conceded that his portrayal of events is conscientious and disinterested; his talent for marshalling facts in narrative form unexcelled; indeed his truth was never called in question except as to certain facts which related to some of the prime actors in the statesmanship of the revolution. Mr. Bancroft as an impartial historian had necessarily to express himself in regard to those whose living descendants felt their pride mortified by his disclosures or his strictures, and he was bitterly assailed by pen and tongue. He did not flinch from such censure; he had spared no trouble in his regard for accuracy, and he was too large-minded to quail before the hail of unpopularity which stung him after his publication of what is undubitalby the masterpiece of his work—the history of the revolution. He is accused of mendacity in his use of quotations; he is also charged with clinging to error, in that he ignored the work of younger investigators in the later editions of his volumes; his style is considered inflated and rhapsodical to a degree that is tedious but these minor defects do not detract from the value of his work as a whole, nor from the ability and power evinced in its achievement. How he was regarded by the great minds of his day is shown by the fact that a partial list of the honors showered upon him by learned societies, as well as by the great universities in Europe and America, fill more than half a column in the quinquennial catalogue of Harvard. He founded exhibitions at Exeter and Worcester, and a scholarship at Harvard which he affectionately named after his old tutor, John Thornton Kirkland. Some of his minor works are: "The Necessity, Reality and the Promise of the Progress of the Human Race"; "A Plea for the Constitution of the United States"; "The Culture, the Support and the Object of Art in a Republic"; "The Office, Appropriate Culture and Duty of the Mechanic"; "Eulogies on Lincoln, Andrew Jack.son, Prescott and Washington Irving"; and numerous other orations delivered on various occasions and afterwards published. He furnished the biography of Jonathan Edwards for the American Cyclopædia. Mr. Bancroft was a man of fine presence, and possessed in a remarkable degree the quality of youth; age did not seem to touch him; his vigor, his upright carriage, his vivacity and joyous bearing did not desert him as his years increased. During the latter years of his life he spent his time between Washington and his Newport home. (See "Allibone's Dictionary of Authors.") He died at Washington, Jan. 17, 1891.