The Cyclopædia of American Biography/Putnam, George Haven
PUTNAM, George Haven, soldier, author,
publisher, b. in London, England, 2 April,
1844, second son of George Palmer and
Victorine (Haven) Putnam. His father was a
son of Henry (1778-1822) and Katherine Hunt
(Palmer) Putnam (1791-1869) and a descendant
of John Putnam, who settled in Salem,
Mass., in 1640, with his wife, Priscilla
(Goulds) Putnam. George Palmer Putnam
(1814-72) was a celebrated bookseller and
publisher of New York City and London, England
(q.v). He traces his descent from Gen. Joseph
Palmer (1742-1904), who was chairman of the
Committee of Safety, 1774, and leader of the
“Indians,” who threw the tea overboard in
Boston Harbor after assembling at Chairman
Palmer's house and arranging for boarding
the British tea ships, continued to serve the
patriot cause in the Continental army throughout
the Revolution and, at its close, held the
rank of brigadier-general. When George
Haven Putnam was four years of age his
parents packed up their household belongings,
took ship for New York on the
“Margaret Evans,” a sailing packet of the Black
Star Line. On reaching New York the father
selected as the first American home for his
family, a pleasantly located house at
Stapleton, Staten Island, overlooking the New York
Bay. George Haven Putnam was instructed
at home by his mother and nurse. The elder
Putnam, as was the custom of that day,
entertained as his guests at his home, the authors
of the works he published, and as a boy,
Haven remembered Miss Bremer, the Swedish
authoress; Susan Warner, the author of “The
Wide, Wide World”; Wendell Phillips, the
lecturer and publicist, and Mr. Fabans, the
traveler, who made, possibly, the first
suggestion in regard to a railroad across the
Isthmus of Panama. Haven was prepared for
college, previously, by the Rev. Dr. Stephen
H. Tyng, who had a class of boys at St.
George's Church, of which Dr. Tyng was
rector and his son, Stephen H. Tyng, Jr.,
instructor of a company of cadets. He next
entered Starr's Military Academy, Yonkers,
N. Y. In 1857 he attended Prof. John
MacMullen's school in upper New York and the
Columbia Grammar School conducted by Dr.
Anthon after 1859. In 1861 he matriculated
at Columbia College, but the condition of his
eyes led his father to send him abroad to
consult oculists in Paris and Berlin. He
sailed from New York, as the only passenger
on board the bark “Louisa Hatch” bound for
Bristol, England, and from London he went
to Paris and thence to Berlin, where he placed
himself under the skill of Baron von Graefe,
then the leading oculist of Europe. Ats his
sight improved, he attended courses of lectures
at the Sorbonne, Paris, devoted to French
literature and the literature and history of
Rome. At the advice of Baron von Graefe, he
discontinued lectures after reaching Berlin
and sought open-air environments as necessary
to complete his treatment. He visited Bayard
Taylor at Gotha and en route visited the
galleries at Dresden, tramped through Saxon,
Switzerland, studied Bohemian life at Prague,
passed through the Black Forest region, saw
the toymakers of Nuremberg, continued the
tramp through the pleasant region of the
Thüringer-wald and finally reached Göttingen,
where he took up his studies at the university.
Here he attended lectures by Ewald, the
distinguished Hebrew scholar. He also took a
course in German history and botany. At
the close of the lectures in the beginning of
July, 1862, he was one of a group of students
that took a vacation trip through the
mountains of the Hartz and this closed his university
course at Göttingen, although he did not
realize that he was bidding a final farewell to
the old university. He was going home to
help put down the rebellion, but at its close
to return within the coming year, complete
his work, and secure his doctorate. In August,
1862, he boarded the steamer “Hansa” at
Bremen and returned to offer his services to
the Union army. The Young Men's Christian
Association was recruiting a regiment that
was mustered into service as the One
Hundred and Seventy-sixth Regiment, New York
Volunteers. In this regiment he served as
quartermaster-sergeant. The regiment was
assigned to the General Banks' expedition
ordered to New Orleans, La., to take
possession of the city recently captured by
Admiral Farragut. They embarked on the
chartered whaler “Alice Corence” and in
crowded quarters, with almost continuous
storms for forty days, reached New Orleans
and after taking military possession of the
city the regiment encamped at Brasier City.
They were nine months' men and on the
expiration of their term of service they were
duly mustered out at Bonnet Carrie and
almost to a man they re-enlisted for three years'
service or until the close of the war.
Quartermaster-Sergeant Putnam was commissioned
second-lieutenant and a few months later,
first-lieutenant. He served as quartermaster of the
regiment for about six months and was then
made adjutant. He served in the Red River
campaign in Louisiana. The One Hundred and
Seventy-sixth New York was assigned to Grover's
Division of the Nineteenth Army Corps
and reached Alexandria on 25 March, 1864,
and constituted a part of the rear guard when
the army marched to Shreveport. His regiment
was next in the Nineteenth Army Corps
with Sheridan in the Shenandoah Valley, Va.
Major Putnam was a prisoner of war at Libby
Prison and subsequently at Danville, but
upon being exchanged he served under General
Emery in the final campaign that led to the
surrender of the Confederate forces under Gen.
Joseph E. Johnston to General Sherman in
North Carolina. His term of service in the
Union army as non-commissioned officer,
commanding officer, in hospital recovering from
swamp fever, and as prisoner of war in loathsome
prisons as Libby and Danville, made up
exactly three years from the time he enlisted
as “a small student just from Germany,” to
his landing an honorably discharged soldier in
the Civil War, at the Whitehall wharf in
New York City. On 5 Oct., 1865, he registered
his name for his first legal vote, after having
so fairly earned his citizenship. He was
deputy U. S. collector of internal revenue
under his father who was appointed by President
Lincoln collector of the Eighth District
of New York in 1862, and he served under
his father, 1865-66. His father resumed the
book-publishing business in 1866 and made his
son his partner under the firm name G. P.
Putnam and Son. His father died in 1872,
and his sons, George Haven, John Bishop, and
Irving Putnam continued the business as G.
P. Putnam's Sons, which business was
subsequently incorporated as G. P. Putnam's Sons,
publishers, with George Haven Putnam as president.
They also established, in 1875, a printing
and binding plant above the Harlem River
equipped with the latest machinery for
manufacturing books, known as the Knickerbocker
Press; and, on its incorporation, George Haven
Putnam was made a member of its board of
directors. He was active in reorganizing the
American Copyright League in 1887, originally
organized in 1851 by his father. He was
secretary of the league during the contest for
international copyright, resulting in the bill
of March, 1891. This service was recognized
in France the same year, when he was
decorated with the cross of the Legion of Honor.
He received the honorary degree of A.M. from
Bowdoin College in 1895 and that of Litt. D.
from the Western University of Pennsylvania
in 1897. He became a member of the Commonwealth
Club of New York, the Century
Association, and the Authors' Club and the Aldine
Clubs of New York. He was one of the founders
of the City Club and of the Reform Club
of New York City; the National, Liberal, and
Cobden Clubs of London made him an
honorary member, and the Swiss Club of London
elected him to membership. He was a founder
of the Society for Political Education and a
member of the executive committee of the
Civil Service Reform Association. The Free
Trade Club of New York, the National
Free Trade League, and the Honest Money
League of 1876-78 elected him to membership.
He is the author of: “Authors and
Publishers” (1883) (seventh edition rewritten
with additional material, 1916); “Questions Of
Copyright” (1891) (second edition brought
down to March, 1896); “Authors and Their
Publications in Ancient Times” (1893)
(second edition revised); “The Artificial
Mother, A Fantasy” (1894); “Books and Their
Makers During the Middle Ages,” (2 vols.,
1896); “The Little Gingerbread Man”; “The
Censorship of the Church of Rome” (2 vols.,
1907); “Abraham Lincoln — The People's Leader
in the Struggle for National Existence” (1909);
“A Prisoner of War in Virginia, 1864-65”
(19—); “A Memoir of George Palmer
Putnam” (19—). He married, first, on 7 July,
1869, Rebecca Kettell Shepard, of Boston, Mass.
She died in July, 1895, and he married, second,
on 27 April, 1899, Emily James, daughter of
Judge James C. and Emily Ward (Adams)
Smith, of Canandaigua, N. Y. She was born
15 April, 1865; graduated at Bryn Mawr
College, 1889; studied at Girton College University
of Cambridge, England, 1889-90; taught
Greek at Parker Collegiate Institute, Brooklyn,
N. Y., 1891-93; Fellow in Greek, University
of Chicago, 1893-94; dean of Barnard
College, New York, 1894-1900, and trustee,
1901-05; vice-president and manager Women's
University Club, New York, 1907-08; president
of the League for Political Education, 1901-04.
She is the author of “Selections from Luccan”
(1891).