Title: Gertrude Slaughter Papers
Inclusive Dates: 1858-1963

Creator:

• Slaughter, Gertrude Elizabeth Taylor, 1870-1963

Call Number: Mss 180; Micro 558

Quantity: 2.4 c.f. (6 archives boxes) and 1 reel of microfilm (35mm)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Abstract:

Papers of Gertrude Slaughter, an author and prominent member of the Madison, Wisconsin and University of Wisconsin communities. The collection includes genealogical materials; writings of her husband, Moses Slaughter, and other family members and friends; papers from Moses Slaughter's 1918-1919 work in Italy for the American Red Cross; correspondence, 1864-1899, among her parents (Joseph and Elizabeth Taylor), family, and friends, and to and from Mrs. Slaughter (1868-1958), including letters to “Nancy” Allinson; and travel notes, including descriptions of climate, scenery, and social life and customs in Europe, the Middle East, and the West Indies. Also includes drafts and notes of her writings, some written in collaboration with Lilliam Dykstra, including reviews of Mrs. Slaughter's work and a draft of her autobiography, Only the Past Is Ours.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-mss00180

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Gertrude Elizabeth Taylor Slaughter, author and prominent Madison, Wisconsin resident in the first half of the twentieth century, was born in Cambridge, Ohio in 1870. She spent her youth in Cambridge and in North Berwick, Maine, home of her grandparents. Her mother was Elizabeth Hill Taylor, and her father, Joseph Danner Taylor (1830-1899), was a noted lawyer and Congressman from Ohio (1883-1885, 1887-1893).

In 1893, she graduated from Bryn Mawr College and married Moses Stephen Slaughter (1860-1923). A classics scholar, Slaughter received a B.A. from DePauw University in 1883 and a Ph.D. in 1891 from the Johns Hopkins University where he had studied Greek and Latin. After teaching at Bryn Mawr, Collegiate Institute in Hackettstown, New Jersey, and Iowa College, he joined the Latin Department of the University of Wisconsin in 1896, and eventually headed the Department of Ancient Classics.

From 1918 to 1919, the Slaughters lived in Venice while Moses served as a major in the Italian Commission of the American Red Cross in charge of the Venice District. Mrs. Slaughter was also very active in the organization, and for many years continued to be involved in philanthropic aid to southern Italy.

Although the Slaughters traveled extensively over the next thirty years and summered at Hancock Point on the coast of Maine, Madison remained their home. In Madison, Slaughter was part of the “Frances Street cabal” which included Frederick Jackson Turner, Charles Sumner Slichter, and Charles Van Hise. During summers in Maine, the Slaughters belonged to an academic and intellectual community which included the physicist Arthur Trowbridge and the historian Charles Homer Haskins. Among the Slaughters' closest friends were Anne Crosby Emery Allinson and her brother, Henry Crosby Emery. “Nancy” Allinson was an 1896 Bryn Mawr Ph.D. and the first Dean of Women at the University of Wisconsin.

The Slaughters had two daughters, Elizabeth Hill Slaughter and Gertrude Taylor Slaughter (“Trudles”), both of whom died in the early years of World War I. Moses Slaughter died suddenly in 1923 while in Rome on leave from the university.

In her long years as a widow, Mrs. Slaughter continued the active life she had known with her husband. She continued to spend summers in Maine and to participate in the life of the Hancock Point community. In Madison she was active in the Madison Art Association, the University League, the Madison Literary Club, and the Wisconsin Archeological Institute. She received an honorary degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1940, Phi Beta Kappa membership in 1950, and a citation from Bryn Mawr in 1960. She died in Madison on December 2, 1963.

Gertrude Slaughter's books include:

• Two Children in Old Paris, From the Notes of a Journal by Their Mother, Gertrude Slaughter. Macmillan, 1918.
• Shakespeare and the Heart of a Child. Macmillan, 1922.
• Heirs of Old Venice. Yale University Press, 1927.
• The Amazing Frederic. Macmillan, 1937.
• Calabria, the First Italy. University of Wisconsin Press, 1939.
• Saladin, 1138-1193, a Biography. Exposition Press, 1955.
• Only the Past Is Ours: The Life Story of Gertrude Slaughter. Exposition Press, 1963.

The Gertrude Slaughter Papers combine both genealogical data and documentation of her life and career as an author. The collection includes family papers (1851-1961, undated), correspondence (1868-1958, undated), travel notes (1910-1949, undated), research notes and drafts of her writings (1898-1956, undated), and articles by family and friends (circa 1858-1954, undated).

Earlier general correspondence (1868-1899) is both incoming and outgoing among her parents, family, and friends. Later correspondence (1903-1958) is almost entirely directed to Mrs. Slaughter, and ranges from personal correspondence and letters of condolence after her husband's death to letters praising her various publications.

Travel notes are fragmentary and include information on climate, scenery, people, and activities in the various countries the Slaughters visited, including France, Italy, Egypt, and the West Indies. “Letters from England” are actually letters written to Nancy Allinson in 1923. However, because of their emphasis on description of travels, they seem to have been written for the purpose of later publication, and have therefore been included with the travel notes.

Her writings are documented by three boxes of materials, including drafts, research notes, and reviews of her essays, short stories, reports, memoirs, biographical sketches of writers Paul Valery and Katherine Mansfield, and novels--an autobiography, mysteries, and romances, some written in collaboration with Lillian Dykstra. Her memoirs entitled Only the Past Is Ours, written late in her life, are also available on microfilm. Bryn Mawr materials include drafts of alumnae notes, correspondence from alumnae, and material from an alumnae weekend in 1950.

The writings by family and friends include articles and lectures by Moses Slaughter, poems possibly by her mother, writings of her daughter, Elizabeth Hill Slaughter, and published articles by and about such friends of the Slaughter family as Charles Van Hise, Edward A. Birge, Charles Sumner Slichter, and Frederick Jackson Turner.

The Miscellaneous folder consists of anonymous poems, notes, and quotations.

Acquisition Information

Presented by Robert H. Taylor, Princeton, New Jersey, January 29, 1964. Accession Number: M64-22

Processing Information

Processed by Susan Sharlin, September 10, 1975.

Mss 180	Series: Genealogical Papers
Box   1 Folder   1	Biographical data on Gertrude and Moses Slaughter, 1924-1961, undated
Box   1 Folder   2	Gertrude Slaughter - Notes for a family history, undated
Box   1 Folder   3	Joseph D. Taylor, 1851-1953
Box   1 Folder   4	A record of Elizabeth Hill Slaughter, 1898-1900
	Series: Correspondence	⇧
Box   1 Folder   5	1868-1879
Box   1 Folder   6	1880-1913
Box   1 Folder   7	1918-1924?
Box   1 Folder   8	1926-1937
Box   1 Folder   9	1939-Oct. 30, 1955
Box   1 Folder   10	Nov. 1, 1955-May 27, 1958, undated
	Series: Travel Notes	⇧
Box   1 Folder   11	Europe and North Africa, 1910-1911, 1923
Box   1 Folder   12	Italy, 1918-1919
Box   2 Folder   1	England, 1923
Box   2 Folder   2	Calabria, 1923
	Letters from England to Nancy Allinson
Box   2 Folder   3	Holograph, 1923
Box   2 Folder   4	Typescript, 1923
Box   2 Folder   5	France, 1927
Box   2 Folder   6	Italy, 1930
Box   2 Folder   7	Middle East, Europe, 1935
Box   2 Folder   8	Egypt, Palestine, 1935
Box   2 Folder   9	Egypt, 1935
Box   2 Folder   10	France, Italy, 1949
Box   2 Folder   11	Paris, undated
Box   2 Folder   12	France, undated
Box   2 Folder   13	Spain, England, undated
Box   2 Folder   14	West Indies, undated
	Series: Writings	⇧
Box   3 Folder   1	Essays and stories by Gertrude Slaughter, 1898-1922
Box   3 Folder   2	Brief published and unpublished writings, 1918-1951, undated
Box   3 Folder   3	President's report and other papers, Hancock Point, Maine, Library, 1940, 1941, 1945, 1948
	Memoirs (finally titled Only the Past Is Ours)- draft, undated
Box   3 Folder   4-9	Paper copy
Micro 558	Microfilm copy
Mss 180 Box   4 Folder   1	Memoirs - draft, undated
Box   4 Folder   2	“Baronessa Americana” - draft of novel, 1941.
Box   4 Folder   3	“Murder Between Friends” - draft of novel by Gertrude Slaughter and Lillian Dykstra, undated
Box   4 Folder   4	“The Marble Staircase” - draft of novel by Gertrude Slaughter and Lillian Dykstra, undated
Box   4 Folder   5	Untitled mystery novel - draft, undated
Box   4 Folder   6	Autobiographical novel - plot line, undated
Box   5 Folder   1	Untitled story - draft, undated
Box   5 Folder   2	“In the Faubourg St. Germain” - draft of a short story, 1913
Box   5 Folder   3	“A Dream of Form in Days of Thought,” undated
Box   5 Folder   4	“A French Socrates” (Paul Valery), undated
Box   5 Folder   5	“Katherine Mansfield,” undated
Box   5 Folder   6	Poems, undated
Box   5 Folder   7	Reviews of writings, 1922-1956, undated
	Research notes
Box   5 Folder   8-10	Saladin, undated
Box   5 Folder   11	“Etruscan Art,” undated
Box   5 Folder   12	Untitled, undated
Box   5 Folder   13	Class Notes - Bryn Mawr Class of 1893, 1944-1952, undated
	Series: Writings of Family and Friends	⇧
Box   5 Folder   14	Articles by Moses Slaughter and related papers, 1888-1917
Box   5 Folder   15	“The Roman Forum Today” - [lecture by Moses Slaughter?], undated
Box   5 Folder   16	“The Significance of Recent Excavations in the Roman Forum” - [lecture by Moses Slaughter?], undated
	Articles by and about friends of the Slaughters
Box   5 Folder   17	1908-1940
Box   6 Folder   1	1942-1954, undated
Box   6 Folder   2	Poems [by Elizabeth Taylor?], circa 1859-1864
Box   6 Folder   3	“Mon Histoire de Paris” by Elizabeth Hill Slaughter, circa 1911
Box   6 Folder   4	“Sir Galahad” by Elizabeth Hill Slaughter, undated
Box   6 Folder   5	Miscellaneous, 1906, undated