Images Related to Hawthorne's Early Life

Hawthorne in His Youth and People Important to His Early Life
Hawthorne's Birthplace
Other Houses Related to Hawthorne's Early Life
Raymond, Maine
The Richard Manning House in Raymond, Maine
The Hawthorne House in Raymond, Maine

Hawthorne in His Youth and People Important to His Early Life

Silhouette of Nathaniel Hawthorne in 1825(?) from Portraits of Nathaniel Hawthorne: An Iconography by Rita Gollin
This is part of a framed set of the 36 graduates of Bowdoin College, 1825, originally owned by Charles Snell, one of Hawthorne's classmates. Now owned by Bowdoin College, this silhouette is signed "Hath." While it is not absolutely certain that this silhouette was made in 1825 on the occasion of Hawthorne's graduation from Bowdoin, the authenticity is unquestioned as another copy is owned by a descendant, Manning Hawthorne. (courtesy of Northern Illinois UP)

Drawing of Nathaniel Hathorne, Sr., son of Daniel and Rachel Hathorne
Nathaniel Hathorne, Sr., Hawthorne's father, was born May 19, 1775. A sea captain, he married Elizabeth Manning in 1801 and died of yellow fever in Surinam (Dutch Guiana) in 1808. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Robert Manning, Hawthorne's maternal uncle
Miniature on ivory in decorative arts collection of the Peabody Essex Museum (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Hawthorne's Birthplace

The house where Hawthorne was born; originally at 27 Union St., it now stands on the grounds of The House of the Seven Gables
The house where Hawthorne was born was moved in 1958 from 27 Union St. to the property of The House of the Seven Gables Historic Site where it now stands and is open to the public. Few of the original furnishings are in the house, but it does contain period pieces. (photography by Aaron Toleos)

The house at 27 Union St. where Hawthorne was born on July 4, 1804.
This house now stands on the property of The House of the Seven Gables Historic Site and is open to visitors. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

27 Union St., Salem
Early twentieth century postcard made in Germany showing Hawthorne's birthplace on Union St. in Salem (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

27 Union St. in Salem where Hawthorne was born on July 4, 1804
This image is from a postcard dated 1900 and published by the Detroit Photographic Co. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Hawthorne's Birthplace, 27 Union Street, Salem
The house where Hawthorne was born was moved in 1958 from 27 Union St. to the property of The House of the Seven Gables Historic Site where it now stands and is open to the public. Few of the original furnishings are in the house, but it does contain period pieces. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Hawthorne's Birthplace, 27 Union Street, Salem, MA
The house where Hawthorne was born was moved in 1958 from 27 Union St. to the property of The House of the Seven Gables Historic Site where it now stands and is open to the public. Few of the original furnishings are in the house, but it does contain period pieces. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Drawing of 27 Union St., Salem, where Hawthorne was born on July 4, 1804
The Manning house on Herbert Street is in the background. (courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The house at 16 Herbert St. whose backyard was the original location of Hawthorne's birth house at 27 Union St.
According to Dr. Blood, "the house was built in 1850 (originally, one floor with two rooms; now, two floors with an addition added on the back some time in the early 20th century). ...our backyard and driveway are accessible only from Union Street (we share the driveway with neighboring 14 Herbert Street). The site of the Hawthorne house (originally 27 Union...) is in our backyard. ... You can see our house (the pinkish-beige house with a tall, flat back constructed so as not to go over the property line onto the Hawthorne property) in the background of some of the old photos of the Hawthorne house before they moved it[in 1958 to the property of the House of the Seven Gables] (one of the old photos you have on your site shows a brick structure...perhaps that is under our aluminum siding?). In any event, the second floor addition was added to our house before the Hawthorne house was moved in 1958, so it is visible in some old photos. We have one we found in an antique shop on Hawthorne Blvd. that clearly shows our house right behind the Hawthorne house. It was one of the selling points for us. When the Hawthorne house was moved down to Derby Street, the property was eventually purchased by the owner of 14-16 Herbert (originally one owner owned the two houses)." (courtesy of Dr. Elizabeth Blood, Dept. of French, Salem State College)

The backyard of 16 Herbert St. in Salem, looking toward Union St. This area was the original location of the house at 27 Union St. where Hawthorne was born. That house was moved to the property of the House of the Seven Gables Historic Site in 1958.
According to Dr. Blood, "the house was built in 1850 (originally, one floor with two rooms; now, two floors with an addition added on the back some time in the early 20th century). ...our backyard and driveway are accessible only from Union Street (we share the driveway with neighboring 14 Herbert Street). The site of the Hawthorne house (originally 27 Union...) is in our backyard. ... You can see our house (the pinkish-beige house with a tall, flat back constructed so as not to go over the property line onto the Hawthorne property) in the background of some of the old photos of the Hawthorne house before they moved it (one of the old photos you have on your site shows a brick structure...perhaps that is under our aluminum siding?). In any event, the second floor addition was added to our house before the Hawthorne house was moved in 1958, so it is visible in some old photos. We have one we found in an antique shop on Hawthorne Blvd. that clearly shows our house right behind the Hawthorne house. It was one of the selling points for us. When the Hawthorne house was moved down to Derby Street [in 1958], the property was eventually purchased by the owner of 14-16 Herbert (originally one owner owned the two houses)." (courtesy of Dr. Elizabeth Blood, Dept. of French, Salem State College)

Other Houses and Buildings in Salem Related to Hawthorne's Early Life

10 1/2 Herbert St. house with plaque
(photography by Terri Whitney)

10 1/2 (also called 12) Herbert St. in Salem
In Hawthorne's time, this may have been 12 Herbert St.; there is no 12 Herbert St. today. In Salem directories, the house is usually listed as 10 Herbert St. As parts of the house were at times rented, this may have resulted in the altered house numbers. Hawthorne moved into this house with his widowed mother and two sisters during the spring of 1808. In his journals he refers to this house as "Castle Dismal." When the Hathornes moved in, the house was owned and occupied by Hawthorne's mother's parents, the Mannings, and their eight children. The house was crowded, and Margaret Moore and others refer to Nathaniel sleeping in the same bed with his uncle Robert (aged 24 when Nathaniel was 4), but in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Margaret Moore explains that beds were in short supply in large families in early nineteenth century New England (60). (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

10 1/2 Herbert Street, Salem, in 2000
In Hawthorne's time, this may have been 12 Herbert St.; there is no 12 Herbert St. today. In Salem directories, the house is usually listed asd 10 Herbert St. As parts of the house were at times rented, this may have resulted in the altered house numbers. Hawthorne moved into this house with his widowed mother and two sisters during the spring of 1808. In his journals he refers to this house as "Castle Dismal." When the Hathornes moved in, the house was owned and occupied by Hawthorne's mother's parents, the Mannings, and their eight children. The house was crowded, and Margaret Moore and others refer to Nathaniel sleeping in the same bed with his uncle Robert (aged 24 when Nathaniel was 4), but in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Margaret Moore explains that beds were in short supply in large families in early nineteenth century New England (60). (photography by Terri Whitney)

10 1/2 (also called 12) Herbert St. in late nineteenth or early twentieth century
In Hawthorne's time, this may have been 12 Herbert St.; there is no 12 Herbert St. today. In Salem directories, the house is usually listed asd 10 Herbert St. As parts of the house were at times rented, this may have resulted in the altered house numbers. Hawthorne moved into this house with his widowed mother and two sisters during the spring of 1808. In his journals he refers to this house as "Castle Dismal." When the Hathornes moved in, the house was owned and occupied by Hawthorne's mother's parents, the Mannings, and their eight children. The house was crowded, and Margaret Moore and others refer to Nathaniel sleeping in the same bed with his uncle Robert (aged 24 when Nathaniel was 4), but in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Margaret Moore explains that beds were in short supply in large families in early nineteenth century New England (60). (courtesy of the Peabody Essex Museum; special thanks to Bryant F. Tolles, Jr.)

Front and rear view of No. 12 [sometimes listed as 10 1/2] Herbert St., Salem where Hawthorne wrote from Hawthorne's Country by Helen Archibald Clarke, The Baker and Taylor Co., 1910, opposite p. 68
The description that Helen Clarke gives of the house which Hawthorne referred to as "Castle Dismal" is very close to the way it looks today. While no longer a "tenement house" it is rental property in some disrepair. Clarke says the house "has none of the charm which belongs to many of the older houses, even when somewhat humble. It is a tall, high-shouldered, wooden structure, with not a line to commend it nor a grace to distinguish it" (69). She notes that the third floor window of Hawthorne's room "is miserably small and jambed up so close to the eaves as to make one think of the interior only as the most unprepossessing of attic rooms" (69). Clarke does point out that in Hawthorne's day the street was less dense and that the house did provide the advantage of being only a block from the sea (69). (courtesy of Terri Whitney)

Brown Building (Union Building), corner of Essex and Union Streets, in 2002
Sophia Peabody's family moved into an apartment in this building in 1810, a year after Sophia was born. Herbert St., where Hawthorne was living with his mother's family at the time, is one street over, and Sophia recalled watching Hawthorne as a boy playing in the yard behind the house. (photography by Lou Procopio)

Brown Building (Union Building), corner of Essex and Union St. in Salem
Sophia Peabody's family moved into an apartment in this building in 1810, a year after Sophia was born. Herbert St., where Hawthorne was living with his mother's family at the time, is one street over, and Sophia recalled watching Hawthorne as a boy playing in the yard behind the house. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Salem Athenaeum, 337 Essex St. in Salem, in 2000 In
The Salem Athenaeum began as part of the Social Library on Market Street, now known as Central Street, in Salem. It opened on July 11, 1810, but moved three times to various sites in Salem over the next forty years. In 1845, however, a bequest from Caroline Plummer enabled the Athenaeum to erect a building, the original Plummer Hall, at 134 Essex Street. The Athenaeum shared this building with the Essex Institute until 1905, when Plummer Hall was sold to the Essex Institute (now the Peabody Essex Museum), and with the proceeds constructed the building it currently occupies at 337 Essex St.

By 1837 the Salem Athenaeum housed 8,000 volumes. According to Hawthorne scholar Margaret Moore in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, it was the "pooled holdings of the Philosophical and Social Libraries, which merged in 1810," six years after Hawthorne's birth (158). The Athenaeum supplied Hawthorne with a tremendous amount of reading material during his Salem years.

William Manning (1779-1864), Hawthorne's maternal uncle, owned a share in the Salem Athenaeum from 1820-1827. Mary Manning (1777-1841) also was a member from 1826; she later gave this share to Hawthorne. Today this same share is owned by David Gavenda of the National Park Service. (photography by Terri Whitney)

Salem Athenaeum, 337 Essex St. in Salem; photo from Architecture in Salem by Bryant F. Tolles, Jr.
The Salem Athenaeum began as part of the Social Library on Market Street, now known as Central Street, in Salem. It opened on July 11, 1810, but moved three times to various sites in Salem over the next forty years. In 1845, however, a bequest from Caroline Plummer enabled the Athenaeum to erect a building, the original Plummer Hall, at 134 Essex Street. The Athenaeum shared this building with the Essex Institute until 1905, when Plummer Hall was sold to the Essex Institute (now the Peabody Essex Museum), and with the proceeds constructed the building it currently occupies at 337 Essex St.

Raymond, Maine

The family graveyard in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Map of Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The approach to Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Dingley Brook in Raymond, Maine, looking upstream from the old dam structure
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Dingley Brook in Raymond, Maine, rushing downstream
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The shoreline of Sebago Lake near Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Sebago Lake near Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The Mouth of Dingley Brook with the Dingley Islands in the Distance
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The Icy Expanse of Lake Sebago, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Pulpit Rock in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Lake Sebago, near Raymond, Maine, in March, still frozen; photographed in 1981
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Rock on Raymond Cape between the Cape and Frye Island
Named "Frye's Leap" because a Captain Frye, leaped from the rock to the island fleeing from pursuing Indians. Later, according to E.H. Knight in Raymond Then and Now, "during the steamboat era as an attraction to passengers, supposed Indian paintings on the rock were reinforced in bright colors. To further intrigue the passengers a man or boy was hired for the summer to live in a tent on the top to appear in full regalia and with blood-curdling whoops fire a gun in the air" (6). (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

View of "Frye's Leap" on Raymond Cape after paintings on the rock have faded. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Close-up of painting on rocks in Raymond, Maine
The paintings, which some said were made by Indians, have faded over time. (courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

$Detail of faded paintings at \"Frye's Leap\"$

Detail of faded paintings at "Frye's Leap"
View of rock at "Frye's Leap" on Raymond Cape where paintings, said to be by Indians, have faded over time. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Mill and box factory run by Willard Libby and built on the site of the original Dingley Sawmill
The Dingley Sawmill and other mills were across the road from the house where Nathaniel Hawthorne spent time in Raymond, Maine. (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

Early picture of the Baptist Church on Raymond Hill, one of the first two churches in Raymondtown
The addition to the building in the rear was, according to Knight, "supposed to have been the building of the first church, which is very likely so, as it is of older origin and would not have been an added structure in this location and form" (173). Knight also notes that "the land for the Hill church was deeded by Richard Manning, agent for the Proprietors, on 23 March, 1803," and he points out that "the cemetery contains the graves of early settlers of Raymond"(173). (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

Building erected in the 1830s on Raymond Hill to house the Baptist Church
The land for this church was deeded by Richard Manning in his position as agent from the Proprietors on 23 March, 1803, but the building shown here was not erected until the 1830s. According to Knight, "the sanctuary of this church has an interesting curved ceiling and the cemetery contains the graves of early settlers of Raymond" (173). (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

The Richard Manning House in Raymond, Maine

Oil painting dated in the 1840s of the Manning House, now in South Casco, built about 1810 in Raymondtown, MA
The painting, done in the 1840s, indicates that there were few changes in the building over time. The house was built by Richard Manning who was the local agent for the Raymondtown Proprietors and was referred to as "'Manning's Folly' for its pretentions to grandeur in those times" (20). Raymondtown was in Massachusetts in 1810, but in 1820 Maine separated from Massachusetts and Casco separated from Raymond town in 1841. (courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

The entrance hall of the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Indian shutters open, having slid into the casement; at the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

Detail of the parlor chair-rail of the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The kitchen fireplace at the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine, with its beehive oven on left
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

$The front hallway of the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine, looking toward the front door, a \"Christian\" door$

The front hallway of the Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine, looking toward the front door, a "Christian" door
(courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

Front stairway with scrollwork pattern in Richard Manning house in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

The Southwest Bedroom of the Richard Manning House in Raymond, Maine
(courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA)

The Hawthorne House in Raymond, Maine

The Hawthorne house in Raymond, Maine, photographed in 1981
According to Melinda M. Ponder in her 1981 paper "Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Morning of His Life," in June of 1816 “Robert [Manning] began the construction of a large house in Raymond so that all of the Mannings could eventually move from economically depressed Salem to their lands in Maine.” She also says that “[w]hile the Hawthorne’s visited Salem during the summer of 1818, construction on their new house continued in Raymond, under uncle Robert’s direction.” The house, which cost $2407.10, was built “on a knoll opposite the Manning house overlooking Dingley Brook.” The house was purchased by the Hawthorne Associationin 1922; they remain the caretakers and schedule cultural events in the home. (courtesy of Dr. Melinda Ponder)

View of the Hawthorne House across the Dingley Brook from South Casco, Maine
The photo was probably taken shortly after the house, which had been used by Raymond Village as the Radoux Meeting House, underwent restoration by the Hawthorne Association. Here the house is freshly painted. (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

Hawthorne House in Raymond, Maine
The Hawthorne House in South Casco, Maine, built by Richard Manning for his sister, Nathaniel Hawthorne's mother. This photograph shows the house in a state of disrepair, before it was restored by the Hawthorne Association. (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

Restored Hawthorne House at South Casco, built by Richard Manning for his sister, Nathaniel Hawthorne's mother
Before being taken over and restored by the Hawthorne Association, the house was the Radoux Meeting House. Francis Radoux, who married Richard Manning's widow, made the house a community meeting place to satisfy a provision in Manning's will which left money for this purpose. (courtesy of Raymond Woman's Club,Cardinal Publishing.)

Hawthorne at Salem

Biographical Information