“These New Year’s Letters”: James A. Garfield and Burke Hinsdale’s Annual Correspondence

James A. Garfield, the 20th president, was a man of letters. In a life of nearly fifty years he wrote thousands of them — to his mother, wife and children, to aunts, uncles and cousins, to fellow teachers, soldiers, politicians and newspaper correspondents, and to his friends. James A. Garfield National Historic Site shared some in its newsletter, the Garfield Telegraph.

James A. Garfield. Credit: National Park Service.

A New Year's tradition

One of those friends was a former student, Burke Hinsdale. Their correspondence began in 1857 and ended only with Garfield's death in 1881. Every year, on or just after New Year's Day, each wrote to the other. The excerpts below come from The Garfield-Hinsdale Letters, edited and published by Hinsdale's daughter Mary in 1949 — examples of letter writing as an art of describing experience, calling up a scene, and expressing a full mind and heart.

1857: The student writes

Hinsdale, then teaching, wrote about his school:

"I am very pleasantly located for the winter; good schoolhouse and good school. I have in all about seventy scholars… They can be divided into two classes; first the children of the farmers… secondly the progeny of the miners… I cannot, however, complain of having willful or ugly pupils…"

Garfield replied from Hiram, Ohio, on January 15, 1857:

"I was made very glad a few days since by the receipt of your letter. It was a very acceptable New Year's present… You will agree with me that everyone must decide and direct his own course in life – and the only service friends can afford is to give us the data from which we must draw our own conclusions and decide our course."

1869: The congressman apologizes

Twelve years later, Garfield, now in Congress, wrote from Washington on January 11, 1869, explaining a missed letter:

"When Congress adjourned for the Holidays, I was taken sick, and kept my bed for nearly a week – and just before New Year's, being a little better but not yet fit for work, Crete and I went to New York and remained until the 5th. On New Year's Day I went with Gen. McDowell and visited the Military Academy… I hope we shall not allow ourselves to get into the habit of omitting or postponing these New Year's letters – for they not only keep us advised of the progress, fortune, or misfortune of each other, but they link us to our past selves – and help us measure our own tendencies, better than we can do in almost any other way."

1870: Hinsdale writes first

The next New Year's Day, Hinsdale wrote from Hiram late at night:

"This day has been a busy one, spent in the classroom and in conversation with some callers… and now, though the children have long been asleep, though Mary too has gone to rest, though the hour is near midnight, though the water formed by the melting snow splashes under the window, my mind refuses to flow into the New Year's channel… it was thirteen years ago today that I wrote you my first letter…"

Visiting

James A. Garfield National Historic Site in Mentor, Ohio, preserves Garfield's home and offers tours and programs, including talks on the Civil War era.

Sources

Based on "Garfield Telegraph Jan.-Feb. 2024," James A. Garfield National Historic Site, National Park Service; a work of the United States government in the public domain. Letters quoted from The Garfield-Hinsdale Letters (1949).