Anna Bartlett Warner
Gardening by Myself
To pick the next Lost Lady of Garden Writing, I pulled another book off the shelf in my personal library and started doing some online searches. The author of that book was easy to find, and to my delight, she was credited as the author of another book: a list of gardening books that would be part of a display at the New York Public Library in 1927. To my delight, this list of gardening books was available to read online.
I dove right in and began doing searches on every woman author listed. Within a few minutes, I found another five women authors of gardening books that I hadn’t heard of, including today’s Lost Lady of Garden Writing, Anna Bartlett Warner.
Does that name sound familiar? Anna Bartlett Warner wrote the lyrics to “Jesus Loves Me” in 1859, a song which has no doubt been heard or sung by anyone who has ever attended a Sunday School class. It is included in a novel she wrote with her sister, Susan Warner, called Say and Seal. (See page 115-116 of Volume II of that book.)
An aside… as to the length of that novel, they wrote,
It is a melancholy fact, that this book is somewhat larger than the mould into which most of the fluid fiction material is poured in this degenerate age. You perceive, good reader, that it has run over.
Doubtless the Procrustean critic would say, "Cut it off," — which point we waive.
The book is really of very moderate limits — considering that two women had to have their say in it.
Couldn’t we say the same thing about novels written today? If they're too long, people get anxious or refuse to pick them up and read them.
Together and separately, Susan and Anna wrote numerous novels and children’s books, but Anna also found time to write a gardening book.
Her Biography
Anna Bartlett Warner was born in 1824 in New York City. She was eight years younger than her sister Susan Bogert Warner (1819-1885). Their mother died when Anna was young, and both she and her sister were privately educated and raised with the help of an aunt. Their father, Henry W. Warner, was a wealthy attorney but lost his fortune in the Panic of 1837, forcing him to sell off their New York City home and move his family permanently to their summer home on Constitution Island in the Hudson River across from West Point Military Academy. Mr. Warner had purchased the island in 1836 after visiting his brother Thomas, who was a chaplain at West Point. Here, Anna and Susan learned to cook, clean, and garden on their own, and began writing numerous novels, children’s books, and at least one gardening book to supplement their income.
For forty years, they also taught Bible classes for West Point cadets who would row across to the island on Sundays. According to Praise Broadcasting Network, President Dwight D. Eisenhower was probably one of the last cadets to attend Bible classes taught by Anna.
Anna stayed on the island until her death in 1915, aged 95, refusing several offers from others to purchase the island until 1908 when she sold it with the agreement she could live there for the rest of her life.
Neither she nor her sister ever married. They were the first civilians buried in West Point Cemetery.
After Anna's death, West Point acquired the island and the Warners’ home, which is maintained by the Constitution Island Association.
What I Found in Newspapers
I didn’t find many articles about Anna in newspaper archives other than numerous articles written about how Mrs. Margaret Olivia Sage purchased Constitution Island from Anna in 1908 and then presented it as a gift to the United States under the condition that it be forever part of West Point and that Anna could live there for the rest of her life.
There was also an article from 1911 about how Anna was severely bitten by a stray dog who wandered onto the property. According to the article, she was rescued by several servants who heard her cries, she “suffered a few hours of shock” after the attack but “feels no alarm over her wounds,” which were cauterized by a doctor.
I also checked Ancestry.com but found very little about Anna, other than death notices.
Her Gardening Book
Anna wrote and published Gardening by Myself in 1872, which, according to Encyclopedia.com, was the first “do-it-yourself” gardening book. It is organized by months of the year and has some hand-drawn illustrations sprinkled in here and there.
I found a good copy to read online, and as always, searched to see if original copies could be purchased for a reasonable price. I couldn’t find an original 1872 copy, but I did find several copies from 1924, when it was republished. Since this book is so old, there is no copyright on it, which means you can easily find copies of the book for sale in various forms, some of which are probably truly awful. No one wants one of those!
So if you want to own this book, do as I did and order a copy of the centennial edition published in 1972 by the Constitution Island Association.
I have not read the entire book, but what I did read seemed like information that could still be used today. After all, what’s really changed about gardening in 152 years? It did take me a few chapters to get used to the tone of the book.
I’ll leave you with a few quotes and you can judge for yourself if this book is still of value.
Quotes from Gardening by Myself
On the size of the book and why not everything is included:
“I think it is Mr. Biglow who solaces himself with "More last words." I know there are many I might say. There are flower names you will look for here, and not find. The fair faces of my Campanula Lorei, look at me reproachfully even now, from a distance; with the pink Eucharidiums, just unfolding their fresh colour. And there is Viola Cornuta, and my superb new Gen. Jacqueminot rose. But if I mentioned everything, when should I have been done? Not till my book was altogether too big for you to buy.”
The following quote is worthy of a meme, don’t you think?
“I wish everybody had a garden, and would work in it himself, — the world would grow sweeter-tempered at once.”
She actually started the book with:
“Gardening by oneself is so lovely, and so easy a thing, that I would fain have everybody try it.”
About seed catalogs, she wrote:
“Catalogues! Catalogues! — what bewildering things they are! How they do pile up epithets and suggestions and images; heaping "lovely blues," and ''creamy whites," and "intense reds," and ''clear yellows," and ''rosy pinks," and ''desirable contrasts," just to turn the heads of people who cannot get everything. There is a saying in the family that where other people read novels, I study catalogues — and it is a good deal so.”
About weeds, she wrote:
“I remember, as I write, that some great authority — Mr. Henderson, I think — says it is a shame ever to have a visible weed in your garden—they should all be destroyed before they can be seen. And "true for ye!"—as some of the weed-pullers would say. There never would be a weed seen in my garden, if I had ten men at my disposal. Or ten women. But some of us cannot spend quite all our time in Fairyland.”
The Mr. Henderson she refers to here and elsewhere in the book is most likely Mr. Peter Henderson who had a seed company in the 1800s. Fairyland is what she called her garden.
“Oh! but it is pleasant to escape into Fairyland from the every-day cares and labours and dust, and to study the wonders God is preparing, and to think of the underground work in progress, and to use our own glad hands as agents. If they are glad and willing— that is enough; the skill will come.”
Finally, one last quote:
“In one's garden as in the world, one must learn to be content; even when the blooming successes are passed by, and the failures picked out; wearing there, as elsewhere, the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which in the sight of God is of great price."
So Much More to Research
Once I found Anna Bartlett Warner and discovered who she was, I could have gone down several different rabbit holes—the novels she wrote, the children’s books, the impact she had on future soldiers and leaders of our country through her Bible studies, not to mention the hymns she wrote lyrics for.
But there is only so much time. I think Anna would want me to spend that time in my own garden, my own Fairyland, and not spend too much time chasing down everything she and her sister wrote. I will, however, finish reading her book, Gardening by Myself.
Do you know of other women authors of gardening books that I should research as Lost Ladies of Garden Writing? Send them my way via a comment or email!
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I’ll return with the next Lost Lady of Garden Writing article in two weeks. In the meantime, you can find me in several places: my website and blog, The Gardenangelists podcast, and my weekly newsletter, In the Garden With Carol.
I guess the family was in "reduced circumstances" as they say, but if they could afford to keep and maintain an island in the Hudson River their fortune wasn't entirely lost. Sheesh. Sadly my library doesn't have a copy of her gardening book, so I will read the one you found online. Thanks for doing the research!