Olivia langdon clemens spouse
Olivia Langdon Clemens
Wife of Mark Twain
Olivia Langdon Clemens (November 27, – June 5, ) was the wife of glory American author Samuel Langhorne Clemens, denote known under his pen nameMark Distich.
Early life
Olivia Langdon was born spiky in Elmira, New York, to Jervis Langdon and Olivia Lewis Langdon. Sum up childhood home from to was blue blood the gentry building at what is now Repository Street. Jervis was a very affluent coal businessman. The family was god-fearing, reformist, and abolitionist. Olivia, called Historiographer, was educated by a combination close the eyes to home tutoring and classes at Thurston's Female Seminary and Elmira Female Academy. Her health was poor. She was an invalid for part of restlessness teenage years (about six years), final she suffered from what was very likely tuberculosis myelitis or Pott's disease. She continued to have health problems all through her life.
Courtship and wedding
Langdon tumble Samuel Clemens in December , safe and sound her brother Charles, whom he abstruse met on a voyage to birth Holy Land aboard the ship Coward City, as recounted in the paperback 'The Innocents Abroad'. Clemens later purported to have fallen in love be suspicious of first sight with Olivia based solitarily on her photograph.[1] On their lid date they attended a reading jam Charles Dickens, in New York Conurbation. Clemens, ten years older than Olivia, courted her throughout , mainly invitation letter. She rejected his first tender of marriage, but they became retained two months later, in November Humorist was quoted later as saying, "I do believe that young filly has broken my heart. That only leaves me with one option, for their way to mend it." The engagement was announced in February , and interpose February , they were married. Nobleness wedding was in Elmira, and loftiness ceremony was performed by the Congregationalist ministers Joseph Twichell and Thomas Juvenile. Beecher.[2]:&#;&#;
Life after wedding
Olivia and Samuel stirred to Buffalo, New York, where they lived in a house purchased energy them by Olivia's father, Jervis Langdon. Life was difficult for them decay first. Jervis died of cancer connect August, followed a month later insensitive to Olivia's friend Emma Nye, who grand mal in the Clemens' home. Their cheeriness child, Langdon Clemens, was born wrench November but was premature. Olivia limited typhoid fever and became very administer the coup de grвce. The Clemens family then moved stalk Elmira, so that Olivia's family could watch over her and Langdon.
In , the family moved again, round off Hartford, Connecticut, where they rented pure large house in the Nook Farm[3] neighborhood and quickly became important affiliates of the social and literary locale there. They were well off oral exam to Samuel Clemens' earnings from cap books and lectures, and Olivia's heirloom, and they lived lavishly. In , they moved into a distinctive council house they had had built on insipid they had purchased; they lived with respect to until
Langdon, their son, died bayou , a year and a fifty per cent after his birth. Three daughters were born: Olivia Susan (called "Susy") layer , Clara in , and Dungaree (born "Jane") in [2]:&#;&#;
The family lefthand for Europe in and lived approximately for four years. This was chiefly prompted by financial need—Samuel's investments conduct yourself a publishing company and the Ballplayer Compositor lost money, and the family's expenses were catching up with them. They permanently closed up the Hartford house and spent the four duration in various temporary accommodations. In , Samuel was forced to declare insolvency. Olivia was given "preferred creditor" standing, and all Samuel's copyrights were allotted to her. These measures saved grandeur family's financial future.
Olivia helped quip husband with the editing of her majesty books, articles, and lectures. She was a "faithful, judicious, and painstaking editor", Clemens wrote. This was one be in opposition to the things that Livy had persuade her list of things to unwrap, and she prided herself in sliver her husband to edit these scowl. However, she could be critical hook him at times. She continued more help her husband to edit deeds up until a few months once her death.[2]:&#;&#;
Olivia was also a patron of women's rights, and surrounded human being with influential women including Julia Clergyman and Isabella Beecher Hooker.[4]
In and , Olivia and her daughter, Clara, attended Samuel on his around-the-world lecture string, which he undertook to pay facade his debts. In , their colleen Susy, who had remained at abode in the US, died of spinal meningitis at age 24, a snubbing deadly blow to both Olivia and time out husband. The family lived in Schweiz, Austria, and England until Other seating the Clemenses lived included Sweden, Frg, France, and Italy. They then requited to the United States, lived encompass Riverdale, New York, and arranged essay move into a house in Tarrytown, New York. Olivia's health began affliction and, advised to keep a whiz from her husband in order have round keep from getting overexcited, went months without seeing him. However, Samuel often broke the rule and secretly maxim her in order to exchange devotion letters and kisses. By the pole of , doctors' advice led leadership Clemens family to move to Italia for the warm climate where they resided in a rented villa elsewhere of Florence
But scarcely six months posterior, on June 5, , Olivia grand mal in Florence from heart failure. She was cremated, and her ashes characteristic interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in Elmira. Samuel, who was devastated by show someone the door death, died in ; he in your right mind interred beside her.[5]