Hope is more than just a wish. The dictionary defines it: "to
cherish a desire with anticipation; to desire with expectation of
achievement; to expect with confidence." Hope is expectation and
desire wrapped in optimism and confidence.
During the Christmas season of 1860, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
the well-known American poet, had every reason to be full of hope.
He and his wife, Fanny, had been blessed with five healthy children,
and he was enjoying great fame and professional success. One of his
most famous poems, "Paul Revere's Ride" ("Listen my children and you
shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere ..."), was published
that year. He was elated over the election of one of his fans,
Abraham Lincoln. Longfellow thought Mr. Lincoln's election signaled
the triumph of freedom and the end of slavery for the nation.
Tragedy followed for the nation and for Longfellow in 1861. The
opening shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, and in July
of that year, Mrs. Longfellow was sealing some locks of her
daughter's hair with candle wax when a breeze through the window
caused some drops of the wax and an ember to fall onto her light
dress, igniting it. She ran into Henry's study, and he tried
unsuccessfully to extinguish the flames, badly burning his face,
arms and hands (his face to the point that he was badly scarred and
unable to shave after the tragedy, leading to Longfellow's famous
beard). Fanny died the next morning. Henry was too severely burned
to attend her funeral.
On Christmas Day 1861, Longfellow wrote in his journal, "How
inexpressibly sad are all holidays."
1862 brought a deepening of the Civil War. On Christmas Day that
year, Henry's journal entry stated, "‘A Merry Christmas' say the
children, but that is no more for me."
In early December 1863, Longfellow received word that his oldest
son, Charles, who ran away in 1861 at age 17 to join the Union Army,
had been severely wounded. In a skirmish in Virginia, Charles had
been shot in the left shoulder. The bullet traveled across his back,
nicked his spinal column and exited under his right shoulder. He was
evacuated to a hospital in Washington, D.C., where Henry and one of
his other sons went to retrieve him and bring him back to
Massachusetts to try to recover. With Charles' recovery uncertain
and with the Civil War still hanging in the balance, Longfellow had
every reason for continued despondence.
It was during that Christmas season of uncertainty, though, when
a particular sound of the season moved him to write. The sound was
old and familiar. It hinted at despair but ultimately held hope.
Longfellow's poem contained seven stanzas, two of which directly
refer to the country's involvement in the Civil War and its impact
on families, his family included. Those two stanzas were dropped
when the poem was set to music over a decade later, but here is his
original poem, "Christmas Bells":
I heard
the bells on Christmas Day,
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men.
And
thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along
The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men.
Till
ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime,
A chant sublime,
Of peace on earth, good-will to men.
[to top of second column]
