[Rarebooks] GREAT GRAND-MOM raped!!!! and......DAD!!!! (Steinbeck)

[Serendipity Books]

                                 of...GREAT 
GRAND-MOM & her sister; his great grand-father


[1858]              UNITED STATES.  Senate.  35th 
Congress, 1st Session.  Ex. Doc. 54.

Message of the President of the United States, in 
answer to A Resolution of the Senate concerning 
the outrages lately committed against the family 
of Mr. Dickson, an American citizen residing at Jaffa, in Palestine.

[Washington: GPO, 1858]   8vo, disbound (30) pp.   Light stain.

             Concerns the rape of John 
Steinbeck's great-grandmother and the rape of the 
sister of his grandmother, the beating of his 
great grandfather, and the murder of the brother 
of his grandfather, in Jaffa, Palestine.  The 
five alleged perpetrators were brought to justice 
after the American consulate reminded local Arab 
officialdom of the presence of American war ships 
in the Mediterranean (cf p. 23, esp.).  This 
government documentation of the case describes 
the happenings, and includes testimony of many of 
John Steinbeck's immediate forebears, including

                 Sarah and Walter Dickson – the novelist's great-grandparents
                 John A. Steinbeck, the novelist's grandfather
                 Mary Steinbeck and one of her sister's, Caroline S. Dickson

The Dicksons and the Steinbecks were in Jaffa 
attempting to "convert the heathen"; alas, it 
appears it was they who suffered the ultimate conversion.

                 John Steinbeck's parents were 
the former Almira Dickson and John Adolphus 
Steinbeck/  Almira's mother was Sara Dickson, at 
this time age 58; Almira's sister Mary was 24 – both raped, 1858.

                 Two Steinbeck brothers married 
two Dickson sisters.  John Adolphus Steinbeck's 
brother was Frederick, a Prussian citizen and 
husband of Mary, here, murdered. Almira's father 
was Walter Dickson, here, beaten.  The house was pilfered.

                 From a copy of Aunt Bessie 
Hamilton's manuscript version recounting great 
grandfather John Gross Steinbeck's understanding, 
we learn the younger of the two brothers growing 
up in Germany would not inherit the family farm, 
so he went as a missionary to Jerusalem, where he 
met the two sisters from Massachusetts, who had 
come to Jerusalem because their brother had tuberculosis.  The brother died.

             John Steinbeck's sister Beth's 
daughter's family possessed a copy of Ex. Doc. 
54. 1st session, 35th Congress, The Senate.   We 
think it likely [ie, certain] John Steinbeck knew 
the factual history of his ancestors and employed 
those facts, re-imagined and transformed, in his 
fiction.   Just how, you might ask?    $1100.00






                                                                 DAD


Steinbeck (J.E.) = John Ernst Steinbeck's 
father.  Toastmaster, WELCOME celebration, 
Reveille Chapter, No. 47.   Three printed stars, 
five pointed, 150 mm across, edged in gold, tied 
with a blue ribbon, white card stock, fine condition.


Star 1:  WELCOME / Reveille Chapter, No. 47.  A 
Masonic fraternity.  Printed in gold

Star 2:  Officers: includes W. Patron = J. E. 
Steinbeck.  With Hettie R. Glover as W. Matron, 
Amelia Bell as Assoc. Matron, Marietta Keef as 
Conductress, Mary Thompson as Asso. Con.; Clara 
Whisman as Sec.; Annie Malloy as Electa; 
Annabelle Abbott as Treas.; Leah Bell as Warder; 
Joseph Adcock as Sentinel; Mae Lacey as Chaplain; 
Carrie Faulkner as Marshal; Miriam Pearson as 
Organist; and including Marguerite Black as Adah; 
Elizabeth Robertson as Ruth; Ruth Abbot as Esther 
and Liullian Lang as Martha.  All printed in gold.

Star 3: Toasts.  Bro. J. E. Steinbeck is 
Toastmaster.  Events, program of sorts follow.


An impossibly rare ephemeron, the earliest 
printed record of the Steinbeck family in 
California, before the move to Salinas, scouted 
by D.A. Sach.  Only known copy?  No, on another 
occasion, David scouted another set of the same stars!   $1250.00





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Peter B. Howard
Serendipity Books
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