Edward H. Durell papers
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Abstract
The collection includes the papers of Edward H. Durell (1810-1887), originally of New Hampshire but who lived in New Orleans from 1836 to 1874. Before the Civil War, Durell primarily practiced law and was an author, publishing under the pen name Henry Didimus. After New Orleans fell to Union forces, Durell, as a Unionist, was appointed to various public positions during Reconstruction, including federal judge on the United States District Court for the District of Louisiana. The collection holds correspondence, letter books, manuscripts, extracts, diaries, notes, scrapbooks, and other documents. Represented in the collection in addition to Edward Durell are his father, Daniel Meserve Durell (1769-1841); other family and friends; his future wife, Mary Gebhard, and her circle; New Orleans merchant Aristide Miltenberger; and others.
Biographical / Historical
Edward Henry Durell (1810-1887) was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, a son of Daniel Meserve and Elizabeth Wentworth Durell, who had at least eight children. Daniel Meserve Durell (1769-1841), who is well-represented in the collection, was an attorney and politically active in New Hampshire, serving one term in the U.S. Congress from 1807-09, a district court judge in 1816-21, and U.S. attorney in 1830-34. Edward graduated from Harvard in 1831 and studied law with his father.
Striking out on his own, Edward Durell left New Hampshire in 1834, moving to Louisiana and settling in New Orleans in 1836. There he practiced law and began to write, including the 1845 work "New Orleans as I found it,"using the pen name H. [Henry] Didimus. For a brief time in the mid-1850s, he held local public office in New Orleans. He opposed secession, but remained in New Orleans when the Civil War broke out.
New Orleans fell to the Union forces in 1862, which led to Durell's re-engagement with public office. Among other positions, he was president of Louisiana's 1864 constitutional convention and briefly mayor of New Orleans. Durell was appointed a federal judge by President Abraham Lincoln, which led to his position on the United States District Court for the District of Louisiana in 1864.
Durell, though a Republican, seems to have had enough of an independent streak that he managed to turn both Republicans and Democrats against him, notably in response to his handling of vote counting in the 1872 presidential election. This eventually led in 1874 to Durell facing charges of corruption and drunkenness, and impeachment by the U.S. House of Representatives. Expecting conviction by the Senate, Durell resigned in 1874 and left New Orleans. Moving north, he married Mary Gebhard in New York City and then retired to Schoharie, New York for the balance of his life. He died in 1887 and was buried in Dover, New Hampshire.
(The above note was based on various on-line sources, including the 2013 M.A. thesis "Edward H. Durell, New Orleans Civic Reformer and Reconstruction Judge" by Sean C. Perry, which drew on the Durell papers.)
Arrangement
The collection is arranged by format, with the booklets of correspondence preceding the various volumes of material.
Scope and Contents
The collection includes correspondence, letter books, manuscripts, extracts, diaries, notes, annotated scrapbooks of (mostly) newspaper clippings, and a catalog, all kept or collected by Edward H. Durell.
The correspondence and diaries are held in about 250 booklets. These pertain to Durell and other members of the family, including personal and romantic letters to and from Edward Durell, many in correspondence with Mary Seitz Gebhart, whom he married in 1875. Six booklets of Mary (Gebhard) Durell's correspondence of the 1880s concern her efforts to market a steam radiator for which she held a patent. Durell's father, Daniel Meserve Durell, also figures prominently in the correspondence, including some letters referring to political matters in 1806-09 when he served in Washington, DC, as a Congressman from New Hampshire. Other members of the Durell family and correspondents represented in the collection include Edward's brothers Nicholas St. John Durell, Charles J.F. Durell, and George C. Durell; sisters Elizabeth S. Durell, Sarah Adeline Durell, Mary J. Durell, and Margaret A. Durell; New Orleans merchant Aristide Miltenberger; J.S.H. Durell, John J.A. Brackett, Fanny Poor, and many others. The container list provides information as to which booklets of correspondence are in which box.
Writings in the collection include Durell's novel "The First Age"; extracts from military general orders, most originating from the headquarters of the Dept. of the Gulf in New Orleans (1 volume, 1862-1865); extracts from the New Orleans newspaper "Daily True Delta" (2 volumes, 1860-1864); extracts from the Shreveport newspaper "South-Western" (2 volumes, 1861-1866); manuscript of stories (2 volumes); an annotated version of "New Orleans as I Found It" by H. Didimus (Durell's pen name); and a translation of P.C. Roux's essay on the history of France, including Durell's notes.
Finally, the collection holds 49 other volumes. Of these, 34 consist almost exclusively of annotated newspaper clippings and 2 appear to be an index to some or all of the clippings. Durell inscribed all of these clippings scrapbooks with a quotation from the English writer Thomas de Quincey to describe their content: "Crude undigested masses of suggestion, furnishing rather raw material for composition and jotting for the memory, than any formal development of ideas." But they generally seem to pertain to national political matters, especially with regard to the South. Volumes 1-27 of the clippings are indexed at least in part (many of the 1880s clippings in the volumes seem to have been added after the indexing was done); volumes 29-34 are not indexed. Other than clippings there are 11 volumes of documents related to Louisiana history and two of miscellaneous essays from various publications.
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Access Restrictions
Open to qualified researchers. Materials are stored offsite and advance notice is required for use. Please contact manuscripts@nyhistory.org prior to your research visit to coordinate access. Keep in mind that it will take between two (2) and five (5) business days for collections to arrive, and you should plan your research accordingly.
Use Restrictions
Taking images of documents from the library collections for reference purposes by using hand-held cameras and in accordance with the library's photography guidelines is encouraged. As an alternative, patrons may request up to 20 images per day from staff. Application to use images from this collection for publication should be made in writing to: Department of Rights and Reproductions, The New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West, New York, NY 10024-5194, rightsandrepro@nyhistory.org. Phone: (212) 873-3400 ext. 282.
Copyrights and other proprietary rights may subsist in individuals and entities other than the New-York Historical Society, in which case the patron is responsible for securing permission from those parties. For fuller information about rights and reproductions from N-YHS visit: https://www.nyhistory.org/about/rights-reproductions
Preferred Citation
The collection should be cited as: Edward H. Durell papers, MS 1261, New-York Historical Society.
Location of Materials
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of the estate of Edward H. Durell, November 1918
About this Guide
Processing Information
The booklets of correspondence and select volumes (the content of boxes 1-11 in this finding aid) were processed and cataloged at some point, possibly around 2000. The balance of the volumes in the collection were shelved separately and only noted as such in the catalog record. In January 2022, archivist Larry Weimer inventoried the separated volumes, updating the catalog record to include reference to the entirety, and producing this finding aid with box level details. At that time, the call phrase for the collection was changed from BV Durell to Edward H. Durell papers (MS 1261).