Samuel S. Forman Autobiographical and Travel Publications and Manuscripts
(Exclusive on Ill-FatedFrontier.com. Does not appear in Ill-Fated Frontier the book)
About 1840 Samuel S. Forman wrote down his autobiographical, genealogical, and travel memoirs for family members and associates. A brief version of this account, apparently written by a reporter from a direct conversation with a very elderly Samuel S. and perusal of his writings, appeared in a Syracuse newspaper. Years later, Lyman C. Draper, a 19th century historian and avid collector of primary source manuscripts associated with the American West, heard of the manuscript from Forman’s descendants. Draper recognized the value of Forman’s travel memoir, despite its having been committed to writing almost a half century following the events described. He identified it as a rare firsthand account of trans-Allegheny westward migration in the Early Republic, over a decade prior to the Louisiana Purchase and the Lewis and Clark expedition. Unlike John D. Shane’s interview transcripts of mostly illiterate and elderly western pioneers (whose transcripts Draper also acquired and archived at the Wisconsin Historical Society), Samuel S. Forman and his writings were literate, featured uncannily accurate recall, and provided a first-person account of a variety of people, customs, and locales.
Acting as editor, Lyman Draper independently verified the identity of numerous frontier persons and incidents described off-handedly, and in vivid detail, by the aging Forman. As did Draper, the modern reader may infer that additional incidents, for which the Forman manuscript remains the sole source, should be taken seriously, if not always accepted in whole cloth. These include otherwise unknown proto-Abolitionist activism of the ladies of Lancaster, Pennsylvania and an aborted armed emigrant slave revolt in Westmoreland County.
The earliest pre-1800 years of westward and southern migration produced sparse contemporary manuscript documentation written by pioneers themselves. This is understandable when one contemplates the small numbers involved, as compared to explosive growth of the Mid-West and Delta South in later antebellum decades, and the scant literacy of rough pioneers, Indians, slaves, and Latino and Creole French frontiersmen and women.
I have traced the manuscripts, apparently written from memory, at separate sittings by Samuel S. Forman, over a twenty-year period from the late 1830s and his death. Forman did not use old letters and documents, still in his possession, as aids to his recollections. The manuscript has come to me in at least four versions, which taken together, yield the full picture of the epic 2,400-mile pioneer trek across the western and southern frontiers of the nascent United States in 1790.
Draper published a manuscript, to which he had access from an unnamed Forman descendant, as a book in 1888. Several reprints of this book, along with Draper’s original footnotes, have been republished for scholars over the decades. Scholars of the American West have long known about Draper’s presentation of Samuel S. Forman’s writings in book form, treating them as a primary source for late 18th century West and South. I have located earlier published versions of the travelogue – unknown to Draper – from 1861 and 1869. I also acquired an unpublished handwritten manuscript apparently written for Samuel S.’s only surviving child, Mary Euphonia Forman. The several versions do not contradict one another, but rather offer additional names, color, and incident in one or another but not all versions. Those variants that establish humanity, names, and agency to otherwise voiceless slaves are of particular interest.
Where Samuel S. Forman addressed the reader in his writings in the first person, and in additional instances where Forman was addressing the manuscript scribe directly, I sometimes present his words as dialog in important interactions among the pioneers and colorful characters they encounter.
The published versions are:
- Forman, Samuel S., and Lyman C. Draper. Narrative of a Journey Down the Ohio and Mississippi in 1789-90. Cincinnati, OH: Robert Clarke & Co., 1888. Herein cited as: Forman and Draper, Journey Down the Ohio and Mississippi 1888. The main part of the Forman’s narrative, as edited by Draper, was reprinted in its entirety without footnotes as: Forman, Samuel S. “Great Heart of the American Dominion: narrative of a journey in the wilderness of the Mississippi Valley in 1789-1790” The Journal of American History 1907, Vol. 21: pp. 337-355. There have been two other publications of Samuel S. Forman’s biography, neither of which Lyman C. Draper was aware. They both apparently drew on different versions of Samuel S. Forman’s writings:
- Caldwell, A.B. “Brief Biography of Major Samuel S. Forman.” Atlas and Argus, March 14, 1861. This newspaper is not yet part of the American Antiquarian Society/Readex Internet database of America’s Historic Newspapers. The sole source of this particular issue is at the New York State Archives: Microfilm at the New York State Library, Atlas and Argus, Syracuse, issue 10935, MC/FM NY42Albany 93-31351. Cited as: Forman Brief Biography, Atlas and Argus 1861.
- Dawson, Charles, C. “Autobiography of Major Samuel S. Forman of Syracuse New York.” Historical Magazine 1869, Vol. 6: pp. 322-337. Dawson transcribed one of the Samuel S. Formans manuscripts, otherwise lost, in which the latter refers to himself in the third person as the semi-legendary Greek Stoic philosopher Anacharsus. Cited as: Forman Autobiography, Historical Magazine 1869.
Other versions of Samuel S. Forman’s genealogical, autobiographical and travel narratives remain in manuscript. All were collected by Helen Lincklaen Fairchild (1845-1931), a meticulous antiquarian devoted to her Lincklaen heritage and that of associated families from Cazenovia, New York’s pioneer settlement era. Toward the end of her life she assured the conservation of the papers she had collected, and distributed them among the New York Public Library, New York Historical Society, and the Lorenzo historical mansion in Cazenovia. Each of these repositories archives additional documents related to Samuel S. Forman’s life and travels in New Jersey and in the Early Republic’s trans-Allegheny West, upper Delta South, and New York northern frontiers.
- Samuel and Samuel S. Forman papers, 1745-1877. In Fairchild Collection, New York, New York: New York Public Library, Ms Coll 969. Cited as: Forman Travels, NYPL manuscript c. 1850
- Fairchild, Helen Lincklaen. Samuel and Samuel S. Forman papers, 1748-1923, Patricia D. Klingenstein Library, Mss Collection BV Forman, New York: New York Historical Society. Cited as: Forman Travels, NYHS manuscript c. 1850
- Lorenzo Collection 1771-1956, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Library. The Samuel S. Forman travel manuscripts reside within this collection. A microfilm version of the entire collection was begun but never completed or distributed. A useful archival aid is: Applegate, Howard L., and Paul H. McCarthy The Lorenzo Collection; a register of papers in the Syracuse University Library, Manuscript Inventory Series, 1964, Vol. 4, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Library. Syracuse University Library is the chief site providing access to this collection, while copies, transcripts, and some originals are retained at the Lorenzo House archive, Cazenovia, NY. The latter’s typescript transcription of Samuel S. Forman’s autobiographical writings is similar to the version at NYHS. Cited as: Forman Travel Account in Lorenzo Collection
- The current author owns a handwritten transcription of Samuel S. Forman’s writings. From internal reference, the source document was written by Samuel S. Forman in 1838. The transcription of it appears to have been made in the early 1880s, prior to the appearance of Lyman C. Draper’s edited book. It contains notable details that do not appear in any of the published or other manuscript versions. Cited as: Forman Autobiography and Travels 1838, manuscript privately owned by the author.