Cecilia Jamison

Background

Cecilia was educated in private schools in Canada, New York, Boston, and Paris; her early ambition was to be an artist, and she received the best instruction America afforded.

Education

She was educated in private schools in Canada, New York, Boston, and Paris; her early ambition was to be an artist, and she received the best instruction America afforded. Shortly after her first marriage, she went to Europe for further study in portrait painting, and lived for three years in Rome.

Career

Writing had been only a favorite avocation with her up to this time, but while Cecilia was in Rome, the poet Longfellow met her, read the manuscript of her first book, Woven of Many Threads, commended it highly, and became enough interested in the novel to arrange for its publication, which was not until 1872. It was favorably received by the reading public. The manuscript, corrected in Longfellow's hand, is now in the rooms of the Massachusetts Historical Society with several of his letters to her. Upon her return she devoted herself for several years to painting and literature, maintaining studios in both New York and Boston. She published successively Something to Do: A Novel (1871), A Crown from the Spear (1872), Ropes of Sand, and Other Stories (1873), and My Bonnie Lass (1877), and began writing short stories and articles for popular magazines. Perhaps the two best-known portraits which she painted are those of Agassiz, which now hangs in the rooms of the Boston Society of Natural History, and of Longfellow, which was presented by the artist to Tulane University, New Orleans. Immediately following her second marriage, the Jamisons went to live on the Live Oak Plantation near Thibodaux, Louisiana, where they resided until 1887, when they moved to New Orleans. Here Mrs. Jamison's most successful books were written: The Story of an Enthusiast (1888), Lady Jane (1891), Toinette's Philip (1894), Seraph, the Little Violiniste (1896), Thistledown (1903), and The Penhallow Family (1905). The first-named was her professed favorite among her works for older readers. Although she had no children of her own, it was her charming stories of child life, in which she drew extensively from picturesque local backgrounds for their settings, that made her most noted. Lady Jane (1891) has been translated into French, German, and Norwegian, and put into the Braille type for the blind. Mrs. Jamison received letters from children in all parts of the world who had read her stories. She also contributed to Harper's, Scribner's, Appleton's Journal, and St. Nicholas. Along with such writers as Lafcadio Hearn, Grace King, George W. Cable, Eugene Field, and Madam Blanc of France, she attended the last famous salon in America, that of Mollie Moore Davis in New Orleans. She was also much interested in the social welfare work of the city. During the latter part of her life, she spent her summers at the summer home of her sister in Nahant, Massachusetts, and upon the death of her husband on July 13, 1902, she returned to Massachusetts. A great sufferer during these last years from a disease of the heart, she died on Easter Sunday at midnight, April 11, 1909, in Roxbury, Massachusetts.

Achievements

• Jamison is best remembered for her works.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Toinette'S Philip

    (This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)

  • Lady Jane

    (This work has been selected by scholars as being cultural...)

  • The Story Of An Enthusiast (1887)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • Thistledown (1903)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • The Penhallow Family: A Story (1905)

    (This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of th...)

  • A Crown From The Spear

    ( This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)

  • Woven Of Many Threads...

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Something To Do: A Novel

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

Connections

While working in a studio in Boston, Cecilia met, and later married, George Hamilton. On October 28, 1878, she married Samuel Jamison (1848-1902), a graduate of the University of Edinburgh and a prominent lawyer of New Orleans, then maintaining an office in New York.

Father:

Viets Dakin

Mother:

Elizabeth Bruce

Spouse:

George Hamilton

Spouse:

Samuel Jamison

References

• Standard History of New Orleans, Louisiana
• A Genealogy of the Viets Family With Biographical Sketches: Dr. John Viets of Simsbury, Connecticut, 1710, and His Descendants (Classic Reprint)