Henry Sydnor Harrison was an American journalist and writer. He contributed articles to The Atlantic Monthly and other magazines.
Background
Henry Sydnor Harrison was born on February 12, 1880, in Sewanee, Tennessee, United States, where his father, Dr. Caskie Harrison, was professor of Greek and Latin in the University of the S. On the paternal side he came of a Virginia family established in America in 1634 by Richard Harrison, a native of Colchester, England. His mother was Margaret Coleman (Sydnor) Harrison of Halifax County, Virginia. In 1882 his parents moved to Mrs. Harrison’s family home, and the next year Dr. Harrison established a private school known as the Brooklyn Latin School in Brooklyn, New York, where he was joined by his family in 1885.
Education
Having prepared for college in his father’s school, Henry entered Columbia where he was graduated with the bachelor’s degree in 1900. In college his literary bent was evidenced by his active participation in amateur theatricals and his service as editor of both Morningside and the Spectator.
Career
After his father’s death in 1902, the family moved to Richmond, Virginia, where at the close of a brief experience with business, Henry joined the editorial staff of the Richmond Times-Dispatch. He was successful as the author of witty paragraphs and of a popular feature known as “Rhymes for the Day. ” By 1908 he had been made chief editorial writer. Early in 1910, encouraged by the reception of a first novel, Captivating Mary Carstairs, which he had published that year under the pseudonym Henry Second, he gave up newspaper work in order to devote all of his time to fiction, and moved to Charleston, West Virginia.
His second novel, Queed, was published in 1911. It won immediate success, justifying Harrison’s decision to rely for a living wholly upon authorship, and was followed in 1913 by another success, V. V. ’s Eyes, and in 1915 by Angela’s Business. Harrison also republished Captivating Mary Carstairs in 1914 under his own name.
In 1915 Harrison joined the American Ambulance Service and spent several months (March-July) on active duty in France. In 1917 Harrison was commissioned lieutenant in the United States Naval Reserves, and, being over age for service at sea, was ordered to Washington, where he remained on duty until February 1919. From that time until his death his home was in New York City, whence he made occasional visits to Virginia and to Europe.
Harrison's first literary work after the war was a tribute to his brother, who had fallen in action in the Argonne, and was entitled When I Come Back (1919). He returned to fiction in 1922 with his Saint Teresa, but with the publication of Andrew Bride of Paris (1925), he gave up novel writing. In 1929 he contributed a series of articles to the Richmond News Leader. His death occurred at a hospital in Atlantic City, New Jersey, four days after an operation for appendicitis and gallstones.
Membership
Harrison was a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters.
Personality
Harrison was described by a literary acquaintance as of medium height, slender, with light hair, and merry blue eyes that crinkle all up at the corners whenever he smiles.
