Charles Stratton A.K.A. General Tom Thumb

 

Welcome to the latest post in my series on disability as entertainment. As you may know, I am currently focusing on the 19^th century freak show. Last week, I examined the life of P.T. Barnum. This week, I will be looking at perhaps his most famous performer, Charles Stratton, better known as General Tom Thumb.

 

Who Was He?

Charles Sherwood Stratton was born on 4^th January 1838, weighing a hefty 9 pounds, 8 ounces. However, this relatively large size was not to last as he stopped growing at 6 months old. Although doctors did not understand what was wrong at the time, it is most probable that he had a pituitary gland deficiency. This resulted in restricted growth, leaving him at 25 inches tall until his teenage years. Neither his parents nor his two sisters had the condition.

Being born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where P.T. Barnum became mayor, it is not surprising that the showman found Stratton. It was not only the fact that Barnum was looking for a dwarf to compliment his giants that connected the two. Barnum and Stratton were related, half-fifth cousins, twice removed, to be precise. I know. I know. They were very distant relatives, but it’s good to stay in touch with family. I mean, I wouldn’t recommend bringing them around the world and making them perform. That’s just my opinion though. Barnum offered Stratton’s parents $3 a week to display him in the American Museum in New York. They agreed as they wanted Charles to be of some use.

When Stratton and his mother arrived in the apartment in the Museum that Barnum had arranged for them, they were in for a shock. Being the excellent promoter Barnum was, he had started advertising his new acquirement as soon as he made the deal with his parents. However, it was not Charles Stratton who was being promoted. Instead, the posters told of a General Tom Thumb, a diminutive English general. Tom Thumb was an English folklore figure from the tales of King Arthur. I guess the inclusion of ‘General’ made him sound more important. Hopefully, in the coming months, I will have a series of posts on disability and folklore/myth.

Anyway, where was I? Barnum now had a dwarf to add to his collection, but just staring at a dwarf probably wasn’t all that interesting. So, he taught Stratton a few tricks. Firstly, he told people that the boy was actually 11 years old. This probably increased the level of interest, as 25 inches is incredibly short for a 4-year-old, so for an 11-year-old it’s astonishing. It also helped to decrease criticism for the exploitation of a child. Barnum taught Stratton how to sing, dance, tell jokes, and do impersonations of people such as Napoleon. General Tom Thumb became extremely popular among audiences.

 

International Stardom

Stratton was performing very well in New York. So much so, that Barnum was paying his parents $50 a week, which was a huge sum of money in the 1840s. Eager to build on this success, Barnum arranged for a tour of England. Which makes sense, as General Tom Thumb was English, right? They were worried as to how English audiences would react because displaying dwarfs for entertainment was not as popular as it was in the U.S. They were right to be worried, receiving a frosty response to their opening shows.

However, everything changed when they were invited to perform for Queen Victoria in 1844. The Queen, her close family and retinue were highly amused by General Tom Thumb. She took him by the hand and paraded him around the room, asking questions as they went. The highlight of the performance was actually when the performance was over. You see, it was royal etiquette to never turn ones back on the Queen, meaning you had to reverse out of the room. This proved tricky for Stratton, due to his small feet. Instead, he ran a few steps then turned and bowed. After repeating this a few times, the Queen’s dog grew impatient. It attacked Stratton, forcing him to defend himself with the walking stick he used as a prop. This greatly entertained the spectators. This visit was such a success, that General Tom Thumb became popular in England and Europe, even performing again for Queen Victoria at a later date.

As a side note, when Stratton was travelling through Ireland, it was during the Irish Famine, when potatoes were destroyed by blight. This led to a huge amount of death and emigration. Stratton (still a child remember) is said to have donated $50 for poor relief, having already donated £100 in London.

Charles Stratton and Lavinia Warren Wedding (Wikimedia Commons)

 

Marriage and Death

We have reached the final section of this post, which I have decided to call marriage and death. Much like in life, the latter will swiftly follow the former, or at least it will feel that way. Charles Stratton fell in love with another of Barnum’s performers, Lavinia Warren. She too was of restricted growth and Barnum arranged every aspect of their wedding. The ceremony was held at Grace Church, an Episcopal cathedral in New York city on 10 February 1863. A New York Times article from the following day stated that Broadway was packed with people for the event. The couple had 2,000 guests at their reception and addressed them while standing on top of a grand piano. They even stayed in the White House as part of the honeymoon after being invited by Abraham Lincoln. The pair travelled around the world performing, visiting exotic places such as Asia, Australia, and Ottawa. For a while they travelled with a baby. It is most likely that Barnum rented babies from foundling hospitals, but it has been claimed that they had a biological child who lived from 1869-1871.

By the end of his life, Charles Stratton was an incredibly wealthy man. He even helped P.T. Barnum out of debt. Charles and Lavinia had a mansion built for themselves in Middleboro, Massachusetts, which contained specially made small furniture. It was here that Stratton died of a stroke on 15 July 1883, aged 45. A large funeral attended by 10,000 people was held in his honour. A few years later, P.T. Barnum died and was buried close to Stratton’s grave. Even though Barnum was his boss, it seems like they were genuine friends.

While he was controlled for large parts of it, Charles Stratton appears to have had a good life and enjoyed the attention.

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Next week I will be exploring the lives of the Siamese twins, Chang and Eng Bunker.

 

                                                                                                    The Wheelchair Historian

 

Further Reading

Candyguy, ‘General Tom Thumb – The Most Famous Midget’ https://www.thehumanmarvels.com/general-tom-thumb-the-most-famous-midget/ Accessed: 13 November 2020.

DeLong, William, ‘General Tom Thumb: P.T. Barnum’s Most Acclaimed Sideshow Dwarf’, Published: 24 September 2018, Updated: 20 July 2020 https://allthatsinteresting.com/general-tom-thumb Accessed: 13 November 2020.

Kinealy, Christine, ‘PT Barnum circus star General Tom Thumb’s strong links to Ireland’, 1 August, 2019 https://www.irishcentral.com/roots/history/pt-barnum-general-tom-thumb-links-ireland Accessed: 13 November 2020.

McNamara, Robert, ‘Biography of General Tom Thumb, Sideshow Performer’, Updated: 3 July, 2019 https://www.thoughtco.com/general-tom-thumb-1773621 Accessed: 13 November, 2020.

Powell, James, ‘Remember This? General Tom Thumb visits Ottawa’, Oct 5, 2020 9:00 AM https://www.ottawamatters.com/remember-this/remember-this-general-tom-thumb-visits-ottawa-2760947 Accessed: 13 November 2020.

Talmon, Noelle, ‘General Tom Thumb Was The Most Famous Circus 'Freak' of All Time’, Updated: 28 December, 2018 https://www.ranker.com/list/facts-about-tom-thumb/nicky-benson Accessed: 13 November 2020.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, ‘General Tom Thumb American showman’, Encyclopædia Britannica, 11 July, 2020 https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-Stratton Accessed: 28 October, 2020.

 

P.T. Barnum: The Man, The Myth, The Legend?

 

Come one, Come all! Let me tell you about a magnificent creature famous throughout the American continent. Where he was born, the natives referred to him as Phineas Taylor Barnum, P.T. Barnum for those who struggle with the local dialect. However, he is better known as ‘The Greatest Showman on Earth’. Believed to be born in 1810 in the exotic lands of Bethal, Connecticut, Barnum is part of a unique race known as the Freak Show Showman. Standing at approximately six feet tall, he is possibly the finest example of his kind. A unique feature of the Showman is his ability to spout absolute nonsense and for people to believe him wholeheartedly.

Wow. It turns out that making the mundane sound exiting is harder than I initially thought.

 

Life Overview 

I was unsure what I should write in this post. I mean, P.T. Barnum’s life was heavily intertwined with the history of freak shows, some of which I covered a few weeks ago. I don’t want to repeat myself, as that would be boring to read, as well as write. To be honest, while the name P.T. Barnum was vaguely familiar, I didn’t know who he was until I saw The Greatest Showman a few years ago. The thought occurred to me to compare the movie to reality, but there were not many facts in the movie to work with. Instead, I am just going to give an overview of his life and try to highlight the interesting bits.

When Barnum was a young child, he admired his grandfather (also called Phineas) who was fond of practical jokes. He felt that it brought entertainment and fun to an otherwise dull existence. When Barnum was 15, his father died, leaving him to provide for his mother, as well as his five brothers and sisters. He became publisher of the weekly newspaper, Herald of Freedom. However, he was arrested three times for libel. This gave him a glimpse of what it was like to be famous and he enjoyed it. At the age of 25, a customer in Barnum’s New York grocery store told him he was selling the 161-year-old slave Joice Heth and knew Barnum loved risky investments. Barnum snapped up the opportunity to buy Heth and thus his career as a showman had begun. Although slavery was outlawed in New York at this time, Barnum found a loophole by paying $1,000 to lease Heth for a year. I can’t remember them mentioning that in the film!

I will go onto his time as a showman shortly but first I will discuss other aspects of his life. At 19, he married Charity Hallett, a 21-year-old Bethal woman and they were married for 44 years. They had four daughters together, the youngest of which unfortunately died in childhood. Due to his talent as a showman exhibiting freak show performers and other curiosities, he became hugely famous and immensely rich. He was able to afford huge mansions where he entertained celebrities such as Mark Twain. It was not until his 60s that he became involved in the circus. He initially joined forces with circus owners Dan Castello and William C. Coup. They established Barnum’s Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan and Hippodrome in 1871. Ten years later, Barnum teamed up with James A. Bailey and James L. Hutchinson to form what would become the Barnum & Bailey Greatest Show on Earth in 1887. The circus was bought by Ringling Brothers in 1907 and lasted until 2017. Barnum died in Bridgeport, Connecticut, on 7 April 1891. Apparently, with his last words he inquired about the previous night’s gate receipts at the circus. A businessman till the end!

 

Jenny Lind, 1850 (wikimedia commons)

Barnum The Showman

There is much more information about Barnum than I initially thought. This post will go on forever if I’m not careful. I shall endeavour to pick out the key highlights. After Joice Heth died in 1836, Barnum needed a new attraction. He found it in the form of the Feejee Mermaid. You have probably guessed that mermaids aren’t real. It was actually a preserved monkey’s head sewn onto the preserved tail of a fish. Once interest in the Feejee Mermaid waned, Barnum needed the next big hit. He found him in the form of Charles Stratton, a child with dwarfism who he renamed General Tom Thumb. Stratton was perhaps his most famous attraction and will get a post to himself next week.

I bet you are wondering where Barnum displayed all of these performers and curiosities. In 1841, Barnum bought Scudder’s American Museum in lower Manhattan and changed its name to Barnum’s American Museum. The museum was already filled with strange and exotic items, but Barnum added his own to bring the total to 850,000 exhibits. More than 4,000 visitors entered the museum per day paying 25 cents a trip. Over the course of time, the museum burnt down twice, forcing him to join the circus. He was a politician for a while and even became mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut. During the Civil War, some people were displeased with his views and did the logical thing, resorting to arson.

 

The Swedish Nightingale

Barnum’s goal was to become one of the best promoters of talent in the world, but this was not the reputation he had. Instead, his name was linked to low brow entertainment. In order to change this, he persuaded the Swedish singer, Jenny Lind to do a tour of America with him. He promoted her as “the Swedish Nightingale” and made sure thousands of Americans knew who she was before her arrival. Barnum took a huge gamble on Lind. He sold many of his possessions to pay her, all without even hearing her sing. Once Lind discovered how much Barnum stood to gain from her, she demanded he increase her fee. In fact, over the nine-month tour, they took in the modern equivalent of $21 million. In spite of this, things were not as good as they seemed. Lind did a large amount of charity work and she hoped to use the tour to raise money for various causes. However, she grew to dislike Barnum and his showmanship. She didn’t like him duping the public and therefore activated the clause in her contract which allowed her to leave after nine months.

As you can see, P.T. Barnum had an interesting life that did not completely revolve around freak shows. I have barely scratched the surface and could go on and on and on. However, if I did that, I would never make in on to my next post.

To keep up to date with my latest blog posts, you can like my Facebook page, or follow me on Twitter. You can find them by clicking the relevant icons in the sidebar.

Next week I will be discussing the life of Charles Stratton A.K.A. General Tom Thumb.

 

                                                                                                    The Wheelchair Historian

 

Further Reading

Andrews, Evan, ‘10 Things You May Not Know About P.T. Barnum’, Published: 2 July, 2015, Updated: 22 August, 2018 https://www.history.com/news/10-things-you-may-not-know-about-p-t-barnum Accessed: 6 November, 2020.

Biography.com Editors, ‘P.T. Barnum Biography’, Published: April 2, 2014, Updated: June 23, 2020 https://www.biography.com/business-figure/pt-barnum Accessed: October 20, 2020.

Golden Kellem, Betsy, ‘The Greatest Showman: The True Story of P.T. Barnum and Jenny Lind’, December 22, 2017 https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/12/greatest-showman-hugh-jackman-p-t-barnum-jenny-lind Accessed: 6 November, 2020.

Mangan, Gregg, ‘P. T. Barnum: An Entertaining Life’, July 5, 2019 https://connecticuthistory.org/p-t-barnum-an-entertaining-life/ Accessed: 6 November, 2020.

Mansky, Jackie, ‘P.T. Barnum Isn’t the Hero the “Greatest Showman” Wants You to Think’, smithsonianmag.com, December 22, 2017 https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-pt-barnum-greatest-humbug-them-all-180967634/ Accessed: 6 November, 2020.

Wallace, Irving, ‘P.T. Barnum American showman’, Last Updated: Oct 18, 2020 https://www.britannica.com/biography/P-T-Barnum Accessed: 6 November, 2020.