DECEMBER 3 - 4, 1918 -- WHILE KENT IS STILL IN SEWARD

RCKWELL KENT WILDERNESS CENTENNIAL JOURNAL

100 YEARS LATER

by Doug Capra © 2018

Dec. 3-4, 2018 Still in Seward

PHOTO

Top row from left: Kent as a child, photo inscribed to his daughter, Kathleen, in 1933; Auntie Josie Banker, Kent's mother's aunt. Kent's mother was raised beginning at age 11 by her Aunt Josie and husband, James Banker on their estate in Irvington, N.Y.  Banker was a wealth capitalist connected with the Vanderbilts; Kent's father, Rockwell Kent I, died when Rockwell II was five yeas old. He's shown here with his flute which Rockwell inherited, learned to play, and took with him on all his adventures. Bottom row from left: Kent's mother, Sara Ann (Holgate) Kent with 3-year-old Rockwell at left and his brother, Douglas at right; young Rockwell; Sara's sister, Kent's Aunt Jo, an artist herself who took Kent to Europe for four months when he was 13 years old. In addition to Kent's Austrian nanny, Rosa,  (not shown here) who taught him German, Kent was raised by the women in these photos.

On Dec. 3, 1918, the day before Kent leaves Seward for Fox Island, he writes three letters to Kathleen and one to Hildegard, and stows them aboard the departing steamship. He’s busy during the days when in town, saving his letter writing for late evening and into the early morning. He composes the first letter just before midnight. He’ll make sure every steamer leaving Alaska has letters for Kathleen so at least every other one should be a happy letter. Though her recent letters to Kent have been disturbing, he has confidence those he gets in January will be more positive but has little assurance of those now waiting in Seattle for the trip north. After all, didn’t he open his heart to her in that Nov. 30^the letter, revealing his new insights and how he has changed? “Tell me,” he writes, “do you believe it, that new self of mine?” He asks for a special letter from Kathleen, more loving, hopeful, and appreciative. “What should it be?” he asks. He’ll summarize what her letter should tell him, giving her an outline to follow: “It shall tell me of all you hope from me, of all you picture for us two. If you’re longing for the happiness that I alone can bring you it shall paint your vision of our future life together – tell me of the days and companionship and the nights when our souls open flower-like and mingle and are one. These things are in your heart. Unlock it, my darling, your sweetheart knocks.” He finishes this letter at 12:30 a.m. December 4…

…and starts on the next one (though it’s still dated Dec. 3^rd). His mood becomes darker during the Hour of the Wolf. “Maybe I’ll not be able to endure it longer without you,” he writes. “Do you know that now it seems impossible? But you must tell me to be strong and stick. You must write me longer and longer letters. Know that my strength of purpose will be failing. Show yourself so true, so beautiful and steadfast in your love, so ardent for me as the spring warms your blood – that anxiety cannot trouble me and my thoughts of you can be at least serene.” Kent asks Kathleen to imagine a romantic camping trip: “How we’ll explore by day and night sleep together in our little tent somewhere beneath the trees. And the little insects will buzz and sing to us two locked together under the warm covers in the double darkness. Ah, Kathleen. What a honeymoon for us at last! To do this is my promise and my hope if only you will love me.” But if she doesn’t love him fully, if she isn’t true to him, the consequences will be severe: “I’ll go forever out of your life and beyond the knowledge of men. My fate is absolutely in your hands, remember it, and to each other we must tell the truth.” What is he saying here? If I kill myself you’ll have only yourself to blame? And If I do, what will happen to Rockie?

His darkness continues in the third letter of Dec. 3rd. “I woke up last night in bed shouting, in my nightmare! a man whom I will not mention has taken advantage of my absence to seduce you.” Kent reminds here there are men who will “steal a wife and deceive the husband.” In his nightmare, Kathleen yielded to the seducer, “…hanging affectionately on his arm and getting into a cab.” He almost packed his bags, grabbed Rockie and left Alaska for New York. “What if I had done it,” he asks Kathleen. “It would ruin our lives in the failure it would mean of my opportunity here!” Kent wants Kathleen to write him immediately to renew the promises she made to him about being faithful.

Keep in mind that Kathleen won’t get this letter for at least two weeks and it will be a month at best before Kent gets her reply. There’s no real communication between the two.

And what about Hildegarde? Between the time Kent left New York in late July 1918 and Oct. 28^th – he has written at least 29 long, romantic letters to her. The last letter he writes to Hildegarde is on Oct. 28^th. Through the end of November, Kent may not have received any in return. But he did receive that disturbing Nov. 21^st letter from Kathleen describing what she learned about Hildegarde on a trip to New York. This is most likely why Kent has been writing so many both loving and disturbing letters to his wife. He needs love, loyalty and adoration from at least one woman. This may be why we see Kent going back and forth between regret, apologies, threats, and sweet loving making in his letters to Kathleen. While in Seward between Nov. 30^th and Dec. 4^th – Kent gets two letters from Hildegarde that had been sent to him in Yakutat back in August. Only two letters. On Dec. 3^rd from Seward, in between the letters to Kathleen, he writes to Hildegarde:

“Sweetheart:

         In a little while I go {back to Fox Island}. This one more letter can be written. I am continually uneasy in my mind about you. And to-day the Yakutat letters came – only two of them – the only ones you wrote me for a whole month. You were in the Adirondacks. Hildegarde, have you been true to me? Do not deceive me. Oh, I mustn’t question you but leave it to your honor to tell me even if you have done wrong. Now I feel so alone. From the only one, I believe, who loved me I have cut myself off. Can you ever, ever forgive me? You must. I am really doing what I know to be best. Do be good, my sweetheart, oh my dear love, be always sweet and good. Lovingly, Rockwell.”

Back to the last letter Kent writes to Kathleen on Dec. 2rd – He tells his wife that he hasn’t written to Hildegarde in six weeks. The affair is over, but he doesn’t know how to tell her. He hopes he she’ll get the message with his silence. Hildegarde’s letters have been “beautifully and touchingly true, particularly of late, making it difficult for Kent to be direct. He apologizes to Kathleen for returning that “poison” letter she wrote to him about Hildegarde’s infidelities, but he can’t allow his wife to say such things about the other woman he loves. And, he adds, he’s lost faith in Kathleen’s love and constancy. Now, seeing little hope in Hildegarde’s love and knowing she will never join him, he makes Kathleen feel guilty about not joining him on Fox Island. You chose to stay in New York. Your choice not mine. That was an expensive choice. You would have saved us money if you had come to Alaska. “You should have thought of this,” he chides, “you would have thought of it HAD YOU WANTED TO.”

Kent continues – But this is a love letter, “not a scolding or complaining one.” As of the moment, Hildegarde is a fading attachment so he must try to woo his wife again. “Oh, Kathleen, but I love you so whole heartedly. You do not know half of my love and I hope to heaven I don’t know one twentieth of yours. On the island see me loving you ever (more) dearly telling Rockwell of your making with him grand plans for the future of us all, kissing him for you and sleeping with my arms about him and dreams of you in my heart. Sometimes I will be unhappy, terribly so, for homesickness and for lack of love and will feel bitterly that you have told us so little. That you can help in the letters you will write from this time on. Let nothing divert you from it. It seems to me that this must hold for both of us, that only the sternest necessity shall turn us from our letters to each other which must be to us what prayer is to devout worshipers of God. Goodbye dear sweet wife of mine with eternal love, deep, deep, true love for you. From your Rockwell.

Second thoughts. Kent has more to say, so there appears writing on the margins of both sides of this last page. “I have written Hildegarde that it is over. It is a hard thing for me to do. She has written faithfully and eloquently and so puts you to shame. The letters have been true whatever she may have done. And let me tell you mother dear that I would rather have the devotion of a sinner to comfort me in my loneliness than the careless neglect of another even if she still be my faithful wife. But neither {NEITHER is dark and big} will do for me. You must love me and be in every act and thought true to me. And I will be to you, that I promise. Help me then for it is vastly harder for me than for you… I don’t expect you to write as I have written. Your nature is different and you must keep it regardless of me…I’ll do everything in my power to make you make your dear life happy. And what is beyond my power to do is still yours to complete for me. Goodbye dear child. Ever your Rockwell.

We’ve seen this again and again in Kent’s letters – but here it becomes especially clear – not only the creative energy he derives from being in love, but also the synergy he demands from his lovers. His third wife Sally knew this about him and revealed it in her introduction to the Companion Booklet to the Facsimile Edition of the story and handmade book Kent created for Hildegarde in 1917 – The Jewel: A Romance of Fairyland (1990).  Sally wrote: “What is important to consider in reading and enjoying The Jewel is that Rockwell Kent was an incurable romantic and that his creative energies were heightened by the focus of being in love. He was that way to the end of his long and exceptional life. Nature, of course, in all its untamed and uncharted magnificence was the great stimulus to his art. But one has only to look at the range of his artistic work to see how often the women in his life were subjects and beneficiaries of his creative genius.”

Yes, his women do benefit in some ways but they also pay a heavy price. Kent’s passion demands adulation, reverence, idolization, and praise in return for his love – and especially loyalty. Their worship provides him dynamism, vitality and self-confidence. Since his affair with Jennie, apparently, Kent can’t depend upon one woman to consistently supply this adoration. In his Alaska letters to Kathleen, he often compares her “hurried,” “careless” and critical letters to Hildegarde’s who writes what he wants to hear. But he hasn’t heard from her recently and is concerned. We don’t have Hildegarde’s letters for comparison, but Kent’s claims seem plausible. The two women own distinctive perspectives and histories with him. Being Kent’s wife with the care of his children is quite different from being his amour. Behind Kent’s mask of bravado and manliness lurks a soul whose relationship with women is needy, exhausting and high-maintenance. 

Kent is not unique in this regard. We see it in other men – artists writers and other creative geniuses with their relationships with women. I’m reminded of the National Geographic series on public television titled Genius one about Einstein, the other about Picasso. There are many other examples. We can never fully get into the minds of these men and women.


Does Kent’s upbringing help explain his tendencies? Perhaps. His father died when he was five years old, and he grew up without the influence of a strong male model. In his Kent biography, David Traxel gives us an interesting insight: “It had been thought best to keep the reality of the father’s death from the children.” Their father was just on another trip, they were told, and would eventually return. As the oldest, Rockwell began to intuit the truth. Traxel continues: “His mother, cold and controlled, did not offer much emotional support.” Young Kent had nightmares of death and began to sleepwalk. “He felt abandoned,” Traxel writes, “his loneliness intensified by the family’s snobbery.” In his autobiography, Kent recalls how his mother would not let him play with the local children. They lacked the social status, even though the Kents at that time – were impoverished members of the gentry.

Kent was the first born, raised, disciplined, and doted upon by his mother, his mother's sister, Aunt Jo, his nurse, Rosa, and his mother's Aunt Josie Banker. He was a difficult child, strong-willed and defiant. Traxel adds “rebellious” and “intractable.” Young Kent learned how to manipulate these women to get his way. As Traxel writes, the boy “enjoyed all the secure material comforts of the late Victorian middle class…It was a home of genteel culture and refinement…The family’s Austrian maid, Rosa, bore responsibility for the day-to-day care of the children. She developed a special relationship with little Rockwell as she taught him German, which he spoke before English…” There were other children. Kent’s brother Douglas was two years younger, and later came a sister, Dorothy. “He teased his young sister unmercifully,” Traxel writes, “making fun of her posture, her speech patterns and the size of her teeth.” She recalled this treatment all her life. In his autobiography, In his autobiography, Kent writes about he and his male friends at the Horace Mann School, and their misogyny. His relationship with women was complex – and as I quoted Kent in a letter he wrote to Kathleen, throughout his life, Kent's relationship with his mother was ambivalent.