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George Horton: the literary diplomat

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 April 2016

Brian Coleman*
Affiliation:
Ottawa

Extract

George Horton was a man of letters and United States Consul in Greece and Turkey at a time of social and political change. He writes of the re-taking of Smyrna by the Turkish army in September 1922. His account, however, goes beyond the blame and events to a demonization of Muslims, in general, and of Turks, in particular. In several of his novels, written more than two decades before the events of September 1922, he had already identified the Turk as the stock-in-trade villain of Western civilization. In his account of Smyrna, he writes not as historian, but as publicist.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham 2006 

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References

1 The Book Buyer, 23.2 (September 1901), 87-8.

2 G. Horton, A Fair Brigand(Chicago and New York 1899; London 1900); republished as A Fair Insurgent(London 1906).

3 G. Horton, The Tempting of Father Anthony(Chicago 1901); dedicated ‘To Katherine D. Horton'.

4 G. Horton, Like Another Helen.Illustrated by C.M. Relyea (Indianapolis 1901; New York 1901; London [printed in Brooklyn, New York, c.1901]; Toronto, n.d.). ‘Dedicated by kind permission to His Royal Highness George of Greece High Commissioner to Crete'.

5 G. Horton, The Long Straight Road.Illustrated by Troy and Margaret West Kinney (Indianapolis 1902; London 1902; New York 1912; Toronto, n.d.). Dedicated ‘To Charles E. Russell, Poet, Gentleman, Friend'.

6 G. Horton, The Monk's Treasure.With a frontispiece by C.M. Relyea (Indianapolis 1905; New York 1905; London 1907).

7 G. Horton, In Argolis.Illustrated from original photographs (Chicago 1902 [introductory note by Eben Alexander, Late US Minister in Athens]; London 1903).

8 G. Horton, Modern Athens. Illustrated by Corwin Knapp Linson (New York 1901); also published in Scribner's Magazine, First paper: 29, No. 1 (January 1901, 3—18), Second paper: 29, No. 2 (February 1901, 195-212); republished London 1902 (printed in New York).

9 Horton first married Carrie Nichols of Indian Springs, Nevada County, California, in 1879. His wife died a few years later. They had one daughter, Georgia or Giorgianna. He married Katherine Deaborough Bogart in 1893 in Chicago. They had one daughter, Dorothy Alice. Their marriage ended in 1901, and his wife succeeded in regaining custody of their child in 1903. In 1909, he married Katherine Sacopoulo in Athens. They had one daughter, Nancy Phyllis.

10 G. Horton, ‘The Human Side: An estimate of Theodore Roosevelt', The Reader Magazine4/1 (June 1904)19-26.

11 G. Horton, The Edge of Hazard.With pictures by C.M. Relyea (Indianapolis 1906); ‘Dedicated to My Mother'. The Princess Romanova: A Tale of the Amur(London 1907); no dedication.

12 Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 11 December 2002.

13 G. Horton, Recollections Grave and Gay: The Story of a Mediterranean Consul(Indianapolis 1927) 194.

14 G. Horton, The Blight of Asia: An Account of the Systematic Extermination of Christian Populations by Mohammedans and of the Culpability of Certain Great Powers; with the True Story of the Burning of Smyrna; Foreword by James W. Gerard (Indianapolis 1926) 100. Reprinted 1953; an abridged version was published by the Journalists’ Union of the Athens Daily Newspapers as Report on Turkey: U.S.A. Consular Documents, Athens(Athens 1985).

15 Horton, Recollections Grave and Gay, 219.

16 G. Horton, Miss Schuyler's Alias(Boston 1913).

17 G. Horton, ‘Smyrna: “The Infidel City“', Art and Archaeology11/4 (April 1921) 145-54.

18 Horton, , Recollections Grave and Gay, 219.Google Scholar

19 Horton, , The Blight of Asia, 123.Google Scholar

20 New York Times, 16 September 1922, 1/2.

21 New York Times, 21 September 1922, 3.

22 Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 29 June 2003.

23 Horton, , The Blight of Asia, 107Google Scholar; New York Times, 4 November 1922, 28.

24 New York Times, 10 June 1942, 21.

25 Horton, , Miss Schuyler's Alias, 310.Google Scholar

26 Evan M. Duncan, Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, Secretary of State, letter to the author, 11 August 2003.

27 United States. National Archives. Records of Foreign Service Posts, Consular Posts-Izmir, Turkey [On binding:] Record of Fees and Declared Exports.’ RG 84, Vol. 001, p. 187.Google Scholar

28 Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 11 December 2002.

29 United States. National Archives. General Records of the Department of State. Inspection Reports on Foreign Service Posts, 1906-39, Smyrna, Turkey, 1912. RG 59. Alfred L.M. Gottschalk, Inspector. Date of Inspection: 9-18 November 1912.

30 United States. National Archives. General Records of the Department of State. Inspection Reports, on Foreign Service Posts, 1906-39. Athens, Greece, July 1907. RG 59. Charles M. Dickinson, Inspector.

31 United States. National Archives. General Records of the Department of State. Inspection Reports, on Foreign Service Posts,1906—39, Saloniki, Greece-Turkey, October 1911. RG 59. Date of Inspection, 8—15 October 1911. Alfred L.M. Gottschalk, Inspector.

32 United States. National Archives. Foreign Service Posts — Consular Files-Saloniki. Miscellaneous Correspondence January—April 1910. RG 84, Ser. No: 373. G. Horton to the Hon. Secretary of Agriculture, Washington, DC, 5 November 1910.

33 Horton, , Recollections Grave and Gay, 313.Google Scholar

34 United States. National Archives. General Records of the Department of State. Inspection Reports, on Foreign Service Posts 1906-39, Athens, Greece October 1912. RG 59. Alfred L.M. Gottschalk, Inspector.

35 United States. Department of State. Foreign Relations on the United States; Diplomatic papers 1913. pp. 1313—15. G. Horton's 1912 ‘Memorandum as to the law concerning jurisdiction in the case of Spiro Macris, Captain of the American S.S. Texas'.

36 United States Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic papers, 1913. p. 1323, ‘The American Consul General at Smyrna to the Secretary of State. July 1, 1912'.

37 Horton, , Recollections Grave and Gay, 317—19.Google Scholar

38 Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 11 December 2002.

39 New York Times, 10 June 1942, 21.

40 The Washington Post, 15 April 1953, 26.

41 G. Horton, Constantine: A Tale of Greece Under King Otto(London 1896; Chicago 1897); ‘Dedicated to Mrs. James W. Scott'. “Constantine was first published in Greek, American and English editions. It was repub-lished in Greece in 1982 and is currently on the market in Greece” (Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 28 July 2003).

42 Nancy Horton, letter to the author, 28 July 2003.

43 Horton, , A Fair Brigand, 8.Google Scholar

44 Ibid., 1-2.

45 Ibid., 35.

46 Ibid., 35-6.

47 Horton, , Miss Schuyler's Alias, 309.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., 310.

49 Ibid., 310-11.

50 Horton, , Recollections Grave and Gay, 318.Google Scholar

51 Ibid., 296.

52 Ibid.

53 Horton, Constantine, 94.

54 Ibid., 4.

55 G. Horton to Arthur Henry, 8 February 1901. ‘Dreiser Collection', Annenberg Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Pennsylvania.

56 Horton, , Like Another Helen, 211.Google Scholar

57 Horton, , Constantine, 111.Google Scholar

58 Horton, , Like Another Helen, 1.Google Scholar

59 Orwell, G., ‘Boys’ Weeklies and Frank Richards's Reply', in The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, 1: An Age Like This, 1920—1960, ed. Orwell, Soma and Angus, Ian (Harmonsworth 1968) 505–40.Google Scholar

60 McCarthy, J., Death and Exile: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ottoman Muslims 1821-1922 (Princeton 1995) 29.Google Scholar

61 Horton, , A Fair Brigand, 248.Google Scholar

62 Horton, , Like Another Helen, 291–2.Google Scholar

63 Horton, , The Blight of Asia, 211.Google Scholar

64 Ibid., 27.

65 Ibid., 38.

66 Ibid., 49.

67 Ibid., 166.

68 H. Morgenthau, Ambasssador Morgenthau's Story(Toronto 1918) 251.

69 Horton, , In Argolis, vii.Google Scholar

70 The British Library, The Library of Congress and Princeton University Library identify The Unspeakable Turkas a work by Horton. It is a collection of cartoons from Punchon Turkey. It was published in Britain towards the beginning of the First World War. Horton's name is nowhere mentioned, and his daughter, Nancy Horton, in a letter to the author of 28 July 2003, writes that it ‘is something I know nothing about'.

71 McCarthy, , Death and Exile, 305.Google Scholar