Making History Today - A 19th Century Presbyterian Novelist

Presbyterian Historical Society of the Southwest

James S. Currie, Executive Secretary

George Washington Cable (1844-1925) was a Presbyterian who was born and raised in New Orleans and as an adult wrote articles for the New Orleans Picayune. Although his parents owned several slaves, and although he fought in the Confederate army, after the Civil War he was adamantly opposed to slavery. Cable was fascinated with Creole culture and in 1880 published a novel about two Creole families set in early 19th century New Orleans, The Grandissimes in which racism and mixed-race families are important themes. So highly regarded was Cable’s work that some have called him “the first modern Southern writer.” In his biography of Mark Twain, Chernow quotes Twain as maintaining that Cable was “the South’s finest literary genius” (p. 309). 

Other of Cable’s works of fiction include Madame Delphine (1881) and Dr. Sevier (1884) in the latter of which Cable dealt with prison reform. Again, according to Chernow, “A devout Presbyterian who headed the church’s mission school, he worked on behalf of the city’s poor. As secretary of the Prisons and Asylums Aid Association, he also protested the shocking abuse of prisoners leased to private contractors” (p. 309). In 1885 Cable wrote two essays, “The Freedman’s Case in Equity” and “The Silent South” which generated a good bit of controversy locally. So much resentment was aroused that Cable decided to leave the South. He relocated to Northampton, Massachusetts where he lived the rest of his life. In Arlin Turner’s biography of Cable, Northampton was deliberately chosen for several reasons. One was that it was the home of Smith College where his four daughters might attend. Another was that it was accessible to both New York and Boston, both of which “put him in easy reach of his publishers and the lecture circuit” (p. 223). 

Twain admired Cable very much and invited him to join him on a speaking tour that lasted from November 1884 to February 1885 and took them to eighty cities across the country. According to Chernow, Twain tired of Cable’s refusal to work or travel on Sundays. Twain also grew weary of Cable’s insistence on attending Sunday school and church wherever they happened to be on Sundays. One writer notes that Twain wondered if Cable would be willing to travel to heaven on Sunday if he were to die on the first day of the week (William Phipps, Mark Twain’s Religion (p. 139). Twain was always the featured speaker, but, apparently, he grew somewhat jealous of the popularity of Cable’s presentations, usually done with a Creole accent. Nevertheless, Twain admired Cable not only for his literary work, but also for his commitment to racial justice. 

Twain himself had connections to the Presbyterian church and ministers from a variety of backgrounds – not only in his native Hannibal, Missouri, but also in Elmira, New York where his wife, Livy, lived and where they lived and in Hartford, Connecticut where they also owned a home (for more on Twain’s religious views, see Phipps). 

In Turner’s biography of Cable we learn that Cable was a member of the Prytania Presbyterian Church in New Orleans, a church that was built in 1849 and was torn down in 1901. A second Prytania Presbyterian church building was constructed on the same site in 1901. That congregation had several prominent New Orleans citizens as members, including Paul Tulane for whom Tulane University is named. The Prytania church no longer exists. Cable’s home was located in the Garden District of New Orleans and is still there today. 

According to Turner, as Cable aged his strict discipline regarding certain habits he had cultivated early on loosened up a bit. He still insisted on attending worship on Sundays – in Northampton he attended a Congregational church and taught Sunday school there. However, he adhered to his Presbyterian principles. One Presbyterian minister with whom he maintained contact was Henry van Dyke, pastor of the Brick Presbyterian Church in New York City. 

Even after moving to Massachusetts, however, Cable’s thoughts were never far from the South. In 1888 he formed “The Open Letter Club”, the purpose of which was “to keep under public discussion every aspect of the great moral, political and industrial revolution going on in the South, and to disseminate in printed form among thousands of good citizens, especially, though not exclusively, in the South, the most valuable matter printed on every branch of this subject” (Turner, p. 264). There were many members of this club, most of whom were in professional vocations. Papers on various topics would be discussed. For a variety of reasons the club never met after the first symposium. 

Cable continued to write. In 1889 he wrote The Silent South. The following year saw the publication of The Negro Question. His final book, Lovers of Louisiana, came out in 1918. Again, it dealt with Creoles and the race issue. Cable’s oldest grandson, George Cable Chard, was killed in World War I in the fall of 1917. Cable himself died on January 31, 1925 in St. Petersburg, Florida. After laying in state in Carnegie Hall in New York City, his body was buried in the Bridge Street Cemetery in Northampton. 

The Presbyterian Historical Society of the Southwest exists to “stimulate and encourage interest in the collection, preservation, and presentation of the Presbyterian and Reformed heritage” in the Southwest. If you are not a participating member of the Society and would like to become one, the annual dues are $20 per individual and $25 per couple. Annual institutional and church membership dues are $100. Checks may be made out to PHSSW and sent to: 

PHSSW – 5525 Traviston Ct., Austin, TX 78738.