Theodore Frelinghuysen Dwight

Born: June 11, 1846, Auburn NY

Died: February 3, 1917: Boston, MA

Parents: Almon Dwight and Cyria Charge White

Theodore F. Dwight was a noted librarian and archivist. He also worked for Henry Adams as his secretary. From 1865-69, Dwight attended Rochester Collegiate Institute. He worked in a hardware and saddle shop to pay his way. In 1873, he worked at G.P. Putnam Publishing Company, but by 1875 he was working in Washington DC as literary assistant to historian George Bancroft. This job then led to a position as US State Department Librarian, working with manuscripts concerning foreign relations of the US starting in 1789. He assembled “the best international law library outside of the British Museum.”  He was instructed to help the US government obtain papers of Benjamin Franklin which were being sold in London. He was successful in this task.

While working at the State Department, Dwight lived at the home of Henry Adams and his wife Marian “Clover” Adams. Henry Adams was getting ready to publish his History of the United States. Dwight negotiated with Scribner and Sons and was able to get the book published. He also looked after the couple’s newly built house, first when Henry Adams and Clover Adams traveled together hoping to restore her health. After her suicide in 1885 he traveled to Cuba with Henry, and then worked on the papers of John and John Quincy Adams during a summer spent in Quincy Massachusetts at the Adams family’s ancestral home.

In 1892, Dwight was hired to be the head of the Boston Public Library. He left after one year with poor health given as the reason for his departure. Next, he represented Isabella Stewart Gardner in Rome, where she was acquiring art and furniture for her new home which became a museum. He also published several volumes of Civil War history for the Military Historical Society of Massachusetts.

In 1904 Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge requested an appointment for Dwight as US consul at Geneva, Switzerland. The appointment was withdrawn after Dwight tried to impose conditions. Then Lodge requested an appointment for Dwight as Consul in Vevy Switzerland. This was approved. At age 49 in 1895, Dwight married Sally Loring. There had been rumors regarding his sexuality for some years. The couple lived in Weston, MA. In 1896, they had a son, Lawrence Dwight. Lawrence spent much of his childhood in Switzerland, but graduated in August 1917 from West Point. He died in France in 1917 of pneumonia.

Theodore Dwight died at the age of 70 in Boston. His obituary made no mention of his wife or his son. He is buried next to his wife at Harmony Grove Cemetery.

Sources Consulted:

• ‍Books: ‍
  • Patricia O’Toole. The Five of Hearts: An Intimate Portrait of Henry Adams and His Friends, 1880-1918.Ballantine Books, New York: 1990.
  • Ernest Samuels. Henry Adams. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts and London England: 1989.
• Internet: Wikipedia.org/w/index.php?=Theodore_Freylinghuysen_Dwight&oldid=1075662317.