Edwin Lawrence Godkin
Published in 18th–19th - Century History, Issue 3 (May/Jun 2007), Letters, Volume 15Sir,
—With reference to the article ‘Men at war: nineteenth-centuryIrish war correspondents from the Crimea to China’ in the last issue(HI 15.3, March/April 2007) I was interested to learn of the reportingfrom the Crimea of Edwin Lawrence Godkin. After emigrating to theUnited States in 1856, he developed a strong following here in his roleas the first editor of The Nation magazine, a progressive weeklypublication. Following his death in 1902, a group of his admirers(including Andrew Carnegie and J. P. Morgan) subscribed $10,000 to afund to establish the E. L. Godkin Lectureship at Harvard University inCambridge, Massachusetts. The only stipulation in the gift is that thelectures be upon ‘the essentials of free government and the duties ofcitizens’, and that they be called the Godkin lectures. Manydistinguished individuals have delivered the lectures over theyears.—Yours etc.,
HENRY H. MOULTON
Cambridge
Massachusetts
