Study Guide to The Man Without a Country by Edward Everett Hale

Intelligent Education

• Publisher: Influence Publishers
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781645420972
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Study Aids
• Subtopic: Study Guides

A comprehensive study guide offering in-depth explanation, essay, and test prep for Edward Everett Hale’s The Man Without a Country, a short story written during the Civil War. As a work of patriotic literature, The Man Without a Country bolstered support across the U.S. for the Union in the North. Moreover, Hale uses irony, mystery, and realism to tell the gripping story of a man who feels seemingly no patriotism or connection to his country during a war in which he must take part. This Bright Notes Study Guide explores the context and history of Hale’s classic work, helping students to thoroughly explore the reasons it has stood the literary test of time. Each Bright Notes Study Guide contains: - Introductions to the Author and the Work
- Character Summaries
- Plot Guides
- Section and Chapter Overviews
- Test Essay and Study Q&As The Bright Notes Study Guide series offers an in-depth tour of more than 275 classic works of literature, exploring characters, critical commentary, historical background, plots, and themes. This set of study guides encourages readers to dig deeper in their understanding by including essay questions and answers as well as topics for further research.

INTRODUCTION TO EDWARD EVERETT HALE

Edward Everett Hale (1822-1909) was a famous Unitarian minister, a popular writer, and a man very much interested in the welfare of his country and the American people. He was a member of an old New England family, but did not feel that the old families should rule the United States. He was interested in the section of the country in which he was born and lived, but he visited and wrote about other sections of the country also. His many articles and books covered a wide range of subjects. He wrote novels, short stories, biographies, autobiographical works, works on theology, travel books, and works on the settlement of the West. He was, in addition, a famous preacher. His most famous work, however, is The Man Without a Country, an historical short story which praises patriotism and condemns those who put local or selfish interest ahead of the welfare of America.

EARLY LIFE

Hale was born April 3, 1822, in Boston, Massachusetts. His father, Nathan Hale, was the editor of the Boston Daily Advertiser. The father was named after his own uncle, Captain Nathan Hale (1755-1776), the American patriot who was hanged by the British as a spy during the Revolutionary War. Captain Hale is remembered as the man who said, just before he was hanged, “I only regret than I have but one life to lose for my country.” His mother, Sarah Everett, was an educated woman and translated books and magazine articles from foreign languages into English. Edward Everett Hale was named after his mother’s older brother, Edward Everett, minister of a Unitarian church in Boston. Hale inherited from his parents his love of learning, his religious devotion, and his patriotism.

He was only two years old when he started to school. He attended two small grammar schools until he was nine. At that time he transferred to the Latin School, a high school which stressed Greek and Roman culture. In 1835, at the age of 13, he entered Harvard College he graduated four years later. One of his teachers at Harvard was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the famous American poet. One of his classmates at Harvard was James Russell Lowell, the famous American poet, critic, and author. After his graduation in 1839, he studied for the ministry and was licensed as a Unitarian minister in 1842, at the age of 21. He preached in various places, but in 1856 he was appointed minister of the South Congregational Church in Boston. He remained there until 1899. He was named as chaplain of the United States Senate in 1903 and kept this post until his death in 1909.

HIS INTEREST IN WRITING

Since childhood Hale had been interested in literature and writing. While at college he wrote for a college quarterly and he had contributed articles to his father’s newspaper. After graduation from college, he began to write reviews and articles for various magazines, such as the Atlantic Monthly. His first successful story, “My Double and How He Undid Me,” was published in the Atlantic in 1859. As the teller of this story, Hale pretends that he is a minister by the name of Frederic Ingham. He used this nom de plume or pen name to disguise his identity in writing a number of stories. Frederic Ingham, in these stories, is not very much like the real Edward Everett Hale and he is not always described the same way. In The Man Without a Country, for example, Frederic Ingham is not a minister, but a retired Navy captain. Hale thought that In His name (1874), an historical novel about Italian Protestants of the 12th century, was his best work. Other works are If, Yes, and Perhaps (1868), a collection of tales; Ten Times One Is Ten (1871), a short novel; and Franklin in France (1887-1888), an account of Benjamin Franklin’s diplomatic mission to France. Readers of The Man Without a Country (1863) would also be interested in Philip Nolan’s Friends (1876), a novel based on the life of an adventurer who was killed in Texas in 1801.

OPPOSITION TO SLAVERY

The Man Without a Country reflects to a limited extent the wide range of Hale’s interests and also many of his ideals. Hale was opposed to slavery. This short story describes some of the evils of slavery. Vaughan, a United States Navy officer is made angry by the discovery of Africans in chains aboard a slave ship. He promises to hang the men who enslaved them. Hale always believed that Negroes are as intelligent as whites and he took an active interest in the education of freed slaves after the Civil War. Hale also supported the Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Company, an organization which recruited settlers for the new territories in the West. He was anxious that these settlers be opposed to slavery. Philip Nolan hears with delight Ingham’s account of the movement of American pioneers into Texas and California. Later in life Hale visited both Texas and California and wrote about his travels there.

OPPOSITION TO BIGOTRY

Hale was opposed to religious and racial bigotry also. He preached against those who had prejudices against Irish, Polish, and other immigrants. He felt that these Europeans, no matter what their language or religion was, should become part of the United States and he was anxious to see them settle in the West. Although Hale was a Unitarian minister, Philip Nolan appears to be a Presbyterian and Danforth an Episcopalian. Like Hale, his fictional Philip Nolan is a religious man. Hale worked for the relief of Irish Catholics during the great Potato Famine of 1846-1848. The Negroes in The Man Without a Country are described in sympathetic and human terms. The African slaves are described as men with the same longings for home and family that all men have.

HALE’S INTEREST IN HISTORY

Hale did not serve in either the Army or Navy, but he was interested in both services. He wrote “The Naval History of the American Revolution” and an article on “Paul Jones and Denis Duval.” Paul Jones is often called the Father of the American Navy. He spent several weeks, in a civilian capacity, during the Civil War, in an army camp. This was, however, a year after he wrote his account of Philip Nolan, a former lieutenant of the United States Army. Hale was always interested in the history of the United States and he wrote, with the help of Sydney Gay, a Popular History of the United States (1877). His Memories of a Hundred Years is both a collection of family and personal memories and a history of the United States from 1800 to 1900. The Man Without a Country is, in very abbreviated form, a history of the United States from 1801 to 1863.

VIEWS ON JEFFERSON

The Memories of Hale and his The Man Without a Country show his strong bias against Jefferson. Hale believed in a strong Navy and Jefferson did not. Hale thought that Jefferson and other presidents who came from Virginia did not do enough to put an end to the slave trade. In 1803, during Jefferson’s presidency, the United States bought the territory called the Louisiana Purchase and in doing so almost doubled the size of the United States. Hale believed very much in the expansion of the United States, but he says nothing about Jefferson’s part in this purchase. Madison is also attacked for his failure to hold Nuku-Hiva Island in the Pacific. Captain Porter held it briefly during the War of 1812. Four of the first five presidents of the United States were from wealthy Virginian families. Hale felt that it was not good for democracy for so many presidents to come from the same area and the same class. Both Ingham and Nolan attack these presidents in The Man Without a Country. Washington, our first president, was from Virginia, but Hale never attacks him. Hale does not mention the fact that John Adams, the 2nd President of the United States, was the father of John Quincy Adams, the 6th President. The Adams were from New England.

HALE’S PATRIOTISM

Hale’s devotion to America, his patriotism, was really a devotion to an ideal. He believed that Americans should know their history, that all men should be free and equal, and that Americans should love and serve their country. Patriotism to Hale was both a religious and a romantic ideal. The country deserves love even when the patriot is not rewarded and a man should love America the way he loves his wife.

LATER LIFE

His own life was peaceful and happy. Hale’s parents were kind and understanding and his brothers and sisters and he were close to one another. He married Emily Perkins in 1845. Their family life was very happy and both lived to see their one daughter and four sons lead successful lives. Hale’s books, especially The Man Without a Country, were very popular and he was widely recognized throughout the country as a literary man and as a preacher. When he died on June 10, 1909, he was praised everywhere as a preacher, a writer, and a patriot.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Events in The Man Without a Country take place between 1805 and 1863. There are also a number of references to events that took place before that time. In order to fully understand Hale’s story a review of the historical events of the period is necessary.

In the Declaration of Independence of 1776, the people of the thirteen colonies in America explained why they should be free from England. These colonies, with the help of France, won their independence when Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown in 1781. The Constitution of the United States was finally ratified by the thirteen states in 1788 and the next year George Washington was inaugurated as the first President (1789-1797). John Adams, the second President (1797-1801) resisted French efforts to control American trade and as a result there were many battles between French and American ships from 1798 to 1800. War was never declared, however.

During the administration of Jefferson, the third President (1801-1809), the American Navy defeated the pirates of North Africa in the Barbary Wars (1801-1805). Jefferson doubled the size of the United States when he made the Louisiana Purchase from Napoleon in 1803. Jefferson authorized the Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804-1806) to explore the American West and in 1808 Congress forbade the further importation of slaves. Aaron Burr attempted to seize control of some territories in the West in order to establish a personal empire. He was stopped by President Jefferson and tried for treason in Richmond, Virginia in 1807. he was acquitted.

When James Madison was President (1809-1817), America fought the War of 1812 (1812-1814) against England in order to protect American ships from seizure and search by the English Navy. During this war, the United States ship Constitution, under the command of Captain Isaac Hull, defeated the English ship Guerriere. Later, under the command of Captain William Bainbridge, the Constitution seized the English ship Java. Captain David Porter of the Essex captured the Alert and nine other vessels. He sailed into the Pacific Ocean and took possession of Nuku-Hiva Island for the United States. In 1814 General Ross of the English Army captured the capital city of Washington and set fire to all public buildings. America and England signed the Treaty of Ghent in 1814. They agreed to stop fighting and promised to hunt out and punish anyone engaged in the slave trade. Unaware of this treaty, General Andrew Jackson defeated an English military force in the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, 15 days after the treaty was signed.

Mexico won her independence from Spain in 1821. James Monroe was President (1817-1825) at that time. The next year Stephen Fuller Austin began to settle Americans in Texas, which was then a part of Mexico. In 1836, when Andrew Jackson was President (1829-1837), the Americans in Texas freed themselves from the rule of Mexico and established an independent republic. James K. Polk was President (1845-1849) when Texas was admitted to the Union as a state in 1845. The Mexican War (1846-1848) ended in American victory. General Zachary Taylor led an American army into Mexico. By the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, America got possession of California, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Texas and New Mexico. America acquired, by peaceful settlement with England, sole possession of the Oregon Territory in 1846. In 1860 Abraham Lincoln was elected President (1861-1865). When he took office, 11 southern states declared themselves separated from the United States. They established for themselves a new government called the Confederate States of America. The Civil War or the War Between the States then followed. General Ulysses S. Grant, who was commander of Union forces in the West, cut the Confederate States in two when he seized Vicksburg, Mississippi on July 4, 1863. He later became commander-in-chief of all Union forces. The western counties of Virginia which refused to leave the Union were separated from Virginia and admitted as the 35th state in 1863.

BRIEF PLOT SUMMARY

Frederic Ingham does not tell the story of Philip Nolan in proper order. He skips back and forth in time and once in a while he contradicts himself. The following brief summary gives the outline of the plot in proper order.

Philip Nolan was born about 1783 in Kentucky and he was brought up on a plantation. He received little formal education and frequently went with his older brother Stephen to Texas to hunt wild horses. He enlisted in the Army around 1800, and he met Aaron Burr for the first time in 1805, probably at Fort Massac, in what is today southern Illinois. He agreed to help Aaron Burr seize some of the western territories of the United States in order to set up a separate empire. He met Burr around August of 1806, when Burr came west to begin his rebellion. In 1807, both Burr and Nolan were tried for treason. Burr was tried in Richmond, Virginia, but he was found innocent. Nolan was tried by the Army at Fort Adams, Mississippi. He was found guilty. The sentence was given by Colonel Morgan on September 23, 1807. Nolan was told that he was never again to hear of the United States. He was taken by military escort down the Mississippi River to New Orleans and put aboard the Navy ship Nautilus. President Jefferson in Washington approved of this sentence. Between 1807 and 1810, the Nautilus stopped at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. Nolan became embarrassed and angry while reading The Lay of the Last Minstrel aloud. He threw the book into the ocean. About 1810, he was transferred from the Nautilus to the Warren somewhere near the Windward Islands. Between 1810 and 1812, he met Mrs. Graff, and old friend, at a dance while the Warren was anchored in the Bay of Naples. She refused to talk about the United States with him. It is said that Burr and Nolan once met in the Mediterranean at this time, but Ingham does not believe this story. Nolan next appeared aboard the Constitution, which was under the command of Captain Bainbridge. On December 29, 1812, Nolan took command of a gun in a sea battle with the English ship Java. Bainbridge gave Nolan his sword. Before the Constitution sailed north, Nolan was transferred to the Essex under the command of Captain David Porter. Porter then sailed around Cape Horn into the Pacific and occupied Nuku-Hiva Island from October to December of 1813. Captain Bainbridge mentioned Nolan in his report when he returned to Washington. The Navy Department at this time began to claim that Nolan did not exist. Nolan’s records were lost in 1814 when General Ross set fire to Washington’s public buildings. After 1817, when Monroe was President, Nolan is never again mentioned in an official report.

Between 1820 and 1822, Nolan was aboard a ship which was patrolling the western coast of Africa. He was asked to translate for an officer who had taken charge of a captured slave ship. At the same time, Nolan became the close friend of a young midshipman by the name of Frederic Ingham. Shortly after that, Ingham heard the account of Nolan throwing The Lay of the Last Minstrel into the sea. Ingham was visiting Cairo and the Pyramids at the time. About 1823 or 1825, Ingham left Nolan while their ship was anchored off St. Thomas in the West Indies. They met again in 1830, but we are not told on what ship. When they met aboard the Intrepid around 1837, Ingham was the 2nd officer. It is then that Ingham read for the first time the original instructions governing Nolan’s imprisonment. Sometime later, probably after 1841, Ingham and Nolan met aboard the George Washington. Ingham was the captain of that ship. In 1945, when Texas had just been admitted to the Union, some officers discussed whether or not to cut Texas out of Nolan’s maps. Lt. Truxto...