La Salle Corbell Pickett: widow of the late General George C. Pickett

              1909
196

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La Salle Corbell Pickett
widow of the late General George C. Pickett.


Announcement
AMONG the noted women of the South no name is dearer to the public to-day than that of LaSalle Corbell Pickett, widow of the renowned Confederate General, who led the greatest infantry charge in all the annals of war.  Mrs. Pickett has recently been captivating large audiences, East and West as well as South, with her talk on the Battle of Gettysburg and her enchanting evenings on the old home life and negro lore of the Sunny South.  No woman in America is better endowed for success upon the platform or for attaining the highest results with these two subjects.

Her childhood was passed on a Virginia plantation, where she not only heard and remembered the wealth of tradition and folklore of the dusky race, but caught to inimitable perfection the quaint and fascinating dialect—the real language—of the old time slave, now rapidly disappearing; already almost lost in oblivion.  This effective impersonation is indescribably delightful and perfect.

Early in the war LaSalle Corbell married General Pickett, following the army through many exciting experiences.  She was known as the Child-bride of the Confederacy.  She thus became fitted as no other woman to speak from the life of those heroic hours in the nation's history.

As a writer upon these and many other subjects Mrs. Pickett has long been celebrated in literature for her brilliant and graceful pen and especially for her invariable accuracy and unprejudiced courtesy.  Adding to these qualities her most exceptional beauty, her rare dignity and distinguished presence, with a voice that is music yet easily heard at a distance, it is not surprising that her recent appearance upon the platform has proved a phenomenal success.  This is gratifying to the public at large—with whom, either known or unknown, Mrs. Pickett is always popular.  Her life and works have endeared her to all, and everyone will appreciate the opportunity for a closer acquaintance, as well as for the enjoyment of the rare pleasure which her lectures afford.

The Slayton Lyceum Bureau, Steinway Hall, Chicago, has exclusive control of Mrs. Pickett's lecture work, and takes great pleasure in presenting her to the Lyceum public.




Commendations
Garden of the Gods Chautauqua, Colorado, August 30, 1903.

Allow me to say that in your work you have struck the real note of greatness—the acme of the natural—subtle, decisive and earnest.  You appealed equally to both heart and intellect and everybody listened and heard you, too, for your voice is as strong as it is sweet.

—J. R. ROBINSON, Superintendent.

Winter Home, DeFuniak Springs, Florida, March 25, 1904.

Your coming to the Chautauqua brought gladness, cheer; a new and larger vision of the manifoldness of life; of the pleasing and amusing in your own charming Dialect Stories, and of life in its great and tragical hours in your really wonderful description of the Battle of Gettysburg.  All in all, it was an inspiration to the higher, the nobler in being, doing and becoming.

—Dr. H. W. THOMAS, of Chicago.

Brooklyn, N. Y., May 22, 1905.

Of all the lectures delivered at the Florida Chautauqua during the season of 1904, I believe there is none that stands out so vividly, in the memory of our people as the graceful and eloquent address of Mrs. General George E. Pickett, delivered before an audience of over three thousand people.  It was a noble tribute not only to the brave general, but also to the heroic Confederate soldiers on the field of Gettysburg.  There is no platform in our country, from north to south, which would not be enriched by the presence and inspiration of this gifted speaker.

—WALLACE BRUCE, President The Florida Chautauqua.

Citronelle, Ala., March 30, 1905.

The Citronelle Chautauqua was fortunate in having upon its program in 1905 Mrs. LaSalle Corbell Pickett, who gave two delightful programs.  The first was an historical lecture entitled Gettysburg and dealing with that great battle in a most vivid series of thrilling word pictures.  The second was a program of readings from her own sketches of Southern life and character.  In both of these programs Mrs. Pickett won the undivided attention of her audience, all of whom were most cordial in their expressions of admiration for the lecturer and her work.

—GEORGE H. TURNER, Superintendent.

Pittsburg, Kansas, Sept. 18, 1905.

It has been my good fortune to listen to Mrs. General Pickett's lecture on the Battle of Gettysburg on two different occasions, and upon one occasion to hear her lecture on the Folk-Lore of the South before the War.

Mrs. Pickett's stage presence is gracious and captivating.  Her voice and delivery are clear and pleasing.  At a reunion of the veterans of the Union Army at Baxter Springs on August 29th, she delivered her lecture on the Battle of Gettysburg to an assemblage of 10,000 people, at least 7,000 of them being old soldiers.  It was one of the greatest lectures or speeches that I have ever listened to.  The old veterans felt again the shock and fury and glory of battle.  They evinced their appreciation by tears and applause, and at the close of the lecture the widow of the Confederate General was surrounded by ex-Union soldiers and given an ovation.

I do not think a greater lecturer or greater lecture is being produced to-day on the American platform.

—P. P. CAMPBELL, Member House of Representatives.





LASALLE CORBELL PICKETT




SUBJECTS:

The Battle of Gettysburg
Negro Folk-Lore—Stories of the Old South
Historical Studies in Jet
The Friends of Yesterday



From letter of commendation from Gen. James Longstreet, Commander of Corps to which Pickett's Division belonged:

Your Battle of Gettysburg is the finest, ablest description of a battle ever written.  It is poetic, forceful and eloquent.  The picture of your battle ground, the courage of your soldiers, their heroism, deprivations and sacrifices, and then the heartbreak of defeat after all, come before you with a vividness that is real.

—JAMES LONGSTREET.

From letter of Gen. Daniel E. Sickles, of the Army of the Potomac, who lost a leg at the Battle of Gettysburg:

To me, my dear Mrs. Pickett, the great importance of your lecture on the Battle of Gettysburg is not in its scholarly, classical and thrilling eloquence, nor in its phenomenal clearness and conciseness, but in its frankness, simplicity and truth and the modest way in which you tell it all.

—DANIEL E. SICKLES.

Washington, D. C., Feb. 7, 1903.

Having heard the most distinguished dialect readers of our country, I feel capable of saying that Mrs. Pickett's work is nearer to the real life of the ante-bellum Southern darkey than any other that has been produced.  Admirable, original and unique as have been her writings, her reproduction of them before the public will be still more striking.

—GEN. CHAS. E. HOOKER, ex-Congressman from Miss.

New York, September 18, 1905.—Mrs. Pickett's hearers will get from her talk not what we call elocution, but dramatization, personation, and a true revelation of Southern life and character.  Before we heard her rendering of her own character sketches we felt we knew many things about this interesting race, but afterward we knew the race itself.

—MARY LOWE DICKINSON, Pres. of King's Daughters.

Cannes, France, Sept. 15, 1905.—In her Battle of Gettysburg Mrs. Pickett thrills the soul of man by memories of her husband's charge and inspires again their hearts by the sentiment of the immortal words that Lincoln spoke: But think of the men who stormed these heights.

In telling her Folk-Lore tales of the old South, of the royal days of Southern dignity and supremacy, her dialect is faultless, her humor delightful and her pathos most tender and characteristic.

—HELEN H. GARDENER, (the well-known Author and Lecturer).

I listened carefully and critically to every word of your beautiful lecture on The Battle of Gettysburg.  In composition it was lofty, brilliant and sublime and was delivered with great originality, sincerity and earnestness.  Having been an officer on the opposite side and having for forty years since that conflict studied all authentic accounts of that fight from both the Northern and Southern standpoints, I not only commend your marvelous compilation of truth, your exactness and justice, but the subtle charity with which you cover and silence any mistakes which may have been made by others.

—GEN. OLIVER O. HOWARD, commanding Eleventh Corps of the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Gettysburg.

I take pleasure in saying that Mrs. Gen. Pickett is a most talented lecturer.  An evening with her is more than an entertainment, it is an education.

—SUSIE ROOT RHODES, President League of American Pen Women.



SLAYTON LYCEUM BUREAU
STEINWAY HALL   CHICAGO