Written by Jessica Pearl
Happy Valentine’s Day! Today marks the day we celebrate one of the first known valentines in North American history. From November 1778 to May 1779, the Queen’s Rangers stationed themselves in Oyster Bay, and their commander, Lt. Col. John Graves Simcoe billeted in the Townsend home. On February 14, 1779, Simcoe composed and delivered a lengthy poem to Sarah (or, “Sally”), the Townsend’s daughter. The poem begins,
Fairest Maid, where all is fair,
Beauty’s pride and Nature’s care;
To you my heart I must resign,
O choose me for your Valentine!
Sarah seems to have been popular, having “The adorable mifs Sarah Townsend” etched into one of the window panes of their home by “J W Gill.” The verse has been published and romanticized many times over almost two hundred years, but I most often wonder, does the original still exist?
Lore states Sarah cherished her valentine, and that it was found by a niece many years after her death. She died at 82 unmarried, so many thought she must have had affections for Simcoe. Morton Pennypacker, famed for unearthing Robert Townsend as George Washington’s spy, “Culper Jr.,” wrote in a 1928 Brooklyn Daily Eagle article, “For generations, the bit of paper containing the above lines was cherished by members of the Townsend family….But one day, when the family went to exhibit this valentine, it had disappeared, and since then they have not been able to find it. It is the belief of some that it was stolen.”
The valentine was first published in Documents and Letters Intended to Illustrate the Revolutionary Incidents of Queens County in 1846, written by Henry Onderdonk, Jr. Following the poem, Onderdonk says he’s indebted to Silvanus Miller. The Center for Brooklyn History holds the Henry Onderdonk Papers, and within lies a letter from Silvanus Miller which states, “Enclosed is a copy of Col. Simcoe’s Valentine to Mifs Townsend of Oyster Bay, which some days ago I received your request for through Mr. J. C. Smith.” Silvanus Miller was a lawyer and jurist and held many positions in New York City, including Public Administrator of the City of New York. How did Silvanus Miller receive a copy of the valentine? One possibility is through Peter S. Townsend, nephew of Sarah Townsend. Peter and Silvanus were founding members of the New York Lyceum of Natural History (now the New York Academy of Sciences) and went on an 1817 expedition to Goshen, NY, where they discovered a mammoth!
I found another letter referencing the valentine through the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library & Museums. I discovered two letters written to Benson Lossing, author of Pictorial Field-Book of the American Revolution, from Solomon Townsend II in 1872. He writes on March 20, 1872, “My attention was called to the “Ancient Valentine” that Col. Symcoe (Simcoe) adjudged in 1778 to my aunt Miss Sarah Townsend of Oyster Bay LI. May I take the liberty of enquiring of you whether you have any knowledge of who is in the possession of the original lines?”¹
If Solomon already questioned where the original poem was in 1872, was it ever on display in the house, as Pennypacker claimed? What happened between the 1840s and 1870s? My original question remains: does the original still exist?
The full poem can be found here: America’s First Valentine
¹Solomon is not referencing the Pictorial Fieldbook, but another publication that Lossing edited, American Historical Record and Repertory of Notes and Queries. Vol. 1 No. 2, February 1872, has an article on “An Ancient Valentine.” It repeats the valentine story and contains a “pen and ink sketch of two hearts interpierced by an arrow, and bearing respectively the initials of her and his name of which a fac-simile is given below.” Vol. 1 No. 9 includes the rest of Townsend’s letter, skipping over the question of the poem’s whereabouts. It also brings more questions to the table!
References
Pennypacker, Morton. “Col. Simcoe’s Valentine to Oyster Bay Maiden Memento of Revolution.” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 13 Feb. 1928, p. 16.
The American Historical Record 1872-02: Vol 1 Iss 2. Open Court Publishing Co, 1872. Internet Archive, http://archive.org/details/sim_potters-american-monthly_1872-02_1_2.
The American Historical Record 1872-09: Vol 1 Iss 9. Open Court Publishing Co, 1872. Internet Archive, http://archive.org/details/sim_potters-american-monthly_1872-09_1_9.
Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library & Museums, Benson J. Losing Collection
