Daniel Pierce Thompson (October 1, 1795 – June 6, 1868) was an American writer and lawyer who served as Vermont Secretary of State and was New England's most famous novelist prior to Nathaniel Hawthorne.American Unitarian Association, The Unitarian Register: A Forgotten Storyteller, Volume 108, 1929, page 783
Early life Daniel P. Thompson was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts on October 1, 1795 and moved to Vermont with his family in 1800.Kevin J. Hayes, editor, Jefferson in His Own Time, 2012, page 133 He was raised in Berlin, Vermont, and graduated from Middlebury College in 1820. He then moved to Virginia, where he taught school, studied law, and attained admission to the bar before returning to Vermont to become an attorney in Montpelier.Middlebury College, Catalogue of Officers and Students of Middlebury College, 1917, page 56William Adams, Gazetteer of Washington County, Vt., 1783-1889, 1889, page 79
Legal and political career Thompson was Washington County Register of Probate from 1825 to 1830, and Engrossing Clerk of the Vermont House of Representatives from 1830 to 1833 and 1834 to 1836.Vermont Historical Society, The Unveiling of the Daniel P. Thompson Tablet at Montpelier, Vermont, January 19, 1915, pages 295-310
Thompson was active in the Democratic Party before moving to the Liberty Party and becoming involved in the abolition movement. From 1849 to 1856 he edited the anti-slavery Green Mountain Freeman newspaper.Abby Maria Hemenway, The Vermont Historical Gazetteer: Washington County, 1882, page 312
He was Washington County Probate Judge from 1837 to 1840 and again from 1841 to 1842,Harry Thurston Peck, Frank Richard Stockton, The World's Great Masterpieces, Volume 19, 1901, page 10581 and he compiled 1835's Laws of Vermont.Daniel Pierce Thompson, compiler, The Laws of Vermont, 1835, title page In 1838 he was a founder of the Vermont Historical Society.Vermont Historical Society, Vermont History News, Volumes 41-47, 1990, page 108
He served as Washington County Clerk from 1844 to 1846.Abby Maria Hemenway, The History of the Town of Montpelier, Including that of the Town of East Montpelier, 1882, page 274 From 1853 to 1855 he was Vermont Secretary of State.Vermont Secretary of State, Vermont Legislative Directory, 1896, page 165
After having been affiliated with the Whig Party, he joined the Republican Party at its founding in the 1850s.Stanley Kunitz, Howard Haycraft, American Authors, 1600-1900: A Biographical Dictionary of American Literature, 1938, page 742
Career as author Influenced by James Fenimore Cooper and Walter Scott, he wrote historical adventure and romance novels, many of which feature life in Vermont.
In 1835 he authored May Martin, or the Money Diggers. Its favorable reception established his popularity, and he specialized in Vermont during the Colonial and Revolutionary War eras.
His writings include a satirizing of Anti-Masonry, The Adventures of Timothy Peacock (1835); The Green Mountain Boys (1840); Locke Amsden, or the Schoolmaster (1845); The Shaker Lovers, and Other Tales (1848); Lucy Hosmer, or the Guardian and the Ghost (1849); The Rangers, or the Tory's Daughter (1850); The Tales of the Green Mountains (1852); Gaut Gurley, a Tale of the Umbagog (1857); The Doomed Chief, or King Philip (1860); and Centeola (1864).
Thompson also authored 1859's History of the Town of Montpelier.
New England's most famous novelist of the 1840s and 1850s, Thompson's work was responsible for imprinting the story of Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys in the public's consciousness.Alexander Cowie, The American Novel, 1951, page 270 His ability to tell action and adventure stories plainly and quickly made his novels popular well into the 1900s, and many of his books are still in print.
Death and burial Thompson died in Montpelier on June 6, 1868.Marcus Davis Gilman, The Bibliography of Vermont, 1897, page 275 He was buried at Green Mount Cemetery in Montpelier.Charles T. Morrisey, Daniel P. Thompson and the early History of Vermont. The New-England Galaxy, Volumes 11-12, 1969, page 15
Family He and Eunice Knight Robinson of Troy, Vermont married in 1831 and they had five children—George Robinson (1834–1871); Alma (1837–1883), the wife of George B. Burrows; William P. (1839–1873); Frances (1842–1858); and Greenleaf (1850–1897); and Charles Sumner (1851–1852).Vermont Historical Society, A Guide to the Daniel P. Thompson Manuscripts, ca. 1841-1866 , 1995, page 2
Thompson was a great-grand-uncle of U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas.
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, retrieved January 3, 2014