Ion Hanford Perdicaris (April 1, 1840 – May 31, 1925) was an American author, professor, lawyer, painter, and playwright. He was a humanitarian and human rights activist. He fought for the rights of Moors, Arabs, and slaves. He was active in the anti-slave movement in the United States and abroad namely in Morocco. Ion fought to change the Protégé system in Morocco. Ion became an international celebrity because of the Perdicaris affair.Andrianis, 2021, pp. 6, 11, 13-16
Born in Athens, Greece, he grew up in Trenton, New Jersey. He briefly attended Harvard University before traveling to Europe to attend school. He fled the United States during the American Civil War due to his ties to South Carolina and his mother's prominent family.Driver, 1895, p 53 Perdicaris renounced his American citizenship and tried to become a Greek citizen in an unsuccessful effort to avoid the confiscation of the Charleston Gas Light Company.
Ion traveled back and forth to London from the United States. He became an international correspondent for The Galaxy magazine. He was a young playboy living a lavish style and attending seances. In 1872 he married Ellen, the wife of C. F. Varley. By the 1880s, Ion and his parents moved to Morocco in a mansion they built at the Place of Nightingales. There Ion became active in the international community and fought for the rights of the local Moorish population, writing several essays and a book advocating their rights.
In May 1904, Ion was kidnapped by Mulai Ahmed er Raisuni. His bandits raided Ion's mansion and brought him up to the mountains along with his stepson Cromwell Varley. Theodore Roosevelt's response to what became known as the Perdicaris affair drew wide attention. Ion briefly returned to the United States and finally lived out the rest of his life in a mansion in Chislehurst, England. Ion and Helen Varley were buried at Saint Nicholas Church Yard Chislehurst.
Early life Ion Hanford Perdicaris was born in Athens, Greece, while his father Gregory Anthony Perdicaris was United States Consul to Greece. His father had migrated to the United States in the late 1820s from Greece. Ion's mother was the granddaughter of United States Revolutionary War hero Captain William Dewitt.Gregg, 1905, p. 447 She was a member of a wealthy family of planters from Cheraw, South Carolina. Some of the members included: U.S. Senator Josiah J. Evans, a great uncle, and South Carolina Supreme Court Justice Henry McIver, a first cousin."Maximilian La Borde, James L. Reynolds" History of the South Carolina College From Its Incorporation, December 19, 1801, to December 19, 1865 Walker Evans & Cogswell Printers Charleston South Carolina 1874: p. 25"Elliot Jonathan, Madison James " The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution as Recommended by the General Convention at Philadelphia, in 1787 J. B. Lippinott Philadelphia 1888: p. 340
Ion's family moved back to the United States in 1845. They resided at the Perdicaris Ashley Cottage, an elaborate twenty-room estate on the north side of Trenton, New Jersey. Ion grew up in Trenton and attended the Trenton Academy. His father was one of the Trustees and the school was controlled by Trenton's elite families. Most of the students were the children of America's leadership and the wealthy elite class. His father became a prominent entrepreneur and was involved in local politics. By the age of ten Ion was involved in the family business but chose painting instead of business. According to an account from one of Ion's classmates, his lavish paintings adorned the mansion. Ion's father Gregory amassed a small fortune. According to the United States Census of 1860, the Perdicaris estate was worth roughly 6 million dollars adjusted for 2019 inflation.Andrianis, 2021, p. 8-11
American Civil War Perdicaris graduated from Trenton Academy in 1855. He wrote an essay titled Unity of Beauty that was presented at the school's commencement ceremony in July 1855. Ion enrolled in Harvard University the following year. He also exhibited his painting Cattle at the Thirty-Third Annual Exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Ion was no longer a student at Harvard in the spring of 1858. He traveled to England that summer to study painting.Andrianis, 2021, p. 13
Ion was urged by members of his family who supported the Confederate States of America to assist on their side in the American Civil War. His father was crucial because he was a former diplomat and had ties to many different countries in Europe, most notably the King and Queen of Greece. There were over 18 different countries represented with over 50 different consuls in the diplomatic community when Gregory was in Greece. The information was relayed to the McIver family, led by Henry McIver; the family were Perdicaris's cousins and prominent supporters of the Confederacy.Andrianis, 2021, p. 15
The McIver family confiscated the Perdicaris family's estate and personal belongings in South Carolina, naming them alien enemies. The confiscation occurred one month after the onset of the American Civil War and three months before the official Confederate Sequestration Act. The McIvers refused to hire a substitute for their cousin who was studying in Europe. They chose to confiscate their assets. One year later, the confederacy confiscated 1351 shares of the Charleston Gas Light Company, worth close to one million dollars, adjusted for 2019 inflation. The shares belonged to Gregory.Andrianis, 2021, p. 14-15
The issue led to the Supreme Court case Dewing v. Perdicaris, 96 U.S. 193 (1877). According to a letter Perdicaris sent to Samuel R. Gummeré, he was instructed by his parents to obtain Greek citizenship to stop the sequestration. They found expatriation a legal solution. Expatriation was not legally permitted until the Expatriation Act of 1868. Records indicate Perdicaris submitted his paperwork twenty-three days before the South sequestered close to one million dollars' worth of stocks. By law, he was still an American citizen.Andrianis, 2021, p. 15 Gummeré's father was business partners with the Perdicaris family.
London Ion was raised in a diplomatic household. His father was the first American Consul to Greece Gregory Anthony Perdicaris. By the 1860s he was a lawyer living in London and traveling the world. He began to affiliate himself with the diplomatic community. His parents Gregory and Margret were reported departing Liverpool England, August 28, 1863. In December 1864, Ion was in Florence, Italy with the diplomatic community watching a theater play.
From a young age, Perdicaris showed an interest in writing. His father was affiliated with Edgar Allan Poe."Edgar Allan Poe" Edgar Allan Poe to Stephen Greenleaf Bulfinch Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore, accessed May 10, 2022 He published several articles in The Galaxy, a New York City based magazine. Ion's first article was about painting it was entitled English and French Painting. One year later he wrote another two articles for the magazine, one was called Reminiscences of a Parisian Atélier and the other The Exhibition of the Royal Academy. One was published in March and the other July 1867. Another article was published in 1868 called Art and Modern Inventions. All four articles were related to art, art history and painting.
Perdicaris lived at two addresses during this period in London. Records indicate he lived at Gloucester Crescent, Camden and the Heathcote-villas St Margarets, London. He was also interested in the subject of spiritualism and séances. Prominent engineer and early developer of the electric telegraph and the transatlantic telegraph cable Cromwell Fleetwood Varley and his wife Ellen Varley also took interest in the claims of parapsychology and spiritualism and attended séances with Ion and other wealthy figures.Noakes, Richard. (2007). Cromwell Varley FRS, Electrical Discharge and Victorian Spiritualism. The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science. 61: 5–21. In 1872, Ion married Ellen Varley.Driver, 1895, p 53
Return to Trenton, New Jersey Ion returned to the United States in the later part of 1874 married to Ellen Varley. She was a thirty-seven-year-old woman with four children from another marriage and was three years older than her new husband. The children's names were Ada, Cromwell Oliver, Hebe, and Fleetwood E. Varley. The children were recorded attending the State Normal School of New Jersey for the year 1875–76. Ion presented his painting called Moorish Interior to the Centennial International Exhibition of 1876. The exposition began May 10 and ended Nov 10. Ion, Ellen, and the children were recorded traveling on a steamer from Southampton to Gibraltar on July 20, 1876. They were traveling to Morocco. The next year local Trenton newspapers recorded Ion freeing a slave in Morocco with the help of the United States Government. While Ion lived in London he was searching for a location to build a summer home on the Mediterranean Sea. He choose Morocco because of a conversation he had with a retired French Naval officer on his way back to Liverpool from New York. The officer invited Ion and his wife to the region. Ion built two houses in Morocco.
They began to build the historical castle mansion known as Idonia or Aidonia (Αηδόνια; "[Place of the] Nightingales") in Morocco in the 1870s. The second home in Morocco was the city home called El Minzah. Ion returned to the United States with the family to put on a play on Broadway for his daughter Eleanor Ada Varley she adopted the stage name Nard Almayne. By 1880, she married an actor named Nelson Decker. Both became well-known stage actors on Broadway in New York City. Two plays appeared in New York City in 1879 produced by Ion. The first play was called La Societaire, Townsend Percy was the cowriter the second play was called The Picture. The Picture featured a massive painting created by Ion called Resurgamus (Combat of Life, Terror of Death and Triumph of Immortality) it was 16 feet x 23 feet or 4.9 meters x 7 meters.
Morocco
Both Perdicaris's parents left Trenton to join their son in Morocco. His father died in Morocco in 1883, and his mother died two years later. Ion hosted lavish parties at his massive estate. He was heavily involved in diplomatic affairs in the region. His second stepdaughter Hebe Varley married the dragoman of the Italian embassy in Morocco. His name was Gianatelli Gentile cav[aliere] Agesilao.Andrianis, 2021, p. 16
Ion convinced the Sultan to create the Tangier Hygienic Commission. Around the same period, the practice of arresting debtors in Morocco was a harsh tactic allowed by local laws and customs. Perdicaris was an advocate for the poor and destitute Moors and Arabs that could not repay certain debts and were harshly imprisoned. Wealthy lenders used the protégé system to control and abuse the local population namely the Moors. Around this period he published a few essays and a book addressing the Treaty of Madrid. He wrote a pamphlet called American Claims in Morocco and a novel entitled The Case of Mohammed Benani. Around this time Ion was also interviewed by a reporter from the Pall Mall Gazette on May 30, 1887. The name of the interview was The European Vampire in Morocco. The interview also addressed the harsh treatment of the Moors and the protégé system.Driver, 1895, pp 49-50