Author: Timrod, William Henry
Biography:
TIMROD, William Henry (1792-1838: Riley)
Timrod was German by descent. His father Heinrich Deimroth (1734-94) was born in Kusel and as an infant was brought to South Carolina by his family. A shoemaker and later a tailor by profession, he married a widow, Mary White, in Charleston SC on 16 June 1765, later changing his name to Henry Timrod. He fought on the American side in the Revolutionary War and prospered sufficiently to buy a plantation at Parker's Ferry. William Henry was the son of his third marriage, which was to a widowed Irishwoman, Susannah Hargan, who had been employed as his housekeeper. But in 1794 Henry Timrod died at Parker's Ferry and his widow remarried, reducing the family fortunes. Their son William Henry, who was bilingual in English and German, may have had some schooling with the support of the local German Friendly Society, but was largely self-taught. Apprenticed to a bookbinder at the age of eleven, he took over the business in 1812 and turned his workroom into something like a salon where visitors could discuss literature and hear some of Timrod's poetical work. On 19 Dec. 1812 he married Thirza (or Thyrza) Prince, aged 16; they had four children, one of whom, Henry Timrod (1829-67) went on to have a successful career as a poet and journalist. Like his father before him, Timrod saw military action as captain of a volunteer company, the German Fusiliers, in 1836, but resigned later that year on the grounds of ill health after a campaign in Florida. He died in Charleston, possibly of tuberculosis, on 28 Jul. 1838 and was buried in Bethany Cemetery. Of his most ambitious work, a blank-verse drama about Benvenuto Cellini, only a few fragments published in contemporary periodicals remain. (Helene M. Kastinger Riley, "German Romanticism in Old Charles Towne? Rediscovering William Henry Timrod [1792-1838], Bookbinder-Poet," South Atlantic Review 59:1 [1994] 65-85; "Timrod, Henry," ANBO 25 Nov. 2021; L. L. Knight, Biographical Dictionary of Authors, Vol 15 of The Library of Southern Literature [1907]) HJ