Jamie Prax
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Professor Zuck
English 5581
December 11th 2014
Wild Wilderness: An Element of Early American Literature
“Not only did the American novel exist as a definable, distinctive literary form,
but also, as a genre, the novel played a significant role in shaping provincial and
parochial identities and communities of the post revolutionary era into the evolving
entity that would become the United States of America” (Davidson 4). What we know
today as an American novel is very much different than where it started. There have
been many transitions that have included epistolary forms, morals, romance, gothic
elements, and even travel narratives before we look at what we are reading today as a
society. Many books have been passed down as great American novels, due to a variety
of reasons and usually one can hold a conversation based off of the well-known authors
they can speak about or the titles that their grandparents or parents have passed down to
them. There are though thousands of novels that may or may not have been popular
when they were written but nevertheless hold true to the notion of being a great
American novel. Black Ralph, The Forest Fiend!, Or, the Wanderers of the West: A Tale
of Wood and Wild (1851) written by Dr. J. H. Robinson, deserves to be included in the
canon of early American literature because it gives readers a look into the culture of
nineteenth century citizens and their relationship with Native Americans, supports the
inclusion of gothic elements into novels during this era, and it connects to many
canonical novels of its time. First let us learn a little bit about Black Ralph and the
adventure we get to partake on as readers.
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Black Ralph draws us into the wild wilderness with our characters and the turmoil
that they have to go to. We start off meeting our narrator Edward Steward who is at a
stand off with an Indian when the Indian suddenly falls dead without a sound. He soon
learns from his travel companions, Gilmore and Arthur Dale, that it can only be the
work of Black Ralph. Black Ralph is a large, black and shaggy man, riding a horse that
is larger than others, that mysteriously appears in the woods and death comes to those
that see him. Black Ralph is described to us as:
He’s one that deals out death in silence; one as can’t be tracked, nor found
out; one as you can’t keep the run on; one as is seldom seen, but often felt;
one as is sure death to the red varmints; The Ingin critters call him the
First Fiend; but I can't call him nothin’ better than Black Ralph. No sound
gives notion of his comin’ or goin’ and nobody’s any wiser than afore.
(Robinson 12)
This is the first that our narrator has heard of Black Ralph but not the last time that he
will encounter him. Our three travelers are on their way to find Arthur Dale’s family that
has relocated from the city in order to use the resources that are in the woods. Before our
three companions even get to Arthur’s family they have run-ins with the Indians, which
leads both sides to kill and defend themselves and the battles continue afterwards
especially after Arthur’s sister Flora becomes the focus of the narrator’s attention. Flora
becomes snatched away by the Indians and we go along with the group to find her.
Steward and Gilmore have a run in with the Indians and they both become tied to a tree,
naked, waiting for the Indians to slowly stick small wood parts into their skin. The
Indians then become scared as a figure approaches, which we soon learn is Black Ralph.
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Black Ralph rescues them for the first of many times. The travelers then embark on
another journey with the new group to find a new settlement and they run into a few more
obstacles. Steward has to fight for his life multiple times, including another time where
he is tied to a tree, and we get to meet a mysterious man in the woods whom we come to
know as Forrester. Forrester originally scares a few of our travelers after they awake from
a slumber to find him sitting there. He returns to warn Steward of danger approaching
and that one of the party will not make it another day. Even with little details given, this
turns out to be true. We come to the last battle of the novel, knowing that another guy
traveling in the woods wants Flora’s heart and is ready to fight for it. It is now Steward,
his fellow companions, and the rest of the settlement versus the Indians. Many Indians
are killed and a few settlers are wounded before Black Ralph comes to save the day once
again. We soon learn that Black Ralph and Forrester are one in the same and he has been
exploring the woods for years in order to find this true love, which happens to be one of
the young women in the group. In another twist of events, this same man turns out to be
Stewards uncle. The Indians had previously carried away his true love and he was on a
mission to find her and kill as many Indians as he could but he would not tell anyone his
secret so it still remains a mystery has to how he silently killed. Everyone makes it out
alive from the large battle and all of our adventures find happiness either individually or
by marriage. The reader is kept interested with the different characters, and all the plot
twists until the story is wrapped up at the very end. All of these elements could have been
intentional by the author but by all means they make for a great story.
Originally looking for the author of Black Ralph, Dr John Hovey Robinson, was a
challenge. The name was handwritten on the novel with the year 1825 next to it, which
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one could assume as his birthdate. Looking through the databases that were available
there was nothing on the author and even finding anything on the story itself was hard. It
became easier to find the author on the Internet when it became clear that typing in
Robinson, J.H. resulted in more articles than typing it the other way. Finally, there was a
list of other works by this author rather than this novel being the only one that he wrote.
This evidence led to hours of retyping in names, dates, and phrases before a partial
biography became available. In this article we learn that John Hovey Robinson was in
fact an extremely popular author in his day but was quickly forgotten about. We only
have some of his biography because of an unpublished manuscript by William J. Benners
of Philadelphia, which is currently in the hands of a gentleman in Lancaster, PA. This
article also explains to us that Robinson was actually born in 1820, according to his
gravesite, instead of the date that circulates around with his novels. He is described as a
“physician, novelist, and poet” who was born in Sebec, Maine. He studied at Harvard but
did not graduate and still practiced medicine in Leicester, Massachusetts. Writing began
as early as 1846 and the only texts that are mentioned in this article are not well known
now. In 1848 he married Mary Waite, who was also an author and they moved a few
times while Robinson continued to send in his manuscripts to be published. This article
describes that Robinson, “could turn out stories faster than the papers could use them, and
was one of the best paid of contemporary writers”. Later on he did write for the New York
Weekly, which is where on of his other popular novels appeared in June of 1858. After his
wife’s death he traveled to Fair Haven, Minnesota to stay with his brother, a Baptist
minister, and two years later died of quick consumption at his brothers on February 17,
1867. He body was buried the next month in Cherry Valley, Massachusetts. (“The
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House”). Even though we have very little information about the author, it forces readers
then to look further at the content of the novel to understand the author and the novel’s
historical context.
There is also very little publication information for Black Ralph. The National
Publishing Company published the novel in Boston in 1851. There are a variety of
libraries that have copies of Black Ralph but they are all on microfilm or pdfs on cds. One
could assume that the novel was popular in its day due to the comments about the author
but there is no evidence to back that theory up. There are a many other texts written by J.
H. Robinson and they all seem to fall in the same success range. Black Ralph though does
have has more existing copies on Microfilm and some novels could not even be found on
databases. Some of the titles include Marion’s Brigade, or the light dragoons: a tale of
the Revolution, Mountain Max, or Nick Whiffles on the Border: a tale of the
Bushwhackers in Missouri, The Lone Star, or the Texan bravo: a tale of the Southwest
and Silver Knife, or The Hunters of the Rocky Mountains, an autobiography (Tripod). As
one can see there is a theme throughout Robinson’s work regarding the west, adventure,
and a wilderness lifestyle. One of these pieces is particularly interesting, Silver Knife,
because it includes the word autobiography in the title and upon investigating if it was an
actual autobiography for Robinson, in the prefatory remarks we learn that Robinson had
promised this piece but was at a loss for material because he had not done much traveling
in the West, which is another concept that is interesting because most of this stories are
about the West. He spoke to his friend about his predicament and soon a package showed
up at his house filled with material from an individual that wished to remain anonymous.
He instead wrote Silver Knife as an autobiography and took on the persona of this
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individual (Silver Knife 3-4). Even though Black Ralph might be the forgotten novel of J.
H. Robinson, it has a lot to offer to readers of today’s era.
A large part of this novel has to do with views on Indians and the interactions that
the Indians have with all of our characters. These views contribute to our understanding
of the culture of early America. Native Americans are a large part of American history
but it wasn't always, and still is not completely, a pleasant journey for all. Our views have
changed since this novel was written and it gives us a great depiction of the common
view of Native Americans in nineteenth century. The entire text uses the word Indian
rather than other appropriate terms to describe these individuals. In The White Man’s
Indian, Robert Berkhofer tells us that the term Indian was a White invention and still
remains largely a White image, if not a stereotype (3). Most people know little about
specific tribes in order to make the distinction but “White writers on the history of White
images of the Indian tend to treat all Native American cultures as a single Indian one for
the purposes of analyzing the validity of White stereotypes” (Berkhofer 26). Throughout
the text we also see many scenes that describes the Indian as a savage. Native Americans
were still even a bit of a foreign concept to most, especially if you did not live near them.
The novel was even written about 20 years after the Indian Removal Act was signed into
law. This act forced tribes to move to the unsettled lands west of the Mississippi and the
government would take over their lands in existing state borders. Even if an individual
had never met a Native American individual before, they had laws and articles such as
these to give them a stereotypical view on Native Americans.
In a documentary selection from 1849, one man states that Indians cannot be
civilized and the only method of converting him is to let him know you are his Superior
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and “that one process by which even that can be done, and that is to shut off of his wind”
(Hurtado and Iverson 287). As we can see from this, there were many of the same views
towards Indians that our author presents to us in the novel. We have countless number of
scenes where our characters are forced to kill Indians to continue on their journey. The
Indians are the only enemy and even our forest fiend states that he has been hunting all
Indians for years in order to to avenge the capture of his maiden (Robinson 96). Our first
scene even includes an Indian who is described as a savage and even further, a painted
savage. We always see Native Americans stereotypically described with war paint,
headdresses, and half clothed. Other stereotypical elements that we see are using the
words savage, red-man, varmint, and Ingin. Ingin is a U.S. colloquial spelling for Indian,
which is a word that most have never heard before (Oxford). The word savage is one that
we are trying to get away from now but it was used interchangeably with Indian
throughout this text and many others of the time. Explorers of this nation thought they
had run into individuals without complex social and governmental organizations and
categorized them as wild and that is part of why savage was more appropriate for English
men to use before (Berkhofer 13). Not only do we see the poor treatment of Native
Americans by our characters, we see the Indians also criticize the White man along side
of those depictions. When our main characters were tied to a tree by a group of Indians
one spoke, “White men die like women, they have no courage; but Indians die like men”
(Robinson 34). All of the actions from the Indians help portray the view of the country at
this time about Native American’s actions and intentions.
Along with the cultural view, the use of gothic elements in Black Ralph gives a
view into the literary taste of the nineteenth century. Readers wanted a change from the
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epistolary novel with strict morals to a darker, adventure theme. Not only was gothic
elements part of this time period, more importantly America was trying to create her own
definition of gothic, aside from Europe. American Gothic is not necessarily a projection
of European elements or those elements transformed from European when placed in an
American setting but one can see the transition from using those elements in European
novels to American (Ringe 10). Teresa Goddu in Gothic America says looking at the
history of the gothic “as it is constructed within American literature makes it particularly
salient for exposing the alignment of America’s literary histories within the nation’s
idealized myths (10). There are a variety of gothic elements in this novel with the scenes
and character descriptions. A lot of our scenes happen during the night, or in the dark
woods where nature has made it gloomy. Our characters are asked to look upon different
characters when the “moonlight streamed” upon their bodies (Robinson 15). Even a part
of our title tells us that this story is going to be about the wood and wild. Another aspect
is the character’s journey that draws us into the gothic elements. We have Edward our
male hero, who throughout the novel continuously tries to save and keep safe our
virtuous female, Flora. She is not only “fair, and comely to look upon, but she is good”
(Robinson 16). There is also a lot of mystery that goes along with the characters and most
importantly Black Ralph himself. We know very little about Black Ralph and his
intentions and death is delivered in silence. Even when we learn who Black Ralph really
is, we still are not able to completely solve the mystery of how he killed the Indians,
“they know, and could conceive of no explosive, that could send a leaden ball to a human
heart in silence; that was a secret known only to myself” (Robinson 96). This leaves the
reader with a cloud of mystery still about the story even as the author tries to wrap
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everything up and bring the story to a close. Furthermore, we have the fear of the other to
bring a close to our gothic elements. The Indians are our enemy but the author used
Indians to assist with the gothic elements rather than just having the fear. “The
Gothicized Indian provided the nation with a distinctive literary asset as well as a
politically useful cultural image. Though America did not have crumbling castles and
antiquated traditions, it did have in the Indian a symbol of a ruined and conquered past”
(Goddu 10). The use of the gothic elements not only shows us the popular literary
techniques of the time and what readers wanted to read about, but gave us an insight into
the use of figures to represent America’s past and literature.
Along with giving us a view into culture and literature interests, Black Ralph
connects to many novels that were written before or during its time that we still read
today. Black Ralph would be a good novel to read alongside others because it has so
many elements that can support other texts while also giving another view of American
culture such as city versus western lifestyle. We experience gothic elements in St.
Herbert and Wieland with the ruined buildings, dark surroundings in the forest, isolation,
and hero and heroine characters. Also in Wieland we see Carwin presented as an
explanation for the supernatural events like we see Black Ralph’s intentions more clearly
when we find him out to be a man. The Spy is concluded with a chapter to wrap
everything together with a nice bow to include the romance aspect of the novel and we
see something similar at the end of Black Ralph. All of our characters get the happiness
that they have been searching for whether it was a person or see the happiness for others
and most of our characters run off and get married and all becomes happily ever after on
the last page. Also in The Spy, even though Indians are vaguely mentioned compared to
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this entire novel having Indians as the enemy, they mention being aware of being scalped
by the savages to members of the family, which again supports our notion of the negative
views. In addition, we know Harvey Birch as this mysterious character while we also
don't find out much about Black Ralph till the very end as we find out Harvey’s true side
when he is an older gentleman. The garden scenes and the subtle mentions of Adam and
Eve in The Coquette and Female Quixotism, once more comes to our attention when
Steward describes his perfect setting for himself and Flora “this same spot should be a
garden of Eden. I would be the Adam – and – and Flora Dale should – should be my Eve”
(Robinson 65). Even though this mention is not as subtle, it is one of the many mentions
of God and Satan and references of the Bible that become part of the novel. Black Ralph
ties together different aspects that we see in other novels that are included in the literary
canon.
The American novel is a great genre to read and to be a part of but there are
always those novels that do not get the recognition that they deserve. Black Ralph is a
terrific novel and should be read and included in the literary canon because it teaches us
what the views towards others were in the nineteenth century, shows us literary taste of
those readers and is able to hold its own next to more familiar texts that we read today.
We see the use of stereotypical words and images used for Native Americans and the use
of the Indian transitions also into the use of gothic elements in this novel alongside
heroes and heroines, mysterious figures, and dark settings just when America was starting
to bring gothic into novels like the British were. Furthermore, Black Ralph can connect to
other novels of its time and holds true when you look at the definition of a great
American novel. It would be a great addition to any bookshelf or college syllabus.
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Bibliography
Berkhofer, Robert F. The White Man's Indian: Images of the American Indian from
Columbus to the Present. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1978. Print.
Brown, Charles Brockden. Wieland. 1798. New York: Penguin, 1991. Print.
Brown, William Hill, and Hannah Webster Foster. The Power Of Sympathy; The
Coquette. New York: Penguin, 1789. Print.
Cooper, James Fenimore. The Spy. 1821. New York: Penguin, 1997. Print.
Davidson, Cathy N. Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America. New
York: Oxford UP, 1986. 4. Print.
Goddu, Teresa A. Gothic America: Narrative, History, and Nation. New York: Columbia
UP, 1997. Print.
Hurtado, Albert L., and Peter Iverson, eds. Major Problems in American Indian History.
Lexington: D. C. Heath, 1994. Print.
"Ingin, n." OED Online. Oxford University Press, September 2014. Web. 5 December
2014.
Ringe, Donald A. American Gothic: Imagination and Reason in Nineteenth-Century
Fiction. Lexington: UP of Kentucky, 1982. Print.
Robinson, Dr. J. H. Black Ralph, the Forest Fiend!, Or, the Wanderers of the West: A
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Robinson, Dr. J. H. Silver-knife, or The Hunters of the Rocky Mountains. Boston:
William V. Spencer, 1854. 3-4. Print.
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"Robinson, Dr. John Hovey." The House of Beadle and Adams and Its Dime and Nickel
Novels: The Story of a Vanished Literature. Northern Illinois University. Web. 30
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"'Robinson, J.H. 1825-'" Tripod. Bryn Mawr College, Haverford College, Swarthmore
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St. Herbert. Windsor: Thomas Pomroy, 1813. Online.
Tenney, Tabitha Gilman. Female Quixotism. 1801. New York: Oxford UP, 1992. Print.