Philip Morin Freneau
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
, nationalist, polemicist, sea captain and newspaper editor sometimes called the "Poet of the American Revolution".
Biography
Freneau was born in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, the oldest of the five children of Huguenot
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
wine merchant Pierre Fresneau and his Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
wife. Philip was raised in Monmouth County, New Jersey
Monmouth County, New Jersey
Monmouth County is a county located in the U.S. state of New Jersey, within the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2010 Census, the population was 630,380, up from 615,301 at the 2000 census. Its county seat is Freehold Borough. The most populous municipality is Middletown Township with...
where he studied under William Tennent, Jr.. His father died in 1767, and he entered the College of New Jersey, now Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, as a sophomore in 1768 to study for the ministry.
Freneau's close friend at Princeton was James Madison
James Madison
James Madison, Jr. was an American statesman and political theorist. He was the fourth President of the United States and is hailed as the “Father of the Constitution” for being the primary author of the United States Constitution and at first an opponent of, and then a key author of the United...
, a relationship that would later contribute to his establishment as the editor of the National Gazette. He graduated in 1771, having written the poetical History of the Prophet Jonah, and, with Hugh Henry Brackenridge
Hugh Henry Brackenridge
Hugh Henry Brackenridge was an American writer, lawyer, judge, and justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.A frontier citizen in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, he founded both the Pittsburgh Academy, now the University of Pittsburgh, and the Pittsburgh Gazette, still operating today as the...
, the prose satire Father Bombo's Pilgrimage to Mecca
Father Bombo's Pilgrimage to Mecca
Father Bombo's Pilgrimage to Mecca is an Orientalist prose satire and picaresque mock-epic coauthored by Philip Freneau and Hugh Henry Brackenridge while both men were juniors at the College of New Jersey .Penned in the autumn of 1770 but...
.
Following his graduation from Princeton, Freneau tried his hand at teaching, but quickly gave it up. He also pursued a further study of theology, but gave this up as well after about two years. As the Revolutionary War approached in 1775, Freneau wrote a number of anti-British pieces. However, by 1776, Freneau left America for the West Indies, where he would spend time writing about the beauty of nature. In 1778, Freneau returned to America, and rejoined the patriotic cause. Freneau eventually became a crew member on a revolutionary privateer, and was captured in this capacity. He was held on a British prison ship
Prison ship
A prison ship, historically sometimes called a prison hulk, is a vessel used as a prison, often to hold convicts awaiting transportation to penal colonies. This practice was popular with the British government in the 18th and 19th centuries....
for about six weeks. This unpleasant experience (in which he almost died), detailed in his work, "The British Prison Ship" would precipitate many more patriotic and anti-British writings throughout the revolution and after. For this, he was named "The Poet of the American Revolution".
In 1790 Freneau married, and became an assistant editor of the New York Daily Advertiser. Soon after, Madison and Secretary of State
United States Secretary of State
The United States Secretary of State is the head of the United States Department of State, concerned with foreign affairs. The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet and the highest-ranking cabinet secretary both in line of succession and order of precedence...
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
worked to get Freneau to move to Philadelphia in order to edit a partisan newspaper
History of American newspapers
The history of American newspapers goes back to the 17th century with the publication of the first colonial newspapers.-Colonial period:-The New England Courant:...
that would counter the Federalist newspaper The Gazette of the United States. Jefferson was criticized for hiring Freneau as a translator in the State Department
United States Department of State
The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...
, even though he spoke no foreign languages except French, in which Jefferson was already fluent. Freneau accepted this undemanding position, which left free time to head the Democratic-Republican newspaper Jefferson and Madison envisioned.
This partisan newspaper, The National Gazette, provided a vehicle for Jefferson, Madison, and others to promote criticism of the rival Federalists. The Gazette took particular aim at the policies promoted by Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...
, and like other papers of the day, would not hesitate to shade into personal attacks, including President George Washington
George Washington
George Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
during his second term. Owing to The Gazettes frequent attacks on his administration and himself, Washington took a particular dislike to Freneau.
Freneau later retired to a more rural life and wrote a mix of political and nature works.
Freneau is buried in the Philip Morin Freneau Cemetery on Poet's Drive in Matawan, New Jersey
Matawan, New Jersey
Matawan is a borough in Monmouth County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough population was 8,810. The name "Matawan" comes from a Native American Lenape word....
. His wife and mother are also buried here. He died at 80 years old, frozen to death when trying to get back home.
Legacy
The non-political works of Freneau are a combination of neoclassicism and romanticism. His poem "The House of Night" makes its mark as one of the first romantic poems written and published in America. The gothic elements and dark imagery are later seen in poetry by Edgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
, who is well known for his gothic works of literature. Freneau's nature poem, "The Wild Honey Suckle" (1786), is considered an early seed to the later Transcendentalist movement taken up by William Cullen Bryant
William Cullen Bryant
William Cullen Bryant was an American romantic poet, journalist, and long-time editor of the New York Evening Post.-Youth and education:...
, Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...
, and Henry David Thoreau. Romantic primitivism is also anticipated by his poems "The Indian Burying Ground," and "Noble Savage."
Although he is not as well known as Ralph Waldo Emerson or James Fenimore Cooper, Freneau introduced many of the themes and images in his literature that later authors are famous for.
The Matawan Post Office on Main Street has a sculpture on the wall of Freneau. It features him with black slaves as he was an abolitionist later in life. It was created in 1939 by Armin Scheler, under a New Deal commission from the Treasury Department.
There is a Freneau fire company on Main Street/Route 79. Until a name change in mid 2000's, there was a restaurant called the Poet's Inn, where Freneau was supposed to have had many a rum.