FAMILY
TRAGEDY
In 1871, Horatio Spafford,
a prosperous lawyer and devout Presbyterian church elder
and his wife, Anna, were living comfortably with their four
young daughters in Chicago. In that year the great fire broke
out and devastated the entire city. Two years later the family
decided to vacation with friends in Europe. At the last moment
Horatio was detained by business, and Anna and the girls
went on ahead, sailing on the ocean liner S.S. Ville
de Havre. On November 21, 1873, the liner was rammed
amid ship by a British vessel and sank within minutes. Anna
was picked up unconscious on a floating spar, but the four
children had drowned.
Spafford family
photographic album,
ca. 1880.
Manuscript Division (1)
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Spafford Family Album
The Spafford daughters, Annie, Maggie, Bessie, and
Tanetta (top row, left to right) drowned
when the S.S. Ville du Havre sank
after it was hit by a British vessel en route to
Europe in November 1873. A fellow survivor of the
collision, Pastor Weiss, recalled Anna saying, "God
gave me four daughters. Now they have been taken
from me. Someday I will understand why." The Spafford's
son Horatio (bottom row second from right),
born three years after the tragedy, died in 1880
at age four.
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The Spafford Cottage at
Lake View, Chicago
At their home in a north side suburb of Chicago,
the Spaffords hosted and sometimes financially supported
many guests. Horatio had been active in the abolitionist
crusade and the cottage was a meeting place for activists
in the reform movements of the time such as Frances
E. Willard, president of the National Women's Christian
Temperance Union, and evangelical leaders like Dwight
Moody, who ignited a religious revival in America
and Europe. Spafford, a senior partner in a thriving
law firm, invested in real estate north of an expanding
Chicago in the spring of 1871. When the Great Fire
of Chicago reduced the city to ashes in October of
the same year, it also destroyed Spafford's sizable
investment.
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Spafford home.
Cabinet card, ca. 1870
Manuscript Division (4)
Horatio Spafford
business card.
Manuscript
Division (4b)
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Currier & Ives.
Sinking of the Steamship Ville
du Havre.
New York: Currier & Ives, ca. 1873.
Prints & Photographs Division (5)
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Sinking of the Ville du Havre
In 1873, to benefit his wife's health, Spafford
planned an extended stay in Europe for his family.
At the last moment Spafford was detained by real
estate business, but Anna and the four girls sailed
to Paris on the steamer Ville du Havre.
Within twelve minutes on November 21, 1873, the luxury
steamer sank in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
after being rammed by the British iron sailing ship
the Lochearn.
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Anna's Telegram to Horatio
Anna was picked up unconscious by the crew of the Lochearn, which
itself was in danger of sinking. Fortunately, the Trimountain,
a cargo sailing vessel, arrived to save the survivors.
Nine days after the shipwreck Anna landed in Cardiff,
Wales, and cabled Horatio, "Saved alone. What shall
I do . . ."
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Anna Spafford.
Transatlantic cable message,
December 1, 1873.
Manuscript Division (6)
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Anna Spafford.
Copyprint, enlarged from ca. 1873 original
Manuscript Division (7a)
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Horatio and Anna Spafford, ca. 1873
Anna Larssen, later Americanized to Lawson, was
born in Stavanger, Norway, in 1842. Horatio was immediately
attracted by Anna's beauty and intelligence when
she attended his Sunday school class in Chicago.
When Horatio realized that Anna, fourteen years younger
than he, was only fifteen, he arranged for three
years tuition at a boarding school near Chicago before
the idea of marriage could be discussed. The couple
married in 1861.
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Horatio Spafford.
Carte-de-visite,
ca. 1873.
Manuscript Division (7b)
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Horatio Spafford. "It Is Well with My
Soul."
Manuscript hymn, 1871. Manuscript
Division (8)
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"It Is Well with My Soul"
After receiving Anna's telegram, Horatio immediately
left Chicago to bring his wife home. On the Atlantic
crossing, the captain of his ship called Horatio
to his cabin to tell him that they were passing over
the spot where his four daughters had perished. He
wrote to Rachel, his wife's half-sister, "On Thursday
last we passed over the spot where she went down,
in mid-ocean, the waters three miles deep. But I
do not think of our dear ones there. They are safe,
folded, the dear lambs."
Horatio wrote this hymn, still sung today, as he
passed over their watery grave.
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