AudHend

Audubon's Henderson

New biography details naturalist's eight bittersweet years in old Kentucky home

By FRANK BOYETT, Gleaner staff
November 11, 2004

Bankruptcy in Henderson was a crucial turning point in the life of John James Audubon, one that put him irrevocably on the path of becoming a great artist.

Audubon lived longer here than anywhere else in the country. According to a new biography by Richard Rhodes -- "John James Audubon: The Making of an American" -- Audubon first set up a general store in Henderson in mid-1810. He quickly prospered, and at one point was one of the richest men in the county. But his wealth evaporated in the financial panic of 1819. When his business failed, he left Henderson in shame in mid-1819.

For the rest of his life Audubon appeared ambivalent about Henderson, Rhodes' book illustrates.

At one point Audubon wrote to his son Victor to tell him about the Henderson days, before business failure and the death of young daughter Lucy threw a black cloud over it: "this place saw my best days, my happiest, my wife having blessed me with your brother Woodhouse and a sweet daughter. I calculated to live and die in comfort. Our business was good [and] of course we agreed. But I was intended to meet many events of a disagreeable nature."

Upon leaving Henderson, Audubon went to the Louisville vicinity, where he made a living doing portraits. "Nothing was left to me but my humble talents," Audubon wrote.

Bankruptcy in Henderson forced him to fall back on skills that had been largely neglected, Rhodes writes: "More than distraction drove his renewed interest in birds. Always an enthusiast, he had all but abandoned his art for commerce during his Henderson years. Commerce had failed him and even shamed him. Now in Shippingport (near Louisville) in long conversations with Lucy he saw that his art might salvage their future. He thought that he 'drew birds far better than I had ever done before misfortune intensified, or at least developed, my abilities,' and he was right."

But if the Henderson bankruptcy put him firmly on the path to artistic greatness, it also left him deeply shamed, and debts from his Henderson days dogged him the rest of his life. After leaving Henderson, Audubon took pains to avoid the town ever afterward, probably in fear of creditors.

For instance, on Nov. 2, 1820, Audubon passed by Henderson -- and even did a sketch of the town from across the river -- but declined to visit. In fact, he wrote, he "could scarcely conceive that I stayed there 8 years ... for it undoubtedly is one of the poorest spots in the Western country according to my present opinion."

He again skirted the town in October 1823 when he and son Victor were hiking along the river.

The greatest value of Rhodes' book is that it brings Audubon the man vividly to life. In one place Rhodes describes how Audubon laid out a river pirate here with one well-aimed blow of an oar. In another he quotes Audubon at length about a dispute with Samuel Bowen, who had cheated Audubon out of a steamboat in New Orleans and left the naturalist $4,250 deeper in debt:

If You Go ...

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Rhodes will make an appearance for a book signing and reception at the Audubon State Park Museum between 5 and 7 p.m. Saturday.

He is the author of "John James Audubon: The Making of an American." The free event is being hosted by the Friends of Audubon. Rhodes’ remarks at 5:15 p.m. are entitled "Audubon: A Life Well Lived."

In 1988, he won Pulitzer Prize in non-fiction for "The Making of the Atomic Bomb," which also won the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

For his Audubon book, Rhodes began his research in Henderson, where Audubon spent the second decade of the 1800s. Don Boarman, former curator of the Audubon Park Museum, played a crucial role in pointing Rhodes in the right direction.

"The book is dedicated to Don Boarman on the occasion of his retirement, which I thought entirely fitting; he’s really the dean of Audubon curators and deserving of all good honors," Rhodes said in a recent e-mail from his home near San Francisco.

"On my arrival (back in Henderson) old Mr. Berthoud told me that [Bowen] had arrived before me and had sworn to kill me. My affrighted Lucy forced me to wear a dagger. [Bowen] walked about the streets and before my house as if watching for me, and the continued reports of our neighbors prepared me for an encounter with this man, whose violent and ungovernable temper was only too well known.

"As I was walking toward the steam mill one morning, I heard myself hailed from behind; on turning I observed [Bowen] marching toward me with a heavy club in his hand. I stood still, and he soon reached me. He complained of my conduct toward him at New Orleans, and suddenly raising his bludgeon laid it about me. Though white with wrath, I spoke nor moved not till he had given me twelve severe blows, then, drawing my dagger with my left hand (unfortunately my right was disabled and in a sling, having been caught and much injured in the wheels of the steam-engine), I stabbed him and he instantly fell."

Audubon was charged with assault and battery, but Circuit Judge Henry Broadnax ruled he acted in self defense. The crusty judge was critical (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) of Audubon's conduct, however: "Mr. Audubon, you committed a serious offense -- an exceedingly serious offense, sir -- in failing to kill the damned rascal."

Further indicative of Audubon's ambivalence about Henderson are the reveries he had about this place in his old age. His last known words, issued at Christmas 1850 when he was lost in a mental fog that was probably Alzheimer's, referred to hunting in Henderson:

"You go down that side of Long Pond and I'll go this side and we'll get the ducks!"

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