JOHN WILKES BOOTH: ACTRESS EFFIE GERMON RARE GURNEY CARTE DE VISITE PHOTO

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JOHN WILKES BOOTH: ACTRESS EFFIE GERMON RARE GURNEY CARTE DE VISITE PHOTO:
$59.99

In John Wilkes Booth\'s pockets were found a compass, a candle, carte de visite photographs of five women--actresses Effie Germon, Helen Western, Alice Grey, Fannie Brown, and Booth\'s fiancée Lucy Hale--and his diary, where he had written of Lincoln\'s death, \"Our country owed all her troubles to him, and God simply made me the instrument of his punishment.\" A rare original Jeremiah Gurney carte de visite photograph of Effie Germon. Bottom margin trimmed otherwise good.

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From Wikipedia:

Euphemia \"Effie\" Germon (June 13, 1845 - March 6, 1914) was an American stage actress of the late 19th century from Augusta, Georgia.[1] She excelled as a soubrette. She was the daughter of actorsGreeneberry Carr Germon a/k/a Greene Germon and Jane (née Anderson) Germon. Her father was the original impersonator of Uncle Tom at the Chatham Theatre.[1] Her mother had begun her stage career at the age of 8, was a cousin of actor Joe Jefferson and continued acting for 50 years.

Germon\'s theatrical debut was made at the Holliday Street Theatre in Baltimore, Maryland, during the season of 1857 - 1858.[3] She played the role of Sally Scraggs in Sketches in India.[1] Germon acted with both the Baltimore and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania stock companies.

Marriage, return to the stage

She left the theater to marry violinist Carlo Patti, the brother of Adelina Patti, whom she married at Providence, Rhode Island on 13 July 1859.[5] She returned to prominence at the Chestnut Street Theatre during the theatrical season of 1863 - 1864.[3] She made her first appearance on the New York City stage which opened in 1869 under the management of John Brougham.[1] Germon appeared with John Gibbs Gilbert at Wallack\'s Theatre in a production of Brother Sam in December 1872.[6] At the same venue she acted with Richard Mansfield in Prince Karl, the original production of Little Lord Fauntleroy (play). She paired with Francis Wilson (actor) in Erminie. During the season of 1906 - 1907 Germon performed on the road in Sunday. She married a second time after divorcing Patti. Her second husband was the comedian Nelse Seymour.

Lincoln assassination

She was performing in Aladdin at Grover\'s Theatre in Washington, D.C., on the evening when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated at Ford\'s Theatre. While she was singing \"Sherman Has Marched To The Sea\", C.D. Hess, manager of Grover\'s Theatre, learned of the shooting of Lincoln. A week earlier Germon was present when John Wilkes Booth came into the office of Hess and inquired as to when Lincoln would attend a performance of Aladdin. The President had been invited and had promised to attend.[7] A photo of Germon was found on Booth when he was killed at Richard H. Garrett\'s farm in 1865.

Death

Germon died at the Actors\' Fund Home in Staten Island in 1914.

She is buried in Evergreens Cemetery in the Actors\' Fund Plot

The Booth family was of the 19th century. Its most famous and well known members were Edwin Booth, one of the leading actors of his day, and John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Abraham Lincoln.

The patriarch was Junius Brutus Booth, a London-born lawyer\'s son who eventually became an actor after he attended a production of Othello at the Covent Garden theatre. The prospects of fame, fortune and freedom were very appealing to young Booth, and he displayed remarkable talent from an early age, deciding on a career in the theatre by the age of seventeen. He performed roles in several small theaters throughout England, and joined a tour of the Low Countries in 1814, returning the following year to make his London debut.

Booth abandoned his wife and their young son in 1821 and ran off to the United States with Mary Ann Holmes, a London flower girl. They settled in Harford County near Baltimore, and built a house named \"Tudor Hall\" in 1847, which still survives. There they started a family; they had ten children, six of whom survived to adulthood.

Junius Sr. and Edwin toured the Western United States during the Gold Rush, performing plays by Shakespeare for illiterate miners, who nevertheless had no tolerance for bad acting. Edwin Booth bought an interest in the Winter Garden Theatre at 667 Broadway in New York City together with his brother-in-law John Sleeper Clarke. The brothers John Wilkes, Edwin, and Junius Brutus, Jr. performed there in the play Julius Caesar at a benefit in 1864, the only time they were seen together on a stage, playing Mark Antony, Brutus and Cassius, respectively.