The Christmas movie “I Heard the Bells” tells the true (and often tragic) life journey of one of America’s most celebrated authors and poets – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The Christmas carol by the same name is familiar to most… but not the story behind it.
His passion
Longfellow was born in 1807 in Portland, Maine. He was the second of eight children. His father was a lawyer and his mother desired a good education for all her children. Longfellow studied in America and then in Europe (for three years) where he learned French, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian (he already knew Latin). Later he would add Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic and even Finnish to his linguistic repertoire.
When he returned to America, he became a professor of literature at two American colleges. One was Harvard. Ironically, he didn’t enjoy public speaking and was a very private, shy person.
After a long teaching career, he devoted himself to writing which was his real passion. He would become America’s most popular poet in his generation.
All ages (and especially children) enjoyed his writing. He also translated several great works of literature into English. Some Canadians know him best for his moving poem called “Evangeline”. She was a fictitious character who personified the anguish of the French Acadian people of Nova Scotia who had been exiled to other parts of British North America.
His wives
Longfellow’s first wife, Mary, died after a miscarriage at age 22. He was greatly impacted by her untimely death and wrote poetically of his love for her. He eventually remarried after courting his second wife, Frances, for seven years. They had six children (two boys and four girls). Frances died tragically in 1861 from severe burns when her dress accidentally caught fire. Her husband desperately tried to save her, first using a rug and then his own body.
Frances died the next day and Longfellow was burned so badly he was unable to even attend her funeral. He started to grow a beard (later his trademark) to cover his facial scars. Again, his grief was deep and he feared he was going insane. For a while, he stopped writing poetry. Later he was able to write poems expressing his love for her. In his later years, Longfellow suffered from bouts of depression, pain caused by neuralgia, and poor eyesight.
His son
Charles was the oldest of Longfellow’s six children. In 1863 (two years after his mother’s tragic death), Charles secretly left home at age 18 to join President Lincoln’s Union Army during the American Civil War. He caught “camp fever” (probably typhoid) and went home for several months. After he recuperated, Charles returned to his unit and in early December was shot. The wound was serious and he was almost paralyzed. His father rushed to the hospital in Cambridge where his son was being treated.
His Christmas poem
This was the context for Longfellow’s famous poem, “Christmas Bells”. At age 57, he was the widowed father of six children. His country was in the midst of a bloody civil war which had almost claimed his oldest son. And then came Christmas.
Longfellow heard the Christmas bells ringing out from church steeples over Cambridge. At first, he was conflicted by the apparent disconnect he was experiencing. On one side was his recent pain of loss and injury in a country mired in war. On the other, was the sound of bells proclaiming a message of peace and hope.
Longfellow’s spiritual journey is reflected in the poem he was inspired to write that day. The first three verses describe the cheer and hope of Christmas. Verse one affirms, “I heard the bells on Christmas Day, their old, familiar carols play, and wild and sweet the words repeat, of peace on earth, good-will to men!”
The next three verses, however, describe the gloom and doom in the poet’s own heart. Verse six laments, “And in despair I bowed my head; ‘There is no peace on earth,’ I said; ‘For hate is strong, and mocks the song of peace on earth, good-will to men!’”
The final verse describes Longfellow’s conclusion. “Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: ‘God is not dead, nor doth He sleep; the Wrong shall fail, The Right prevail, with peace on earth, good-will to men.”
The poem was put to music a few years later by an English organist and soon became the popular carol “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day”.
Longfellow died in 1882 at age 75 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His life was full of literary achievement, personal loss, and an undying faith in God.
Rob Weatherby is a retired pastor.
