Mr. OGDEN HAGGERTY HAMMOND,
Saloon Class Passenger
Ogden Hammond
c. 1927
image courtesy Amy Schapiro (Hugh Fenwick Collection)
Ogden Hammond, 46, was born 13 October 1869 to General John Henry
Hammond and Sophia Vernon Wolfe in Louisville, Kentucky, United States.
Ogden was the second of six children. His father John
served in the Civil War as chief of staff to General William Tecumseh
Sherman before becoming a general himself. John Hammond is also
best known as "the father of Superior" in his role for transforming the
Wisconsin swamp into a thriving city. Sophia Wolfe was the
daughter of Nathaniel Wolfe, former attorney general for the state of
Kentucky.
The Hammond family moved to Chicago, Illinois when Ogden was four and
there his father become president of a bank. The Panic of 1873
forced
the bank to close. President Hayes then appointed General Hammond
as Inspector of Indian Agencies in 1876.1
Moving to St. Paul, Minnesota, the Hammond family lived in the
Forepaugh-Hammond mansion, which is now a restaurant. General
Hammond often took his sons Ogden and John on scouting trips to
Superior, where the General became a local hero. General Hammond
had plotted early land allotments, built the first important office
buildings, and brought major railways to the city to better use the
natural harbor at the western end of Lake Superior. With
the revenue earned from the development of Superior, General Hammond
was
able to send Ogden and John to Philips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New
Hampshire
and Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut.
In the spring of 1890, Ogden's freshman year at Yale, General John
Hammond fell ill and died. The Hammond estate at that time was
valued at over half a million dollars.
After Ogden's graduation from Yale, he moved to Superior where his
mother was living and became active in the Superior community like his
father before him. Ogden was a first lieutenant in the National
Guard, and he was then elected alderman for the sixth ward of Superior,
twice. Ogden also
started an insurance business with his friend Phil Stratton.
While on a visit to Bernardsville, New Jersey, a Yale friend introduced
Ogden to Mary Stevens of Hoboken, New
Jersey. Her family had founded the city of Hoboken, pioneered
steam transportation, and founded the Stevens Institute of Technology.
Ogden and Mary married on 8 April 1907. He was
thirty-eight, she was just a few weeks shy of
her twenty-second birthday.
For the first year of their marriage, the two lived in Ogden's hometown
of Superior, Wisconsin. Then they moved east where Ogden
purchased a house on 30 East 70th Street in New York City, Manhattan to
be exact,
and an estate in Bernardsville. The Hammonds procured their
forty-seven room, New Jersey "summer cottage" from a Mr. Ellsworth, who
had bought
the estate from Mary's Uncle Edwin Augustus Stevens, Jr., who had built
the house in the late 1880's. Ogden added a swimming pool and a
five-room
wing, and in 1908 the Hammonds moved in just in time for the arrival of
their first child, Mary. A second daughter, Millicent Vernon, was
born on 25 February 1910. A son, Ogden Jr., was born to them in
1912
in New York City.
Among their prized possessions was a Packard, as automobiles were
novelties in those days. Ogden and Mary would often go on Sunday
drives together.
On the East Coast, Ogden worked as an insurance broker before expanding
to real estate. He became president of the Broadway Improvement
Company and the Hoboken Terminal Railway Company, and he became
vice-president of the Stevens family's Hoboken Land and Improvement
Company. The New York
Times also named Ogden as secretary and director of the Standard
Plunger Elevator Company of 115 Broadway, New York.
In politics, Ogden served on the Bernards[ville] Borough Council from
1912 to 1914. In 1915 Ogden, running as a Republican, was elected
to a one-year term in the New Jersey assembly. Ogden and Mary
Hammond became well-known in the social and political circuits.
They were known to be friendly and genuinely concerned for the
people.
Also in 1915, Mary Hammond was eager to aid victims of the ongoing war
in Europe and help the Red Cross establish a hospital in France.
Although rumors persisted for weeks up to the time before the Lusitania's
final departure from New York, Mary would not be dissuaded from her
mission. Whereas other passengers such as Alfred Vanderbilt and Charles Frohman received anonymous
warnings, Mary received one that was much more personal. Mary's
Aunt Elsie was a friend of German Ambassador to the United States,
Count Johann von Bernstorff.
Days prior to the Lusitania's departure, von Bernstorff had
stressed to Aunt Elsie, "Do not let anyone you know get on the Lusitania."
Elsie did not ask why and did not want to know. All that she knew
was that von Bernstorff meant business, and with all speed Elsie made
for Bernardsville to warn Mary and Ogden. Mary laughed at Elsie's
pleads and said, "I'm sailing on the Lusitania."
After all, the Lusitania was supposed to be the fastest and
safest ship afloat.
That night Ogden and his brother John2 stayed up trying to dissuade Mary
from her mission, but Mary remained obstinate. Her mind was made
up and no one was going to change it for her. Giving up, John
then
asked Mary, "Do you have a will?"
"No I haven't." Mary answered, "Why don't you draw one up for
me aboard the Lusitania before she sails and I'll sign it."
One wonders why Mary, who had lost her parents as a child, did not
think of the possiblity that her own children could lose her in the
face of the German submarine threats. Nevertheless, unable to
dissuade her wife from making the crossing, Ogden too, booked passage
on the Lusitania, unwilling to leave her wife unattended.
Their cabin would be D-20, one of the few with a private bathroom.
On the morning of the Lusitania's sailing, 1 May 1915, the
newspapers ran a warning strategically placed by Count von Bernstorff
amongst the travel advertisements. John came to see Mary and
Ogden off, but his cause was not for celebrating. He was there to
seek Mary's signature for
the will he had drawn up for her. In the will, Mary created a
trust
for her children and their future children, set up with money from the
Stevens estate and the Hoboken Land and Improvement Company.
Mary and Ogden were in the saloon class lounge of the Lusitania
when the torpedo hit. To Ogden, the vibration "felt like a blow
from a great hammer striking the ship. It seemed to be well
forward on the starboard side." Going out on deck to see what had
happened, Staff Captain Anderson reassured Ogden that nothing was the
matter and that he should go back to the lounge.
Another jolt followed shortly afterward and the ship immediately listed
to starboard. Ogden wanted to go back down to their cabin to
fetch lifebelts as those on deck were already gone, but Mary pleaded
with Ogden not to leave her. The two joined Marguerite, Lady Allan for a while
before continuing to along the deck without lifejackets. A young
man then passed them saying that Upper Deck "D" was already flooded in
"a rush of water."
The Hammonds then went to seek a place as high above the water as
possible. Near the aft end of the superstructure on the port side
where Ogden and Mary were a lifeboat (#20?) was being loaded and a
petty officer told Mary to get in. Mary refused to be parted from
her husband,
but when it became apparent that there was still room in the lifeboat,
both Mary and Ogden stepped in. The boat was about half filled
with
about 35 people.
As the boat was being lowered, a man at the bow davit let a rope slip
as the the man at the stern was still paying out slowly. The
lifeboat dropped bow first and was going perpendicular, and Ogden, at
the bow, grabbed the rope to halt the lifeboat's descent. Instead
of stopping the lifeboat, however, the rope tore the skin off Ogden's
hands and all in the boat, including Mary, were thrown sixty feet into
the sea.
Thirty or so people fell on top of Ogden as the boat plunged into the
sea. Ogden did not think that he would come up again, but he rose
and
sank three and four times before he was hauled onto another boat.
After he got his breath back he clung onto an oar and saw the Lusitania
plunge
bow first, with her "decks almost at right angles" about three-quarters
of
a mile from him. As the ship disappeared beneath the waves an
explosion followed.
Two-and-a-half hours later Ogden was picked up by the steamer Flying
Fish and taken into Queenstown, Ireland. He prayed for news
of
Mary's survival and soon heard that a Mrs. Hammond was in a local
hospital.
He rushed over to her side only to discover that the woman there
was
a Canadian woman, Kathleen Hammond. Her husband Frederick had
been
lost in the disaster, and feeling sorry for her Ogden gave her money to
buy
clothes and return home. Ogden never saw Mary again. When
Ogden
arrived in Dublin he found out that he had a broken rib and a neck
injury.
The next three weeks he spent recuperating in a Dublin hospital.
Ogden never discussed Mary's death, not even with his children.
The children's lives would go on. To keep life running
smoothly like before, Ogden's sister Peggy and sister-in-law Emily
moved in to fill in the role of mother. Ogden mourned alone and
threw himself into his work. He would later present to the United
Aid Society the Mary Stevens Hammond Home
for the homeless and needy children of Hoboken. Ogden was
reelected
to the New Jersey assembly in 1916. Around this time, Ogden wrote
to local politician John McGuiness, "I have been thinking for some time
that it would be a good plan for Bernardsville to have a woman on the
school board." This issue of women in politics was deemed "too
complex" and not achieved until 1932. Ogden was also
vice-chairman of the New Jersey State Board of Charities and
Corrections and the Prison Inquiry Commission. When war was
declared, Ogden became chairman of the United States Food
Administration for Somerset County.
In December 1917 at the wedding reception of Mary Pyne and Lieutenant
Oliver Dwight Filley, Mary Pyne's parents Percy and Maud Howland
announced the engagement of Maud's sister-in-law, Marguerite "Daisy"
McClure Howland, to Ogden Hammond. Daisy herself was a widow with
one son, McClure, also known as "Mac". Daisy had moved in with
the Pynes after the death of her husband Dulaney in 1915 and rumor had
it that the marriage was Maud's idea to get Daisy out of her house.
Daisy and Ogden married later that December. She insisted that
the Hammond children start to call her "Mother," but the Hammond
children, Mary, Millicent, and Ogden Jr., did not find her nurturing as
a mother should be. Daisy would lavish her attention on Mac, and
to the Hammond children she only served as an authority figure.
Whenever a dispute arose among the children, Ogden would defer to
Daisy's judgment. He would not acknowledge that any tension
existed within the family and was not interested in getting involved.
For social reasons, Daisy thought it best for the Hammonds to start
spending their summers in Newport, Rhode Island instead of
Bernardsville. Starting in 1919 the Hammonds abandoned
Bernardsville for a rented summer home only a few doors down from the
Vanderbilt mansion, The Breakers.
Judge Julius Mayer begans hearings for legal claims to the loss of the Lusitania
on 17 April 1918. Ogden Hammond was one of the first witnesses
and
he filed a claim for himself and his children. In Ogden testified
to
the lack of lifebelts on deck and the lack of proper lifeboat drills.
Judge
Mayer delivered his decision on 23 August 1918 where he absolved
Captain
Turner and the Cunard Line from any fault, and that reparations could
be
sought from the Imperial German Government at the end of the war.
Reparations
would not be available until 1925. The Mixed Claims Commission
awarded
Ogden $17 970 as a Lusitania survivor. The children Mary,
Millicent, and Ogden Jr. were awarded $5000 each for the death of their
mother. Another $31 143 was allocated to Mary's estate, which was
already valued at more than one million dollars. The trust in
Mary's
will included income and principal, the latter owned by Mary's
yet-unborn
grandchildren so the funds would be transferable without taxes later in
life. Half of the income generated by the principle went to
Ogden,
the other half to be equally divided amongst Mary, Millicent, and Ogden
Jr. when the became twenty-one. Ogden successfully petitioned the
court to use some of the income to cover the cost of child care; the
remaining
funds were reinvested.
Many of Ogden's friends urged Ogden to run for state senate in 1917 but
bowed out. He knew a judge and a mayor who were also vying for
the position and wrote, "If I should enter the race alse we would have
a very bitter fight and I wish to prevent that." Even so, his
involvement and politics and political stature led to New Jersy
governor Walter Edge to appoint Ogden to a Prison Inquiry Commission
headed by Dwight Morrow, father of Anne Morrow Lindbergh and later
ambassador to Mexico.
Locally, Ogden was Somerset County's Republican chairman, but
nationally he was recognized as a delegate to the Presidential
Nominating Convention. President Woodrow Wilson also selected
Ogden to chair a presidential committee formed in 1919 to reorganize
the foreign service.
With Calvin Coolidge's ascendancy to the presidency came an
ambassadorship for Ogden. Edge had been pressuring Coolidge to
select New Jerseyans for presidential appointments, and rumors
persisted that Ogden would become ambassador to Germany; however,
nothing materialized out of that rumor, and one can only speculate that
Ogden's Lusitania ties may
have been a factor. In late 1925, Ogden was offered the choice of
ambassadorship to either Argentina or Spain. J. P. Morgan Bank
was pressuring Ogden to select Argentina in order for the bank to
establish stronger ties with that country. In exchange, the bank
would make Ogden a partner. Daisy, however, preferred Spain
because Spain had royalty. Argentina did not. Ogden
deferred to Daisy's wishes.
In December of that year, Daisy withdrew Mary (Ma) and Millicent from
the
Foxcroft School to accompany them to Spain. Mac and Ogden,
Jr.(Oggie) stayed behind at St. Paul's School. As Ma was in her
last year
at Foxcroft, she received a diploma despite missing her last
semester. Millicent, being two years younger, did not. Her
formal education ended with the Hammond family's move to Spain.
The
Hammonds in Spain. Left to right, back: Millicent, McClure,
Ma, and Oggie.
Daisy and Ogden are seated in the front. Image courtesy Amy
Schapiro/Hugh Hammond Fenwick.
Ogden invited Bill Githens to be Ogden's secretary in 1928 and joined
the Hammonds in Spain. Mac and Oggie would have to wait for the
school year to end to join their family. Their summers, like most
affluent Spaniards and the Spanish royalty, were spent at San
Sebastián, a resort on the north coast. Once in San
Sebastián, the dictator Primo de Rivera sealed a deal with Ogden
(and Millicent as translator) to provide Spain with a national
telephone system, which was done by 1927. On another trip to
Cadiz, the Hammonds met up with Gertrude Whitney, founder of the
Whitney Museum in New York, who was donating a statue of Christopher
Columbus to the port of Huelva.
Herbert Hoover was elected president in 1928 and as a matter of
protocol, appointees of the previous presidential administration were
to resign. The Hoover administration was sad to see Ogden go, as
he was popular in Spain and Spanish-American relations had improved
under his service. A very gracious and appreciative Spanish Royal
Court awarded Ogden the Gold Cross of Isabella for his public
service. The Hammonds returned to New York just before the stock
market crash of 1929. The Hammonds did not suffer financially
because of the funds Mary Stevens Hammond had set up just prior to
sailing on the Lusitania, but
Millicent was very much ill from appendicitis, which for months had
been misdiagnosed as a gallbladder problem.
Left to
right: Millicent, Ogden, and Ma on Easter Sunday, 1930.
Image courtesy Amy Schapiro/Hugh Hammond Fenwick.
On 8 August 1931, Ma Hammond married Count Ghino Roberti of
Italy. Pope Pius XI even bestowed a papal blessing on the
couple. Daisy beamed with pride. As Ghino was an Italian
diplomat, Ghino and Ma were deported from Mexico when Mussolini came to
power. In the couple's haste to leave the country, Ma exchanged
all her assets into gold and took the gold bracelets with her when they
left.
Ogden and Daisy did not approve at all of Millicent's choice of
husband, Hugh McLeod Fenwick. Fenwick was married, and for
Millicent divorced his wife Dorothy in 1931. Daisy was so
disgusted with Millicent that Daisy had her thrown out. Ogden did
nothing to stop her. Daisy was determined to sabotage the 11 June
1932 wedding. She purposely kept the ceremony small, using the
death of her brother Arthur as an excuse. Then she went around
unplugging the photographer's lights, so the only pictures of the
wedding are lit by sunlight. Two children later, Millicent and
Hugh separated in 1938 and then divorced in 1945.
Ogden and Daisy did not help out with Millicent's married life and
Millicent never asked for help. Oftentimes Ogden, in his
chauffered car, would drive past his grandchildren on his way to his
job as president of the First National Bank of New Jersey, rarely
offering them a ride to school. In 1948 Ogden sold the
Bernardsville mansion to Mary Stevens Baird, first cousin to Mary
Stevens Hammond. Cousin Mary, in turn, sold the property to
Millicent.
On 29 October 1956, Ogden Hammond passed away two weeks after his
eighty-seventh birthday. His friend, former New Jersey governor
Walter Edge, died on the same day. After Ogden's death, the
children's share in the Hammond/Stevens estate now stood at one-third
each. Ogden had requested that he be buried with his father at
the Oakland Cemetery in St. Paul, Minnesota. His daughters each
would receive a portrait of him and his personal effects were
bequeathed to Oggie.
Two years later, Ma died of radiation overdose from cancer therapy in
Italy. Millicent, then a writer for Vogue flew in to be by her
sister's side until the end. After Ma's death, Millicent helped
settle affairs. Ma and her husband Ghino had no children.
Years later, he would remarry.
Ogden Hammond, Jr., was educated at St. Paul's School in Concord,
New Hampshire. He died during Millicent's first term as New
Jersey
Congresswoman.
Millicent, pouring herself into social services, became ambassador to
the United Nations Food and Agriculture
Organization. She also became involved in the Civil Rights
movement in the 1960's and became greatly involved in local and state
politics in New Jersey. In 1975 Millicent Fenwick was elected to
Congress at the age of 64, what the media described as a "geriatric
triumph." Millicent was known for her
outspoken and colorful character and although she ran for Senate she
was
not successful in that bid. Millicent died on 16 September 1992.
1 John Hammond's
granddaughter Millicent found missing Lewis and Clark papers in his
desk. A legal battle involving ownership of the papers between
the federal government and the family ensued, with the family winning
out. They then promptly sold the collection to Yale University,
where it is now a major part of their Lewis and Clark collection.
2 Ogden's brother John was
a big fan of music and is credited for discovering Billie Holiday,
Benny Goodman, Count Basie, Bob Dylan, and Bruce Springsteen.
Contributors:
Michael Poirier
Maureen Fenwick Quinn
Amy Schapiro
Judith Tavares
Hildo Thiel
References:
Hickey, Des and Gus Smith. Seven Days to Disaster.
G. P. Putnam's and Sons, 1981.
Preston, Diana. Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy.
Berkeley Books, 2002.
Schapiro, Amy. Millicent Fenwick: Her Way.
Rutgers University Press, 2003.
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