MOTLEY, .loth LoTnuor (1814-77). An eminent American historian. horn in Dorchester, Mass.. April 15. 1811. Ile entered Harvard Col lege at the age of thirteen. and was graduated in the elaiss of 1831. The two years following lie spent in Germany at the universities of niatingen and Berlin, and here lie formed an intimate per sonal friendship with Bismarck. which continued till his death. On his return he studied law. lie WaS married, in 1837. to Miss Mary Benjamin. of Boston. first venture in literature was a story entitled 1/orfon'x llopr (1S39), a very unsueeessfnl historical-romantie novel. In 1811 he was made secretary of the American Legation at Saint Petersburg, but. owing to the severity of the etiolate and his regret at being separated from his family, he soon resigned. His first work revealing his real lower was a review of a memoir Peter the Great. which lie wrote for the Vorfh .Imerican Vcricte in 1845. Two years later he published in the same periodical a scholarly article on Balzac, and in 1849. for the same organ, a review of Talvi's Gesehiehtr der Colonisation ron u England, a paper show ing accurate knowledge of the history of New England and of the Puritan movement, and dis playing philosophical insight. The same year saw the appearance of his Merry-Mount, an his torical novel dealing with an episode in the early life of the Massachusetts Colony.
With this novel, and with an unsuccessful term in the :Massachusetts Legislature, ended what may be called _Motley's experimental period. He saws the true path for his genius to follow, and he was seized with the desire to write, to cite his own words. 'one particular history.' that of the Dutch. Having obtained the approbation of the historian W. H. Prescott, on whose territory lie feared he might be trespassing, he began to gather material in America. and in 1851 he set sail for _Holland to continue his researches. In 1850 ap peared the History of the Rise of the Dutch Re public, a in three volumes, published at his own expense. The same year :Motley returned to Boston, where he remained about a year: then he went to England in 185S. Here he received the degree of D.C.L. from Oxford, and in 1860 he published the first two volumes of his History of the United Netherlands. In England he did his
country good service by sending (1861) to the London Times two letters on the causes of the American Civil War. which helped to dissipate the British misunderstanding of American affairs. In 1861 he was appointed Minister to Austria, and in Vienna lie served the United States faith fully and with tact, until misunderstanding and calumny caused him to resign in 1867. In 1S08 appeared the last two volumes of the History of the United Netherlands, a book which sustained the high reputation of his earlier work and its own earlier volumes.
President Grant, on his election. appointed Motley Minister to England. but lie recalled him in November of the following year 1870). for what appear to have been unsatisfactory reasons. Motley then retired to private life, and began work on the last of his hi.stor•ies. This was The Life and Death of John of Barnereld, Adrocatc of Holland; with a Flew of the Primary Causes and Norements of the Thirty Years' War (18741, which, in two volumes, virtually completed his plan of the history of Holland and the Dutch. It was his last work. He had suffered an in capacitating paralytic stroke in 1S73. and the death of his wife in 1874 was a heavy blow. He himself lingered three years longer, and died in Dorchester. England. May 29. 1877.
Motley takes rank with the most distinguished of American historians. His work presents a fin ished and often brilliantly colored picture of the times and the country with which it deals. it was written only after a thorough examination and analysis of all available documents, and is philosophical as well as pictorial in its treat ment. It is full of an inspiring love of freedom, has the advantage of dealing with an heroic movement, displays marked skill at characteriza tion, and often flashes with wit. His Correspond ence is scarcely less brilliant, and affords many glimpses of interesting personages, both Amer ican and European.
The histories are published in good English and American editions, There is a memoir by his intimate friend, Oliver Wendell Holmes (Bos ton, 1878) : The Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley was edited (New York, 1889) by G. II Curtis.