Remember Me In Your Dreams

Today when we dream we usually have different kinds of dreams. The ones that I write down and consider significant are the ones that I can remember in graphic detail. On occasion, unfortunately, people also have nightmares and those are always the most unpleasant. Lots of Americans were doubtful about dreams because in the 18th century, they considered them to be the products of bad indigestion or perhaps the beginning of mental illness. People in those days never recorded their dreams nor did they analyze them. Gradually this changed during the 19th century and people began to think of dreams as omens of things to come or perhaps even portals to another world. Soon it became fashionable to tell other people about your dreams and what your thoughts were on them.

Historian Andrew Burstein is the author of the book “Lincoln Dreamt He Died: The Midnight Visions of Remarkable Americans from Colonial Times to Freud”. In the book, he writes about eight 19th-century dreams that were drawn from journals, letters, and autobiographies. These are all analyzed in his book and it clearly shows that Americans stopped worrying about having dreams and began enjoying their nighttime visions eager to discuss them.

First Lady Abigail Adams

On January 1, 1797, First Lady Abigail Adams confided a dream she had had to her husband the Second President of the U.S. John Adams. She tells him that she dreamt about riding in her coach and suddenly noticed some large black balls, most likely cannon balls, flying through the air. She said they were the size of a 24-pounder. All of these cannonballs seemed to be directed right at her. Suddenly they all burst and fell before they could reach her. She continued heading toward these balls and saw that they had crumbled into atoms. During the time all this was happening two guns were fired at her left ear and she saw the flash of gunfire and heard the report. All through this she remained alive and unhurt and was able to continue her journey.

Abigail Adams would often dream about her husband during long separations. In his book, Burstein analyzes her dream saying that the cannonballs represented political attacks against her husband as president. In a way, she was more aware of these attacks than her husband was. Of course, living in the 18th century she was more likely to dismiss than accept dreams but dreams of this nature appeared to have affected her in some way.

Benjamin Rush to John Adams

Benjamin Rush was Treasurer to the U.S. Mint and he related a dream he had had to the president on October 17, 1809. In his dream, he speaks to his son Richard asking him what kind of book he had in his hand. His son replied that the book was the history of the U.S. and his son offered to read him a page. However Rush replied that he didn’t believe in the truth that history offered he only believed in the truth that was in the Old and New Testaments. His son said that the page in question referred to his father’s friend John Adams. Rush then took the book and read the page with great delight and sent a copy of it to the president.

This dream represented the fact that two estranged friends wished to reconcile. Therefore Rush sent Adams a long transcript of a history that he had read in a dream. Rush was interested in the dreams he had and often recorded them. Burstein notes in his book that both men would exchange nighttime visions as part of their friendly intimacy and quite often these dreams centered on current political events. In this particular letter Rush “foretold” of a reconciliation between Adams and Jefferson and added that this reconciliation would lead to the death of both men almost at one and the same time. As it happened both of these events eventually did happen.

On July 4, 1826, former Presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, once fellow Patriots, later adversaries, died on the same day within five hours of each other. Adams's last words on his deathbed at the age of 90 were “Thomas Jefferson still survives.” However, Jefferson at the age of 83 had died five hours earlier at Monticello.

The Diary of Washington Irving

In his diary, author Washington Irving records the dream he had on November 25, 1825. He dreamt that he was living in a large old house and saw that the house was collapsing from above and escaped. Once he had escaped he saw the house fall to ruin and begin to burn. At this point, Irving rushed toward the house because all of his personal property and his manuscripts were inside. He remembered saying that he was not going to be worth a sixpence if he did not save his manuscripts. As it turned out he discovered that one room was untouched and found his brother E.I. in the room arranging papers, wiping books, and otherwise helping to save what could be saved. He informed Irving that he had managed to save all of their belongings by putting them into this one room.

Washington Irving often wrote about characters such as Rip Van Winkle who dreamt in his stories. He rarely took the time to record his own dreams. Burstein analyzes this dream as an anxiety dream because Irving made poor investments while his brother Ebenezer was financially more successful.

The Autobiography of Former Slave Charles Ball

Charles Ball tells of a dream that he had in his 1837 autobiography. In the dream, he recounts that he thought he had managed to escape from his master. He headed back to Maryland going through many dangers and sufferings. Once again he was back in his cabin with his wife and had two of his little children on his lap. His wife was preparing fried fish for supper as she usually did when he was home.

This is the rather tragic dream of an enslaved man who wound up being sold away from his family. In the retelling of this dream, he wanted his readers to be aware of the evils of slavery. It is a most emotional dream asking for the reader to sympathize with Ball and his longing to once again be with his family.

The Journal of Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson an American essayist, lecturer, and poet recorded a dream he had on December 20, 1840. In his dream, a congregation had assembled at a convention of sorts to debate about the institution of marriage. A speaker rose to reply to some arguments and suddenly extended his hand. He grabbed onto the spout of an engine and began to squirt water from the spout. The water drove everyone here and there and finally pushed them all out of the house. In the dream, Emerson stood and watched as this was happening and was amused by the malice and vigor of the orator. Then suddenly the man with the hose brought it round a corner and drenched Emerson as well. He woke up and was relieved to be dry and convinced that the institution of marriages was safe for the moment at least.

Burstein notes that Emerson recorded the absurdity of his dreams with great interest. He states that this interest paralleled antebellum American literature and art’s fascination with the realms of the sublime and transcendental. At this point, it was the 19th century and people were attempting to get to know themselves better and were less afraid that their dreams could reveal flaws in character.

The Journal of Henry David Thoreau

Author Henry David Thoreau records a dream in his journal on October 26, 1851. Horses he rode upon would bite each other in the dream. This greatly troubled him and brought on anxiety since he had to hold the horse’s heads apart. As the dream progressed he found himself sailing over the sea and was in a small-sized boat similar to the Northmen used. Supposedly he was sailing on the Bay of Fundy and the waters finally emptied out into a gulf. Once again he found himself in his small pleasure boat and learning to sail upon the sea. He raised his sail and his anchor dragged far into the sea. He saw buttons that had come off of the coats of drowned men. Not knowing that he had one he saw his dog standing up to his chin in the sea to warm his legs which had become cold and wet.

About this dream, Burstein says that many anxiety dreams were often seafaring dreams. These dreams took place in the Age of Sail and therefore when a person was anxious about something he tended to have his dream take place upon the water. It is possible that today an anxiety dream might show a person in a car, driving and getting lost or having some other kind of trouble.

When Thoreau awoke he wrote that at the end of the dream that he imagined himself to be a musical instrument. His body was the organ and channel of melody, his flesh reacted and vibrated to the strain and his nerves were like the chords of the lyre. Burstein mentions that many thinkers in the 19th century were very interested in what impact different activities had on the nervous system.

Abraham Lincoln Relates His Dream to Ward Hill Lamon

In 1865 the 16th President of the U.S. Abraham Lincoln related his dream to his personal friend and self-appointed bodyguard Ward Hill Lamon. He tells him that about ten days ago he retired quite late. Lincoln had stayed up to wait for important dispatches from the front. He was so tired that when he finally got into bed he fell asleep and began dreaming. Soon he heard people sobbing and he walked from room to room but saw no one. Yet as he passed by he still heard the sounds of distress. It all seemed so mysterious and shocking that Lincoln kept walking about until he came to the East Room and went in. There he received a great shock – a catafalque, upon which was a corpse that was wrapped in funeral vestments.

Ward Hill Lamon included a chapter in his memoirs of the time he worked for the late President titled “Dreams and Presentiments”. He stated that at times dreams elated and sometimes disturbed Lincoln to an amazing degree. This incredible dream of Lincoln’s came just a few days before his assassination and the corpse in the dream must have represented Lincoln himself.

The Journal of Mark Twain

Author Mark Twain recorded his dream on August 10, 1898. He dreamt of a whaling cruise in a drop of water. It was actually just a single drop of water. Supposedly this would make the participants practically invisible to God and supposedly he wouldn’t be interested in them anymore. Twain thought about this dream and decided to write a dispute between a microscope and a telescope.

Burstein writes that people started to see a more familiar expression of dream disorientation in the postbellum years. Twain’s fascination with the upside-down world that could be found in dreams made its way into his work and into his interest in psychic phenomena.

By this time the interest that Americans had taken in their dreams had started to lay the groundwork for their fascination with Sigmund Freud. It appeared that Freud’s theories caught on faster in America than in his native Europe because Americans had become more and more engaged with the dream state.