Strangers – Today

Barnard Elliot Bee, Sr., 1787 — 1853

Barnard E. Bee, Sr. was an attorney and politician, first in South Carolina, and later in Texas. Bee served in various governmental roles in the Republic of Texas, including Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of War, and Secretary of State. During the Texas Revolution, Bee was sent as part of delegation to Mexico to negotiate for peace and recognition of Texan independence. His negotiations were rejected and Bee was threatened with imprisonment, but negotiated passage back to the United States through Cuba. His designation in this entry as "Texan Minister" refers to his appointment by the Texas government as ambassador to the United States upon his return from Mexico, not a religious appointment. As ambassador, Bee negotiated with United States secretary of state Daniel Webster for the recognition of Texas as a republic by the United States, although the treaty was not ratified until 1843, after Bee had been recalled from the post by Texan President Sam Houston.

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James Shepherd Pike, September 8, 1811 – November 29, 1882

James Shepherd Pike was an American journalist, author, and diplomat. In the 1850s, he served as the Washington correspondent and associate editor of the New York Tribune, publishing Republican anti-slavery and pro-black suffrage commentary. As the Civil War unfolded, President Abraham Lincoln named Pike U.S. Minister to the Netherlands, where he gathered support for the Union and worked to counter Confederate diplomatic efforts. Following the Civil War, Pike drifted away from the mainstream Republican Party, eventually publishing The Prostrate State: South Carolina under Negro Government in 1874, which for decades was held as an objective eyewitness account of Reconstruction. The work is an attack on the Reconstruction-era government of the state, underscored throughout by racist descriptions of the state's free people of color and formerly enslaved populations. The Record of Strangers indicates that Pike visited the Athenaeum multiple times after the Civil War.

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Chevalier Johan Cornelius Gevers, 1806 — 1872

Chevalier Johan Cornelius Gevers was a Dutch diplomat. He was Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the United States, serving as the Charge d'Affaires in New York from 1854 - 1855. He married Catherine Mary Wright, daughter of New Jersey Senator William Wright. After leaving the United States, Gevers served as a Minister to Russia in St. Petersburg and to England in London.

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Mr. Jean Hervé

Jean Hervé was a visitor from Paris. His name appears in the record above the names of  two U. S. Navy lieutenants, with member Peter Stephen Du Ponceau (a native of France) listed as the person who introduced all three of them to the Athenaeum.