Archives Charles William Daniel Company

Period (1815-) 1906-1992
Total size  5.02 m.
ConsultationNot restricted

History

Founded in 1902, the company was named after its owner, Charles William Daniel, who determined its character to a very large degree; Daniel was born in Islington, London 1871; went to work at thirteen after his father died; held a job in the Walter Scott Publishing Company in the late 1890s, whose publications included the works of Lev Tolstoj, which greatly influenced him; started the C.W. Daniel Company Ltd. with the purpose of further propagating the ideas of the Russian writer; visited Tolstoj at Jasnaja Poljana in 1909; founder and editor of the magazine The Crank in 1904, later renamed The Open Road, a forum for Tolstojans, anarchists, pacifists and health food promoters; married Florence E. Worland in 1905; participated in anti-war propaganda in the First World War; condemned and imprisoned for the publication of pacifist pamphlets; the company published the works of authors like Mary Everest Boole, Michael Fraenkel, Emma Goldman, Stephen and Rosa Hobhouse, Søren A. Kierkegaard, H. Valentine Knaggs, S.S. Koteliansky, D.H. Lawrence, José Ortega y Gasset, W.T. Symons and many others; he also published the periodicals The Healthy Life and Purpose, a literary journal in the 1930s; in 1941 the offices of the publishing house were blasted in an air raid and the firm was evacuated to Ashingdon in Essex, where Charles Daniel died in 1955; the company was continued by Denise Waltham until it was sold in 1971; Daniel was the author of `Instead of Socialism' based on the ideas of P.J. Proudhon and Henry George (c. 1909) and the editor of `An Indictment of War', an anthology from the works of more than two hundred great thinkers (1919).

Content

Correspondence with authors including Michael Fraenkel, 1938-1956, Alfred Haffenden 1932-1938, Stephen and Rosa Hobhouse 1933-1962, Richard Lee 1929-1939, Josiah Oldfield 1928-1936, Joseph P. Swan 1936-1939, Leo Tolstoj 1906-1907, Helen Trevelyan 1934-1936, G.T. Wrench 1938-1954 and many others; minutes book of general meetings 1935-1972; articles of partnership 1922; cash books, ledgers, accounts and other financial documents 1911-1974; authors sales statements 1924-1972; notebooks 1911-1972; manuscripts (typescripts) by Mary Everest Boole, Vladimir G. Čertkov, Hendrik W. Dunnewolt, Petar J. Stankovic and William Watson; typescripts of translations of works by Leo Tolstoj; proofs 1907-1968; a file on court cases against Charles W. Daniels in 1917-1918; clippings. Papers of Denise M. Waltham: correspondence with Ian and Jane Miller 1972-1987 and others 1916-1987; other documents (1815-) 1934-1988; Papers of others: documents of Jeremy Goring and of some other persons (1865-) 1907-1992.

Processing information

Inventory made by Tiny de Boer in 1994 and 2005

Introduction

The C.W. Daniel Company Ltd. was founded in 1902 in Cursitor Street, London. The company published books, pamphlets and journals and from 1908 it also had a bookshop. The company was named after its founder and owner Charles William Daniel, born in Islington, London, on 24 April 1871. He was an anarchist and pacifist and a supporter of vegetarianism. From the late 1890s he had worked at the Walter Scott Publishing Company, whose publications included works of Leo Tolstoy, which greatly influenced Charles Daniel. He started his own publishing company with the purpose of further propagating the ideas of Tolstoy and these publications became his principal stock in trade. He obtained the agency of the Free Age Press Publications of Tolstoy's works. The editor of the Free Age Press was Vladimir G. Tchertkoff, who was Tolstoy's only literary representative outside Russia. In 1909 Charles Daniel visited Tolstoy in Yasnaya Polyana, Russia. Besides Tolstoy's works he published books on health by Valentine Knaggs, books on child psychology and education by Mary Everest Boole, Eleanor Cobham and other educational pioneers, books on vegetarianism by Ernest Savage, who later changed his name into Edgar J. Saxon, and books on many other subjects as long as these did not oppose his beliefs. Charles Daniel was a pioneer of the cheap paperbacks. A series of paperbacks for the price of one penny, called 'People's Classics', 'printed to place in the hands of the masses, at the cheapest price, the richest thoughts of the world's greatest thinkers', containing the works of Plato, Aristotle, Rousseau, Emerson, Francis Bacon and Lao Tze, were the company's speciality. Other cheap paperback series were 'Christian Mystics' and 'Pearls from the Poets'.
Charles Daniel met Florence Worland at the London Tolstoyan Society, who was one of the visitors of the meetings. Although often critical of Tolstoy's teachings, she nevertheless collaborated with Charles Daniel in writing a book about the Tolstoyan Society. They married in 1905 and went to live at Downham, near Wickford, Essex.
In 1904 Charles Daniel founded and edited the monthly periodical The Crank, later re-named The Open Road, a forum for Tolstoyans, anarchists, pacifists and health food promoters, which existed until 1913 when publication was ceased. In 1908 Charles Daniel opened a book shop in Amen Corner.
Here he first met Edgar J. Saxon, who as author and editor worked together with him for nearly half a century. Saxon was also the editor of Daniel's magazine The Healthy Life, later renamed Health and Life, which was devoted to nature cure and food reform. From 1913 Denise M. Waltham worked as the main colleague of Charles Daniel. She shared the same opinions on vegetarianism, anarchism and pacifism as Charles Daniel.
After 1914 wartime restrictions reduced the flow of books. But at the same time the war gave a stimulus to Daniel's publishing activities. It gave him and his fellow Tolstoyans a cause to fight for. Being above military age himself, his contribution to the anti-war effort took the form of pacifist propaganda. In 1916 he published a pamphlet calling for the end of the 'cruel and ruinous war', for which he was condemned and sent to prison at Wormwood Scrubs, and in 1919 he was imprisoned again during three months for publishing a novel dealing with homosexuality and conscientious objection. Besides publishing Charles Daniel also wrote the book 'Instead of Socialism', which was based on the ideas of Proudhon and on the 'single tax' theories of Henry George (c. 1909) and he edited 'An Indictment of War', an anthology from the works of over two hundred great thinkers (1919). From the 1920s The C.W. Daniel Company published works of various authors like Alfred Adler, Emma Goldman, Stephen and Rosa Hobhouse, Soren Kierkegaard, S.S. Koteliansky, D.H. Lawrence, José Ortega y Gasset, Nelly Shaw, W.T. Symons, Anton Tchekov and many others. A monthly magazine Focus on matters of health, wealth and life was published in the 1920s and edited by Florence Daniel-Worland, but ceased after her death in 1927. Charles Daniel wrote in this magazine under the pseudonyms 'The Odd Man' and 'John Marlow'. Towards the end of 1928 the Company took a house in Bernard street, Bloomsbury, and there the quarterly Purpose was launched in January 1929 in succession to Focus. Founder and editor was W.T. Symons, a close friend of Charles Daniel and later director of The C.W. Daniel Company. Religion, philosophy, psychology, science, art and sociology came within the orbit of Purpose and among its contributors were V.A. Demant, Philippe Mairet, Maurice B. Reckitt, Henry Miller, Dorothy Richardson, A.M. Ludovici, Lord Northbourne and Neil Montgomery. In 1934 Charles Daniel revived the monthly periodical The Healthy Life, which appeared as Health and Life under the editorship of Edgar J. Saxon. The magazine was published by the company until the end of 1950 when it was sold. The new proprietors continued it under the same editorship. Regular features included articles on nature cure and food reform.
After Desmond Hawkins joined the editorial board in 1935 as literary editor Purpose became a literary journal of the first rank and the contributors consisted of the literary avant-garde of the 1930s, including W.H. Auden, T.S. Eliot, Elizabeth Bowen, Stephen Spender, Hugh GordonPorteous, RaynerHeppenstall, Dylan Thomas and E.K. Barlow. The publication of Purpose ceased in July 1940. In 1936 The C.W. Daniel Company Ltd. had moved to premises in Great Russell Street, which included a small shop and made possible a window display of books.
After 1939, when paper and labour shortage during the war made publishing conditions difficult, it was decided to limit the Company's output of new books to those on nature cure, food reform, soil regeneration and kindred subjects, including the non-exploitation of animals. Among them were books by M. Bircher-Benner, a Swiss doctor whose dietary ideas have since become world-renowned and the writings of Edward Bach, a physician who discovered 'flower remedies' as a treatment. When in 1941 the publishing offices in Great Russell Street were blasted by an air raid, the business was evacuated to Ashingdon in Essex. When peace came in 1945 Charles Daniel, at 74, was too old to start again. He did not want to return to London and stayed in Ashingdon, where he went on publishing a few books, until he died on 15 January 1955 at Rochford, Essex, at the age of 85. (From: 'A Tribute to the Memory of Charles William Daniel' by Denise M. Waltham and from: 'The Centenary of a 'Crank' Publisher' by Jeremy Goring, inv.nos. 107-108, 189-190).
Denise Waltham continued the company until it was sold in 1973 to Ian and Jane Miller, who continued the C.W. Daniel Company at Muswell Road in London. Almost until the end of her life she gave help and advise to the new directors of the C.W. Daniel Company. Denise Waltham died in 1990 at Ashingdon, Essex, at the age of 93.

ARCHIVE

The archive was received by the IISH in 1992. Series of correspondence were mainly found in numbered and 'carded' parcels. These parcels were split up and arranged into an alphabetical and chronological series of correspondence, which consist of correspondence with authors and publishers, mainly covering a number of years and also containing agreements with authors, outlines of manuscripts, reviews, photographs, clippings, notes and some correspondence concerning authors.
An amount of earlier correspondence and other documents might have been lost at the bombing of the premises in 1941 during the Second World War, as happened with many manuscripts of Charles Daniel on his impressions of life in Russia (From: 'A Tribute to the Memory of Charles William Daniel' by Denise Waltham).
The archive contains many financial registers of which, except for the ledgers, no official bookkeeping terms were given. These registers have been arranged according to the superscriptions, although it was not always completely clear, where the registers were used for.
The 'Tolstoy'-manuscripts mainly consist of English translations. Some typed 'Tolstoy'-manuscripts in Russian without subscription are to be found in inv.no. 111 and 117, and typed manuscripts with the typed subscription of Tolstoy are to be found in inv.no. 120 and 124. These could be original manuscripts by Tolstoy, although this is not certain. The years of the translations of the 'Tolstoy'-manuscripts are unknown, therefore the chronology has been based on the original dates on the manuscripts. Because several of these manuscripts were in a very poor condition photocopies have been made and added to the manuscripts.
Some personal papers of the shareholders of The C.W. Daniel Company Ltd: Charles W. Daniel and Denise M. Waltham and a few papers of relatives are to be found in the annex of the inventory and this also includes papers of R.E. Way, of which the connection with the archive is not clear.
In addition to the archive the IISH also received books of The C.W. Daniel Company which have been transferred to the library of the IISH and can be found by using the collection code "C.W.Daniel". Pamphlets on Charles Daniel and Florence Daniel-Worland and some other books and periodicals that had not been separated earlier from the archive, have now been transferred to the library; photographs of Leo Tolstoy and Denise Waltham and a poster have been transferred to the audiovisual department of the IISH.

I N V E N T O R Y