10 Famous Feuds

Copyright 2016 by Gary L. Pullman

Feuds don't always end in death, and many involve words rather than weapons. Often, feuds produce animosity and emotional trauma. Sometimes, they destroy personal or professional reputations. Occasionally, they put an end to a person's career.

No one seems immune to the feelings that ignite feuds, and such conflicts have involved writers, a philosopher, artists, inventors, psychoanalysts, patriots, scientists, and sharpshooters. One involved even a former U. S. secretary of state and a sitting vice-president.

Hopefully, we'll never become involved in extended hostilities such as those in which the individuals of these 10 famous feuds participated. 

10 Hans Christian Andersen vs. Charles Dickens

 

Both Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) and Charles Dickens (1812-1870) greatly admired one another's work. They met during Andersen's 1847 tour of England, and a 10-year period of “friendly correspondence” ensued. When the Danish author again visited England, he stayed as a guest in Dickens' home, Gads Hill Place. His visit was supposed to last two weeks but stretched, instead, to five, disrupting the Dickens' household and vexing the English author's children. Subtle hints that it was time to end his visit went unnoticed. 

After Andersen finally departed, Dickens wrote a note on the guestroom mirror: “Hans Andersen slept in this room for five weeks—which seemed to the family AGES!” Andersen, who'd “thoroughly enjoyed” his stay, was confused when Dickens broke off their correspondence. Some contend Dickens, as an act of revenge, modeled “the bony bore” Uriah Heep of his novel David Copperfield on Andersen. 

9 Hans Christian Andersen vs. Søren Kierkegaard

Hypersensitive to criticism concerning his work, Andersen often “retaliated” by writing caricatures of his critics. In 1838, when Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard wrote an unsympathetic review of Andersen's only novel, Only a Fiddler (1837), Kierkegaard ignited a feud with his fellow Dane. Describing the novel as uneven and unoriginal and as failing to separate the author from his characters, Kierkegaard's generally negative review suggested the fiddler's grievance with life represented Andersen's own “dissatisfaction with the world” and his reluctance to struggle in life.

In “The Snail and the Rose-bush” (1863), Andersen may have retaliated by depicting the rather reclusive Kierkegaard as a snail—and a female one, at that—who comes out of her shell only once a year to question a rose-bush (Andersen) about why it flowers (creates art), before retreating again into her solitude. The snail, Andersen's narrator says, “had much within her, she had herself” and regarded the world as “nothing.” 

8 Leonardo da Vinci vs. Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Both celebrated artists even in their own day, Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) and Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475-1564) were rivals whose feud seemed to be inspired by mutual jealousy. Michelangelo publicly insulted Leonardo, “shocking bystanders when he sneered at the older genius for never finishing his statue of a horse in Milan.” Attending a meeting to decide where Michelangelo's statue of David should stand, the older artist suggested the genitals of Michelangelo's sculpture should be covered, his comment suggesting “a symbolic castration of his rival. 


7 Thomas Edison vs. Nikola Tesla

NikolaTesla (1856-1943) hoped to impress Thomas Edison (1847-1931) with his work on alternating current (AC), but Edison, committed to his own work on direct current (DC), brushed him off. Thereafter, Tesla sold his patents to Edison's rival, George Westinghouse (1846-1914), for whom Tesla went to work. Westinghouse was already working on AC at the time, but Tesla “helped to improve upon the process and the product.” A highlight in the feud between Tesla and Edison occurred with the so-called War of the Currents, which Tesla and Westinghouse won. 

6 Thomas Edison vs. George Westinghouse

Westinghouse had the financial clout needed to take on Edison, and, in him, Edison recognized a threat, as Westinghouse Electric “began installing its own AC generators around the country, focusing mostly on the less populated areas that Edison’s system could not reach” while, at the same time, the company undercut the fees Edison charged his urban customers for electricity. 

Edison believed AC was “dangerous.” To demonstrate its lethal effects, Edison began electrocuting dogs, claiming AC would kill a human being just as quickly. Later, he also electrocuted “several calves and a horse,” and, when Harold Brown (1857-1944), an electrical engineer and electricity salesman, was commissioned to build an electric chair, Edison bribed him to use AC. William Kemmler's (1860-1890) execution was botched, and the murderer died horribly, his face “contorted,” a palm bloody from his clenched fist, and his coat on fire. Witnesses were horrified, and Westinghouse feared losing millions if Edison convinced people AC was deadly. 

Edison next arranged to electrocute an elephant, Topsy, who'd been determined to represent a danger to people. The execution took place at Coney Island and featured the use of AC. Despite Edison's efforts to convince the public that DC was safer than AC, Westinghouse won a contract to illuminate the World's Fair and received “all the positive publicity he would need to make alternating current the industry standard.” 

5 Sigmund Freud vs. Carl Jung

Psychoanalysis' founder, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), and Carl Jung (1875-1961), who originated analytical psychology, differed in their views about the nature of the unconscious. Their differences fueled a feud marked by “charges and counter-charges. Freud fainted several times while in Jung's presence. Freud says Jung harbored death wishes towards him; Jung laughed the idea off.” Supposedly, both men also recognized the development of homosexual feelings for one another, which may have facilitated their parting of ways. 

4 Alexander Hamilton vs. Aaron Burr

The longstanding feud between former U. S. Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804) and Vice-President Aaron Burr (1756-1836) ended in an illegal duel on July 11, 1804, in which Hamilton was killed. They had several political rivalries, but their feud climaxed with “the New York governor's race in 1804.” Burr, until then a Republican, ran as an independent candidate. Hamilton encouraged New York Federalists “not to support Burr,” and Burr lost the election. “A relative slight” gave Burr the excuse he needed, and he challenged Hamilton to a duel. Each man fired his pistol. Burr remained unharmed, but Hamilton suffered a mortal wound, dying the following day. Although Burr survived the duel, his career as a politician was a casualty of the affair, and he never held “elective office again.” 

3 Patrick Henry vs. Thomas Jefferson

Patriot Patrick Henry (1736-1799) and Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) became embroiled in a protracted feud when Jefferson believed “that Henry was critical of his performance as Governor during the Civil War.” 

Although, when “he was elected to the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1768,” Jefferson “joined its radical bloc, led by Patrick Henry and George Washington,” Jefferson's later two years as Virginia's governor marked “the low point” of Jefferson's political career,” as “torn between the Continental Army's desperate pleas for more men and supplies and Virginians' strong desire to keep such resources for their own defense, Jefferson waffled and pleased no one.” In addition, to protect his state's capital from the British army, he moved it from Williamsburg to Richmond, “only to be forced to evacuate that city when it, rather than Williamsburg, turned out to be the target of British attack.” He further humiliated himself when, the day before his second gubernatorial term, he “was forced to flee his home at Monticello” to evade “the British cavalry, thereby incurring the label of coward. Henry's criticism of his term in office offended Jefferson, and the two men feuded thereafter. 

2 Thomas Henry Huxley vs. Richard Owen

English Victorian anatomist and paleontologist Richard Owen (1804-1892), the assistant curator of the Royal College of Surgeons' Hunterian Collections, refused to accept Charles Darwin's (1809-1882) theory of evolution. Instead, he held that each species is derived from the same archetypal “blueprint” created by God. Owen's views brought him into conflict with Darwin's “bulldog,” Thomas Henry Huxley(1825-1895), resulting in a feud between the men that lasted throughout their respective careers. Their debate as to whether the brains of apes and men were more similar (Huxley's view) or dissimilar (Owen's position) reached its climax when Huxley “conclusively demonstrated that the hippocamus minor, a small fold at the back of the brain,” was not “unique to man,” as Owen insisted, “but also was to be found in the brains of apes.” The British public, which followed the claims of the rivals with great interest, judged Huxley to have won their long-standing feud. Nevertheless, Owen's distinguished career continued until he retired at age 79. 

1 Annie Oakley vs. Lillian Smith

Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show wasn't big enough for both Annie Oakley (1860-1926) and Lillian Smith (1871-1930). Oakley, called “Little Sure Shot,” and Smith, dubbed “the California Huntress,” were both expert shots, but Oakley was regarded as “demure, feminine and reserved, while Smith was seen as flirtatious, brash and boastful.” Newspaper accounts of their exploits played up the differences in their personalities and in their respective ages: Oakley was 11 years Smith's senior, but Oakley insisted she was 6 years younger than her actual age. Smith suggested her rival's celebrity was fading. Unlike Oakley, Smith also received the benefit of the doubt when the same behavior by both of them was called into question. While touring England, Oakley scandalized the nation when she shook hands with “Prince Edward's first wife,” but Smith, who did likewise, received no reprimand. Buffalo Bill Cody also flamed the fires of their feud by praising Smith's skills “while downplaying Oakley's achievements.” Finally, Oakley left the show. Ultimately, though, Oakley's fame continued, whereas Smith's career ended in obscurity. (LINK 15)