MENKEN

Adah Isaacs , formerly Adelaide McCord (dau. of James McCord a merchant d. 1842). b. Chart rain, afterwards called Milneburg in Louisiana 15 June 1835; she and her younger sister were engaged as the Theodore Sisters, dancers at Opera house, New Orleans 1849; danced at the Tacon theatre in Havana; played at Port Zavaca, Texas; worked as a journalist in New Orleans and Cincinnati; taught French, Greek and Latin at a ladies’ school in New Orleans; m. 3 Aug. 1856 Alexander Isaacs Menken musician, a Jew, whose religion she adopted, divorced from him in Nashville; acted in Milman’s Fazio at Varieties theatre, New Orleans 1858; played in the southern states; studied sculpture; m. near New York 3 April 1859 John Camel Heenan the pugilist, he obtained a divorce in Indiana 1862; first appeared in New York, June 1859; played leading busine in the southern states; first played Mazeppa at Green st. theatre Albany 7 June 1861; went through a form of marriage with Robert Henry Newell known as Orpheus C. Kerr, Oct. 1861, divorced from him Oct. 1865; m. 21 Aug. 1866 James Barclay; acted in California 1863–4; played Mazeppa at Astley’s amphitheatre, London 3 Oct. 1864, where she cleared £200 a week for four months; played Leon in Brougham’s Child of the Sun, at Astley’s 9 Oct. 1865; became intimate with Charles Dickens, A. C. Swinburne and Charles Reade in London, and with Alexandre Dumas and Théophile Gautier in Paris; appeared at the Gaité, Paris in Les Pirates de la Savane 30 Dec. 1866; played as Mazeppa at Astley’s, London 19 Oct. 1867 and in Black Eyed Susan, Jany. 1868; at the Pavilion theatre, April 1868; directre of Sadler’s Wells, May 1868; author of Memories. By Indigen a, about 1856, a vol. of poems not in British Museum library; In felicia 1868, a vol. of poems dedicated by permi ion to Charles Dickens, new illustrated ed. 1888. d. Rue Cramartine, Paris 10 Aug. 1868. bur. Père la Chaise cemetery Aug., her remains and monument were removed to Mont Parna e cemetery 21 April 1869. A. I. Menken’s In felicia (1888), memoir and portrait ; Les Pirates de la Savane. Par Bourgeois et Dugué. Paris (1867), memoir pp. 1–14; T. A. Brown’s American stage (1870) 243, portrait ; Stirling’s Old Drury Lane , ii 251–3 (1881); The Age , ii 369 (1864), portrait ; Illust. sporting news , i 44 (1862) portrait , iv 569 (1865), portrait .