In choosing cult-related books to read, I have tended to focus on ones that explore the phenomenology of people who are caught up in cults. Perhaps this reflects my perspective as both a former member and a mental-health professional who endeavors to help other former members. I want to know how people felt in their situations, what kept them in their group, and how they managed to leave. In comparison, Susan Wels, historian, journalist, and author of An Assassin in Utopia: The True Story of a Nineteenth-Century Sex Cult and a President’s Murder looks at the effect a particular cult had on history. It is a different perspective than mine, but Susan Wels has written an interesting and thoroughly entertaining book.
The sex cult of the book’s title is Oneida Community, a Utopian farm and commune in central New York, founded by John Humphrey Noyes. Those who study cults will recognize Noyes as an archetypal cult leader and the Oneida Community as a typical cult. Noyes cut a striking figure: tall, bearded, with red hair and striking gray eyes; and he believed he had received a direct revelation from God that he was a perfect human, incapable of sin. As a young man, he began publishing a newspaper, The Perfectionist, which gave him a forum to expound his religious views and to begin gathering a following. Indeed, the newspaper business was thriving in the United States of the mid-19th century, and that context provides one of the threads Wels uses to weave together the different narratives in the book.
In 1848, Noyes, along with his wife and first three disciples, arrived at Oneida Creek to begin their community. Wels gives some fascinating historical background in this recounting of all the religious groups that originated in that part of New York, later called the “Burned-Over District” as the result of the remarkable fire of religious passion that had swept through the region in the early 19th century. From there, Noyes began to build a utopian commune with nonconformist practices such as free love and the communal rearing of children. Since the couplings had to be approved by the leadership, free love may not be the best way to describe the sexual practices at Oneida—though Noyes is credited with coining the term. Men and women slept separately, but they would be allowed to come together for an hour or two for a sexual encounter, and then they would return to their separate quarters to sleep.
That selectivity likely was one reason the Oneida Community is considered to be the most successful utopian experiment in the history of the United States: It reflected the community’s ability to attract capable and hard-working members, and to keep out assorted riffraff and malingerers (p. 16).
Possibly because of the appeal of free love, many people applied to become members of the community; but the existing members were selective about whom they let join. That selectivity likely was one reason the Oneida Community is considered to be the most successful utopian experiment in the history of the United States: It reflected the community’s ability to attract capable and hard-working members, and to keep out assorted riffraff and malingerers (p. 16).
Even so, the occasional miscreant was bound to get in. One such person was Charles Guiteau (the assassin of the book’s title), who joined the community in 1860. Guiteau adjusted poorly to the rigor and discipline of life in the community. He also was upset that none of the women found him attractive and did not want to have sex with him. He left Oneida in 1863 after spending only 3 years there and made his way to New York City, where he sought employment with the colorful publisher of The New York Tribune, Horace Greeley, who also was a politician. Horace Greeley’s story is fascinating, and Wels writes about it as part of her deep, historical dive into the world and society in which Guiteau lived.
Guiteau’s chief impact on history was his shooting of James Garfield, the twentieth President of the United States. Wels tells how Guiteau stalked Garfield after Garfield was elected. After some work he had done in the campaign, Guiteau believed he was entitled to some appointive office in the Garfield Administration. He expected to be made Ambassador to either Austria or France, despite his having neither the qualifications nor capacity for such a position. He hung around the White House, pressing his case for office; but people associated with him sensed that he was mentally imbalanced. Eventually, it became clear that Guiteau would not be rewarded with an appointment to government office for his efforts, and he felt betrayed by some of the appointments President Garfield did make. Guiteau believed Garfield should have been more grateful.
Ultimately, Guiteau shot Garfield at close range at the rail station in Washington, D.C. In one of the many interesting historical asides she makes throughout the book, Wels notes that Garfield’s Secretary of War, Robert Todd Lincoln (son of the former President), was also at the rail station at the time and witnessed the shooting of President Garfield, just as he had witnessed the death of his father in the aftermath of Lincoln’s assassination less than two decades earlier.
The book closes with the last chapter of John Humphrey Noyes’s life in a house near Niagara Falls, surrounded by family and what was left of the Oneida Community. Noyes was revered as a wise father and leader, and his final days were idyllic. Members of the of the community visited with him on Sundays and when he was teaching Hebrew to the children in the community school during the week. Nevertheless, Wels notes that Noyes was often fearful and depressed, in spite (or because?) of his being inspired by loving, female spirit guides. In any case, he died at age 74, in his bed, by himself.
Nineteenth-century America is filled with an array of fascinating figures, and many of them make an appearance in this energetic narrative that you might initially be inclined to discount as being a bit scattered. However, I suspect the author intends to come across as somewhat manic: imagine a brilliant history professor who, to give the reader a felt sense of the Zeitgeist, takes methamphetamine and then writes about this period of our history. Or think about Carrie Mathison (the character Claire Danes plays on the brilliant Showtime series Homeland), who goes off of her bipolar meds so she can more easily construct all the potential connections of whatever conspiracy she is trying to unravel. Reading this book creates a similar effect, and it is certainly entertaining.
And it’s remarkable that all these characters are, in fact, connected to each other. For example, Rutherford B. Hayes, the 19th President of the United States and the immediate predecessor to James Garfield, is the first cousin of John Humphrey Noyes (!), and numerous people from the Oneida Community are entertained at the White House during Hayes’s Administration. Roscoe Conkling, a Republican politician from Oneida who was critical of the Oneida Community, was the bitter enemy of Horace Greeley, Rutherford B. Hayes, and James Garfield. Nevertheless, Conkling became a US Senator and a formidable power broker.
Most of the major politicians of the period, such as Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, and Chester A. Arthur, are tied into the narrative. Colorful characters—such as Horace Greeley’s close friend P. T. Barnum, and Greeley’s employee, Margaret Fuller, who was the first female foreign correspondent for a major daily newspaper and thought to be one of the most educated women of her era—people the narrative. It is astounding how the story keeps folding back on itself, with many of the connections running through Horace Greeley. The somewhat chaotic feel of it all seems to capture the Zeitgeist of the United States in the 1800s, and perhaps that was the author’s intent.
Finally, be aware that this is not the book to read to gain a deep insight into cults. In fact, I think the author falls prey to a general tendency in our society to emphasize the salacious, sensational, and scandalous aspects of cults. However, we can glean at least one interesting thing about cults from An Assassin in Utopia…: As many former members understand, cults try to attract and retain competent people. People who are too impaired whether because of limited ability or mental illness—tend to not be adaptable enough to meet the expectations of high-demand groups. Although the book does not directly address this characteristic of high-demand groups, the author makes quite clear that Guiteau did not have the work ethic and basic social skills he needed to function well in the closed society of the Oneida Community.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed reading An Assassin in Utopia… for all the interesting history, much of which I did not know beforehand. Any book with characters such as Horace Greely, P. T. Barnum, and John Humphrey Noyes is bound to be entertaining when written by an author as skilled as Susan Wels. I thought this was a fun read and a rollicking good time. Moreover, I thought Wels had some good insights into American society at large, and I am happy to recommend the book.
