Helen of Troy
This story starts not in Greece during Homeric times but in St. Paul, MN in October 2022. I received a letter from Mrs. Elsa Prigozy, a volunteer for the Hart Cluett Museum in Troy, NY. She contacted me wondering if I was interested in something she found in the archives of the museum. Mrs. Prigozy was in the process of cataloguing the papers of a prominent Troy citizen Mrs. Helen Evans Warren, nee Francis, (1880-1965). Included among the papers were letters sent to Helen by a Greek man named Ion Dragoumis. Mrs. Prigozy found out more info on Dragoumis and the fact that a few years prior I authored his biography.[1] I have spent over 15 years researching and writing on different aspects of Ion Dragoumis’s life, but I was not aware of the existence of such letters, indeed I don’t think anyone else is! I asked for more information as I was very much interested in the opportunity to see a different part of Dragoumis’s life. It was through the efforts of Mrs. Prigozy and Ms. Kathy Sheehan, director of the Hart Cluett, that I obtained copies of about sixty letters from Ion to Helen; I also located about one hundred letters sent to Ion from Helen and her family.[2] They paint a picture of an unknown part of Ion and Helen’s lives.
Ion Dragoumis (1878-1920) is one of the most multifaceted figures of modern Greece. The scion of a prominent family of intellectuals, patriots, and politicians, he became the most celebrated member of the family. He was a diplomat, politician, political theorist, and intellectual who had a meteoric career in the Greek Foreign Service culminating with his appointment as Greek Ambassador to Imperial Russia in 1914. Elected to Parliament in 1915, Dragoumis became a foe of Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos and his pro-Entente policies. Dragoumis and his party were preparing to challenge Venizelos in the November 1920 elections. However, a few months before the elections, on August 12-13, 1920, an attempt on Venizelos’s life set in motion a series of unfortunate events which culminated in the assassination of Dragoumis by venizelist paramilitary troops. Dragoumis will be forever remembered, above everything else, as a patriot who became the soul and brains of the successful Greek attempt to counter Bulgarian influence in the Ottoman province of Macedonia (most of which is today, thanks to a large degree to Ion’s efforts, part of Greece). His three years (1902-1905) as secretary in the Monastir (Macedonia) Greek Consulate represent his most dynamic work on behalf of Hellenism and the fulfillment of the Greek irredentist ideology of Μεγάλη Ιδέα (Megali Idea, Great Idea).
While earning a reputation as a tireless worker for Hellenism and as a man of letters, Dragoumis was also gaining a reputation in another sphere; he was fast becoming known as one of the great lovers of his time. His exploits in that field became legendary and a frequent topic of conversation, not always positive, among his contemporaries. We know some of the names, but hardly all, of the women with whom he had liaisons; a foreign princess, who was the mistress of the heir to the Greek throne, the wife of one of the anti-venizelist opposition leaders, the Greek wife of a British politician, are but the most famous of them. Above all, his very public relationship with Marika Kotopouli, the most celebrated Greek actress of her time, became fodder for gossip and of interest to the Greek public; even today, Dragoumis’s love affairs are the subject of gossip, books, and even a tv series. But before he became a national icon and a celebrated intellectual; and years before his romantic exploits made the rounds of Athenian salons, 22-year-old Ion Dragoumis met and fell in love with Helen of Troy.[3]
Just as the Dragoumis family was well established in Athens, the Francis family was part of the elite of Troy, NY. John Morgan Francis (1823-1897) was a successful businessman; the founder (1851) and owner of the newspaper “Troy Daily Times”. In 1871 he was appointed US Minister to Greece, a position he kept till 1873. After a decade looking after his business interests back in Troy, he was appointed US Minister to Austria-Hungary, 1884-1885. One would think that this was the pinnacle of distinction of a locally prominent, but not nationally known, family. This was not the case because a few years later John’s son, Charles Spencer Francis (1853-1911), continued in the family tradition. While still a student at Cornel he spent some time as his father’s secretary in Athens; then, after a successful career in business, which included taking over and running the “Troy Daily Times” Charles was appointed US Minister to Greece, Rumania, and Serbia (1900-1902) with Athens as his base.[4] After spending a few years back in Troy tending to his private affairs Charles was appointed to another of his father’s old posts becoming US Minister to Austria-Hungary (1906-1910).
The new envoy left for Athens with some members of his family in February 1901; his wife Alice and some of the younger children joined the family on a later day. Besides Charles and Alice their children were John, Helen, Harriet (Riette), Margaret, and Pomeroy. Since Mrs. Francis was not with the family from the start it was left to 20-year-old Helen to make domestic, and other, arrangements for the family in their early days in Athens. It appears that the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs assigned 22-year-old Ion Dragoumis, at the time a low-level foreign service officer, as liaison to the US Envoy. One assumes that besides official business the young diplomat was asked by members of the family, including Helen, for some help as they were establishing themselves in their new environment.
Athens, at the turn of the 20th century, was not the most desirable diplomatic post. The city had a population of about 100,000 and few modern conveniences. On the plus side there were ancient monuments to explore and the US, not being yet the world power it became later, was viewed favorably by most Greeks. It was natural that Ion, competent, charming, and well connected, formed a personal and social bond with the Francis family. There were excursions with Ion as guide, introductions to Athenian society, and other families of foreign diplomats, arranged by Ion; visits to houses of prominent citizens and dinners. It is at this point that the story takes an interesting turn as Ion and Helen, being of about the same age, formed a bond that would last for a long time.
Helen and Ion exchanged dozens of letters; unfortunately, almost all of them are undated so it is next to impossible to reconstruct a timeline. There are some letters, early on I presume, which are friendly but a bit too formal. They reveal an early friendship between the young American woman, out of her environment in Athens, and the young Athenian who knows everyone in town and who can introduce Helen, and her family, to the city’s “good society”. After a while the letters become more intimate revealing the bond forming between the two. At times it appears that Ion wrote almost daily to Helen planning excursions, asking to see her, inquiring about her health. Helen wrote back, in familiar terms but always more guarded. It becomes clear that the two young people were close to each other. Ion, always more impulsive, makes it clear that he is in love; he calls her “darling” and once or twice ends a letter with “goodbye my love”. Helen’s letters reveal affection and even love but she is more guarded in her pronouncements. It might be that even though they were of the same age, Helen was more mature at this point in their lives; even if her feelings for Ion were strong, she understood the issues which would make a common future difficult, if not impossible. For her Athens was a nice interlude but her life and future were back in the US; Ion’s life, and life’s work, was centered in Greece and his plans for helping the country expand. One would be hard pressed to imagine the two together; she would not have been happy in Greece, away from her close-knit family, and he would be miserable in the US away from Greece and his dreams for the country’s future.
The correspondence between the two continued; at times Helen and her family were out of town visiting various locales (Paris, Rome etc.). When the Francis family returned to the US for good the correspondence did not end, although by now it must have been clear even to Ion that Helen and he were two good friends with tender feelings for each other but no prospects for a closer relationship. This became even more clear in late 1903 when the Francis family sent a wedding invitation to the Dragoumis family for the upcoming nuptials of Helen to Eugene Warren, also a member of Troy’s elite. Nevertheless, the warm and friendly correspondence continued, albeit less frequent, at least until 1916, the last year I can confirm that Helen Warren (as she had become after her marriage), sent a Christmas card to Ion.
This is, as far as I can tell to date, the extent of the relationship between the two. Two young, cosmopolitan people from similar social background but far apart both geographically and in interests, met briefly, fell in love, and had a long term platonic/friendly relationship. Helen Francis became Helen Warren but remained Helen of Troy, Beautiful Helen, a presence in her city’s society. Ion Dragoumis became the celebrated patriot, intellectual, noted lover of his time and the enfant terrible of Athenian society. Did Helen mourn his death in 1920? Did she confide to friends the details of her meeting, many years before, with that strangely attractive persona? The fact that she kept his letters all these years tells us that this early meeting remained a pleasant memory for the rest of her long life.
And what about Ion Dragoumis’s feeling for Helen of Troy? She appears a few times in his journal.[5] On December 18, 1901, he wrote that he dreamed of Helen hugging him and proclaiming her love. On April 8, 1902, he records that an unnamed woman seems to be jealous of Helen. Finally, in May 1902 he wrote a short poem which, in the opinion of his brother Phillip, was inspired by Helen. Ion says more about Helen in his book, published posthumously, The Footpath.[6] In this book Helen is given a sub-chapter under the title “Helen”.[7] In this short passage Ion manages to describe his relationship with Helen in more intimate terms; “Helen loves me a little because she knows that I love her a lot…”. He also describes the future of their relationship “You, who I love, will leave and with you will take many others” [He means feelings, dreams etc.]
Judging from the letters at our disposal Ion Dragoumis was right. Helen Evans Francis, soon to become Warren, loved him a little while he loved her a lot, at least for a time. Unlike the mythical Helen, her modern namesake returned to Troy to live a long and one hopes a happy life. Ion Dragoumis also left Athens soon after for Macedonia and then Constantinople, where his reputation was built and survives to this day, and then went back to Athens where the assassins’ bullets cut his life short and, in the process, turned him into a legend.
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John A. Mazis
Professor of History
Hamline University
[1]John A. Mazis A Man For All Seasons: The Uncompromising Life of Ion Dragoumis (Istanbul: ISIS Press 2014).
[2]Ion Dragoumis Archives. Gennadius Library. American School of Classical Studies in Athens. Much of his correspondence has been digitized. https://dragoumis.ascsa.net/research?v=list
[3] While the mythical Helen is known to the world as “Helen of Troy” modern Greeks refer to her as “Beautiful Helen”; a picture of Helen Francis confirms that Helen of Troy, NY was indeed beautiful.
[4] It was during the time that Charles and his family were leaving for Athens that the Upstate New York paper “Gloversville Daily Leader” dubbed one of his daughters, Helen Evans Francis, “Helen of Troy” February 1, 1901, p. 8.
[5] Ion Dragoumis. Φύλλα Ημερολογίου A 1895-1902 (Pages from the Journal v. 1 1895-1902) Theodoros Soteropoulos ed. Athens: Hermes, 1988, pp. 162, 178, 183.
[6] The book was written in 1902 but was not published until 1925, five years after Ion’s assassination, and has been republished since. See Mazis. A Man For All Seasons, p.79.
[7] Ion Dragoumis. Το Μονοπάτι (The Footpath). Athens: Nea Thesis, 1992, pp. 194-201.