Was it Clement Clarke Moore's creation?

   For 190 years, families have loved and shared the joyous poem of Christmas with their families. The poem, A Visit from St. Nicholas, more commonly known as 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, has been a classic since its first appearance in the Troy Sentinel in 1823. The poem was published anonymously and, as excitement over the verses grew, everyone wanted to know the name of the author.

Livingston

Moore

   In 1837 Clement Clarke Moore, a biblical scholar in New York City, allowed his name to be attached as author and, in 1844, he included the piece in his own book, Poems. Moore explained that he had written the poem on the Christmas Eve of 1823.

   But there was a problem.

   For at least fifteen years before the poem saw the light of a Troy New York day, by 1808 at the latest, a group of children had been listening to Henry Livingston read them the poem.

   Whether Henry, dead by the time Moore took credit for the poem, would have cared for the fame and attention is doubtful. Whether he would have appreciated someone appropriating his work, though, is a completely different thing.

   For over a century and a half, those who remembered have passed on the story to the next generation. Descendants collected one another's memories in the hopes that some stray thread would be found that could be pulled on, and maybe, just maybe, unravel the curtain preventing their story from emerging.

   But for all that time, and all that effort, the Livingston descendants failed to make a case strong enough to put up against the word of the son of the Rector of New York City's Trinity Church.

   There was no smoking gun. The original in Henry's handwriting had burned in a Wisconsin fire.   

   What it took was someone who could look at the problem from a completely new point of view. A literary detective who could trace the origin of writing styles.

   The rest of the story is here.