"A Northern Bride with Southern Principles"

John Tyler has made me work twice as hard. In his short time as president (1841-1845), he had two wives. Not only that, but the biography of his second wife, And Tyler, Too: a Biography of John and Julia Gardiner Tyler by Robert Seager, II, is 550 pages long, 12 point type, single space. Not exactly a quick read. However, to my great relief, it is wonderfully written and easy to read. There is far too much information for one blog post, so for Julia Tyler, I will jot down my thoughts in several posts.



Four months after his first wife passed away, John started to court Julia Gardiner who was 30 years his junior. They were married the next year, April 1844, in a near-elopement style wedding making John Tyler the first president to marry while in office. There were many eyebrows raised because of the age difference. John Tyler had children older than his new bride! But there is nothing surviving in any of their correspondence to indicate that they had any issues or hesitations based on the age difference. They were very affectionate and loving to each other and went on to have seven children.

After their wedding ceremony in New York near her parent's home, John and Julia went on a wedding trip with many stops including his new home Sherwood Forest in Virginia. The author describes the occassion of Julia's first meeting with her newly acquired 60 plus slaves on the plantation. I thought to myself, what was running through her mind as she, a Northern born wealthy woman, was meeting her slaves for the first time? Was this awkward for her? Did she detest slavery and just do what she had to do because she married a southern plantation owner? Or, being from a very wealthy family, was she used to someone else doing the work and what did it matter if they were called slaves or servants?

An old duplex slave cabin on Sherwood Forest Plantation

The author must have read my mind. He answered that very question in the next chapter of the book which describes the Gardiner family. Lion Gardiner came to America in 1635 with the Connecticut Company to protect the settlement from Indians, first by killing them and then Lion sought another way by seeking to understand and communicate with them. For ten pieces of cloth he purchased Manchonake Island off the coast of Long Island and continuted to buy more and more real estate on Long Island. Those purchases stayed in the family and made them wealthy.  Manchonake Island is now Gardiner Island and is still owned by the family today. The Island was passed down through the generations until 1816 when Julia's father, David, became its caretaker while its rightful heir was only 12 years old. The farming on Gardiner Island was worked by Indian and African slaves from Lion Gardiner's time until 1817 when New York manumitted its slaves! I was shocked! I have never heard of slavery above the Mason-Dixon line!

But this answered my question about Julia's state of mind while looking over the slaves of Sherwood. Slavery was not foriegn for her. Although slaves were manumitted before she was born in New York, her family must not have objected. It was their way of life for almost two hundred years. Maybe they were even bitter that they lost their work force! The author quotes the New York Herald who, in 1844, called Julia a "Northern Bride with Southern Principles" drawing attention to the similarities in her family's way of life to those of the southern plantation owners.

Now I am very curious about slavery in the north. How many other Northern states freed their slaves before the Civil War? Who else in New York had slaves? Why were they freed in 1817? Who on the state level worked that legislation through and why?

Gardiner Island Manor House built in 1947



And also, who will go with me to go visit Gardiner Island??



Priscilla Cooper Tyler

Priscilla Cooper Tyler and the American Scene, 1816-1889 was one of those books you think about during the day and cannot get wait to get back to reading before bed! Priscilla and her sisters left scads of gossipy, dramatically detailed letters and journals which the author quoted often so I could really feel the emotion behind the facts. Priscilla's personality reminds me of Josephine March from Little Women. She would encourage her younger sisters to put on little dramatic plays at home. She edited a family newspaper. She was not good at domestic tasks. All those were left to her older, more responsible sister, Mary Grace.



Her father was the famous Shakespearen actor, Thomas Cooper and her mother was Mary Fairlie whose family never accepted or loved Thomas, but stayed close to Mary and their children. When Priscilla was a teenager her mother passed away from a long illness. Her father’s popularity on the stage had dwindled as he had gotten older and the family was strapped for cash. So to support her family, Priscilla went on stage with her father putting on the Thomas Cooper Benefit Tour. The family was careful to shield Priscilla from the rough backstage life. Her older sister Mary Grace went as costumer and chaperone to help out. They toured from New York all the way down to New Orleans for four and a half years. Priscilla’s journals and letters reveal that acting was merely a job for her. She must have been good at it based on the newspaper reviews quoted in the book, but she does not speak of enjoying the attention or praise or the work.

During one performance in Richmond, Virginia, Robert Tyler, son of governor John Tyler, saw Priscilla on stage and he apparently fell in love at first sight. He pursued her and they were married shortly there after.  Priscilla left her home in Bristol, Pennsylvania to live at the Tyler plantation in Virginia. It seems to have been a happy family together and Priscilla called John Tyler, Father, all her days.



When John Tyler became president, his wife, Letitia, was an invalid confined to her chair, his older daughters were married, and his younger daughters were still children. So Priscilla was it! And she did a fine job! The author says that although politically John Tyler could do nothing right, socially, the Tylers could do nothing wrong.

When John Tyler moved his family to the White House, he sat everyone down for a family meeting reminding them that they would only be in this high office for a short time then the would be the plain Tylers again, so they should remember to conduct themselves with humility.

I like to think how her career on the stage prepared Priscilla for life in the White House. She was already used to having an audience and performing when the spotlight was on her. She was used to paying attention to details of a performance like her costume, the scenery, in essence setting the stage so that the atmosphere is just right. Even knowing a script in a play is not too much different from preparing proper topics of conversation for important dinner parties. By the end her time as hostess she wrote that she felt born to the role.

However, she did display some stage fright during her first cabinet dinner. She fainted away at the table! Daniel Webster took her from the table to try to revive her at the same time, Priscilla says, John Tyler “deluged us both with ice-water, ruining my lovely new dress and, I am afraid, producing a decided coolness between himself and the Secretary of State.”

Priscilla’s success may also be due to her wisdom in seeking advice from Dolley Madison who was often in Washington and was close friends with the Tylers. During one particularly trying time for John Tyler, Priscilla decided to get him to lighten up. She dressed up her four year old daughter like Dolley Madison, coached her in imitating Dolley’s speech and then ran to John in his office and said “come quick! Dolley needs to see you in the drawing room!” John rushed down to see his granddaughter as Dolley and they all had a good laugh!

When John Tyler remarried in 1844, Priscilla’s time as hostess was up, but not her time mixing with politics. While he reluctantly practiced law, Robert Tyler remained active in his political party and helped to get Pierce and Buchanan elected. His potential political career in Pennsylvania was ruined by the outbreak of the Civil War. When he mentioned he was for state’s rights, he was run out of Bristol by a lynch mob. He eventually escaped to his father’s home in Virginia and fought for the Confederacy. By the time the war was over, Robert Tyler was completely ruined and he and Priscilla were staying with her family in Alabama. At this time, his faithful friend James Buchanan wrote him a letter extending his friendship and also a check for $1000. Robert Tyler returned the check but appreciated the support.  The Tylers stayed in Alabama where Robert helped greatly to keep integrity and honesty in the government during reconstruction.



610 Radcliffe Street, Bristol PA
home of Robert and Priscilla Tyler when he was run out of state by a lynch mob
This house is now the Grundy Museum.

The First Ladies each have a different home life and background before they come to the White House that either helps or hinders them in their role as hostess. Priscilla thrived because of her background on the stage. This makes me look ahead to Reagan. How did his background in acting help him in the presidency? Were there other actors and actresses in the White House?

Although her family and in-laws were so different, both were so loving and supportive. This reminds me of Louisa Adams’ unhappy family and her feelings of being imprisoned in the White House. She was stuck with her miserable husband and unhappy children! The Tylers were a loving family so although it was a lot of work, there were a lot of fond memories in the White House. Of course, Tyler’s emphasis on humility allowed them to live in reality too. I’m sure John Tyler did not nit pick his family when they weren’t perfect (sound familiar, John Quincy??).  He allowed them room to make mistakes, like fainting at a cabinet dinner. Love and humility can go a long way in the success of any house as we see from the families that have called the White House home.

Anna Symmes Harrison

Once again, I have come to a first lady who does not have a biography written about her so I relied again on Laura Holloway’s book. There is more information available about Anna Harrison than Hannah Van Buren, but Anna never functioned as first lady since her husband, William Henry Harrison, was only president for 30 days and during his short presidency, Anna spent the whole time at her home in Ohio. Since she wasn’t feeling well when it was time for William Henry Harrison to go to Washington for his inauguration on March 4, 1841 Anna stayed at home and was to join him later. But she never saw him again. He caught pneumonia and died April 4. 

Anna Harrison never had the chance to function as first lady, but her life story is important because, like Rachel Jackson before her, it shows how America had changed from being ruled by the upper class that were schooled in European courts to Americans who were pioneers of unsettled parts of our country. She was born in New Jersey and her mother died shortly after her birth. When Anna was four years old, her father took her to be raised by her grandparents on Long Island. This was during the American Revolution and in order to have safe travels he dressed as a British soldier to take her there. Anna then was raised by her grandparents until she was 19 and her father took her with him to settle in Ohio.

There in Ohio Anna met William Henry Harrison who was a popular general and married him when she was 20. William Henry Harrison was appointed governor during Adams, Jefferson, and Madison’s presidencies. A lot of his work was with Indian relations.



Anna gave birth to 10 children. There was no school in the neighborhood so she hired a tutor for her children and also invited the children in the houses nearby to come benefit from the tutor also. How generous of her!

Sadly, Anna saw 9 of her children die and also 10 of her grandchildren in addition to her husband. Yet through all her grief the religion of her grandparents who raised her gave her peace and comfort. Before her own death she choose Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know I am God” to be spoken on at her funeral. Oh, how often she must have meditated on that verse during her life.

Even though I was able to find bits and pieces of info on Anna Harrison, I still don’t feel like I really know her as a woman. I am anxiously awaiting a biography on her which will hopefully someday be written by a new acquaintance, Cynthia Ogorek, from the Public Historian at http://www.centerofknownhistory.com/welcometohistory.html

When I was looking for information on Anna Harrison, I emailed her historic home, Grouseland, and was directed to Cynthia who recently researched Anna for a presentation about First Ladies from the Midwest. I wish I was close enough to see her presentation and someday I hope to see that she has published an Anna Harrison biography!

Hannah Van Buren

A simple Google search turned up no biography for poor Hannah Van Buren. Of course since she died long before her husband, Martin, became president this does not surprise me. I was hoping there would be a little booklet or something at the Van Buren’s home in New York, but an email to the park ranger at their home simply said there was nothing. I even asked about a biography of Martin that would tell me about Hannah. But there really isn’t any. He doesn’t even mention her in his autobiography. Ouch. That hurts!



So I decided to invest in a new anthology of First Ladies. This time I choose the reprint of an older one by Laura Holloway written in 1881 entitled The Ladies of the White House; or In the Home of the Presidents. Being a Complete History of the Social and Domestic Lives of the Presidents from Washington to the Present Time--1789-1881. The section on Hannah was very short, only a couple of pages. Basically, Hannah and Martin grew up together in the same tight knit Dutch community near Kinderhook New York. They got married when she was 25. She had 5 children but one died in infancy. Then she passed away after being married for only 10 years. That was it for detailed information on her! But there was a reprint of her obituary and also a couple pages describing the perfect gentility and graciousness of her character. One story sticks out in my mind. (Actually, I think it was the only story.) Hannah was sick a long time before she passed away and during that time she asked her niece to make sure that when she died that the tradition of the family spending money on grieving scarves would be replaced by the family spending the same amount of money on the poor.

Then I flipped through some other write ups in the book and noticed that most of them left out information like dates of birth, marriage, children being born, whereabouts of where they lived, how they met their spouse, etc. Instead all the write ups focused on the ladies’ character and painted their qualities in extreme terms like they never had a bad day in their lives, but they were ALWAYS patient and ALWAYS hospitable. Was this just the style of the author? Or the style of writing in the late 1800’s?

Although this writing did not satisfy my curiosity to know about Hannah Van Buren, it reminded me that who I am is more important and lasts longer that what I do.

Rachel Jackson

A Being So Gentle: The Frontier Love Story of Rachel and Andrew Jackson by Patricia Brady was a breath of fresh air after the depressing saga of Louisa Adams. Sure, Rachel had her share of sorrows. When she was twelve her family braved an incredibly dangerous trip down a river facing Indian attacks, bitter cold winter, disease, and hunger to become among the first white settlers in what is now Tennessee. Then, as a teenager she married a young man who turned out to be angry, jealous, and unfaithful. Not having any legal rights to a divorce, she lived separate from him with her own family after trying to reconcile.

 

But then Andrew Jackson, a dashing, hot-headed lawyer came to the Tennessee area and boarded with Rachel’s family while he was starting his law business. The two fell in love and eloped to Natchez where they passed themselves off as a married couple. Did they actually have a marriage ceremony there? No one knows. There is no record. However, in the frontier where preachers were hard to come by and Rachel had no rights to a legal divorce, the fact that they passed themselves off as man and wife made them married. (Eventually, the first husband wanted to remarry, too, so he legally divorced Rachel.)

The love Andrew and Rachel shared was deep and life long. Reading snippets of their letters to each other reminded me of Abigail and John Adams and how they were so emotionally connected and beared their souls to each other. Andrew and Rachel loved to spend the evening together sitting in front of their fire place each smoking their pipe.

 Rachel was unable to have children, however, they had various nephews and nieces they cared for at different times and three nephews in particular that they raised (two of which were named Andrew Jackson!). They also raised an Indian baby that Andrew had found lying in his dead mother’s arms after a battle he had fought against her tribe. Andrew had been an orphan himself and this baby’s plight tugged at his heart so he took the baby and sent him home for Rachel to raise.

Rachel Jackson was also very down to earth which I could relate to. So far the other first ladies were wealthy (or very in debt so they appeared wealthy!) and had experience with European courts and royal etiquette. Rachel and Andrew Jackson entertained just as much as the other presidential couples, yet without overwhelming debt or fancy etiquette to measure up to. In fact there was time when money was short so they actually downsized! If you were to visit the first Hermitage, a three-room log cabin, you might drive up to find Andrew Jackson rocking on his porch smoking his pipe while Rachel herself was sweeping with her apron on and her large key ring on her belt. If you stayed with them, you would sleep in the loft area of the home with whomever else was visiting or living with them. Yet the couple was praised for their warm hospitality and good food.

 

Rachel never got the chance to be First Lady. She died of a heart attack shortly after Andrew was elected president. After she drew her last breath, Andrew refused to accept the truth and stayed by her side all night long hoping she would wake up. He never truly recovered from her death and wore her miniature about his neck from then on.

On the one hand I would have liked to see what Washington would have been like with Rachel as hostess of the White House. How would her frontier taste and style have refined the etiquette of the day? On the other hand, it could have been the Lord’s mercy that she did not have to live in Washington. Rachel’s first marriage was used against Andrew in political campaigns for years and she was branded in the public as an adulterer. Would she have been shunned and ostracized by the ladies of Washington? Certainly the treatment of one of Andrew’s cabinet member’s wives with a similar background as Rachel’s gives us a hint that Rachel would not have been welcomed.

Louisa Catherine Adams

Cannibals of the Heart by Jack Shepard is the personal biography of John Quincy Adams and Louisa Catherine Adams. As you may guess by the title, their marriage was anything but perfect. And neither was Louisa's life. She faced great loneliness, grief, and a constant search for purpose in life.



Louisa was born to wealthy America parents who lived and worked in France. When she was a young girl, the close knit family moved to England. Louisa was the boarding school outcast because she was foreign to the other girls. Louisa was also sickly and spent a lot of time to herself. Before her marriage she had never been away from her mother for more than a couple of hours. Imagine the shock of a new husband (who was never very affectionate or emotionally present) and then moving to a new country (Prussia, where John Quincy was appointed minister). Then again to a new country when she finally set foot on American soil for the first time as a young adult. Then again to a new country when he was appointed to St. Petersburg (a post he accepted without consulting her at all.) Then to France, then England, then back to America. All with an emotionally cold husband for company!

                                                                                            

                                                               

But her loneliest time was her time "imprisoned in the White House" as First Lady. She fulfilled her duties of entertaining and calling but confided in her son that she had "no one to break the dreadful tedium of an almost entire solitude" and that she "could not bear the loneliness of my life." 

I'm sure the grief she experienced in her life compounded the feelings of loneliness. First of all, her beloved father faced complete financial ruin shortly after her marriage. It probably didn't help that John Quincy continually brought it up and felt her father passed himself off as wealthy to dump Louisa on him. In truth, her father was ruined in part because he had to wait in England for John Quincy to stop stalling the wedding so he could return to America to take care of his business. By the time John Quincy got around to marrying Louisa after delaying for over a year, it was too late to save the business.

She also grieved the loss of eight babies through miscarriage. And her only daughter died as a toddler while in St. Petersburg. When John Quincy was appointed to St. Petersburg, he arranged with Abigail Adams for their two sons, George and John, to be left with Abigail without consulting Louisa at all. Then they did not see their sons for eight years! Although they were reunited later, the damage had been done. John Quincy's demanding, harsh parenting which lacked a loving relationship had ruined their sons. George committed suicide and John literally worked himself to death trying to please his father. Out of her 12 pregnancies, only their son Charles lived a full life.

Women in America in the early 1800's lived boring lives of hanging on their husband's arm as a pretty little ornament with not much meaning in life besides. Gone were the colonial days when men needed women to join in the Revolution by boycotting and holding down the home front while they were fighting for freedom. Louisa keenly felt this purposelessness thorough out her life with the exception of acting as John Quincy's campaign manager. But after the election, she was again purposeless.  After John Quincy's one term as president, he was elected to the house of representatives and worked towards abolition of slavery and the right of the people to petition. Louisa here found purpose as she saw the similarities between slaves and the lack of women's rights. She studied her Bible and other writings (including her mother in law's papers) for thoughts on individual freedoms and rights, not just for white men. She also compiled petitions for John Quincy to present to the house. While John Quincy worked on the floor of the house for slave rights in general, he never helped one slave in particular. However, in 1849, Louisa bought the freedom of her slave cook, Julie, a decided move from a woman who had finally found a purpose.



Elizabeth Kortright Monroe

Some first ladies are more well known than others. I knew when I started this project there was a possibility that there would not be a biography for each one. I thought that was the case when I first started looking for Elizabeth Monroe. A simple Amazon search and Google search came up empty. I wasn't sure what to do next. After a couple of weeks, I tried an Amazon search again. This time there was a used biography of Mrs. Monroe for $40! That was little more than I was willing to pay. Especially when I looked at the details of the book and discovered the book only contained 35 pages. So I went to the library. There was only one copy of the book in any library in the state. But they were not willing to lend it out. Hmmm. Then my brother suggested that I call Ash-Lawn Highland, the Monroe's home. Jack-pot! I called the gift shop and after yelling my name and address into the phone several times so the kind, but hard-of-hearing volunteer could get my information, the 35 page booklet was in the mail. For only $4!! It came addressed to Rachel Moyer! Close enough!



It turns out that so little has been written on Elizabeth Monroe because so little is known. Her personal papers were destroyed when she died. She was born into a well-known and prominent family in New York and was married to James Monroe when she was 17 and he was 27. James was a Virginia representative to the Continental Congress which met in New York at the time.

One story about Elizabeth stands out which happened when James was minister to France during the French Revolution. The Lafeyettes were considered enemies of the state since he was imprisoned in Austria and Madame Lafayette was imprisoned in France along with the rest of her family. James Monroe wanted to help her out of prison, but could not directly do anything as a foreign minister. So Elizabeth climbed into a beautiful carriage and visited the Madame in prison. When the Madame was summoned from her cell to see her visitor she thought her time had come to be executed since her grandmother, sister, and mother had recently been executed. When she saw Elizabeth was there to visit she "became hysterical with joy!" Elizabeth's attentions swayed public opinion and eventually led to the Madame's release. The Lafayette's were ever grateful to the Monroes.

The people of America were not so kind to Elizabeth when she took on the role of First Lady. Cokie Roberts in her book Ladies Of Liberty comments that Elizabeth's lack of hospitality and calling on others "was the cause of crisis cabinet meetings, summons to the secretary of state, and grousing gossip gaggles."



When she did entertain in the White House, the atmosphere was lofty, formal, and elegant. No longer were the parties a mix of the common people and the upper class. This was a relief to some Washington watchers, but to others this was a loss of the uniqueness of American "court." Elizabeth announced she would be happy to receive calls and visits, but would not make calls, let alone the first call to someone new to town the way Dolley Madison had.  Elizabeth's daughter Eliza would pay some calls, but she was haughty since her French boarding school experience and most people couldn't stand her. Many women were personally offended and angered by this tone of privacy and formality brought to the White House.

In fairness to Elizabeth, she was sick much of the time and could not physically keep up the demands of the social schedule that Dolley Madison had kept. Could ANYONE have kept the schedule Dolley kept? She set the bar so high! After 8 years of Dolley creating the unwritten rules of the role of first lady as the capital itself was being created, anyone following Dolley would be scrutinized in comparison to her. Elizabeth Monroe, unfortunately, was the one to sit in that hot seat.

This is not unlike a pastor's wife. In many churches the congregation expects the pastor's wife to do things a particular way or to fill a particular role. Like the joke of when a congregation goes to hire a new pastor and the number one concern is: does his wife play the piano? And none of these expectations are written down. They just exist in each individual's own assumptions of what a pastor's wife should be like.  Fortunately for me, the congregations I've been a part of have been kind and gracious in allowing me to be myself. Some of my pastor's wife friends have not been so fortunate. Like Elizabeth, all we can do is be ourselves and do the best with the energy and time we are given. And "whatever we do, work heartily as unto the Lord, not to men" Colossians 3:23.