The First Lady and the Rebel, page 33
“Then I hope you will have the chance. Will you stay for dinner tonight?”
“I’m sorry, no. I am dining with a…friend.”
Plainly, he was speaking of Miss Mary Harlan, the daughter of Senator James Harlan of Iowa. Mary fully approved of the girl, who was well educated and pretty, without being so pretty as to be worrisome. She would have been quite content to let the couple do their courting in the Executive Mansion. Evidently, however, Bob with his outsized sense of privacy, which had grown noticeably over the past several years, preferred to tryst in secret, or so he thought. “Very well,” she said serenely. “Give Miss Harlan my regards.”
Bob blushed, and Mary felt some revenge for him insisting on entering the military.
* * *
Of the gloomy days Mary had seen in Washington, President Lincoln’s second inaugural day, March 4, surely ranked among the worst. The rain had scarcely let up for two days, turning the city’s streets into pure muck. Mary, picking her way into her carriage with her black velvet skirts lifted as high as decency would allow, remembered that long-ago day when she and Mercy had made their way along Springfield’s muddy streets with their pile of shingles. It was a pity she had not saved a few.
Pennsylvania Avenue was lined with spectators spilling out into the street, hanging precariously out of windows, and perching in trees. Mary smiled and waved at them somewhat guiltily, for the person they most wanted to see, the President, had quietly slipped over to the Capitol long before and was passing the time in signing bills. It was, the ever-cranky New York Herald would grumble, like seeing Hamlet without Hamlet. Still, Mary knew that there would be a fine parade of military troops, fire companies, and civil organizations behind her, and as every place or thing that could possibly support a flag had been bedecked with one, the cloudy day was much brightened by the red, white, and blue that flashed everywhere.
In the Capitol, she and her sons took their places; Bob, resplendent in his captain’s uniform, for General Grant, of course, had acceded to the President’s wish and had already assumed his duties. Finally, the President entered, looking particularly well turned out in a new Brooks Brothers suit that Mary had personally inspected before he left the Executive Mansion. He was escorted by his outgoing vice president, Mr. Hannibal Hamlin, and followed by his new vice president, Andrew Johnson.
Mary had understood why Mr. Lincoln, when seeking reelection, had chosen Mr. Johnson as his running mate, as he had served as the military governor of Tennessee and could be expected to help win the border states for Mr. Lincoln. Nonetheless, she had had vague misgivings about the man, which proved only too well founded when the new vice president wobbled upright to make his required speech. Was the man intoxicated?
For what seemed an eternity, Mr. Johnson rambled on about his humble origins—which, Mary thought, were all too plain now—while the President’s face turned into a study of gloom, elegant and dignified Senator Charles Sumner buried his face in his hands, and Vice President Hamlin tugged gently at, then yanked, his successor’s coattails. It was a vain effort, for it only encouraged the second man in the nation to remind the officials around him that they derived all their power from the people. “And I will say to you, Mr. Secretary Seward, and to you, Mr. Secretary Stanton—”
Mr. Seward managed a sardonic smile. Mr. Stanton looked murderous.
“Mr. Secretary… Who is Secretary of the Navy?”
“Welles,” said the bearer of that name. “Good God in heaven.”
“Welles,” Mr. Johnson said firmly. “Mr. Secretary Welles. Power from the people.”
At last, Mr. Johnson ran out of words and took the oath of office administered by Mr. Hamlin, who proffered the necessary Bible as if wanting to rap his successor’s hand with it. Kissing the Bible as if it were a squirming baby, Johnson then attempted to administer the oath of office to the new senators, but after a few tries wisely turned the task over to a clerk and subsided into his seat.
The oaths completed without further ado, it was time to proceed to the east portico of the Capitol, overlooked by the building’s fine new dome. New, too, was the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court who would administer the oath of office to the President after he gave his inaugural speech: Salmon P. Chase, replacing the ancient Justice Taney, who had died the previous year. But newest of all was what Mary sensed as she surveyed the crowd. The last time she had sat in this place, the spectators had looked restless and on edge, terrified of what the future might hold. Now, though many had suffered and many would likely suffer still as long as there were armies in the field, there was hope, even optimism, in the faces looking toward the portico.
To applause, the President entered, still natty in his suit and looking unruffled by his vice president’s disgraceful exhibition. As the clapping ceased, he glanced up, followed by tens of thousands of eyes. The sun, hidden for days, had chosen that precise moment to break through. As the multitude fell silent, he spoke. “Fondly do we hope—fervently do we pray—that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bondman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said ‘the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.’
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”
Mary, with tears in her eyes, was unequal to applauding. So, evidently, were most of the spectators.
As they dressed for that evening’s reception, though, she took the opportunity to congratulate her husband on his fine speech. The President, drawing on his white gloves, winked. “So you didn’t want the earth to sink beneath you this time?”
He referred to a speech he had made the previous year at a sanitary fair. It had not been one of his finer efforts, and Mary had told him so. “Really, Mr. Lincoln, I wish you would forget that unkind criticism of mine. I certainly have.”
“Oh, you were probably right. I usually do value your opinion on these things.”
* * *
On Monday, the Lincolns prepared to ride to the inaugural ball, Mary in her white silk gown, Mr. Lincoln fresh from the barber and dressed in evening clothes. Bob, who had overcome his aversion to the gossip of the press sufficiently to serve as Miss Harlan’s escort, fell in step beside them as they proceeded to the waiting carriages. “By the way, Mother, I kept meaning to tell you. Before I came back to Washington, I was put in charge of seeing a lady to the rebel lines, and who do you think it was? Aunt Emily! She sends her regards.”
“Going to see about her cotton,” the President said.
“You mean you let her, after that impertinent letter?”
“Of course. I promised that I would help her if I was reelected, and it was a promise I always intended to keep.”
Mary shook her head. “You put up with a good deal from we women, Mr. Lincoln.”
“And Todd women in particular. Just don’t make me dance tonight, and I won’t complain.”
“I had my one dance with you back in Springfield, and my feet still carry the memory.”
“I hope it was worth it in the long run.”
She squeezed his hand and looked up at him, so affectionately that next to them, Bob blushed. “It certainly was.”
28
Emily
March 1865
Something about the handsome young Union captain waiting for them at Varina Landing looked familiar, but Emily could not place him until she remembered the face that had appeared so often in Mary’s photograph album back at the White House. “Bob?”
“Aunt Emily? I was told only that I would be meeting two ladies. Not which two ladies.” He embraced Emily and smiled at Mrs. Bettie Pratte, an old friend of Emily’s who was traveling to Richmond to join her husband—the wives of living Confederate officers being unwelcome in Kentucky.
As Bob helped them disembark, Emily said, “Do you remember when you were a boy, and your mother was teaching you manners? She made you help me out of your family carriage, again and again, until you were quite the Lord Chesterfield.”
“Well, I hope I learned my lesson well. Now, I do have to check your documents, or I’ll find myself back at Harvard.”
“I am glad that you were allowed to serve, even on the wrong side.”
Bob had the graciousness to smile at that feeble joke.
In February, Mr. Lincoln, through his old Illinois friend Orville Browning, had granted Emily permission to come to Richmond. Mr. Browning, a former senator who had stayed in Washington as a lobbyist, had put her under the charge of General James Singleton, a fellow Illinoisan with connections to the South. Ostensibly, General Singleton was coming to Richmond to explore the possibility of peace, but as recent talks for that had stalled on the issue of reunion, everyone, in the South and North alike, assumed that he was in the Confederate capital to further his own business, and that of Emily and many others, of trading in cotton. The whole affair struck Emily as a little unsavory, but as one of its chief beneficiaries, she was hardly in a position to complain.
The steamer would not depart for Richmond until the next day, so in the meantime, a string of Yankee officers came aboard to talk with General Singleton. Remembering her unpleasant experience with General Sickles and Senator Harris, Emily dreaded their arrival. But things were quite different this time; it might have been any social gathering of officers and their wives. General Stephen Ord, a West Point graduate, made light conversation about his and Hardin’s alma mater. Had Emily ever been there? She must visit some time, and the river journey to it was sublime, as Mrs. Lincoln could no doubt attest. General John Mulford, who was in charge of the prisoner exchanges as well as the steamer, brought his wife onboard to entertain the ladies so that the wait would not be too tedious. Just a few years her senior, Mrs. Mulford was interested in Emily’s travels, particularly Lookout Mountain. How Emily had managed to ascend that height without fainting was beyond her. Might it be possible to go up just a little way and still have a respectable view? Or might just staying put on the lowest possible ground have its own charms?
Everyone was so pleasant, it was unsettling. Her hosts could afford to be pleasant, Emily supposed, given the state of the Confederacy these days. Atlanta, Savannah, Columbia, Charleston, Wilmington—all had fallen to the Yankees. Still, the Northerners were having the decency not to gloat in front of her, so she chatted amicably with them, surprising herself by her ability to mention Hardin in casual conversation without tears welling in her eyes.
Bob Lincoln and General Ord did not linger, but departed for Washington and Mr. Lincoln’s second inauguration. “Do give your parents and Tad my regards,” Emily said, pecking him on the cheek. “I was short with your father during my visit to him, and rather unkind in my last letter to him. I hope he—and your mother—will not think too ill of me for it.”
“If he did, you wouldn’t be here. As for Mother—well, if she is upset with you, she’ll come round. Anyway, Tad’s wild to see his favorite aunt again, and he usually gets his way.”
“I noticed that,” Emily said wryly.
The next day, General Singleton, having commandeered an ambulance, took Emily and Mrs. Pratte from their landing place to the Spotswood Hotel. Cannon rumbled in the distance as pedestrians in bright clothing sauntered by on Franklin Street, crowded with persons of all ranks, military and civilian; only when Emily alighted from the ambulance and saw the passersby close up could she see the patches on the fabric. It was, she thought, the perfect metaphor for the tattered Confederacy.
At the Spotswood, which was only a few months older than the war, the carpets had been torn up to make army blankets, and the cramped room allotted to her—one that she had won only through General Singleton’s influence, as the city was full of refugees from the recently conquered towns—was barren of all furniture except for a bedstead and a rickety chair. But champagne, she was assured as she was handed her key, would be available from early in the morning. Evidently it was possible to spend one’s entire waking hours in a soused state, and some of her fellow guests appeared to be trying.
* * *
General Singleton having taken on the weight of Emily’s business—indeed, Emily supposed her presence in Richmond to be largely superfluous, except that she might be called upon to sign some documents—Emily had considerable time on her hands. Her first visit was to Mrs. Pember at Chimborazo Hospital.
“You’re looking well,” Mrs. Pember said after they had embraced. “I know I shouldn’t say it in your bereaved condition—and how sad I was to hear of General Helm’s death!—but you are. If you’re not looking to remarry, you had best guard yourself, because there is a perfect mania for weddings here, and you are far prettier than some of the brides I’ve seen. Oh, dear, these hospital walls are making me catty. I blame it on the hospital rats.”
“Rats?” Emily tugged at her skirts.
“No, dear, not those kind, although I’ve seen my share of those, too. They thrive here, them and the cockroaches. No, the hospital rats are those patients who just won’t get well, or who when they do, get sick again the moment they set foot back on the field. They’re twice as much trouble as the men who are genuinely sick, and they plague me constantly for whiskey, although it has absolutely no medicinal effect upon them. Mind you, when it comes time to evacuate, I expect that a force much like that of your Jesus Christ will heal them.”
“Do you think it will come to that—evacuation?”
“Well, officially, everything’s fine, but unofficially, Rome is getting ready to fall. The government is packing up its papers in case it needs to flee, Congress has approved the use of colored troops, the white troops are deserting in droves, Mrs. Davis has sold some of her fine clothes for the cause, and President Davis has appointed a day for fasting and prayer. The fasting seems a bit redundant. So I would not linger here if I were you.”
“And you?”
“I shall see it through. I’m not going to desert my patients, although a few probably wouldn’t mind. But it’s not something I want to dwell on too much, so I shall put you on the spot. What are you going to do when you return to Kentucky? Are you going to remain with your mother?”
“Yes. We do get along.”
“That’s pleasant. And she’s bound to tell you how to raise your children, how to run your life in general—all good things in your case, for they will distract you from your grief.”
Emily smiled. “Well, I have had a great deal of advice. As for what I will do—well, if I cannot get my cotton, or if Sherman’s men have destroyed it, I suppose I will have to find something to make a living at. I can’t have my mother supporting me forever.”
“There is remarriage.”
“It would have to be a very special man for me to make him my children’s stepfather.”
“Yes, you can’t be too particular in that respect. And to be frank—”
“When are you not frank?”
“To be very frank, there are compensations in the single life. I could not be here, and do what I really think has been good, had I remarried as some advised me to do. As the ever-sensible Miss Jane Austen said, a single woman of good sense and good character must always be respected, and she need not be without occupations. Change ‘widow’ for that, and there you have it.”
* * *
Soon after Emily arrived in Richmond, a member of the British Parliament, Thomas Conolly of Ireland, came to town from the swamps of North Carolina, where he had landed courtesy of a blockade runner. His own vessel, which he had hoped to use to haul cotton overseas, lay in the Bahamas being repaired, and it seemed most unlikely that he would be bringing anything back to Ireland besides himself, but this had not daunted his good humor or his predilection for cocktails and ladies. Mr. Conolly established himself at the Spotswood, and despite herself, Emily could not help being flattered that the aristocrat deemed her suitable to include in his champagne and oyster breakfasts and his strolls around town.
Naturally, Mr. Conolly was welcome in the highest society of Richmond, including the drawing rooms of President and Mrs. Davis and of Mrs. General Lee. Through him, and likely for Hardin’s sake as well, Emily could have gained admission, but she was mindful of her obligations to Mr. Lincoln and knew that any such visits on her part would likely find their way to the New York Tribune and the other Northern papers. In any case, Mr. Conolly’s recapitulation of his visits was nearly as good as the real thing. “Mr. Davis is a fine man,” the Irishman said as a servant, leased from an accommodating Richmonder for his expertise with cocktails, mixed his specialty. “A noble bearing with sensible conversation. But Mrs. Davis—oh, Mrs. Davis! A viper with a vicious tongue, and I must say, one who does not appear at all sympathetic to the Southern cause.”
It was what the North said about Mary, only in reverse. Emily almost wished that Mary were there to appreciate the irony.
* * *
General Singleton kept Emily well apprised of his progress. “I’ve learned that some of your cotton is stored in Augusta, Georgia,” he said as a waiter proffered Emily the inevitable champagne. “General Sherman spared that city, so it should be safe for now.”
Emily waved away the champagne. “And the rest?”
“Unfortunately, some of it most likely was burned. But some may be here. General Helm was sensible; he stored it in different warehouses.”
