Read Online Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker by Jennifer Chiaverini - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Jennifer Chiaverini
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often told Elizabeth—sometimes sadly, sometimes in defiance—that Elizabeth was her only true friend within a hundred miles.
Elizabeth—who had been readily received into the elite of colored Washington society by virtue of her natural grace and dignity, her status as a White House intimate, and, ironically, the impressive bloodline she had inherited from Colonel Armistead Burwell, her father and former master—gently tried to steer Mrs. Lincoln down paths that might lead to her greater acceptance. While sewing for other clients, she had detected hopeful signs that the hearts of some of the ladies were softening toward the First Lady. “Nowadays the womenkind of Washington are united only in giving the cold shoulder to Mrs. Lincoln,” Elizabeth Blair Lee, who had remained Varina Davis’s friend despite their political differences,remarked to Elizabeth during a fitting. “We Republicans at least ought to rally around her.”
But not even the friendship of the popular, imperious, and generous Mrs. Samuel Phillips Lee could redeem Mrs. Lincoln in the eyes of those who disparaged her for behaving as if the nation were not at war. When she discovered that Congress allotted twenty thousand dollars to each administration to refurbish the White House, Mrs. Lincoln promptly set about spending the allowance with unrestrained delight. Elizabeth would be among the first to agree that the White House had been sorely neglected; even upon her first visit, when the importance of her interview preoccupied her thoughts, she had not failed to notice the shabby state of the mansion’s threadbare rugs, broken furniture, torn wallpaper, and ruined draperies, from which souvenir collectors had snipped pieces until they hung in tatters. But as necessary as the purchases were, it did not look well for the First Lady to be spending so much on carpets and china when some poor, brave soldiers went without tents and blankets.
Mrs. Lincoln’s loyalty to the Union was also questioned—entirely without justification, as Elizabeth well knew. “Why should I sympathize with the rebels?” Mrs. Lincoln had once declared, angrily tossing aside a
Harper’s
magazine that insinuated she might. “Are they not against me? They would hang my husband tomorrow if it was in their power, and perhaps gibbet me with him. How then can I sympathize with people at war with me and mine?”
While it was true that Mrs. Lincoln’s brother, three half brothers, and three of her brothers-in-law were serving in the Confederate army, Mrs. Lincoln herself was a staunch Unionist, and despite growing up in a slaveholding family, she had stronger abolitionist leanings than her husband. This did not prevent Northern newspapers from printing entirely false tales that Mrs. Lincoln’s youngest half sister, Emilie, whose husband was a general in the Confederate army, had used a presidential pass to smuggle supplies across Union lines to the rebels. Only Southerners correctly surmised where Mrs. Lincoln’s loyalties truly resided,and they condemned her for it. They considered her a traitor whose repudiation of her Southern heritage disgraced her family’s good name. Union and Confederate alike, each side believed her loyal to the other, and thus neither would claim her.
Although the immediate threat of invasion seemed to have passed for the moment, the Confederate army never felt very far away. Virginian militia companies drilled in Alexandria just across the river, and for every Union picket guarding the Washington side of bridges leading into the capital, there were Virginia militiamen posted on the other end. A Confederate flag flew boldly above an Alexandria hotel, easily visible from Washington City to anyone with a good vantage point and sharp eyes or a telescope. Elizabeth sometimes observed President Lincoln standing at a window in the White House, studying the flag in silence. Sometimes he sat back in his armchair, rested his feet on the windowsill, and watched
Elizabeth—who had been readily received into the elite of colored Washington society by virtue of her natural grace and dignity, her status as a White House intimate, and, ironically, the impressive bloodline she had inherited from Colonel Armistead Burwell, her father and former master—gently tried to steer Mrs. Lincoln down paths that might lead to her greater acceptance. While sewing for other clients, she had detected hopeful signs that the hearts of some of the ladies were softening toward the First Lady. “Nowadays the womenkind of Washington are united only in giving the cold shoulder to Mrs. Lincoln,” Elizabeth Blair Lee, who had remained Varina Davis’s friend despite their political differences,remarked to Elizabeth during a fitting. “We Republicans at least ought to rally around her.”
But not even the friendship of the popular, imperious, and generous Mrs. Samuel Phillips Lee could redeem Mrs. Lincoln in the eyes of those who disparaged her for behaving as if the nation were not at war. When she discovered that Congress allotted twenty thousand dollars to each administration to refurbish the White House, Mrs. Lincoln promptly set about spending the allowance with unrestrained delight. Elizabeth would be among the first to agree that the White House had been sorely neglected; even upon her first visit, when the importance of her interview preoccupied her thoughts, she had not failed to notice the shabby state of the mansion’s threadbare rugs, broken furniture, torn wallpaper, and ruined draperies, from which souvenir collectors had snipped pieces until they hung in tatters. But as necessary as the purchases were, it did not look well for the First Lady to be spending so much on carpets and china when some poor, brave soldiers went without tents and blankets.
Mrs. Lincoln’s loyalty to the Union was also questioned—entirely without justification, as Elizabeth well knew. “Why should I sympathize with the rebels?” Mrs. Lincoln had once declared, angrily tossing aside a
Harper’s
magazine that insinuated she might. “Are they not against me? They would hang my husband tomorrow if it was in their power, and perhaps gibbet me with him. How then can I sympathize with people at war with me and mine?”
While it was true that Mrs. Lincoln’s brother, three half brothers, and three of her brothers-in-law were serving in the Confederate army, Mrs. Lincoln herself was a staunch Unionist, and despite growing up in a slaveholding family, she had stronger abolitionist leanings than her husband. This did not prevent Northern newspapers from printing entirely false tales that Mrs. Lincoln’s youngest half sister, Emilie, whose husband was a general in the Confederate army, had used a presidential pass to smuggle supplies across Union lines to the rebels. Only Southerners correctly surmised where Mrs. Lincoln’s loyalties truly resided,and they condemned her for it. They considered her a traitor whose repudiation of her Southern heritage disgraced her family’s good name. Union and Confederate alike, each side believed her loyal to the other, and thus neither would claim her.
Although the immediate threat of invasion seemed to have passed for the moment, the Confederate army never felt very far away. Virginian militia companies drilled in Alexandria just across the river, and for every Union picket guarding the Washington side of bridges leading into the capital, there were Virginia militiamen posted on the other end. A Confederate flag flew boldly above an Alexandria hotel, easily visible from Washington City to anyone with a good vantage point and sharp eyes or a telescope. Elizabeth sometimes observed President Lincoln standing at a window in the White House, studying the flag in silence. Sometimes he sat back in his armchair, rested his feet on the windowsill, and watched
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