Civil War Quilts: February 2016

Saturday, February 27, 2016

Stanley Family Quilt

The New England Quilt Museum recently acquired a quilt

dated 1865. I found the pictures on Cyndi's excellent shop blog Busy Thimble.

The sampler style, with red and green applique and a flag block, is consistent with that date.

But some fabrics looks to be older. This star for example

could be 1820s or '30s.

Alternate blocks are appliqued in both Broderie Perse (cut-out chintz) style

and conventional applique, another indication that parts of the quilt

may have been stitched decades earlier.

The set looks to be eight-pointed stars (perhaps pieced in the 1830s and '40s)

set on-point with alternate blocks of applique.

The quilt is a gift of Judy Lewis Simpson. She'd received it from a friend who was the great-granddaughter of the quiltmaker. The family attributes it to New Yorker Penelope Carpenter Stanley (1810-1900) who finished it for son Jerome Henry Stanley's wedding to Ida M. Livenberger November 17, 1864.

Jerome and Ida were married in Tuscarawas County, Ohio.

"For Jerome By His Mother 1865"

"Jerome and Ida Forget Me Not"

After the Civil War Ida and Jerome moved to Redlands, California, west of Los Angeles, where they are listed as orange growers in early 20th-century city directories.

Redlands was the heart of California's citrus empire.

Over her long life, Penelope Carpenter Stanley migrated from Mamaroneck, New York to Wisconsin

where she is buried near Berlin.

The quilt has several hearts, crosses and other symbols such as anchors---images we often see in the album quilts made close to the Civil War and soon after. We think of the Christian attributes Faith, Hope and Charity, but the same images also carried a weight of symbolism in fraternal organizations.

This block with a cross, anchor and heart is from

an 1867 quilt by another New Yorker, Susan Rogers.

The triple link chains are an important symbol in the Odd Fellows

fraternal group.

Quilt signed Susan Rogers, Brooklyn, New York.

Collection of the Smithsonian Institution.

Curator Pamela Weeks at the New England Quilt Museum

is working on trying to find out more about their new quilt,

its symbolism and its maker.

Those of you who haven't decided how to set your Time Warp stars might

give Penelope Carpenter Stanley's quilt a look. Alternate applique blocks.....

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Westering Women Block 2 Indian Territory

Westering Women: Block 2
Indian
By Becky Brown

St Joseph, Missouri, was another boom town that supplied western travelers with wagons, oxen and food for the trip across the continent, another of what were called "Jumping Off Places."

Hilly St. Joseph overlooked the Missouri River and the territories beyond.

In June, 1847, Elizabeth Dixon Smith recorded her first day beyond the U.S. in her diary:

"Passed through St. Joseph on the bank of the Missouri. Laid in our flour, cheese and crackers and medicine for no one should travel this road without medicine for they are almost sure to have the summer complaint....

[The next day]
Crossed the Missouri. Doubled teams with difficulty ascended a hill or mountain. Traveled 3 miles and encamped. We are now in Indian territories."

Kansas and Nebraska were Indian Territory in the 1840s and into the 1850s. Travelers tempted to try to settle the pretty countryside west of Missouri had to keep moving.

George Catlin's map shows the reserves assigned to the various Eastern tribes west of the Missouri border (the brighter horizontal strips). The green stripe was the reserve assigned to the Kickapoo, moved west from the Great Lakes. Below them the narrow yellow strip was assigned to the Delaware people moved from their original lands in New York and New Jersey. The tan-colored area was the traditional home of native tribes.

From a period map drawn on linen

The land was promised forever to native tribes like the Kansas and the Osage and to resettled Eastern tribes like the Shawnee.

George Catlin, painting of Wáh-chee-te,

Wife of Cler-mónt, and Child, 1834

Osage/Wa-zha-zhe I-e.

Collection of the Smithsonian Institution

The Smith party made only three miles that first day because they had to wait to cross the Wolf River. The next day they traveled at a more typical pace covering 18 miles.

Albert Bierstadt painted the ford at the Wolf River west of St. Joseph.

The tribes who camped at the passages often charged a toll fee to cross.

The bank may have looked like "a hill or mountain" to Elizabeth Dixon Smith, but wagons crossed these small rivers (we call them creeks today) at the lowest and most stable spots.

From the collection of the Kansas State Historical Society

In 1859 Beirstadt's brothers took a photo of the ford at Wolf River---

painters and diarists might exaggerate for drama's sake.

Block 2, Indian By Denniele Bohannon

We can recall the pre-Civil War years when half the United States was home to native tribes with a block called Indian. Quilt designers in the 1930s named several blocks in variations of the word Indian, primarily because the quilt pattern looked like something one might find in a Navajo rug or a pueblo pot. Nancy Page in her fictional syndicated quilt club named this one, which is BlockBase #2050

Cutting a 12" Block

A - Cut 4 squares 3-1/2" x 3-1/2"

B - Cut 4 light and 4 dark squares 3-7/8"

Cut each into 2 triangles with a diagonal cut. You need 8 triangles.

C - Cut 1 square 6-1/2" x 6-1/2"

Sewing the Block

Martha Spence Haywood

about the time of her journey in the 1850s

One of the very few references I found to quiltmaking on the trails was in Martha Spence Haywood's journal. She peeked into a tent in a Native American settlement near Fort Laramie and saw several women working: "One was making patchwork."

Martha Spence Haywood's journal was published in Not By Bread Alone: The Journal of Martha Spence Haywood, 1850-56 (Utah State Historical Society, 1978).

Elizabeth Dixon Smith's was published in T.T. Geer's Fifty Years in Oregon in 1912. Read it online at this link:

http://www.theragens.com/fifty_years/fifty_years_in_oregon_18-19.htm

Block 2 Indian By Linda Mooney

Saturday, February 20, 2016

Judy's Replica Quilt

Reproduction of a Civil War Flag Quilt

Dated 1862 by Judy Hansen,

Michigan, 2016.

Judy did a terrific job of reproducing the small quilt below

Actual quilt dated 1862.

The back of Judy's

She had a lot of small triangles left over from another repro project

and was inspired....

See her post here with information about her method.

http://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/2016/01/replica-of-1862-crib-quilt-and-why-i.html#comment-form

Wednesday, February 17, 2016

Threads of Memory Finishes

Remember 2014?

We did the Threads of Memory Block of the Month: 12 stars.

Barbara at Cookie's Creek won a prize with hers, an impressive red ribbon.

Some other finishes found in 2015.

Jelibet

Rachel - all Kaffe Fassett fabrics

Jean

Rosemary

That's a good set.

Flo with alternate pictorial blocks.

From the Patchwork of Life Blog

Christine

She quilted the name of each block.

Kathie

Do go over to our Flickr page every once in a while and see what's new. Dustin and I did a separate page for the 2014 BOM.
https://www.flickr.com/groups/threadsofmemory/