Washington Whirlwind #11
Road To the White House (& Away) by Jeanne Arnieri
Roads go two ways. This month's block remembers the painful road away from the White House that Mary Todd Lincoln and her sons took after Lincoln's assassination. They were required to vacate the family quarters for new President Andrew Johnson, wife Eliza, their grown daughters and children.
Sister Elizabeth Todd Edwards and friend Elizabeth Keckly tried to help the ex-First Lady with her plans and packing but getting Mary Lincoln to focus on a future without her husband was difficult.
The nation mourned
Almost six weeks passed before the Johnsons could move into the Executive Mansion. The Lincolns left for Chicago on the train with "scarcely a friend to tell her good-by," recalled Elizabeth Keckly when she dictated her memoir. She accompanied Mrs. Lincoln as she "passed down the public stairway, entered her carriage, and quietly drove to the depot where we took the cars. The silence was almost painful."
Mary Lincoln's eccentricities---her self-absorption, post-traumatic stress syndrome and tendencies to hoard--- interfered with the orderly transition. Objects with links to her husband were given away because of painful associations; lack of supervision enabled souvenir seekers to strip the White House and her inability to choose wisely caused arguments with eldest son Robert, which Elizabeth Keckly remembered.
Robert "tried without avail to influence his mother to set fire to her vast stores of old goods. ‘What are you going to do with that old dress, mother?' he would ask. ‘Never mind, Robert, I will find use for it. You do not understand this business.’
Robert Todd Lincoln (1843-1926)
Robert, the only son who survived her, was often at odds with Mary,
rarely placating her or tolerating her tantrums as his father had done.
Elizabeth remembered his rather harsh advice about White House souvenirs:
"I wish to heaven the car would take fire in which you place these boxes for transportation to Chicago, and burn all of your old plunder up;’ and then, with an impatient gesture, he would turn on his heel and leave the room."
Road To the White House
Elsie's purple version
The boxes were full of her "dresses" at a time when the word could mean the yardage as well as the finished garment, fabric Mary would never wear again in her conspicuous mourning but fabric she transported many yards from home to home for the rest of her life.
Typical railroad train, "the cars" of the time, this one the Lincoln
funeral train that took his remains and son Willie's back to Springfield,
Illinois to inter him in early May. Mary did not travel to the interment but Robert did.
Lake Michigan, the Chicago River and the city before the 1871 Fire
Mary and Tad began housekeeping in Chicago where Robert was settling into a life as independent of his mother as he could create.
Road To the White House by Denniele Bohannon
Diarist Benjamin Brown French who had worked closely with her for four years wrote on May 24th, 1865:
“Mary Lincoln left the city …I went up and bade her good-by, and felt really very sad, although she has given me a world of trouble. I think the sudden and awful death of the President somewhat unhinged her mind, for at times she has exhibited all the symptoms of madness…it is well for the nation that she is not longer in the White House.”
After years of being rather circumspect about the First Lady he wrote: “It is is not proper that I should write down, even here, all I know! May God have her in his keeping, and make her a better woman." He continued to act as the official introducing the Johnson Presidential women at public events.
"Oh how different it is to the introductions to Mrs. Lincoln! She sought to put on the airs of an Empress – these ladies are plain, ladylike, republican ladies, their dresses rich but modest and unassuming.”
Tennessee State Museum Collection
Andrew & Eliza Johnson with daughters Martha & Mary in 1843
The Block
Road To the White House by Elsie Ridgley
Farm Journal called this orderly string quilt variation
Road to the White House (BlockBase 1693)
The Broken Sugar Bowl could refer to all the White House
china pilfered by the public in the weeks after Lincoln's death.
Elsie's making two versions
Jeanne's sampler of 12 blocks.
One more to go---December 11th.
