by Michiana Covenant | Jul 11, 2013 | Breckinridge
April 20, 2010
My RJB research continues to go well — though since I’m in 1852, I’m heading into one of the worst stretches, as RJ’s marriage to Virginia is falling apart. They married in 1847 and seem to have done pretty well for a couple years. But Virginia never got along well with his eight children. I came across a couple letters in 1851-52, where the 15 year old Marie (who prided herself on being only the third fattest girl in her school) told her father that she couldn’t write to her brother or sister because she feared that she would misspell the word “which.” The first time I saw that, I wondered. After the second time (by which point I had come across other unmistakable indications), it became clear that the Breckinridge children may well have been the ones who came up with the “Witch of Danville” nickname.
This is not to absolve RJ. While he seems to have gotten along fairly well with her children at first, her two sons died in 1848, and her 19-year old daughter soon married and wound up in a protracted legal battle with RJ over her father’s estate. I don’t think that was wise. He plainly had the law on his side (and so was able to gain a sizeable piece of the Shelby estate for their daughter, Virginia), but his wife was furious. She wanted the entire Shelby estate to go to her daughter, Susan. RJ’s comment to his nephew, John C. Breckinridge, who had served as his lawyer for the case, reveals something of the strain in the marriage: the news of the verdict was “to the inexpressible distress and rage of your Aunt; and to my perfect satisfaction.”
It has been interesting to watch the Breckinridge children grow up. Mary was four years older than any of the others (she was the only one of the first four children to make it past the age of four), so she was the responsible sixteen-year-old who took care of her younger siblings after the death of their mother in 1844. But when Mary married William Warfield in 1848, her younger sister Sally began to step into her place. By the time she was 19 in 1851, RJB felt comfortable letting Sally take seven-year old Charley from Baltimore (where he was at the General Assembly) to Richmond to visit family for a few weeks. A few weeks turned into a few months (after all, no one in those days would dream of sending an unaccompanied 19-year old girl across or around the mountains from Virginia to Kentucky), and so Sally and Charley wound up traveling with cousins who were visiting relatives in Virginia, South Carolina, and New Orleans, before finally coming up to Louisville with Cousin Sally McDowell (yes, the same Sally McDowell who six years before had divorced Governor Thomas — and five years later would marry John Miller — it turns out that she spent a couple months in Kentucky with RJ and Virginia in the spring of 1852, which gives her letters to John a whole lot more weight than I first gave them). Sally’s letters to her father reveal a very confident young woman who sought to respect her father’s wishes — but also (given the fact that her father’s wishes might take a week to become known!) was capable of making responsible decisions for herself and her brother. She even counseled her father in how to handle her 17-year-old brother RJ Junior (who was the black sheep of the family — a drunk, a gambler, and a womanizer by the age of 17! Oh, how his father must have rued the day that he named a son after himself!), and professed to be eager to get back to Lexington and resume the charge of RJ’s children — which again demonstrates that Virginia was simply not interested in them.
by Michiana Covenant | Jul 10, 2013 | Building
Right in the middle of that dirt pile is the location of the new pulpit. From that patch of dirt, may a man of dust proclaim the glory of the man from heaven until he returns!
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Day 1 of MCPC’s Building Expansion program
by Michiana Covenant | Jul 9, 2013 | Building
This morning the excavators began work on the building expansion project. Shortly after the end of the Men’s Discipleship Study I had the opportunity to witness them take the first scoop of grass out of the lawn.
We will be adding 640 square feet to the sanctuary as well as a 528 square foot addition to the fellowship hall which will have a movable partition, which will provide additional classroom space as well.
Watch this space for further updates!
by Michiana Covenant | Jul 4, 2013 | Breckinridge
April 1, 2010
In 1836 Sally McDowell was fifteen years old – and like many fifteen year old girls, she was something of a flirt. Her father, the governor of Virginia, sent her to live with her Uncle Benton (a US Senator from Missouri) in Washington, D.C., so that she could attend a “female academy” there. One of the boarders at Senator Benton’s house, was the 36-year old bachelor congressman, Francis Thomas of Maryland.
Thomas fell in love with her – and his attentions were not objectionable to Sally either. They married on June 8, 1841, when she was 20 and he was 42 (over the objections of Governor McDowell – who prophesied trouble, but permitted the match because of the insistence of his daughter). Five months later, Francis Thomas was elected governor of Maryland.
But the marriage was already in danger. Francis Thomas had a jealous streak a mile wide. Any man who dared to look at his charming young wife was suspect. He accused her of multiple affairs within the first four months of their marriage – including one with his own dentist (a close relative of his). He would tell her that if she would only confess and admit it, then he would forgive and everything would be okay – and the poor girl did. But the accusations only got worse (he accused her of having an abortion at one point – claiming that she was trying to get rid of the evidence of her unfaithfulness: but the only evidence he could produce was her “confession” that he coerced!).
For all practical intents and purposes, the marriage ended on January 28, 1842, in the drawing room at “Uncle Robert’s” in Baltimore, Maryland. Uncle Robert J. Breckinridge (Sally’s mother and RJ’s wife were sisters) had been enlisted by Governor McDowell to “rescue” Sally from Governor Thomas – a delicate maneuver in antebellum southern society, where the husband’s authority over his wife was pretty near absolute.
I’ll spare you all the gory details (once he realized that he was never going to get her back, Governor Thomas published a pamphlet detailing his allegations against Sally – but when the matter went to court, he couldn’t prove any of it). Suffice it to say that RJB played an important role in helping Sally realize that Governor Thomas was not going to change.
Now, I know that my story is about RJB – but some of you will no doubt wonder, “what happened to Sally?” Divorce was exceedingly rare in antebellum Virginia. And while a divorcee had the legal right to remarry, who would want to marry a woman who had been at the center of such a scandal? whose ex-husband continued to harass her for years, periodically renewing his request for reunion?
The divorce was granted in 1845 (when she was 24). In 1846 ex-Governor Thomas accused his dentist of trying to poison him (the same man he had accused of having an affair with Sally), he called on Sally to testify against his dentist. She came to Frederick, Maryland, (with her parents) and testified before the grand jury (thankfully the judge kept Thomas on a short leash and refused to allow any questions beyond the precise point in the case! And, no, the grand jury did not indict the dentist – in fact, Thomas’s own lawyers quit as soon as they realized that Thomas was utterly deluded and probably insane). But while in Frederick, she went to church. The pastor of the Presbyterian church was John Miller (whose sister had married RJB’s brother).
Eight years later, now a widower with two small children, John Miller wrote to Sally McDowell. Her parents had both died, leaving her as the functional head of the McDowell family, and the owner of the family estate near Lexington, Virginia. He was now a pastor in Philadelphia. Their correspondence between 1854-1856 now fills nearly 900 pages of a volume entitled, “If You Love That Lady, Don’t Marry Her” – the nearly unanimous advice given to him. Indeed, Sally herself told him that if he married her, he would be ruined – no church would want her as a pastor’s wife. For two years they wrote non-stop about everything (including quite a bit about “Uncle Robert” and “the Witch of Danville” – I’ll save that one for a future epistle!). Finally, she yielded – against her fears that he would turn out to be like Governor Thomas, and against his fears that she would be too much like her cousin Virginia Shelby (the aforementioned “Witch of Danville”) – and in 1856 they married.
I would like to say that John Miller’s congregation welcomed this much maligned and falsely accused woman – but they didn’t. They immediately and peremptorily demanded his resignation. It was true: no church would call a man who was married to Sally McDowell. So he moved with his two children to Virginia, where he supplied vacant churches in the Shenandoah Valley. (I believe that after the Civil War he was able to find a call)
But while I cannot say much for the Presbyterian church’s response to this – I will say that John and Sally appear to have had a truly happy marriage. They added two more children – and lived affectionately for thirty-nine years together, dying only one week apart in 1895.
And Governor Thomas? He never remarried – but his political career was ruined. For twenty years he remained in retirement, only returning to political office during the Civil War (curious how the War seemed to wash away all prior blemishes…). He died in 1876 when a train ran over him.
by Michiana Covenant | Jun 25, 2013 | Breckinridge
April 22, 2010
I overheard an interesting remark today at the Capitol City Brewing Company (it’s fun to sit at the bar and work on naming all my pictures from the day’s photography — I can be busy doing mindless work and listening to the rather noisy conversations around me!). One woman was telling another woman that when she was in business, “everyone was devoted to building something, making something, doing something productive. But here in Washington all people care about is how they look — all they want is power.”
Not that things have changed much…
In fact, if anything, the politics of power were far more pervasive in the antebellum period. For one thing, all government jobs were patronage jobs. Today, only the top government jobs are appointed. In those days every government job was appointed. Even postmasters were appointed by the president, and when the opposition party took control of the government, the old postmaster (with all his friends) would be shown the door, and a new postmaster would have to train a new staff of nephews and cousins of party workers. Obviously, no president could possibly know who the most qualified person was — so he would rely on his supporters from that region to nominate a candidate. This meant that cabinet members, leading members of Congress (from the president’s party), and other prominent figures were eagerly sought out to assist in urging the case of office-seekers. RJ was frequently targeted by office seekers (especially Presbyterians) because he was related by marriage to Henry Clay and John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, William C. Preston of South Carolina, and was personal friends with several other prominent politicians. (In fact, the first person to write a letter of condolence to RJ after the death of his wife Sophy in 1844, was John J. Crittenden.)
But RJ frequently told such office seekers that he would not participate in the game. If he knew the man personally, he might consider recommending him, but only if he was convinced that the person was in fact the best qualified person for the job.
But he preferred to remain above the whole mess:
“I hardly care to be any way indebted to Mr Crittenden for anything: and I am not without feelings of contempt & bitterness – for the whole race of dispensers of patronage – and the whole race of seekers of it: and would infinitely prefer to have an effectual opportunity to scourge them all – rather than receive anything from their selfish & polluted hands – much less be counted amongst the recipients of their favours. Personally – God be praised – I owe no man anything.” (RJB to John C. Breckinridge, December 31, 1852)
Of course, the object of RJ’s letter was to ask his nephew (a member of Congress) to intercede for RJB Jr., and get him a position in the Coast Guard survey team. The irony was not lost on John C., who remarked calmly two weeks later. “I have some hope of obtaining a place for Robert in the coast survey….Your letter contained some bitter expressions, and was almost abrupt, but I feel quite sure that those parts of it were not intended for me.”
And the background of RJ’s hard feelings toward Crittenden, was the Senator’s failure to get RJB a place at West Point in 1851. For 15 years RJ had received fawning letters, with dozens of people telling him such things as, “no one in Baltimore has so much influence with the president as you,” or “I cannot doubt that you possess a prevailing influence with the Secretary of the Navy [his wife’s cousin, William B. Preston], with Col. Wm. C. Preston and with Gov. Crittenden…” I think RJ had actually started to believe them, and so when Crittenden did not come through for his son, RJB blew his stack. (Never mind that there were only ten “at large” openings for West Point, and the President had determined only to appoint the sons of officers who had died in the Mexican War. I’m Robert Jefferson Breckinridge! If I want my son to go to West Point, it must be through the betrayal of Crittenden that he failed to get in!)
RJ cooled down and later apologized to Crittenden, who gracious forgave him, saying, “Not expecting or caring to make many new friends while I live, I do not wish to lose any of those old ones whose ‘adoption’ has been ‘tried.’ And it is, therefore, that with more than ordinary gratification, I subscribe myself as heretofore & always yr friend, JJ Crittenden.” (June 3, 1851)
But an interesting trend was beginning to be seen amongst the younger generation. On August 17, 1852, a young Irish Catholic named Ignatius Donnelly wrote to John C. Breckinridge (RJ’s nephew — the Congressman) that he was “troubled at the wish you express that, ‘the intimacy thus begun may ripen into friendship.’ You are a distinguished man in a distinguished position: I, a nonentity – a nobody. You are walking a path illumined by Fame & History; while I, a minor, a mere student, almost “unhatched i’ the womb of Time” am little more than creeping into the world. Friendship between a superior and an inferior, carries too much of patronage on the one side and reverence on the other, to suit my taste.” (Donnelly would later go to become a Congressman from Minnesota and a leader of the Populist Party that would successfully eliminate the patronage system and institute the modern civil service system. He may be more famous, however, for his theories that Atlantis was destroyed by the Flood — and that Francis Bacon was the actual author of the plays of William Shakespeare)
In a very real way, these two episodes demonstrate the changing world of antebellum America. R. J. Breckinridge’s America was still a world of patronage, deference, and honor. But a generation was rising that would level the playing field for everyone — or, at least for themselves.
Oh, and that conversation I overheard? The woman who was complaining that everyone was just into power? Within fifteen minutes she had very successfully cajoled her friend into seeing things her way…