Mrs. Lincoln's Rival

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  FEBRUARY 1861

  T

  his is a mortifying embarrassment,” Father grumbled as he paged through a sheaf of documents Governor Dennison had sent over from his office in the capitol. “I’ve stated very clearly, in person and in print, that I object to any conciliation with the secessionist states until after Mr. Lincoln takes office. Dennison knows that. Everyone knows that. It will seem the height of hypocrisy for me to sit down with these traitors now.”

  “It isn’t hypocritical merely to meet with them, if you don’t give in to their demands.” Kate glanced over his shoulder at the papers lined up neatly on his desktop. The conference would open at the Willard Hotel in Washington City on February 4, she read, and former president John Tyler himself would be the chairman. “It isn’t hypocrisy to represent the state of Ohio at the request of your governor, or to listen to what the secessionists have to say for themselves. Also, don’t underestimate your influence, Father. You might achieve some good there.”

  “I can’t imagine what. I doubt that most of the rebellious states will send delegates. Those who most need to listen to reason won’t be present to hear it.” Shaking his head, Father organized the papers into a neat stack and placed them into the leather satchel she and Nettie had given him for Christmas the year he became governor. “Our time would be better spent strengthening the capital’s defenses against an attack from the South. There are fewer than a thousand federal troops and local militia stationed around Washington, and their loyalty to the Union is by no means certain.”

  “Couldn’t President Buchanan summon troops from the Western frontier?”

  “He could, but he won’t. He’s afraid that a show of military strength would only heighten the tensions, so instead he’s determined to be the very model of inaction.” Frowning, Father set the satchel aside and rose from his desk. “I’m also displeased to be obliged to depart for Washington sooner than I had intended. I expected to have another month to prepare, to close up the house here, to find a proper home for you and your sister there.”

  “I’ll take care of matters here,” Kate reminded him, tucking her hand through his arm and giving it a reassuring pat. “Once you’re in Washington, you’ll be able to find temporary lodgings for us, and that will do until I join you and can begin the search for a proper home.”

  So Father and Nettie packed and prepared and departed Columbus for Washington, arriving on February 1. On that same day Texas seceded from the Union, as if to mock Mr. Tyler’s vain hopes for peace.

  Upon their arrival, Father and Nettie first stayed with longtime friends, Elizabeth and Louis M. Goldsborough, the daughter and son-in-law of Father’s mentor in his legal studies, William Wirt. A few days later, Father rented a suite of rooms at the Rugby House at the corner of Fourteenth and K streets. “It used to be a private boys’ school but it is newly made a hotel,” Nettie wrote to Kate the day they moved in. “It is brick and in a quiet part of the city and I like it very much. I have made a friend across the hall, a gentleman by the name of Nathaniel Hawthorne, and yes, I do mean the writer. He is very shy but he is nice to me.”

  Kate was pleased that at last Nettie had found something to like about Washington City. Her earliest letters had been full of homesick longing for their lovely, comfortable home, for her cousins and playmates, and for the pretty, bustling city of Columbus. Nettie’s first incredulous, appalled impression of Washington City was that of a squalid rural village where cows, pigs, and geese roamed freely through the streets, which were cloudy with dust on dry days and ran thick with mud when it rained. Pennsylvania Avenue and a few adjacent blocks of Seventh Street were paved, but the cobblestones were broken and uneven, and mud oozed up between the cracks.

  The 156-foot stub of the Washington Monument stood forlornly in the midst of an open field where cattle grazed, its construction halted by political squabbling, uncertainty, and vandalism. The Capitol too was unfinished, but there, at least, construction continued; the incomplete, truncated dome loomed above the landscape surrounded by derricks and scaffolding, flanked by bare, unadorned marble wings and surrounded on all sides by a scattering of workers’ sheds, tools, piles of bricks, and blocks of marble. Citizens dumped refuse in the old city canal, which often spilled over into the marsh to the south of the Executive Mansion grounds, and throughout the city, foul outhouses abounded, giving off a fetid miasma that the hotel keeper cheerfully warned Nettie would only worsen come spring and summer.

  Kate was somewhat taken aback by her sister’s critical review of their new home. Although she couldn’t dispute a single one of Nettie’s observations, and honesty compelled her to admit that the capital did offer a peculiar mix of grandeur and squalor in close proximity, Kate had always chosen to focus on the city’s more pleasant attributes—the elaborate mansions and lovely gardens of the wealthier residents, the grand estates in the surrounding countryside, the opulent marble edifices that housed the various federal departments, and the splendid, extravagant entertainments put on by the social elite. True, it did take a bit of care and practice to navigate the city as one made one’s way from dignified residence to grand reception without ruining skirts and shoes in the mud, but Kate considered that a small inconvenience compared to the exciting, invigorating rush of Washington City, and she could not wait to return.

  Kate and her maid, Vina—who was unmarried and quite willing to leave Columbus for the excitement and adventure of a strange new city—traveled by train to Washington, where her father and sister met them at the station. Nettie held her hand and pointed out sights they passed along the way to the Rugby House—the Center Market on the Avenue between Seventh and Ninth streets, its stalls heaped with fruit, vegetables, fish, and beef and swarming with flies; her favorite cake and ginger-soda stands at the foot of Capitol Hill; the broad swath of grass south of the Executive Mansion where the Washington Potomacs played the popular game from New York called baseball. Hiding her amusement, Kate allowed Nettie to believe that she was glimpsing the familiar sights for the first time rather than spoil her sister’s pleasure.

  Father saw them safely to the large, unpretentious Rugby House before kissing Kate quickly on the cheek and apologizing for his retreat to the Peace Convention at Willard Hall, which was proceeding as badly as he had expected. Only twenty-five of the thirty-four states had answered the opening roll call; none of the seven seceded states had sent delegates, nor had Arkansas, nor five western states. Meanwhile, on that same day far to the south in Montgomery, Alabama, representatives from the seceded states were meeting to organize a unified Confederate government. John Tyler’s own granddaughter raised the Confederate flag at the opening ceremonies.

  As the senior delegate from Ohio, Father had tried to organize the more radical delegates from other Northern states under his leadership. In his first major speech, he emphasized that restriction of, not war upon, the South’s “peculiar institution” would be the policy of the new administration. “This goes against my personal beliefs,” Father admitted to Kate later, who needed no reminder of her father’s opposition to slavery wherever it existed. “But it is the Republican Party platform, and Mr. Lincoln has professed his intention to follow it.” Factions were so divided that Father would consider the conference a success if its sole achievement was keeping the important border states in the Union until Mr. Lincoln took office.

  In the days that followed, while her father toiled at Willard Hall, Kate paid calls and deftly provided noncommittal answers to questions about her father’s role in the new administration. According to the Washington press, one day Father was certain to be named secretary of the treasury, the next he was unquestionably out of contention. To Kate’s satisfaction, some editors ran lengthy appeals to Mr. Lincoln urging him to offer Father the Treasury. The newspapermen knew the future no better than the Chases did, but that did not stop them from making contradictory announcements and printing demands that Mr. Lincoln was likely to ignore.

&n
bsp; As Kate made her social rounds and searched for a more permanent residence for the family, she was dismayed to discover how many old acquaintances had closed up their fine mansions and had departed the city for their homes in the South. Some ladies were glad to go, loudly and defiantly condemning the United States and the “Illinois abolitionist ape” who would soon take the presidential chair, while others were grief-stricken, longing to remain but obliged to obediently follow their husbands out of the city and out of the Union. The friends they had left behind told Kate sadly of tearful farewells and solemn vows that the conflict between their states would not sever their bonds of affection. Perhaps wives could not choose their own country, but they could choose whom they loved.

  Other acquaintances intended to remain in the city only until after the inauguration, when a new regime would succeed them. One of Kate’s first calls was to Miss Harriet Lane, who was so distracted by her beleaguered uncle’s political struggles that she seemed to have given little thought to her plans after her departure from the White House. “I wish it were you who would take my place here,” Miss Lane confessed with a sudden, unexpected passion, “and even more so, that your father would take my uncle’s, although perhaps that is not a position I should wish on any man. I don’t know what to think of this frontier Republican, or his wife. I can’t imagine how either will be prepared for the roles they are so ambitious to undertake.”

  “I wish the same,” said Kate solemnly, but then she smiled mischievously. “But only because then the question of where my family will reside would be answered without any more trouble on my part.”

  Miss Lane laughed, her enormous troubles forgotten for a moment, which was precisely what Kate had intended.

  Although Kate could make light of her fruitless search for a proper home to amuse her friend, in truth, she found little humor in it. Few of the available properties met Father’s strict criteria. Their new home must be a handsome, gracious residence, comfortable enough for a family and yet suitable for entertaining large numbers of guests in fine style. It must be an easy walk to the Capitol, where Father expected to work, but also to the White House, in the event that the appointment he still hoped for was finally offered. Most important, it must be within Father’s means, not only the rent but the cost of upkeep, furnishings, and servants. Father was burdened with debt, how sizable he would not say and Kate dared not insult him by asking. Although he was trying to sell their home in Columbus as well as a few properties in Cincinnati, the real estate market was too depressed to tempt any buyers. Cost would be the most difficult criterion to satisfy, Kate thought ruefully, but she refused to believe that her father had given her an impossible task.

  • • •

  On February 11, Mr. Lincoln, his family, and various dignitaries, assistants, and trusted friends departed Springfield for Washington City in a special train car adorned with patriotic bunting and fitted with all the modern conveniences and luxuries befitting the status of its illustrious occupant. The train would follow a long, circuitous route through several cities and towns, both to allow the president-elect to greet as many supporters along the way as he could and to thwart anyone who might attempt to do him harm. Numerous threats had been made upon his life from the day he won the nomination, and they had steadily increased ever since, spiking after the election, the secession of South Carolina, and Mr. Buchanan’s failed attempt to relieve Major Anderson at Fort Sumter. The most vile threats came from the Southern press, who brazenly printed their menacing declarations in shockingly lurid detail. Of course, Kate only assumed that these editorials were the most vile; it was entirely possible, even probable, that Mr. Lincoln received much worse through the post.

  When Kate considered the effect of the threats upon Mr. Lincoln’s family, how frightened and concerned for his safety his wife and sons must surely be, she felt a painful twinge of sympathy—and the barest breath of relief that her father had not become the target of such fierce hatred.

  Despite the vitriol in the press, the labors of the Peace Conference continued, although Father rarely had any progress to report. Then, two days after Mr. Lincoln left Springfield, the Peace Convention set their work aside and adjourned shortly before noon so that the delegates could attend the official counting of the states’ electoral votes.

  Earlier that morning Kate had asked her father if she could accompany him, and he had agreed, so Kate dressed in a sensible, flattering dress of dark-blue wool trimmed in pale-yellow ribbon, strolled a few blocks down Fourteenth Street from the Rugby House to the Willard, and waited in the ladies’ parlor for the delegates to emerge from the adjacent Willard Hall, a former Presbyterian church that the Willard brothers had transformed into a lecture and performance venue. The Willard, like the Neil House in Columbus, was not only the city’s finest and largest hotel but also a nexus of Washington society and politics. Mr. Hawthorne had told Kate he thought it more justly called the center of Washington and the nation than either the Capitol, the White House, or the State Department, which was perhaps why he had taken rooms at the Rugby House instead. Recently the Willard brothers had gamely endeavored to maintain peace between contentious factions by assigning Southern guests rooms on a single floor and urging them to use the ladies’ Fourteenth Street entrance, while Northerners were encouraged to use the main doors on the Pennsylvania Avenue side. Even so, they were bound to encounter one another in the hotel’s public rooms, which were illuminated by gaslight and opulently furnished in rosewood, damask, lace, and velvet and smelled of cigar smoke and spilled whiskey—and were not, perhaps, quite the place for a well-bred young woman to sit alone.

  Fortunately, her father soon arrived, greeted her with a kiss on the cheek, and offered her his arm. “Dare I ask how your morning went?” Kate asked as they hurried off.

  “Nothing has been accomplished,” said Father. “My fellow delegates are too easily distracted, and this day, especially, has offered distractions in abundance.”

  It was all too true. Aside from the joint session of Congress to which they were on their way, news of Mr. Lincoln’s train journey was everywhere: descriptions of the cheering crowds that had greeted him the first two days; his eloquent speeches, which drew praise for their brevity and moderate tone; the threats upon his life, which had come to the attention of authorities in the cities along his route. Closer yet, a sense of apprehension hung over the city, provoked by fears that Vice-President Breckinridge, a known Southern sympathizer, would betray his duty to preside over the counting of the electoral votes that would confirm Mr. Lincoln’s victory.

  As was the custom, the official election certificates had been kept in the vice-president’s personal custody since their arrival in the capital, but with animosities between North and South rising by the hour, the occasion presented a dangerous opportunity for a political coup. The stalwart General Winfield Scott, charged with the defense of the capital, had vowed that interference with the lawful count of the electoral votes would be firmly and decisively quashed. Any man who tried to interfere, he declared, whether by force or unparliamentary disorder, “should be lashed to a muzzle of a twelve-pounder and fired out of a window of the Capitol. I would manure the hills of Arlington with fragments of his body, were he a senator or chief magistrate of my native state!” The general backed up his words by ordering two batteries of cannon into position along First Street near the Capitol. Kate eyed them anxiously but found some comfort in their presence as she accompanied her father to observe the count.

  The halls of the Capitol were jammed with onlookers, the mood tense and wary. The delegates to the Peace Convention had been invited onto the House floor to witness the proceedings, so while Father made his way into the crowd of lawmakers and special guests, Kate climbed the stairs to the gallery. “There’s Miss Chase,” she heard someone murmur excitedly, and the crowd parted as heads turned to look her way. She exchanged warm, cordial greetings with those who gave her welcome, and nodded graciously
to others who peered eagerly her way but were too shy to address her. A vacant chair appeared for her in the front, and as she took her seat she searched the crowd below for her father, and found him easily, his tall, imposing figure regal and solemn amid the milling throng.

  At noon the House was called to order, and after the chaplain led them in prayer, the previous day’s journal was read and approved. A member from Illinois submitted a perfunctory resolution that the Senate should be summoned for the reading of the votes, a measure that swiftly passed. While the House awaited the senators’ arrival, a lengthy communication from the Treasury Department about a crucial loan matter was read. Afterward, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Mr. Sherman, asked to introduce a bill allowing the president to issue bonds to help meet the imperative needs of the Treasury. Immediately following the reading of the bill, a voice rang out, “I object!”

  A murmur went up from the gallery. Kate searched the House for the speaker and her gaze lit upon a clean-shaven man of about forty years glaring about defiantly—Mr. Garnett, a Democrat of Virginia.

  “I trust the gentleman from Virginia will not object,” Mr. Sherman replied, brow furrowing, “as the simple effect of the bill will be to give to the creditors of the United States coupon bonds as evidence of indebtedness. No new debt will be incurred.”

  “After the recent declaration of war by the president-elect of the United States,” Mr. Garnett retorted, “I deem it my duty to interpose every obstacle to the tyrannical and military despotism now about to be inaugurated!”

  A chorus of assent clashed with a roar of anger in the air above the House floor. “Declaration of war?” Kate overheard a woman exclaim from the back of the gallery. “What on earth could he mean?”

  Below, Mr. Sherman tried again to introduce the bill, only to have a representative from North Carolina object. As voices rose in a clamor of proposals and objections, the Speaker struggled to regain control of the chamber, finally banging his gavel and declaring that in accordance with precedent, he ruled it out of order to conduct any other business until the votes were counted.