Civil War Wives: The Lives & Times of Angelina Grimke Weld, Varina Howell Davis & Julia Dent Grant

Three Women Of The Civil War

In recent years, Americans have combined their long passion for Civil War history with an interest in women's studies. Carol Berkin's book, "Civil War Wives" (2009) combines this themes of the conflict and its women. She offers biographies of three women: Angela Grimke Weld (1805 --- 1879), Varina Howell Davis (1826 -- 1906); and Julia Dent Grant(1826 -- 1902) who married famous husbands. Berkin explores the lives of these women before, during and after their marriages. She tries to understand the different ways in which her subjects understood their own independence and marriages in an era in which women were widely-believed to properly occupy "separate spheres", centering upon home and family, from men. Berkin is Presidential Professor of History at Baruch College.

Grimke, Davis, and Grant all were born to wealthy slaveholding families. Each of the three women left substantial writings, which allowed Berkin to write about their lives with first-hand rather than reflected sources. Thus Grimke kept a journal throughout her life and wrote letters, speeches and articles. Davis wrote letters and, late in her life, a biography of her husband. For most of her life, Julia Grant wrote little. But after the death of Ulysees Grant, she wrote her own memoirs which were published only in 1975. Beyond these similarities, each of these women has their own story to tell. Berkin writes effectively in emphasizing the different life-paths of even these privileged American women of the 19th Century. These three ways, perhaps, illustrate three means of self-understanding, among possible other means. The comment on Julia Grant is telling. Berkin writes: (Preface, at xiii):

"Over the months, as their biographies took shape, I came to know these three women with the intimacy that biographers often acquire and with an affection that biographers do not always sustain. Angelina's bravery won my respect, Varina's brilliance won my admiration, and Julia's contentment won my envy."

Angelina Grimke differs from her two companions in this book in that she had a highly visible, notorious career in her own right before her marriage. The daughter of a wealthy and established slaveholding family in South Carolina, she became, as a young woman, highly critical of the peculiar institution. She followed her sister, Sarah, 14 years her senior, to Philadelphia and became a Quaker for a time. She soon became part of the Abolitionist movement and, with Sarah, became a passionate speaker in the Northeast relating her own experiences with the dehumanizing experience of slavery. Unlike some of the Abolitionists, the Grimke's also became advocates of women's rights. In the late 1830's Angelinia married her mentor, the abolitionist Theodore Weld. Many people, including her supporters, doubted whether Angelina would find happiness as a married woman given her independence and advocacy of women's issues. With the exception of a brief speaking engagement in 1963, Angelina Grimke's public career ended with her marriage, as she raised her children, became a housewife, and assisted Weld with his writing and research. The marriage was unconventional as well in that Sarah Grimke, who never married, lived almost for its entire course with the couple. Berkin describes the many tensions and unresolved issues that simmered as a result of this arrangement.

Varina Howell Davis also was the child of the owners of a successful plantation. She married Jefferson Davis when she was a young beauty of 17 and Davis was a reserved introspective man of 35 just beginning his political career. Many years earlier, Davis had courted and married the daughter of Zachary Taylor, Margaret, but, after a lengthy and stormy courtship, Margaret died months after the marriage. Davis love for Margaret cast a shadow over his marriage to Varina. Varina Davis was highly intelligent and educated and unafraid to express her opinions. Her independence caused some difficulties with the more traditionally-minded Jefferson Davis, but the couple on the whole appeared happy. The couple had six children, only one of whom survived young adulthood. (One child died in a tragic accident while Davis was the president of the Confederacy.) Varina Davis seemed more comfortable in the presence of educated men, who valued her independence and candor, than in the presence of other women who frequently denigrated her as the "Queen". After the fall of the Confederacy, Varina acted independently and courageously in her tireless and eventually successful efforts to free Jefferson Davis from prison. She assisted Davis in writing his memoirs and after his death had a life of her own. Varina Davis moved to New York City, wrote her own memoirs of Jefferson Davis, and became a writer and a journalist. Her home in a New York City became a meeting ground for artists, intellectuals, and politicians as Davis carved out a career in late life in her own right.

Julia Dent Grant was the daughter of Missouri slaveholders. When a young, socially awkward U.S. Grant visited the family, he became smitten immediately with Julia and remained so throughout his life. The couple had a long courtship, over the objections of Julia's father and with Grant's military career. The pair did not even see each other over a three year period. U.S. Grant and Julia enjoyed a long and, by all accounts, happy marriage, as both Grant and Julia accepted the gender conventions and roles of the society in which they lived. Julia's had an embarassing lack of political sense especially where slavery, and the role of her husband in ending it, were concerned. Her attachment to the Union was based on her love for her husband rather than in an understanding of political issues. When Grant died, Episcopal Bishop John Newman praised the couple's relationship, describing their complementary roles in accordance with gender mores of the time: "Husband and wife the happy supplement of each other. He the Doric column to sustain; she the Corinthian column to beautify. He the oak to support; she ivy to entwine." (Berkin, p. 303) Following Grant's death, Julia Grant showed a degree of independence by writing her own Memoirs. She boldly asked more for them than the publishers would pay and, as a result, her Memoirs remained unpublished until 1975.

It was valuable to get to know these three women and to try to understand Civil War America from their perspectives. As Berkin realizes, it is treacherous to generalize attitudes in any time and place over a pervasive subject such as gender roles. As Berkin wisely concludes with respect to her subjects (at 314) "[p]erhaps we cannot understand our own modern sensibilities until we understand theirs."

Robin Friedman