Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker Read online

  “Home, indeed.” Mrs. Davis laughed shortly. “Mississippi is the state of my birth, but Washington is the home of my heart. I should hate to leave it, even if the place is overrun by Republicans.”

  “I should hate to see you go.” Elizabeth thought of Mrs. Samuel Phillips Lee, her pretty features drawn with irritation as she stormed away from the Davis residence. “As I’m sure your friends would too.”

  “I doubt my dearest friends will linger. Some of them have already declared themselves eager to depart for friendlier states. None of us has much choice in the matter.” Sighing, Mrs. Davis obligingly allowed Elizabeth to move her arms apart so she could better fit the sleeves. “It’s our duty as wives to accompany our husbands. If they say we stay in the Union, and thus in Washington City, then we stay. If not—” Mrs. Davis forgot herself and waved a hand in helpless dismissal, tugging the muslin sleeve from Elizabeth’s grasp. “Well, we go where they go, willingly or not.”

  “If you must go, and it seems to me there’s still a good chance you won’t,” said Elizabeth, “you’ll be the best-dressed woman in Mississippi—if you hold still and let me finish.”

  In spite of herself, Mrs. Davis laughed. She patted Elizabeth’s hand where it rested on her waist, but after that, she stood perfectly motionless as Elizabeth bade her until the task was done.

  As December passed, the subject of war came up often in the Davis household—between the senator and his wife, Mrs. Davis and her friends, the senator and his numerous visitors. The senator worked increasingly long and erratic hours, and when Mrs. Davis wasn’t tending to her young children, she distracted herself with writing letters, reading books, and entertaining friends she probably thought she must soon part with and might never see again. A deep, hushed anxiety permeated the city, the sense that time was running out, and Elizabeth felt it most intensely within the Davis household.

  As the holidays approached, Mrs. Davis kept Elizabeth busy sewing everyday clothes for her and the children, and one special garment for her husband—a fine silk dressing gown meant for his Christmas present. As Mrs. Davis wanted it to be a surprise, she asked Elizabeth to keep it out of sight whenever the senator was home. Once, Mrs. Davis dashed into the sitting room, where Elizabeth was busy sewing, and flung a quilt over her—the pieces of silk, her sewing basket, and Elizabeth herself from shoulders to shoe tops—only moments before Mr. Davis walked in, home earlier than expected from the Capitol. There was no time to adjust the quilt so that the draping was less ridiculous, so Elizabeth merely sat and nodded a greeting while Mrs. Davis whirled about to kiss her husband. The senator accepted the welcome with distracted affection, but then he looked past his wife to peer curiously at Elizabeth. “Are you cold, Lizzie?”

  “Not anymore, Mr. Davis,” she replied. Mrs. Davis flashed her a quick, secret smile and led her husband from the room, asking about his day. Muffling laughter, Elizabeth threw off the quilt, folded up the silk, and hid the pieces in her sewing basket before the senator returned.

  It was a rare lighthearted moment in a season of increasing worry and dread. A few days before Christmas, all of Washington was shaken by the news from the South—South Carolina had voted to secede from the Union. Within the Davis household, the debates Elizabeth overheard immediately shifted from whether it was legal and right to dissolve the Union to which states would follow South Carolina and how soon. As the calls for secession increased, Mrs. Davis’s ambivalence persisted. One day, she would champion the cause of states’ rights and praise the slave system, while on the next, she would confide to a friend that she could not bear the thought of leaving Washington City, where she had resided so long and forged such enduring ties. “I would rather remain in Washington and be kicked about than go south and be Mrs. President,” she said. And when her friend exclaimed in surprise, Mrs. Davis assured her that it was the true sentiment of her heart.

  That more Southern states would follow South Carolina out of the Union seemed all but certain. In all the disquiet, Elizabeth had found very little time to work on Mr. Davis’s dressing gown. After weeks of swift, clandestine, off-and-on sewing, on Christmas Eve, the dressing gown remained unfinished.

  Although Mrs. Davis did not rebuke her, Elizabeth knew she was anxious to have the dressing gown completed, lovingly wrapped and ready to give to her husband Christmas morning. “I’ll stay and finish it, if you like,” Elizabeth offered as the afternoon waned, though she was already weary after a long day of sewing, her fingers tired, her head and back aching.

  Mrs. Davis gladly, gratefully accepted, so Elizabeth kept on, sewing with neat, quick, flawless stitches in the sitting room by gaslight while her patron decorated a Christmas tree in the parlor for the children. Her thoughts wandered to her son, who would be spending the holidays with a school friend in Cleveland. It would be their first Christmas apart. Elizabeth had sent George a gift—candies, a book, and two fine shirts—but she had not heard from him. Watching Mrs. Davis bustle about preparing for her family’s celebration made her miss George more acutely than ever. When she was still a young woman, her beauty and natural grace had drawn the attention of a powerful white man, Alexander Kirkland, who could not be fought off and would not be denied. Her master had done nothing to protect her, and so George had come to be—the child she had not wanted but had come to love with all her heart.

  The closing of a door elsewhere in the house snatched her from her reverie, and when her gaze fell upon the clock on a nearby table, she saw that it was a quarter to midnight, well past the ten o’clock curfew for colored people. She could not walk home now, even if she dared brave the streets at so late an hour, what with crime on the upswing even in fine white neighborhoods like the Davises’ and respectable middle-class colored neighborhoods like her own. She decided that when she finished the dressing gown, she would present it to Mrs. Davis and request a bed for the night in the attic with the servants. With any luck she could snatch a few hours’ sleep and be well rested enough to enjoy the Christmas service at Union Bethel Church in the morning. Virginia and Walker Lewis had kindly invited her to join them and their young daughters for a Christmas feast later that day, and Elizabeth had gratefully accepted. She was accustomed to a good deal of time alone—after more than thirty-seven years as a slave denied all privacy, a bit of solitude still felt luxurious—but on the day of the Lord’s birth, she wanted to celebrate in the company of friends.

  She was adjusting the tie cords when she heard Senator Davis in the hallway between the sitting room and the parlor. “How festive you’ve made everything, my dear,” she heard him praise his wife, though his voice was devoid of merriment. “The children’s eyes will light up with joy when they behold that tree.” He leaned against the doorway, and suddenly he glanced over his shoulder into the sitting room. “That you, Lizzie?” he exclaimed, turning her way. “Why are you here so late? Still at work? I hope Mrs. Davis isn’t too exacting.”

  “No, sir,” she answered, startled by his gray and careworn look. Elizabeth knew he was ten years older than herself and that he often suffered from poor health, but clearly the events of the past few weeks had aged him drastically. Taken aback, she had missed her brief opportunity to hide the dressing gown. She had no choice but to explain herself, although she tried to conceal as much of the surprise as possible, without lying outright. “Mrs. Davis was very anxious to have this gown finished tonight,” she told him carefully, glancing toward the parlor to be sure Mrs. Davis would not overhear, “and so I volunteered to remain and complete it.”

  “Well, well, the case must be urgent.” The senator crossed the room and took the hem of his Christmas surprise in his hand. “What is the color of this silk? This gaslight is too deceptive to my aging eyes.”

  “It’s a drab changeable silk, sir.” She almost added that it was a rich, handsome color and would suit him well, but she decided to let him discover that for himself when he opened his gift the next morning and could admire it in daylight.

  He nodded, smile
d curiously, let go of the hem, and left the room without another word. Elizabeth knew then that he had easily guessed that the dressing gown was his wife’s Christmas gift to him, and he did not want her to know that the surprise had been spoiled. She found herself touched by his thoughtfulness. She would never concur with his views on slavery and secession, but she couldn’t help admiring him for the small kindness he showed his wife.

  She finished the dressing gown just as the clock struck midnight. Her thoughts drifted unexpectedly to her own husband, how he had deceived and disappointed her, until she had been obliged to tell him that they must live forever apart. James Keckley, who had pretended to be a freedman among other things when she agreed to marry him, was likely still a runaway slave hiding out in St. Louis if his drinking had not killed him yet.

  Carefully she folded the dressing gown and pushed thoughts of her estranged husband aside. It was Christmas, and she would not wish anyone ill on that sacred day, especially not the man she had once loved.

  Just before midnight on December 31, the bells at Trinity Church at Third and C streets rang out “Hail, Columbia” and “Yankee Doodle” to welcome the New Year, but any lingering chance for reconciliation between North and South had been left behind in the old. New Year’s Day was usually a festive, merry holiday in the city, or so its longtime residents told Elizabeth, but on the first day of 1861, no crowds celebrated in the inns and taverns, and few neighbors ventured out to pay calls. Those who did bore anxious and troubled expressions, as if urgent business rather than a wish to spread New Year’s greetings had compelled them from the comfort of their homes on that bright, frigid morning. A neighbor, a former slave employed as a butler at the White House, later told the Lewises that only a small fraction of the usual number of guests had attended the traditional New Year’s Day reception. The guests were as courteous to one another as gentility required, but some boldly wore Union or secession cockades in their hats so that no one would mistake their loyalties. Not even President Buchanan was immune from barbs and bitter words as he shook hands in the receiving line, but as the host as well as the leader of the land, if only for a few more weeks, he bore it with diplomacy and tact.

  On January 9, Mississippi voted to secede, and Jefferson Davis told his wife that he was resolved to follow his beloved state out of the Union. Within days, the senator fell ill and took to his bed, which was where the unceasing stream of friends and politicians and statesmen conferred with him. Elizabeth did not doubt that the strain upon him as the leader of the Democrats’ Southern faction contributed in no small part to his poor health. Mrs. Davis nursed him tenderly, and when Elizabeth remarked upon her sure hand in the sickroom, Mrs. Davis replied matter-of-factly, “I’ve had a great deal of practice.”

  One evening, as Elizabeth was dressing Mrs. Davis for one of the few social gatherings the couple attended that bleak winter, Mrs. Davis suddenly said, “Elizabeth, you are so very handy that I should like to take you with me.”

  Something in her voice told Elizabeth that this was no idle compliment. “When do you go South, Mrs. Davis?” she asked.

  “Oh, I cannot tell just now, but it will be soon. You know there is going to be war, Elizabeth?”

  She had long suspected, but Mrs. Davis spoke as if she had certain knowledge of it—which, as Senator Davis’s wife, she very well could have. “War? You cannot mean it.”

  “I tell you, yes. The Southern people will not submit to the humiliating demands of the abolition party. They will fight first.”

  Elizabeth fought to keep her voice even as she fastened the last of Mrs. Davis’s buttons. “And who do you think will win?”

  “The South, of course,” replied Mrs. Davis. “The South is impulsive, and the Southern soldiers will fight to conquer. The North will yield when it sees the South is in earnest, rather than engage in a long and bloody war.”

  Impulsive and earnest, perhaps, but Elizabeth didn’t think that was enough to win a war. She also thought, although she would not be impudent enough to say so aloud, that Mrs. Davis underestimated the determination of Northerners. Those of Elizabeth’s acquaintance did not seem particularly yielding, or any more afraid of a fight than Southern folks. “Mrs. Davis,” she said instead, in her most reasonable tone, “are you certain that there will be war?”

  “I know it.” Suddenly she turned in her chair and clasped Elizabeth’s hand. “You had better go South with me. I will take good care of you.”

  Elizabeth was so startled that without thinking she snatched her hand away.

  Mrs. Davis seemed not to notice her rudeness. “When the war breaks out, the colored people will suffer in the North. The Northern people will look upon them as the cause of the war, and I fear, in their exasperation, will be inclined to treat you harshly.”

  Reluctantly, Elizabeth acknowledged the truth of her patron’s words with a nod. Secession would cause the war, and the state delegates who had voted to leave the Union would have to bear the responsibility. Still, Elizabeth had no reason to doubt that somehow the blame would shift to the people of her race, as it so often, so unfairly, did in other matters.

  “I may come back to Washington in a few months, and live in the White House,” Mrs. Davis mused, turning around to examine the drape of her dress in the mirror. “The Southern people talk of choosing Mr. Davis for their president. In fact, it may be considered settled that he will be their president. As soon as we go South and secede from the other states, we will raise an army and march on Washington, and then I shall live in the White House.”

  “Mrs. Davis,” Elizabeth managed to say, “I’m very pleased that you’ve placed so much confidence in me. However, I—” She had to stop, to take a breath, to find a moment to think. “I have my business to consider. I have my church and my friends.”

  “We do have churches in the South, you may recall, as well as many colored women who would surely like to count you among their friends.” A faint, amused smile turned up the corners of Mrs. Davis’s mouth. “As for your business, it will surely thrive. I’ll have plenty of work for you within my own household, but if that doesn’t suffice, with my recommendation you’ll have no trouble finding many eager new customers in Montgomery.”

  So the Davises were planning to remove to Alabama, not Mississippi. Elizabeth wondered why her patron had not mentioned this before. “I—I don’t know what to say. Forgive me my uncertainty. I’m very grateful you think so highly of my work.”

  “Not only of your work, but also of you.” Mrs. Davis caught her gaze in the mirror and held it. “Promise me you’ll consider my proposal—although time is of the essence. I’ll need your answer soon.”

  That much Elizabeth could do. “I promise.”

  Elizabeth kept her word, pondering Mrs. Davis’s proposal, praying over it. She was tempted to accept. She liked the Davis family, and Mrs. Davis’s reasoning seemed plausible. But to go so far south, so deep into the land of slavery—even as a freedwoman, life there would be difficult for her, far more difficult than in the slaveholding District of Columbia. But as much as she liked Mrs. Davis, she liked the Lewises more, and she would miss her friends in the congregation of Union Bethel Church. And though the Northerners might, as Mrs. Davis predicted, blame the colored race for the inevitable war and turn upon them in anger, weren’t Southerners as likely to do the same?

  After pondering the question alone, and with the deadline for her decision approaching, Elizabeth turned to her friends for guidance. One and all, freeborn and former slave, urged her to remain in Washington. They were astonished that Mrs. Davis would even presume to ask such a thing upon such a short acquaintance. Elizabeth had been in the family’s employ less than three months, and Mrs. Davis expected her to leave her home and place herself in unimaginable risk in a land she herself expected soon to be torn by war? They did not believe, as Elizabeth did, that Mrs. Davis’s offer was generous, that it was a sign of respect. “Don’t go,” Virginia implored after one late-night talk in her parlor. “If y
ou change your mind, you may not be able to come home.”

  Elizabeth knew her friends were right. She also knew that the North was far stronger than Mrs. Davis seemed to believe—in spirit as well as might. Mr. Lincoln’s people were powerful and eager for victory, and Elizabeth could not believe that they would let the Southern states go without a fight or that they would give up as soon as the Southerners resisted. In the end, after all her questioning and pondering and prayer, her decision came down to one irrefutable fact: She was a colored woman, and she would be far wiser to cast her lot with the people of the North, many of whom supported abolition, than those of the South, most of whom believed she belonged in chains.

  Elizabeth had not yet told Mrs. Davis of her decision when she arrived at the Davis residence a few days later to find that her patron had gone out earlier that morning to purchase several yards of floral chintzes, pretty but less fine than the fabrics she usually favored. “I’d like you to make me two wrappers,” Mrs. Davis said, draping the fabrics upon the sofa.

  “From chintz?”

  “Yes, Elizabeth, from chintz.” Mrs. Davis’s smile twisted as if she were fighting back tears. “I must give up expensive dressing for a while. Now that war is imminent, I—and I daresay all Southern people—must learn to practice lessons of economy.”

  “Of course.” Elizabeth gathered up the fabrics. “I’ll get started right away.”

  “Thank you.” After a moment, she added, “Elizabeth?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Davis?”

  “I think…” Her voice trailed off, and she inhaled deeply. “To be prudent, it would be best to finish the wrappers sooner rather than later.”