On the Money Trail and its Trials

As we continue to travel onward with MDB, we encounter money problems resulting from the changes in the Southern economic climate in a healing country.

Letter and Draft

Hand-written

By Martha Dandridge Bibb

Montgomery, Ala

May, 1897

Dr. G. B. Fowler
Dear Cousin,

"I wish to ask your kind offices in regard to a matter of personal interest. For several years past my finances have been growing 'small by degrees and beautifully less' from the various causes, among them shrinkage values, stringency of these hard times, heavy taxation,  etc..."

 Sound familiar? She goes on to say--

"so I am seeking to build up my broken fortunes and knowing first of all your kind heart and enquiring mind and consequent knowledge of what is transpiring in the great world. I think you can give me some valuable information, and aid me in disposing of some relics and a few pieces of old coin. I am prompted to do this by the clippings, which I enclose. Some years previous to the War, my father came in possession of a fifty cent piece of silver with the date of his marriage, 1819, and gave it to sister Lou as a souvenir. It has on one side a head with the word “Liberty” above the date. It also is the date of Alabama’s admission into the United States. I have a gold dollar, which Dr. Rives received at Washington, Ga., after the surrender of the Confederate Army, dated 1853..."

Her list continues citing specific coins and stamps. I don’t know if she ever mailed the letter or if she simply pondered the idea. Her plight parallels present struggles in today’s fast lane. Not only the trying economic times, but her methods of attempting to “build up broken fortunes” resemble mine. Several of my family treasures have gone into an assortment of hands for various amounts to help in these troubling times. I have discovered Civil War relics maintain their lure and can be good money-makers. One day I may regret parting with James D. Porter’s spurs given to him by General Otho F. Strahl prior to the Battle of Franklin and the General's death. For now, I am grateful he got them, I got them, and someone else got them who appropriately reveres them. Letting go is part of my journey. Who knows what might be next?

Stepping on Toes

My great-great grandmother, MD Bibb, left a trail of letters. Hers by far outnumbered all the others I found in "the box". She carefully copied in duplicate her own letters and held onto them. She also kept correspondence to her family and to her. She is undoubtedly responsible for assembling the majority of documents I found together in one place. Of course, there were others after her who treasured what she had archived, and they probably added bits and pieces, too. I can't help but wonder what they all would have wanted me to do with their legacy. That now is my dilemma.

The next series of correspondence had to do with an on-going dispute with Martha Dandridge Bibb initiated by the family of Mary Phelan who served as Vice President of the Ladies’ Memorial Association under Sophie Bibb. Mrs. Phelan's children believed their mother was being shoved from a rightful place of honor in historical records. I shall mention this dispute briefly, compared to the amount I have in my book.

From Mrs. Phelan's daughter:

Phelan vs. Bibb

Montgomery, Ala.

June 24, ‘93

Mrs. M.D. Bibb.

Pres of L.M.A. (Ladies’ Memorial Association)

Montg. Ala.
"Dear Madam:

I beg your forbearance to read the enclosed letters, I am sure a perusal of them will show you the tenor of mine and my family’s feelings in the discussion between us and prove to you how deeply painful is the fact of seeming to wish to glorify our demised Mother. I have been forced to the issue by a flat contradiction several years after when I said before the Ass’n I had a right to speak to it because my Mother was one of the originators of the Ass’n. I would not have made that speech if I had foreseen the result, then to know a history had been written and her name ever being in doubt. I felt I must correct an injustice. What has subsequently occurred no one can regret as I...

I feel the name of my “dear good Mother” had been trailed in the dust by an excited scene for which I am grievously sorry. I did not wish or intend to convey an impression, I questioned your great, good Mother may have been primary in conceiving the idea of a Memorial Ass’n,..."

Mary Phelan Watt

Response by Martha Dandridge

Hand-written

Montgomery, Ala.
July 1st, 1893

"Dear Madam,

Your note and letters were not received until last night. Absence from home and business engagements must plead my apology for tardiness in acknowledging them.

I did not then make any suggestion in reference to the origin of this ‘Association’ as I did not suppose there was any difference in public opinion in regard to a fact, having the sanction of so many years, and on both occasions, I denied your assertion, simply, because it placed my mother in the unenviable position of receiving commendations for that which she did not deserve...

She was too modest, and too sincere, to have accepted the homage paid her as (your sister expressed it) “the mother of the Association”, had it not been a well known fact, but true to her noble nature would have declared, to Mrs. Judge John D. Phelan this honor is due...

Neither have I any desire to 'glorify my mother'. She only obeyed the promptings of her poise, unselfish character, and her tender sympathy for suffering humanity. She never claimed any superior merit for duty she performed, but often said that the ladies of the ‘Hospital’ and Memorial Associations deserved great praise, and that a nobler band of co-laborers never lived and without their hearty cooperation such grand results could never have been obtained..."

Believe me

Martha Dandridge Bibb

This type communication went on, and on, and on for over ten years!  The Phelans and MDB never resolved their differences but the Phelan family discredited  and assailed Martha Dandridge in a preface to one of the written histories of the Ladies' Memorial Association of Montgomery.  Martha Dandridge responded "in her manner born" by saying to S.H. Phelan--

"I have not replied to the charges made against me in your preface, because I am intensely averse to dissension and contention, and regard our sacred cause as too exalted to have its harmony broken by a discordant note. In this reply, I 'nothing extenuate or set down aught in malice'. In justice to the Memorial Association, to our faithful Secretary and to my honored mother, I must decline to accede to your request. Serious illness of five months duration will plead my apology for the tardiness of my reply."

I suppose the entire issue arose as a result of filial love, an honorable thing. I'm not sure, though. It's only my opinion, but I don't think the mothers, either Mrs. Phelan or Mrs. Bibb, would have cared at all who got credit for what. They seem to me the ones whose intentions were honorable.

A Monumental Task

The next group of letters I reference in my book had to do with the designing, building, and financing the Confederate Memorial Monument in Montgomery, Alabama, after the Civil War.The correspondence was between Martha Dandridge Bibb, Presidient of the Ladies' Memorial Association, and the company, as well as sculptor, in charge of making the monument.

CURBOW-CLAPP MARBLE CO.

Dealers in Marble & Granite Monuments

and Building Stone

Importers of Italian Monuments and Statuary

Iron Fences a Specialty

209 and 211 Dexter Avenue

Montgomery, Ala.

Dec. 3rd 1897
"Dear Mrs. Bibb,
I send you letter from Mr. F. Barnicoat, our sculptor in Quincy, Mass.-also send the photo he speaks of. I think it is a fine piece of modeling and will certainly be a grand piece of work when executed in granite.
There will be no photographs of the Infantry and Cavalry as they were accepted as shown with a few minor changes which are in our specifications with Mr. B.
You will please note what he says about the Marine statue time of shipment. I was afraid it would not be possible to ship as early as February.
If possible I would like to telegraph Mr. B tonight."
Yours very respectfully.
Oliver A. Clapp

A letter from the sculptor:

Hand-written

By Sculptor to Curbow-Clapp Marble Co.

F. BARNICOAT

GRANITE AND STATUARY

QUINCY, WESTERLY, SOUHEGAN

MILLSTONE POINT GRANITE MONUMENTS

CIRCULAR WORK A SPECIALTY

PORTRAIT FIGURES AND BUSTS

MODELING OF EVERY DESCRIPTION SOLDIERS AND IDEAL FIGURES IN GRANITE

SEND FOR DESIGN SHEETS OF GRANITE STATUARY

Quincy, Mass.
March 7, 1898
Curbow-Clapp Marble Co.
Montgomery, Ala
"Dear Sirs,
...We have commenced to cast model in plaster and shall be ready to commence work in the granite as soon as we hear from you. To model and cut this anchor will cost $100.00 extra. It means a good deal of relief work which takes time in granite."
Yours Truly,
F. Barnicoat

Oh, the problems that go hand in hand with construction! Those decisions were just  more in a string of challenges for Martha Dandridge as she marched on to complete her mother's dream. Her involvement  not only meant dealing with the sculptor, etc., but there were money problems as well.
Here's a little background:

"The men’s Historical and Monumental Association founded in 1865 had become quiescent during the dreary, difficult years of Reconstruction in Alabama. In 1885, a new organization, The Monumental and Historical Society, was formed on September 30, chaired by Montgomery Mayor Colonel Warren S. Reese. Under its auspices, Ex-President Jefferson Finis Davis, then 78, laid the cornerstone of the Confederate Monument on the north lawn of the Alabama State Capitol Building in elaborate two day ceremonies on April 29, 1886. However, the Society ran into difficulty raising the $46,000 needed to finish the job. Alabamians were still devastated and struggling...
The women stepped into the breach. The men’s Society had raised $6,755.00. Some shamed politicians raised $5,000, managed to get a legislative grant for $10,000, and then another $10,000 grant. The Ladies’ Memorial Association raised $10,000."

Nothing seemed to deter Martha Dandridge and the Ladies' Memorial Association from seeing their task completed. Martha did say in a communciation--

"…Though I am opposed to women’s rights in general yet regarding all things pure and tender as being within a woman’s presence, I am quite a lobbyist and have strong hopes of success for our Ladies’ Memorial Bill when the Legislature re-convenes in a few days..."

I dare say, she would have been a marcher for women's rights eventually.

Off the Trail

I've been known to go wandering and I don't deny the lure of a winding road. This post roams a bit, too, as I introduce Lewellyn Shaver's sister, Emma, good friend of the Bibbs in Montgomery. Emma's letters to Lou and Martha Dandridge Bibb came from her new home in Woodlawn, a suburb of  budding Birmingham. 
Excerpts from Emma Shaver's  handwritten letter dated 1892 to Louisa S. Bibb:

"Woodlawn is a very quiet place, in spite of its proximity to Birmingham. There are no mines, plants, nor any other interests here to attract the rougher elements. People who live here are generally those, whose business interests are in Birmingham and who do not feel financially able to reside in the city. The gentlemen are in Bham all day... Mrs. Cameron from Montgomery, lives not far from us. Mrs. Pearsall and her brothers run a market garden a little off in the country. They are doing nicely and Mrs. Pearsall seems busy and happy. Woodlawn is a city of about 2500 or 3000 inhabitants. The Democratic Mayor was nominated last week with every certainty of election. We live on a dummy line and can go into B. and return at any time, for .10. The distance is (six) correction four miles, and we go through another village before we reach East B(irmingham). It is a convenient place to live. All the marketing is brought right to the door, even oranges, kerosene oil, etc., and the cost is very reasonable. We live in walking distance of two churches, and the post office is not a quarter of a mile distant. You see we have a happy blending of the quiet of a country, and conveniences of a city home."

In another letter to Lou, written in 1896, Emma mentions the politics and news of the times:

"If one believed the belligerent spirit of the papers, one would dread the coming of December. Kolb certainly ought to be called Cobb for no matter how often you down him, he will not sink to the bottom, but because of sheer lightness of weight is ever bobbing up again. Local politics are running riot in Bham but very fortunately we only hear their buzz. It all disgusts me so that I scarcely care to read a paper. Oh! "the tempests that disturb the tea-pot!”

I cannot help but notice the many similarities that can be drawn over the past and present. Even the reference to "tea-pot" reminds me of the present "tea party", with its fervent and perhaps tempestuous stirrings. Ironically, the "Kolb" mentioned was a Commissioner of Agriculture, Rueben Kolb, who ran for Governor in 1892, 1894, and again, made a bid in 1896. He certainly did keep "popping up". After losing on the Democratic ticket, he branched into his own brand, Jeffersonian Democrats, who in essence aligned too closely with the Populist's views and candidates to hold any distinction on their own.

So much for my detour. Well, maybe.

A Bitter Sweet Battle

The battle I write about in this post is not specifically Martha Dandridge's although her daily battles revolved around  it.  Another letter from "the box" was from Lewellyn Shaver in 1889. Apparently, Martha Dandridge was gathering mementos for the Atlanta Exposition and she had communicated with people who had fought or served in the Civil War asking them to contribute worthy items. Mr. Shaver wrote back responding to her request.
In part from Washington:

"I have sent you by mail today my haversack and Bible, which Emma wrote me you would like to place among Confederate mementos which you prepare to exhibit at the Exposition. The Bible was handed to me by Miss Lou as I went out of the door of your residence the morning I started to join my Company in the latter part of 1862. I carried it in my haversack for convenient reference. The haversack is the only one I had during the War and accompanied me on many a weary march and throughout several bloody battles. On the morning of March 31, 1865,about nine days before the surrender, while we were charging the enemy over an open field on the “White Oake Road” to the right of Petersburg near “Hatchers Run”, a ball struck the haversack, was deflected by the Bible(which it shattered) and passed out. You see the two holes in the haversack...the one made by the ball as it entered and the other as it passed out. The Bible, doubtless, saved my life..."

Miss Lou, to whom he refers, was Martha Dandridge's sister and Emma was his sister. Mr. Shaver's story is an unusual one of salvation with the physical Bible being the protector. I'm sure he felt the intervention extended beyond the physical and it seems he would have reason to believe that. The haversack was returned to his sister after the Exposition.

The bitter or sad side of Mr. Shaver's story became apparent when he spoke in 1899 at Oakwood Cemetery on Decoration Day at the request of the Ladies' Memorial Association. He stood over the myriad of tombstones covering the hill and gave a somber talk. Included in his speech, he said these words:

"I was further constrained to accept your invitation by a desire once more to lift my voice, feeble though it be, in praise of the martyrs to a just cause, who, more fortunate than their survivors, passed from 'the perilous edge of battle' over the river and are resting peacefully under the shade of the trees on the farther shore.
I speak of them as more fortunate than their survivors. They have been spared the struggle for existence under adverse conditions, which with the Confederate soldier succeeded the struggle of war, and the pain of witnessing the misfortunes of the South consequent upon the failure of her cause. Often in the stress of life’s battle since the war, when these matters have weighed heavily upon me, my heart has seemed as full of sorrows as the sea of sands, and I have been unable to repress the unmanly regret that I did not fall at Chickamauga."

Did I say "somber"?  His words resonate the sobriety of the South and one specific veteran thirty years after the war.

On the Old Battle Field

Another series of correspondence was in "the box" I found in the closet of my home when I emptied it. Those were the letters between Martha Dandridge Bibb and Wager Swayne.

General Swayne of the Union Army arrived in Montgomery July, 1865, as an assistant commissioner of the Freedmen’s bureau. He was later appointed military Governor of Alabama during the early days of Reconstruction, serving from 1867 to 1868. During his stay, he lived at the home of Martha Dandridge Bibb and her family on Moulton Street. Swayne played a major role in establishing schools for African Americans, including high schools in Selma, Montgomery, and Mobile. He also helped organize Talladega College. He apparently revisited Montgomery thirty years after his initial stay and wrote a letter of appreciation to his hosts.

From his letter:

Swayne & Swayne

Attorneys at Law

August, 1890

120 Broadway, New York

"My dear Mrs. Bibb:
Immediately after my return from Montgomery I wanted to write and thank you for the pleasure I found in again meeting you and your sister, but found, to my surprise and regret, that you had always been so familiarly known to me as Mrs. “Dyke” Bibb, that during an interval of thirty years your proper name and faded out of mind...

I enclose herewith a photograph which you may recognize. Since the original had the pleasure of meeting you, it has occurred, as then anticipated, that McKinley has been nominated upon a gold standard basis, and I have often reflected with amused interest upon the cordiality with which you were anticipating that result. I have also been following with interest the sound money movement in Alabama, and hope it may yet be that I shall rejoice with you, not only over the election of McKinley but over Alabama’s coming into line as a good Republican State. If that occurs, the conversations we had thirty years ago will enable you to appreciate how I shall be disposed, in view of that result, if not to “depart in peace”, at least to invite you to rejoice over it with me."

An excerpt from Martha Dandridge's response:

"Your photograph is an excellent likeness and bears the impress of a happy and successful life. It has given me great pleasure, and brings back through the lapse of years the memory of so many gentle courtesies extended my dear mother and father that while I look upon it my heart is filled with grateful sorrow mingled with pleasant thoughts of your delicate efforts to cheer them in those dark days of adversity and gloomy apprehensions, indicating so fully that you were to the manner born. You may remember that I sometimes reminded you jokingly that your virtues were inherited from your good southern blood. You little knew that laughter often comes to hold in check the flow of tears. How like a dream it all seems now!..."

And later in the letter, she responds to his specific reference to McKinley and the South possibly changing its political bent:

"Surely the (passing) of time brings many changes, and I am not surprised by your amusement of my willingness to accept McKinley on the gold standard basis, instead of any representative of the face silver craze, but I beg to explain that it was only a choice of evils. I assure you I am still a democrat. The South cannot afford to be anything else until the Negro problem is solved. I hope it will be many years before you “depart in peace” or will be enabled to invite me to “rejoice with you in Alabama’s coming into line as a good Republican State”. It was indeed a pleasure to meet you again and to note how lightly time had touched you since your sojourn in the South."

For sure, the passing of time does bring many changes, but  these exchanges tell volumes about the climate of those years and maybe even, foreshadowed the future. There's much between the lines.

On other battles tomorrow.

Ma Dike Picks Her Battles

She had plenty to choose from--battles, that is. In many instances, her passion for justice and "the sweet courtesies of life" drove her pleas for help or determination toward a goal. One series of correspondence is between the Governor of Alabama and Martha D., instigated by the latter. In those, she begs for the pardon of her cousin. A segment of her initial letter on behalf of cousin J. Dubose Bibb, convicted of keeping a gambling table follows:

—

To Governor Seay of Alabama

Montgomery, Ala.

Sept. 15th, 1888

Governor Thomas Seay

"Dear Sir,
Will you allow me to make an appeal to you on behalf of my kinsman Mr. J. Dubose Bibb, recently convicted of keeping a gambling table.
I know applications of a similar nature are often made upon your decency, and I invite with some apprehension lest I lay too great a tax upon your kindness I feel assured will at least pardon me when I tell you the circumstances which impel me to crave your mercy.
Mr. Bibb was taken from the arms of a dying mother when only one day old and tenderly reared by my own mother as one of her children. He reached the years of manhood with no bad habits and probabilities of a bright future seemed to beckon him to the goal of a successful life.."

And a bit more:
"Though my parents had entreated him with tears and prayers to forsake his evil ways, they again sought him in this extremity and offered him home and sustenance so long as he refrained from gambling. He stayed with them six months and against their most earnest protestations, again he returned to his former haunts and gambled, he said for a living, as all legitimate means of earning subsistence were denied him though he had earnestly and diligently sought employment for a long while. His peculiar conduct then and since that time has been so contrary to his education and former associations that our family, as well as a number of physicians, believe that his mind is unhinged. He is also a physical wreck and being unfitted for labor of any kind would prove a burden to the State."

Then Martha pulls the trump card:
"I now bespeak your kind offices on personal consideration. You know that two of my father’s brothers held the honorable office you now fill, when Alabama was a Territory and after the organization of the State and through a long ancestral line no stain has ever dimmed the brightness of their reputation. They served this Commonwealth in peace and defended her in war and with this record of fidelity, I plea the anguish of the sorrowful old man for whom I seek your official pardon and whose chains are only more galling because his own hands have wrought them."

She knew how to pour it on, but regardless of her attempt, or words, or allegiance, it was a rather pathetic letter. It showed that some of today's heartaches are the same as those in the 1800's and that life changes, and doesn't. Her letter is much longer and details his life before gambling took hold and after. It is included, along with the Governor's and Cousin J. D. Bibb's, full-bloom in my book.The Governor was taking it under consideration, but his response didn't prove hopeful.

Dubose's response in part to Martha's and the Governor's letters:

"...My Dear Cousin, if you only knew how sad it makes me feel when I reflect about all the pleasures on my past life; for I believe no mortal ever enjoyed more. I think of my Angel wife and every thing else which could make life desirable. I say when I think of these things and my present condition in my old age, my life being at last a failure, I am simply dumb..."