The next week, in one of their many discussions on the abolitionist platform, Julia suggested that Laura could actually be quite useful in the grand scheme of things. Chev was not so sure she would volunteer to be of help; her ardor for her dear Chev had quite noticeably cooled. When he walked into a room, she sensed it immediately and usually took her leave forthwith. That was the thanks he got for rescuing her from death, a death she was hell-bent to bring upon herself. At least she’d never brought up again her alleged ability to taste and seemed to be eating enough, presumably satisfied with the provided victuals. If he were made of weaker stuff, he would’ve patronized and encouraged her delusions, which he was certain would have proved more damaging to her in the long run.
When he and Julia sat her down in the parlor, Laura held herself ramrod straight, her head cocked to one side like an inquisitive parrot. She clearly knew it was a serious matter if they were both meeting with her.
“Angry about Mr. Brown?” she wrote before they could begin.
“No,” Chev told her. “But why?”
“Brown not blind, but―”
“Of course, he’s not blind.”
“Only one big eye, like Cyclops.”
Chev couldn’t believe it. “Where in the world did she get hold of Homer?”
Julia laughed. “No worse than the Bible for her.”
“Mr. Brown has two eyes,” Chev wrote.
“Sees only one thing,” Laura countered. “Mad.” She fidgeted with her eyeshade, and for one frightening moment, Chev was afraid she was going to suddenly rip it off, which would be too much of a shock for Julia, who was not accustomed to such awful sights.
“She says he’s mad,” Chev told his wife.
“Well, she has held the hands of many maniacs and idiots. Perhaps she feels something―”
“You’re doubting the man now? Based on Laura’s assessment?”
“You’re the one who’s always claimed she could tell more from a person’s touch in thirty seconds than the rest of us could in thirty years.”
Chev looked disconcerted for a moment. “She does have her way, but I have no doubts whatsoever that Brown is willing to devote his life to the redemption of the colored race.”
He took Laura’s hand again, though her expression was obstinate. “We are helping Brown fight slavery.”
“He’s bad.”
“Slavery is bad.” Chev couldn’t believe he felt the need to explain himself to her.
“L,” Julia wrote, “surely you care about slaves.”
“I am not free,” Laura wrote, pushing down so hard that Chev could see the prints of her fingers in his wife’s palm. “I am not free to even be a woman like you.”
“Of course you are,” Julia said.
Chev noted that both women’s palms were sweating. Strange. Laura’s hands almost never sweated; she used a dusting of powder to make sure of it.
He tried again. “On Exhibition Days, help by writing against slavery to visitors.”
“What exhibition? You hardly show me.”
“I will then. You can write about Negroes. Have great influence.”
“You are all black to me,” Laura wrote. “Everyone is dark. Think it is the same for God.”
Julia was excited; she grabbed Laura’s hand again. “You could write exactly that.”
Laura sat for a moment, her lips twisted as if in exasperation, then tapped Chev’s arm and gestured at the door. “Go?”
“Yes,” he told her, and he and his wife were left alone. “You’d think she’d feel for the slaves, see that they are held captive as she is.”
“Why don’t you have the press raise Uncle Tom’s Cabin? It’s been out five years already, and none of your girls have read it. If only Laura could see one of the ‘Tom’ shows running. Two on right now in Boston.”
“I keep meaning…But that Stowe woman, she just rubs me―”
“Harriet is not my favorite model either, but I think the atrocities of the book will impress Laura, even if it’s not particularly well written.”
“That’s the other thing. I’ve always made a concerted effort not to overstimulate her. Those who are merely blind are subject to a much greater disturbance of their faculties when confronted with such horror, but with Laura the sensitivity is severely heightened. Who knows what she might do?”
“I think you’re more afraid of her getting started on religion again.”
“Even if I ordered the press to start tomorrow, it would still take a couple of years for the full print. And we have several other important books pending.”
Julia sighed theatrically. “I’ve tried to rile Laura up on women’s rights, you know, but she takes no interest in that either.”
His least favorite subject. Thank God Laura still had some sense, Chev thought, but shook his head in mock conciliation. “I’m surprised. She has perhaps lost her tender streak with age.”
“It can happen to the best of us,” Julia said quietly, then stood and left the room.
October 18, 1859. A day Chev would never forget. John Brown had been taken alive, but seriously wounded, at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, by Col. Robert E. Lee and company. Brown’s small band of eighteen, including two of his sons and five Negroes, had held the government arsenal for two days. His sons were dead, and none of the Negroes he’d been expecting from neighboring plantations had joined the rebellion. All this time the South had cowered in fear of a slave uprising, yet even the slaves Brown had freed voluntarily returned to their masters. For the life of him, Chev didn’t understand this; none of the abolitionists did.
He’d known old Brown was planning something, and the Secret Six, as they’d come to be called, had kept sending him money, Sharps rifles, and pikes. Brown was indicted exactly one week after his capture for treason and murder, and Chev immediately formed a committee to provide for his defense. True to his word, Brown refused to implicate the Northerners, but the authorities found letters and other papers incriminating the six at his farm just over the Maryland border.
Rumor had it that a federal warrant might be issued for the arrests of the Secret Six and they could be extradited to Virginia, where they could end up being tried for conspiracy. The Chevalier had never panicked in his life, but now he did. The month he’d spent in a Prussian prison in 1832 had hardened him against any real martyrdom. It had been soul-killing, and he’d only been in his early thirties then; now at almost sixty, he would fear for his life and his sanity. Let Brown be the holy martyr. Chev left nothing to chance; he composed a letter to the newspapers, disclaiming any prior knowledge of Brown’s plans. Of the assault at Harpers Ferry, he wrote, “It is still to me a mystery and a marvel.” By the day the letter appeared in print, Chev was on his way to Canada, telling his family and close acquaintances that it was a long-planned trip to recruit Canadians to teach the blind. He tried to get the others to flee with him, but only Stearns went.
Chev had made a point of avoiding Laura since the raid, but as he carried his bags down the stairs, there she was, waiting in the main hall.
She grabbed at his hand. “Where?”
“Don’t need to know.”
“Told you. Madman.”
Who was she to lecture him? He put down his bags. He channeled all of the nervous exhaustion and anxiety to strike at her palm. “He was a saint. Should pray for him.” He knew he was hurting her, but he couldn’t stop.
She managed to twist one hand out of his. “Pray for people he killed.”
“Slavery is evil, Laura.”
“Murder is evil, Doctor.”
“I regret nothing,” he said, though at this point, it wasn’t entirely true.
Then of all things, she patted him on the back as if he were a child. It had been gut-punch enough that his wife had said, “Just go,” and only halfheartedly hugged him good-bye, her belly big with child against him.
“I need to find teachers in Montreal,” he’d told Julia, and she’d laughed. She’d actually laughed in his face. Y
es, of course, she was worried for him, but she’d stopped just short of calling him a coward. Higginson, however, had not held back and made a point of informing his longtime friend that he considered his present actions ignoble. And the greatest slight had come from Sumner, who had not even replied to his messages.
On December 2, Brown mounted the gallows and the North fell into mourning. By then, Chev was already in Montreal. The time there was torturous, but three weeks after the hanging, he got word that the danger of extradition to Virginia was past and arrived home just in time to see his son born on Christmas night. Samuel Gridley Howe Jr. As he held the child safe in his arms, he dared wonder if perhaps the fiery spirit of John Brown, just departed, might have found its way into this new soul. He didn’t mention his strange hope to anyone, least of all Julia. It was a secret wish he would keep to himself.
In January, a congressional summons was issued, and the Secret Six appeared before a Senate committee investigating the raid. But the last thing the committee wanted to do was blight the lives of these fine New Englanders, and so they all returned to their homes, their explanations and denials having quickly satisfied their peers. Chev could breathe again, though his wife would barely look him in the eye, much less let him in her bed, for months. Once again, she used the nursing as an excuse. How much he loved his children, and yet the irony was that the making of them prevented making more of them, at least for now, and for that he was in a constant state of distress. If Julia were a man, she would understand. Then again, Sumner didn’t understand. But if Sumner were a woman—no, he would not play out the thought. Even Laura had not touched him since his return; she refused to so much as acknowledge him when they passed in the hall. In what strange, new world was it possible for Laura Bridgman, of all people, to act morally superior to Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe? A strange, new world in which brothers turned against brothers, and the country split into bloody halves, flies buzzing over the tender flesh despoiled. A real war was on its way, he was sure of it.
Chapter 26
Julia, 1860–1863
Before Sammy’s birth, Julia would have sworn she had no favorites among her children, but he quickly changed that. From the moment he was born, when she first saw the downy red of his hair, she was smitten. Her only redheaded child! It was as if the spirit of her beloved Mr. Wallace had descended through the ether and passed into the child, and so as the baby lay swaddled in her arms, she breathed into that tiny rosebud mouth the sweet breath that had entered her only once. She nursed Sammy for thirteen months and let him sleep in her bed well after that. Though she had previously valued her time in her attic nook above all, now she studied and wrote in the nursery while her son played. He was rarely out of her sight; she bundled him up and took him with her on walks and carriage rides into the city. Though her other children were well and truly beloved, Florence and Julia Romana never seemed to have forgiven their mother for leaving them for her hiatus in Rome, and now sided with their father in all domestic disputes. Julia realized that she had long thought of her children as background to her intellectual pursuits and personal preoccupations, but now for the first time motherhood was the foreground of her life. Funny thing, though they already had a son, Harry, this one proved even Chev’s greatest little fellow, and so the parents spent much more time together, bound by their love for the child. They tried not to compete for the boy’s attention, but it was a constant struggle, and therefore, he was the most spoiled of their children.
But life outside the home bore the beginnings of a national hell. Fort Sumter was attacked, and the war became a foregone conclusion. Both Julia and Chev applied their efforts to the cause of the Union. Julia was one of the founders of the Women’s Central Association of Relief for the Sick and Wounded of the Army, a title she felt was far too long, but a great venture nonetheless. Chev campaigned to head the Sanitary Commission, a supply and relief organization supporting the Army. In late 1861, the couple headed off to Washington to further their efforts, and to the surprise of the older children, they took Sammy, who was almost two, along with them.
While Chev politicked, Julia did some rambling, always in a carriage and always accompanied by either Massachusetts Governor Andrew or James Freeman Clarke and his wife. She was surprised that the city of Washington seemed more like an unruly village than a true city, much less the capital of the nation. The wide avenues were still unpaved, and ambulances, soldiers on horses, and orderlies on foot trailed up and down Pennsylvania Avenue. Most of the federal buildings stood only half-finished, and the Capitol itself had yet to be crowned with its dome, another project put on hold for the war effort. The grand Army of the Potomac surrounded Washington, their brown tents pitched like molehills all along the outskirts to protect the city from the Johnny Rebs, who had set up camp just over the river in Virginia. With her friends, Julia visited camps and hospitals, and even the Massachusetts Heavy Artillery led by her second cousin. But wherever she went, someone always asked after Laura, be it an injured lieutenant or a bugle boy. Apparently, even during wartime, Laura’s star had not completely dimmed in the public firmament.
In November, as Julia was watching a review of the troops at Bailey’s Crossroads, Virginia, Confederate troops suddenly descended and a skirmish began. As she headed back into Washington, she could still hear the sounds of battle. On the way they passed some soldiers singing the popular “John Brown’s Body,” and Mr. Clarke teased her that she should write new lyrics for the tune.
That night, Julia awoke well before dawn, and in the dim light began to write out verses, almost as if from memory, with little of her usual effort. As Sammy and her husband slept, she finished her poem, with its echoes of the violence of the Old Testament, in particular a favorite passage of hers from Isaiah. Two months later, James T. Fields published the revised “Battle Hymn of the Republic” in the Atlantic, for which the author received the princely sum of five dollars. And though the average fellow did not read this esteemed publication, because she had set the words to the tune of “John Brown’s Body,” the song was soon on everyone’s lips.
Chev, of course, suffered great agitation at his wife’s sudden fame. He had not been granted the command of the Sanitary Commission, though no clear reason was given, and so they soon returned to Boston. His headaches grew worse, and he even took Julia away from Sammy to nurse him, all to no good end. President Lincoln himself first heard Julia’s song after the Battle of Gettysburg and reportedly shouted, “Sing it again!” to wild applause. Yet when she was invited to attend Lincoln’s second inauguration, Chev forbade her to go to Washington because he had a sick head, though she knew it was because he chafed under the idea of being her guest for the event when he himself had not been invited. He went as far as bringing up divorce again, but for Sammy’s sake, Julia quelled his hurtful demands.
Julia would have thought she would be ecstatic to be known as the new poetess of the nation, and yet she began to feel more drawn toward the essay form and the idea of reading out and engaging with the public off the page; however, she knew Chev would fight her tooth and nail on the idea of a speaking tour and that she probably wouldn’t be allowed to take Sammy with her. That would have broken her heart, as he was at the age when he asked about everything, talked about everything, her perfect and intellectually curious redheaded child. She liked to pretend he was Mr. Wallace’s son and that he would grow up to be a great philosopher or writer, or ideally both, like his parents.
One chilly May morning, Julia set out for a drive with Sammy, and realized after they’d gone a mile that she’d forgotten his scarf and gaiters, but he proved his usual bright self. That night, however, he came down with fever and chills. Chev was away, so Julia called in their doctor from town, who pronounced the boy ill with diphtheria. Her own words thrummed blackly in her head: He hath loosed his fateful lightning and his terrible swift sword. Julia telegraphed Chev and he made it home by the next night. They both stayed up with their son, who seemed to be feeling better. At 5:00 a.m.,
Sammy died in his mother’s arms. He had just turned three.
Chev did not blame her; instead he said nothing, withdrawing to his study and then to his bed. He refused to go to the funeral, even after the other children begged him. Julia stayed a mother to her children throughout her pain, her numbness, the unwillingness of her spirit to go on. Surprisingly, only Laura offered her any real comfort, sitting with her for hours as she wrote poems about Sammy, some of which she signed into Laura’s palm. What a strange and unexpected twosome, she thought, as they wept together, her patting dry the tears that leaked from beneath Laura’s shade.
Julia turned to the Book of Common Prayer, a favorite since childhood, and again devoted herself to her studies. It was only the second time in her adult life that she had been gripped with such anguish, and in her heart the deaths were connected. For a year afterward, she wrote poems only about Sammy and reams of letters to him, which she never showed a soul. She also wrote poems in honor of Mr. Wallace’s memory and composed a series of philosophical lectures, concentrating on his beloved Comte and on Hegel, but she couldn’t read his novels. She’d tried, but their violence reminded her of the vicious circumstances of his death. She planned to give readings on particular topics of ethics while also advancing the cause of practical Christianity, which in her recent grief had been a great comfort. Our God is marching on.
She thought Chev would battle her about the readings, but he gave in without any argument, insisting only that she not charge for the events, which she had hoped to do. Her parlor readings were a huge success, and she decided she’d try a series in Washington. She was publicly embarrassed when Sumner, whom she’d thought would support, if not attend, the readings in his newly adopted city, railed against her ambitions, telling anyone who’d listen that she was in no way qualified to speak on any of those topics. It was one thing not to be for her, but why was Charlie so adamantly against her? After all, Julia had never intervened in his relationship with her husband, though since Sumner was in Washington, he didn’t get to spend much time with his favorite friend anyway. As a matter of fact, she and Chev spent little time together anymore, as if the grief had severed their last ties of true affection.
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