19. New York County, Land and Property Records, Liber 493:415–16.
20. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder D, articles of agreement between Eliza B. Jumel and Ambrose C. Kingsland, February 26, 1850.
21. Over the years, this lot was referred to as encompassing anywhere from 94 to 100 acres. I have chosen to refer to it consistently as the 96-acre lot, the size most often assigned to it.
22. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder A, lease of a farm from Eliza Jumel by Peter Lestrange, 1842; N.Y. Com. Pl., Martin C. Clancy vs. Eliza B. Jumel, 1861-#226.
23. N.Y. Com. Pl., Eliza B. Jumel vs. Philip A. Levy, 1841-#1245; N.Y. Com. Pl., Martin C. Clancy vs. Eliza B. Jumel, 1861-#226.
24. New York County, Land and Property Records, Liber 391:291–93.
25. N.Y. Com. Pl., Eliza B. Jumel vs. Philip A. Levy, 1841-#1245.
26. N.Y. Sup. Ct., Philip A. Levy vs. Eliza B. Jumel, 1841-#645.
27. Warren, Women, money and the law, 133–34.
28. N.Y. Sup. Ct., Philip A. Levy vs. Eliza B. Jumel, 1841-#645.
29. Ibid.
30. B-779, box 112, deposition of Nelson Chase.
31. N.Y. Sup. Ct., Philip A. Levy vs. Eliza B. Jumel, 1841-#645.
32. Warren, Women, money and the law, 10, 318n37.
33. Ibid.
34. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder B, summons in the case of Antoine Soil [sic] vs. Eliza Jumel, March 14, 1849; NYHS-JP, box 3, folder G, release, Antoine Soel [sic] to Eliza B. Jumel, March 22, 1849. The plaintiff signed himself variously “Soili” and “Soil.”
35. N.Y. Com. Pl., John Rogers, an Infant, by William Wordsworth his next friend, vs. Eliza B. Jumel, Judgment Record, 1844-#864.
36. Ibid.
37. B-779, box 112, deposition of Nelson Chase; for the address, 255 West 19th Street, see the 1845 edition of Doggett’s New-York City Directory.
38. New York City Municipal Archives, Manhattan Deaths, vol. 14; B-779, box 112, deposition of Nelson Chase; 1873 Transcript of Record, 303. The record of the death lists the location of the deceased as 253 West 19th Street. As this differs from the Chase’s house number as given by Doggett’s (255), one number may have been wrong or, alternately, Eliza Tranchell may have lived next door. If she had been taking care of Mary, the death could have occurred in the Tranchells’ lodgings.
39. B-779, box 112, deposition of Nelson Chase.
40. NYHS-AHMC, Jumel, Mary E., Mary Jumel to Maria Jones, N.d. (beginning with the words “Dear Mother”) vs. Shelton, 156 (beginning with the words “My Dear Mama”).
41. She is buried in lot 222, section 111 (www.green-wood.com; accessed June 26, 2012).
42. B-779, box 112, deposition of Nelson Chase.
43. Ibid.
44. Ibid.
45. B-779, box 113, deposition of Eliza J. Caryl.
46. MJM 4.14, photocopy of a letter from Nelson Chase to Eliza Jumel and Eliza Jumel Chase, February 10, 1852.
47. 1873 Transcript of Record, 307.
CHAPTER 32: MADAME JUMEL
1. NYPL, MssCol 510, Thomas Chamberlain diary, 1835–1860, entries for July 17 and July 30, 1842; Barnes F. Lathrop, “A Southern girl at Saratoga Springs, 1834,” North Carolina Historical Review 15, no. 2 (April 1938): 160.
2. Thomas Chamberlain diary, entries for July 30, August 1, and August 4, 1842; “High Life at Saratoga—1837,” American Heritage 18, no. 4 (June 1967): 107; Field Horne, The Saratoga reader: Writing about an American village 1749–1900 (Saratoga Springs: Kiskaton Publishing, 2004), 167.
3. Thomas Chamberlain diary, entries for summer 1842 (for attendance at various churches); “The late Daniel D. Benedict’s diary,” Supplement to the Saratoga Sentinel, May 19, 1881, [1], entry for August 20–22, 1846.
4. Saratoga Sentinel, June 25, 1833, 3; Saratoga Sentinel, July 9, 1833, 3.
5. Saratoga Sentinel, July 14, 1835, 3.
6. Salvatore Mondello, The private papers of John Vanderlyn (1775–1852) American portrait painter (Lewiston, NY: The Edward Mellen Press, 1990), 96–98, 112, 116. The painting is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art today.
7. E.g., Philadelphia Inquirer, February 9, 1830, 2 (in this report indicating that two of her horses were stolen, she is referred to as Madame Jumel).
8. “The Jumel estate case,” New York Herald, January 29, 1873, 5; MJM 4.14, photocopy of a letter from Nelson Chase to Eliza Jumel and Eliza Jumel Chase.
9. Saratoga County Clerk, Deeds Book LL, 499–501, and Deeds Book CC, 224–25; NYHSJP, box 2, folder I, conveyance from William L. F. Warren to Eliza B. Jumel, August 29, 1836; Saratoga County Clerk, Deeds Book CC, 250–51; NYHS-JP, box 3 folder C, indenture between Eliza B. Jumel and Isaac Taylor, September 3, 1836. She paid $13,343 in total for the farmlands.
10. J[ames] S[ilk] Buckingham, America, historical, statistic, and descriptive (London: Fisher, Son, & Co., [1841]), 2:435.
11. Buckingham, America, 2:431; Stuart, Three years in North America (see chap. 24, n. 5), 1:131.
12. Thomas Chamberlain diary, entry for August 5, 1842; also see entry for July 24; Horne, Saratoga reader, 128.
13. Lathrop, “A Southern girl,” 160; Buckingham, America, 2:430–31.
14. Buckingham, America, 430; Horne, Saratoga reader, 166.
15. Horne, Saratoga reader, 95.
16. “A scene at Saratoga,” Alexandria Gazette, September 8, 1846, [2] (for all of the quotations in this paragraph).
17. Ibid.; “Disgraceful affair at Saratoga,” New-Bedford (Massachusetts) Mercury, September 4, 1846, [2] (reprinting an article published in the Springfield Gazette); “Daniel D. Benedict’s diary,” [1], entry for August 26, 1846.
18. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2]; “Daniel D. Benedict’s diary,” [1], entry for August 26, 1846.
19. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2].
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. “Disgraceful affair at Saratoga,” [2]; “Daniel D. Benedict’s diary,” [1], entry for August 26, 1846; Albany Evening News, August 29, 1846, [2].
23. “Disgraceful affair at Saratoga,” [2].
24. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2].
25. “Daniel D. Benedict’s diary,” [1], editorial note to the August 26, 1846, entry.
26. Albany Evening News, August 29, 1846, [2]; Myra Beth Young Armstead, “The history of blacks in resort towns: Newport, Rhode Island and Saratoga Springs, New York 1870– 1930” (PhD diss., University of Chicago, 1987), 41; Saratoga County Clerk, Deeds Book cc, 250–51.
27. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2].
28. Bellows Falls Gazette, September 18, 1846, [2].
29. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2].
30. Bellows Falls Gazette, September 18, 1846, [2].
31. Nigel Cliff, The Shakespeare riots: Revenge, drama, and death in nineteenth-century America (New York: Random House, 2007), 208, 245–46.
32. Cliff, The Shakespeare riots, 246.
33. Daniel E. Sutherland, Americans and their servants: Domestic service in the United States from 1800 to 1920 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1981), 10; [Thomas Hamilton], Men and manners in America (Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1833, 1:106–107.
34. Holly V. Ivard and Caroline Fuller Sloat, “A teenager goes visiting: The diaries of Louisa Jane Trumbull (1835, 1837),” in Children and youth in a new nation, ed. James Martin (New York: New York University Press, 2009), 222; John Hope Franklin, A Southern odyssey: travelers in the antebellum North (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1976), 131, 133.
35. Sutherland, Americans and their servants, 15.
36. “A scene at Saratoga,” [2].
37. “Fancy ball at Saratoga,” Daily Evening Transcript (Boston), August 24, 1850, [2], quoting the Saratoga Whig.
38. “The courts,” New York Herald, March 1, 1872, 11.
39. In 1865 Eliza’s family said that the comtesse Tascher de la Pagerie, whose husband was a cousin of the Empress Josephine, sold jewelry and furniture owned by Josephine to the Jumels (Shelton, 155). However, it is highly unlikely that th
e comtesse would have possessed such items. Neither she nor her husband, Henri, was on intimate terms with Josephine by the time of the empress’s death (unsurprising, since Henri had become a royalist; see chapter 14, p. 73), although earlier, at the time of their marriage, Josephine had purchased a thirty-thousand-franc diamond parure for the new comtesse (Macleod, “Eliza Bowen Jumel: Collecting and cultural politics,” 66 [see chap. 16, n. 39]). Possibly the comtesse sold the diamonds she had received from Josephine to the Jumels, and that is where the story that they had been worn by Josephine originated.
40. NYPL, Jumel Family Miscellany, NYBG Fam 2008-2482, transcription by Josiah C. Pumpelly of a clipping from an unnamed newspaper.
41. Ibid.
42. Massachusetts Plowman and New England Journal of Agriculture, October 12, 1850, 4.
CHAPTER 33: ELIZA BURR ABROAD
1. B-779, box 113, deposition of Eliza J. Caryl.
2. Ancestry.com, U.S. Passport Applications, 1795–1925 (see chap. 6, n. 17).
3. MJM 4.8, two slightly different English translations of a letter from Eliza Jumel to Charles Louis [sic] d’Orléans, prince de Joinville (the addressee’s given names were actually François Ferdinand; he had a brother named Louis Charles).
4. Ibid. A high-ranking naval officer, Joinville was staying in New York while his ship was refitted. See “Intelligence,” Army and Navy Chronicle 12, no. 40 (October 7, 1841), 317; Memoirs (Vieux Souvenirs) of the prince de Joinville, trans. Lady Mary Loyd (New York: Macmillan and Co., 1895), 220.
5. The Collector, no. 1 (November 1922): 5.
6. “Sailing of steamers,” New-York Tribune, October 13, 1851, 6; “Passengers arrived,” New York Daily Times, June 14, 1852, 4, “The Jumel will case,” The World, November 13, 1866, 5 (letter from Eliza Burr to Nelson Chase, Nice, Italy, February 6, 1852).
7. “The Jumel will case,” 5.
8. NYHS-AHMC, Jumel, Mme. Stephen, Eliza J. Chase to Nelson Chase, May 21, 1852.
9. Ibid.
10. The original drawing is in the collection of the New-York Historical Society, acc. no. 1956.125.
11. The print was listed in the July 17, 1852, issue of Bibliographie de la France, an indicator that two copies had been deposited at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, as required by law.
12. She had an additional phrase added to the caption of a copy that would remain in the family, dubbing herself fantastically, “The heroine of New York” (MJM 80.467).
13. “Arrival of the Asia,” Weekly Herald, April 24, 1852, 131; “Death of Prince Torlonia,” Clarence and Richmond Advertiser (Grafton, New South Wales, Australia), March 30, 1886, 4; NYHS-AHMC, Jumel, Mme. Stephen, Eliza J. Chase to Nelson Chase, May 21, 1852.
14. “The Jumel will case,” 5.
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Eliza may have been referring to the explosion of the boiler of the steamer L’Industrie, which took place at Marseille on December 14, 1852. Two or three people were killed and ten or twelve seriously wounded (“Later from Europe,” New York Times, January 3, 1852, 1).
18. “The Jumel will case,” 5.
19. “The Jumel estate case,” New York Herald, January 28, 1873, 8; 1873 Transcript of Record, 294–95.
20. “The Jumel estate case” (for the itinerary). Today the portrait is at the Morris-Jumel Mansion in New York City.
21. “Aaron Burr’s wife,” Kenosha Democrat, March 17, 1854, 2.
22. Ibid.
23. Greatorex, 181.
24. “The Jumel estate case,” New-York Tribune, January 28, 1873, 2.
25. 1876 Bill of Complaint, letter 15.
26. NYHS-JP, box 1, folder 5, Eliza Burr to Jean E. Pery, May 22, 1854.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
29. ADG, 3 E 45740.
30. 1873 Transcript of Record, 297.
31. Ibid.; NYHS-JP box 1, folder 5, Power of attorney from Eliza Burr to Levi K. Bowen; Archives Municipales de Bordeaux, 2 MI D 4/62, no. 373; “State news,” Albany Argus, January 31, 1873, [2].
32. “State news”; New York Post, July 27, 1854 (marriage notice); “The Jumel estate case,” New York Herald, January 28, 1873, [8]. According to the Albany Argus (“State news”), they had a fourth marriage performed by the American consul at Bordeaux, but this seems to be an error. The consul was present for the signing of the marriage contract and the legal registration of the marriage, but did not perform the ceremony (ADG, 3 E 45740; Archives Municipales de Bordeaux, 2 MI D 4/62, no. 373).
33. “State news.”
34. Ancestry.com, New York Passenger Lists, 1820–1957 [database online] (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010).
35. Daily Union (Washington, DC) July 25, 1854, 3. The story was probably published first in one of the New York evening papers the day before. It was picked up by several other newspapers as well. The June 25 dating given to the so-called “letter from Bordeaux” confirms that it was concocted later. The “letter” refers to provisions in the marriage contract, but the contract wasn’t signed until July 5.
CHAPTER 34: A ROMANTIC WIDOW
1. They are listed as passengers on the Atlantic from Liverpool, arriving in New York on August 7, 1854. See Ancestry.com, New York Passenger Lists, 1820–1857 (see chap. 33, n. 34).
2. “The Jumel estate case,” New York Herald, January 25, 1873, 11.
3. NYHS-JP, box 1, folder 5, Eliza Burr to “Monsieur Pery père,” January 22, 1855.
4. NYHS-JP, box 1, folder 5, Eliza Burr to Paul Pery, January 21, 1855.
5. NYHS-JP, box 1, folder 5, Eliza Burr to Eliza Jumel Pery, January 21, 1855.
6. NYHS-JP, box 1, folder 5, Eliza Burr to Eliza and Paul Pery, February 7, 1855.
7. Ibid.
8. She was present at the mansion when the New York State census was taken on June 4, 1855. Ancestry.com, New York, State Census, 1855 [database online] (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013).
9. NYHS-JP, box 2, folder I, Nelson Chase to Jean Edouard Pery, March 22, 1856.
10. Ibid.
11. ADG, 4 M 738/268.
12. “A personal sketch of Madame Jumel, wife of Aaron Burr,” Pioneer and Democrat (Washington Territory), November 14, 1856, [1], reprinted from an 1855 article in the Albany Express.
13. Ibid.
14. NYHS-JP, box 2, folder D, agreement between John Hodgman and Eliza B. Jumel, August 30, 1851.
15. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder D, agreement between Eliza Jumel and James H. Darrow & Co., September 1, 1853.
16. “Madame Jumel’s estate,” New York Herald, November 13, 1866, 4.
17. Ibid.; Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion, June 18, 1853, 399.
18. “Madame Jumel’s estate.”
19. “Madame Jumel’s estate”; Daily Saratogian, August 31, 1857, in Chronicles of Saratoga, ed. Evelyn Barrett Britten (Saratoga Springs, 1959), 195.
20. Ibid.
21. Saratogian, October 1, 1857, [2].
22. Parton, 661. The 1861 edition published by Mason Brothers bears the words “14th edition” on its title page.
23. Parton, 661.
24. Ibid., 660.
25. Ibid., 665.
26. Ibid., 664–65.
27. Ibid., 665.
28. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder E, letters between Samuel A. Pugh and Nelson Chase, dated from May 31, 1862, to May 7, 1863.
29. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder A, agreement between Samuel A. Pugh and Nelson Chase, May 12, 1862.
30. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder E, Samuel A. Pugh to Nelson Chase, June 8, 1862.
31. There is such a document in NYHS-JP (box 1, folder 13), with the header “July 8, 1836,” but with the vice chancellor’s signature dated September 14, 1836.
32. Liber 368:387-88; Isenberg, Fallen Founder, 403 (see chap. 25, n. 21).
33. Liber 368:381–82.
34. E.g., N.Y. Ct. Ch., Eliza Jumel vs. Peter R. Wickoff and others, D. CH 91-J.
35. NYHS-JP, box 3, folder E, Samuel A. Pugh to Nelson Chase, May 7,
1863.
CHAPTER 35: THE END OF AN ERA
1. Michigan Farmer, October 22, 1859, 342, quoting the Saratoga Sentinel.
2. Mathilde, born April 13, 1855, appears to be four or five years old. Her date of birth is given in the 1875 passport application for her in Ancestry.com, U.S. Passport Applications 1795–1925 (see chap. 6, n. 17), although the event is wrongly stated to have occurred in New York. The large buttons on the central placket of Eliza Pery’s bodice also suggest that the photograph was taken c. 1860, when that style was in fashion.
3. Eliza Jumel, Eliza and Mathilde Pery, and Nelson and William Chase are identified in NYHS-AHMC, Mauer, Charles Arthur, unsigned letter (probably from Mauer) to Dorothy C. Barack, February 3, 1950. None of the other figures are named. Paul’s 1856 passport described him as one meter seventy centimeters tall (just under five foot seven inches), with reddish brown hair, a blond beard, an uncovered forehead, an oval face, a small mouth, and a round chin (ADG, 4 M 738/268).
4. “Madame Jumel’s estate,” New York Herald, November 13, 1866, 5.
5. N.Y. Sup. Ct., Eliza B. Jumel vs. John Flinn, 1860 F-12.
6. New York Times, April 11, 1861, 6 (advertisement).
7. “The widow of Aaron Burr has her farm surveyed—the surveyor’s bill,” New York Times, November 12, 1863, 2.
8. They are listed in Trow’s New York City Directory … for the year ending May 1, 1859 (New York: John F. Trow, 1858). 1873 Transcript of Record, 308. The property remained in Eliza Jumel’s possession at the time of her death (N.Y. Sup. Ct., William Ingles Chase vs. Nelson Chase and others, 1878 (-36).
9. See Trow’s New York City Directory for the years ending May 1, 1860, and May 1, 1864; 1873 Transcript of Record, 308.
10. Ancestry.com, 1860 United States Federal Census [database online] (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009).
11. 1873 Transcript of Record, 308. His address continues to be given as “Washington Heights” (or equivalent names for upper Manhattan) in city directories throughout this time period.
The Remarkable Rise of Eliza Jumel Page 34