Civil War Fundraiser from Newlin Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania

"Liberty

1862"

https://mycchc.catalogaccess.com/objects/13873

Museum cataloging notes: "According to old card, 'Made by women of Newlin Township in 1864 and chanced off at Fair for sick in field hospitals in Civil War. Said to have brought $200.00 Quilt was presented to the late Hugh E. Steele, then owner of the Laurel Iron works, in whose home the quilting had been done by wives of the mill operators.' "

West Chester Record, June 4, 1864

The Great Central Fair was held in Philadelphia's Logan Square in June, 1864

The applique---a standard wreath design

I've been digitizing patterns for traditional applique.

Here's one that's close to the Chester County wreath.

Anna (Hannah) Baldwin Rakestraw Steele (1819-1895) must have hosted the quilting parties for the wives of her husband's employees....

some of whom lived in the workers' housing near the iron mill

on the West Branch of Brandywine Creek.

Mortonville, home of the Laurel Iron Works

The Steeles were members of the local Doe Run Presbyterian Church

Read a post about a visit to the Great Central Fair here:
https://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2017/11/a-day-at-philadelphias-great-central.html

Washington Whirlwind #12: Windblown Square

 

Washington Whirlwind #12 by Jeanne Arnieri.

 Windblown Square recalls the Lincoln family's life after the White House years.

Heritage Auction

Thomas "Tad" Lincoln at about 14 in 1867

Mary Todd Lincoln left with youngest son Thomas "Tad" for company tried to establish a life as the widow of a martyred and idolized President.

Early 1870s

Spiritualism continued to offer some solace in her windblown years. Charlatan photographer William H. Mumler captured her with this photo superimposing Lincoln's spirit on her portrait. Gullible people like Mary always ready to believe in alternate realities took this kind of "evidence" as Spiritualist gospel.

Never satisfied in one place very long Mary began her new life in Chicago, where eldest son Robert lived, buying a house at what is now 1238 West Washington Boulevard, east of Union Park. 

Chicago

Windblown Square, the plan by Becky Brown

After a restless year she rented it out and traveled to Europe. She never returned to live in the house but continued to store trunks and boxes there. She also brought much baggage with her on extended visits to Europe beginning in October, 1868. Being both a hoarder and a woman never content for long in one spot is a bad combination of disorders. And now we can add severe depression to that list of mental problems.

"I am so miserable, I feel like taking my own life. My darling boy, my Taddie alone, I fully believe prevents the deed....I am positively dying with a broken heart and the probability is that I shall be living but a very short time."       Mary Lincoln to Elizabeth Keckly, January 12, 1868

Thomas "Tad" Lincoln in Frankfurt, Germany at 16 in 1869.

He spent about 2 years in a German boarding school.

Tad looking like a German student with a buzz cut. As a former special education teacher I fret about him in German schools. He was hard to understand in English and had an obvious learning disability....

How did German boarding school go?

Tad, about 1870. 

Mary and Tad returned to the U.S.in 1871.

July, 1871

Tad's health deteriorated and Mary worried about a cold he'd caught on the ocean voyage in the winter of 1870-1871. In another devastating blow, Tad died of a lung disorder a few months later.  

Windblown Square by Denniele Bohannon

Mourning cockade

Mary's history of bereavement as widow of an idolized American martyr should have made her a sympathetic figure in the public eye but as they say about those with narcissistic personalities: She was her own worst enemy. Once obsessive about clothing she spent her post-war years obsessing about finances. Although she had adequate resources she publicly hounded Congress for a pension and complained about the generous amount once it was granted. Anxious about her money she pinned securities, bonds and cash to her undergarments, behavior that alarmed her only surviving son attorney Robert who realized it was public knowledge and she was in danger of being attacked. He hired a bodyguard to follow her in secret. 

Lincoln Financial Group

Mary Lincoln's stationery 1867

"A piece in the morning Tribune, signed 'B' ...says there is no doubt Mrs. L is deranged and had been for years past and will end her life in a lunatic asylum." 

Mary Lincoln letter to Elizabeth Keckly, October 9, 1867

Windblown Square by Elsie Ridgley 

Bellevue Place

If public opinion deemed her insane Robert agreed and had her institutionalized for what he believed to be her own good in 1875. She spent three months at Bellevue Place Sanitarium in Batavia, Illinois, working to free herself, persuading sister Elizabeth and her husband Ninian Edwards to accept responsibility for her, now "restored to reason." 

After one more lonely trip to Europe, she spent her last years in the care of the Edwards relatives who gave her a home in Springfield. Mary occupied her days sifting through her fabrics in her trunks and boxes---dress silks and laces a widow could never wear; draperies for houses she did not live in. She died in July, 1882.

Windblown Square by Elsie Ridgley

We'll give Julia Taft Bayne the last word. In closing out her memoir of the Tafts and the Lincolns she wrote of the assassination's effect on the former First Lady:

"Mrs Lincoln was not fitted to withstand a violent blow to her emotions. If....she could not stand even the sight of Willie's playmates, what would be the result of [that] awful shock....She literally went wild with sorrow. I do not believe her mind ever fully recovered its poise."

Julia with Calvin Coolidge in 1928

Julia, our reporter on the Lincoln family, grew up to marry Congregational minister John Strawn Bayne from Illinois in 1869. They had four sons and a daughter during their midwest postings. Brother Horatio II "Bud" became an accountant and died in Rockford, Illinois in 1915. He was said to look much like their cousin William Howard Taft, President from 1909 to 1913 (a rather distant cousin.)  Halsey "Holly," also went into banking and died in 1897. Youngest brother William lived in Chicago.

Do read Julia Taft Bayne's Tad Lincoln's Father, on which this year's BOM was based. It's been reprinted by the University of Nebraska Press's Bison Books.

https://books.google.com/books?id=F5UaW8odX0kC&printsec=frontcover&dq=tad+lincolns+father&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi70Ij4mcP9AhUGHTQIHUwIB50Q6AF6BAgEEAI#v=onepage&q=tad%20lincolns%20father&f=false 

The Block

Uh oh! I've been so distracted lately I forgot to post the actual pattern.

Sorry!

1875

http://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2023/01/mary-lincoln-had-fabric-problem.html

Washington Whirlwind, all 12 blocks by Elsie Ridgley

And Jeanne Arnieri

The story of the Lincoln White House and Tad and his mother turned out

to be a lot sadder than I expected. I think if Tad were living today we could do

a lot for him---Special Education and surgery might have made his life happier and longer.

 His mother, whom I have always been curious about, is a different story. She looks to

have been a classic Narcissist with a personality disorder that seems incurable.

Hope next year's BOM's are more cheerful!

I think you will enjoy the pieced Petticoat Press.

Washington Whirlwind: Links to the 2024 Pieced BOM

 

Links to the dozen 2024 blocks: 

Introduction with sets, etc.

https://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2023/12/2024-pieced-bom-washington-whirlwind.html

See our Facebook Group and post your blocks!

WashingtonWhirlwindQuilt

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2682765051880664 

Whirlwind by Janet Gluesenkamp

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #1: Whirlwind

Boy's Playmate by Laura Stewart

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #2: Boy's Playmate

Lincoln's Platform by Cindy Brouillard

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #3: Lincoln's Platform

4 Next Door Neighbor by Denniele Bohannon

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #4: Next Door Neighbor

5 Road to the White House by Heidi Kapszukiewicz

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #5: Road to the White House

6 Columbian Puzzle by Roberta Goulding Brunet

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #6: Columbian Puzzle

7 Whirling Star by Marie Boop

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind # 7: Whirling Star

8 White House Steps by Laura Stuart

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #8: White House Steps

Lady in the White House by Janet Nagy Hanley

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind # 9: Lady in the White House

10 President's Block by Erica Cannon

Civil War Quilts: Washington Whirlwind #10: President's Block

11 Road to the White House by Jeanne Arnieri

https://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2024/11/washington-whirlwind-11-road-to-white.html

#12 Windblown Square by Elsie Ridgley

https://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2024/12/washington-whirlwind-12-windblown-square.html

You can buy a pattern packet for Washington Whirlwind ---14 pages to print yourself for $12.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1614892877/washington-whirlwind-blockofthemonth

And post your progress on our Facebook group page: WashingtonWhirlwindQuilt

https://www.facebook.com/groups/2682765051880664

Kentucky Classic #9: Bluegrass Bouquet for Sarah Nelson Edwards

Bluegrass Bouquet by Elsie Ridgley

Bluegrass Bouquet, our last block in the Kentucky Classic series of nine blocks, was inspired by a medallion appliqued by Sarah Nelson Edwards of Harrodsburg, Kentucky in Mercer County.

Sallie's design is a far more complicated bouquet than our square block. We assume she made this red and green extravaganza in the 1850s when she was about 20. We used her corner carnations for pattern #3:

Elsie Ridgley's finished all nine blocks and bordered her top.

Sarah Anne Connor Nelson Edwards (1836-1922)

Harrodsburg is not far from Garrard County---

about 15 miles from Bryantsville. Sallie lived in Mercer County all her life.

The 1850 census shows her at 14 living with several 

Nelsons on their Mercer County farm. 

In 1860 she married William W. Edwards who spent his career in banking after serving with the Union's Ninth Kentucky Cavalry. The year the Civil War began she gave birth to her only child, Loulie, a quiltmaker too according to the magazine article.

Loulie Edwards Vivion (1861-1941)

Loulie's quilt which looks to be Marie Webster's Wreath of Roses.

Loulie had family in the fabric business. Her husband Grant Vivion owned The Big Store, a

 general store in Harrodsburg.

The Block

Bluegrass Bouquet

Kentuckian Billie Jo Rondi Leslie's version

Blocks 1 to 9 in the side-by-side set

15" blocks = 45" Square

Becky Brown expanded on Sallie Ann's ideas for her

Kentucky Classic medallion

Sallie's quilt was pictured on the cover of 

Lady's Circle Patchwork Quilts in Spring, 1983

Sallie's block is rectangular, allowing for more imagery.

Gail Smith's reproduction interpretation Homage to Sallie Ann, 

pattern by the late Di Ford, quilted by Angela McCorkle.

Pauline's version quilted by Desley Maisano at 

Addicted to Quilts:

https://addictedtoquilts.blogspot.com/2012/06/homage-to-sallie-ann.html

With Sallie Ann's block we are finished with the Kentucky Classic.

Becky Brown

Either Medallion style....

Becky Collis

Becky C's Block #1

Or Block by Block

Links for all 9 patterns:

https://civilwarquilts.blogspot.com/2024/10/links-for-kentucky-classic.html