Elizabeth Keckley

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Elizabeth Keckley about 1870

Elizabeth Keckley (also Keckly) (February 1818 in Dinwiddie Court House, Virginia , † May 26, 1907 in Washington, DC ) was an African-American seamstress and writer . Originally a slave , she managed to buy herself and her son out at the age of 30. As a seamstress, she quickly made a name for herself among the wives of high-ranking American politicians and eventually became the milliner and close confidante of the first lady, Mary Lincoln . In addition, she founded aid associations for former slaves. After the end of the Civil War and the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln , Keckley published her autobiography Behind the Scenes, Or Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House in 1868 , which in part her memories of slavery and in part her life the Lincoln family describes. Although suppressed and unsuccessful during Keckley's lifetime, the autobiography is still used today as a source for the Lincoln family life.

Life

Childhood and youth

Memorial plaque for Elizabeth Keckley in Hillsborough , North Carolina

Elizabeth was born in Dinwiddie Court House, Virginia, in February 1818, to the African-American slave Agnes Hobbs. The exact date is unknown as it was not customary to keep the birthdays of slaves. Her mother was married to George Pleasant, the slave of a neighbor who was only allowed to see his family at Easter and Christmas. Agnes Hobbs' job in the household of their masters was tailoring and Elizabeth helped her with that as soon as she was old enough. The knowledge she acquired here would later help her career. Their parents were eventually separated forever when Pleasants' master moved west and took his slave with him. Although she referred to Pleasant as her father in her autobiography, she later stated that her master, Colonel Armistead Burwell, was her father, which may explain why she was referred to as quite fair-skinned by contemporaries. It could also have been a reason for the harshness of their mistress against Elizabeth and Agnes.

At the age of four, Keckley was entrusted with the care of her master's newborn daughter, Elizabeth, and was whipped for the first time in her life when she accidentally rocked the cradle so hard that the baby fell out. Like other slaves, she experienced separations from enslaved families and her uncle committed suicide rather than admitting the loss of farm equipment to his master. At the age of fourteen she was assigned to the household of eldest son Robert Burwell, and four years later the family moved to North Carolina. There, at the instigation of her mistress, Keckley was repeatedly flogged by both Burwell and Headmaster Bingham in order to "break her stubborn pride". Ultimately, Keckley remained the moral winner as both apologized to her and ceased further abuse against her and other servants.

She was also sexually abused for four years by the white Alexander Kirkland, whose son George gave birth to her in 1839. Kirkland died when George was one and a half years old. Years later, when Keckley applied for a pension for widowed mothers of fallen soldiers after the death of her son, she stated that her owner had married her to Kirkland. However, at the time of George's birth Kirkland was verifiably married to Anne McKenzie Cameron and in her autobiography Keckley tells of painful memories of Kirkland's "stalking" and "low lusts". It is therefore possible that she merely claimed to have been his wife in order to legitimize her son and to receive the pension.

Career

Her life changed for the better when she was assigned to the household of Anne Garlands, Colonel Burwell's daughter, and moved to St. Louis with her family in 1842. With the family in dire financial straits, Keckley began working as a tailor and earned a living for a household of eighteen for two years. Her skill, hard work, and engaging demeanor soon gathered a loyal customer base around her, mostly women from the upper classes of the city, whose stories Mary Lincoln would hear about Elizabeth Keckley for the first time. During this time, James Keckley began to woo her, but she initially turned him away because she was afraid of having children with him and since the children of a slave would automatically become slaves themselves. She began to negotiate a price for her freedom with the Garlands, hoping to buy herself and her son out. After much hesitation, Garland finally set the price at $ 1,200.

Since James Keckley assured Elizabeth that she was a free black man, and she had hope of being able to buy herself and her son out soon, she finally married him, probably in 1852. After the wedding, however, it turned out that he was in truth himself a job Was a slave. Keckley later said only a few words about living with her husband, only mentioning that she lived with him for eight years and that he "turned out to be a burden instead of an assistant". In addition to her husband, Keckley still had to support the Garland family financially, so there was hardly any money left for her ransom. After Garland's death, she finally made the decision to travel to New York and raise funds there. For the trip, however, she needed six guarantees for her return. She hoped to get the last one from an acquaintance named Farrow, who however frankly told her that he did not believe in her return. In this situation, her customers came to her aid and collected 1200 dollars for her. With the money, Keckley was able to buy herself and her son out in 1855, and since she still worked as a tailor, she was soon able to repay the amount.

Varina Davis , Elizabeth Keckley's customer

Since her husband wasted her money and drank a lot, she separated from him in 1860 and moved to the north. After a brief stint as a tailoring teacher in Baltimore, she settled in Washington, DC that summer, where she began working as a tailor again. Here, too, she quickly built a loyal customer base and was hired in November as a milliner by Varina Davis , the wife of Senator Jefferson Davis , the future President of the Confederate States of America . From her, Keckley finally learned that war was imminent, but after some deliberation, turned down the offer to accompany the Davis family south. Just before she left, Keckley made two dressing gowns for Varina Davis, one of which, memorably, she found again at a charity sale in Chicago in 1865 after the war. Allegedly, according to legend, Jefferson Davis carried him to his capture.

Keckley's final breakthrough came when she made a dress for Mrs. Lee for the reception of the British Prince of Wales , the future Edward VII. Mrs. Lee recommended her to other ladies who also attended the reception, and Keckley went on to work among other things. a. for Adele Cutts, wife of Stephen A. Douglas . Due to the higher paid jobs, she soon had a regular income, but the demands of her customers also grew. She was expected to complete orders at short notice and overnight and still deliver high quality. In exchange for a very short-term assignment, a customer recommended Keckley to Mary Lincoln shortly after Abraham Lincoln was elected president. As the new First Lady , Mary Lincoln needed a tailor for a representative cloakroom and on March 3, 1861 she selected Keckley from a total of four applicants.

social commitment

Although Keckley remained on friendly terms with the Garland family and other southern whites even after her ransom, her autobiography shows that she viewed the institution of slavery as an injustice. She referred to slaves as "millions trapped in hopeless bondage, bound and bound with chains stronger and heavier than iron handcuffs," and the fate of her son in particular vividly demonstrated to her how arbitrary slavery was, especially in the case of mongrels. She herself was very likely the daughter of a white man and her son also had a white father. In fact, he was so fair-skinned that he was accepted as a white soldier for the Northern Army. Yet his mother's mere status had originally condemned him to slavery.

“Both Anglo-Saxon and African blood flowed in his veins; two streams mingled - one sang of freedom, the other was mute and sullen after generations of despair. Does the stream of life of one race have to bind the other race in chains, as strong and steady as if the Anglo-Saxon part didn't exist? According to the law of God and nature, interpreted by man, one half of my boy was free and why shouldn't the white birthright of freedom lift the curse of the other half and lift them up in the bright, cheerful sunshine of freedom? I could not answer these questions from my heart, although it made me half insane and I learned to view human philosophy with suspicion. "

Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church about 1899

From 1862, former slaves began to pour into the north. Although Lincoln had not given his officers authority to free slaves, the soldiers argued that slaves could be used by the Confederate army as labor to build entrenchments and trenches. Slaves were therefore not officially freed, but rather confiscated as prohibited goods, in English contrabands . Very few of the contrabands had friends or relatives in the north and many were left to their own devices, as white society showed little interest in integrating them.

Keckley, on the other hand, belonged to the free African American elite and was able to help other blacks. She was friends with leading African American civil rights activists, including Frederick Douglass and Henry Highland Garnet. Inspired by charity events for the benefit of injured soldiers, Keckley made the decision to organize aid societies for the contrabands donated by colored sponsors . Her idea was well received at Fifteenth Street Presbytherian Church , and the Contraband Relief Association was launched two weeks later, with forty members. The Church established the first public schools for African American children, including the Colored Mission Sabbath School .

Keckley used a trip by Mary Lincoln to New York and Boston in September 1862 to make contacts among the free blacks of the cities and to secure their help for the organization. A branch of the organization was founded in Boston under the direction of the wives of Pastor Leonard A. Grimes and clergyman Martin. From there, Keckley and the organization received over eighty aid items during the war, donated by free blacks. In New York, the black pastor Henry Highland Garnet organized a meeting at his church, and Frederick Douglass himself helped Keckley raise money and give lectures on behalf of the organization. The Contraband Relief Association has also received funds from Great Britain through its contacts . Abraham and Mary Lincoln also made regular donations. A year after its inception, the organization was renamed the Freedmen and Soldiers' Relief Fund . Keckley herself became president of the organization and held that position from the founding of the association until the publication of her autobiography.

Friendship with Mary Lincoln

Although wicked tongues disparaged Mary Lincoln as vulgar and illiterate, Keckley found that as a first lady she behaved gracefully and confidently. The two women became friends, and Mary Lincoln soon referred to Keckley as "Lizabeth". In her first spring as Mary Lincoln's milliner alone, Keckley made about fifteen dresses for her. The two became particularly close when Lincoln's son Willie became seriously ill and Keckley helped his mother take care of him. When the Lincoln's couldn't cancel a social reception, Keckley stayed at the sickbed. Willie died a few days later and Keckley helped prepare the body for the funeral as Mary Lincoln was nearly incapacitated from the pain. Keckley had also recently lost her son in the battle at Wilson's Creek and Mary Lincoln tried to console her for the loss.

Mary Lincoln in a dress tailored by Elizabeth Keckley

Keckley also defended Mary Lincoln against allegations of secretly sympathizing with the South. For all the intimacy between the two women, Keckley still insisted that Mary Lincoln and other women of her class be above her socially. “It is more compatible with their dignity to send for me and let me come to them than for them to come to see me.” Keckley was also one of the few people who knew of Mary Lincoln's debt. In an attempt to be a worthy Presenter, the first lady had bought many dresses but could not afford most of them. In 1864 her debt was $ 27,000, which is about $ 420,000 today.

Keckley also developed a friendly relationship with Abraham Lincoln. He praised her skills as a seamstress and often talked to her, including about his goats. With Keckley helping Mary Lincoln with dressing and hairdressing before receptions, the President would occasionally come in and ask, "Well, Madam Elizabeth, can you tame my bristles for this evening?" Keckley should have his comb and after his death got his hairbrush as memories. Just before the formal reception for Lincoln's re-election, Keckley congratulated him, to which he replied, “Well, Madam Elizabeth, I don't know whether or not to be grateful. Keckley was impressed by the personality of the President and asked as a reminder Lincoln's right glove, which he wore at the first reception after his second inauguration .

“I will cherish him as a precious memento of the second inauguration of the man who did so much for my race. He was a Jehovah to my people, raising them out of bondage and directing their steps out of the darkness into the light. I will keep the glove and bequeath it to posterity. "

After the fall of the Confederate capital Richmond in April 1865, Keckley accompanied Mary Lincoln there and was able to sit in the chair of the ousted President Jefferson Davis in the congress building. A little later, on April 14th, Abraham Lincoln was murdered. His completely broken widow immediately sent to Keckley, who arrived at her the morning after the attack. During the next few days, Mary Lincoln withdrew completely, tolerating only her children and Keckley around. Keckley later suggested that Mary Lincoln would probably have been more popular if she had received visitors to express their condolences.

Keckley helped the devastated Mary Lincoln pack her things and clear the White House for Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson . She received Mary Lincoln's coat and hat that the first lady had worn during the assassination attempt. Keckley later donated these items along with the hairbrush, comb, and glove to Wilberforce University . By now, Mary Lincoln's debt had grown to $ 70,000 (between $ 864,000 and $ 1,220,000 today) and the former first lady was in serious trouble paying her bills. Despite Keckley's disagreement, she insisted that her friend accompany her to Chicago , although it meant financial difficulties for Keckley as well, as she had to close her business. Keckley helped Mary Lincoln and her sons settle in their new home before finally moving back to Washington, DC. She resumed her business and sewed for President Johnson's daughters Martha and Mary, among others. In 1866 she also visited the Garland family, their former masters.

In March 1867, Mary Lincoln asked Keckley for help. She was still in need of money and she planned to sell the clothes she had worn as first lady to improve her situation. To this end, she suggested a meeting in New York to find a dealer for the clothes. Keckley spent days finding used goods dealers, but no deals were made with them. Eventually, Mary Lincoln followed the directions of Brady and Keyes to use their dresses for an exhibition, a move that the public found profoundly improper. Her fondness for cut-out dresses was ridiculed and generally viewed as wasteful and suspected of promoting corruption in the White House. Keckley tried to publish corrections to explain Mary Lincoln's motives, but it had little effect. For Mary Lincoln's sake, Keckley stayed in New York, but had to take sewing jobs to support herself. Their workrooms were in the house of Amelia Lancaster, a beautician of the New York elite, and next to the salon of Madam Ester, also an Afro-American, famous hairdresser who “served the best people in town and the surrounding area”.

Autobiography

Elizabeth Keckley's engraving from her autobiography

In 1868, Keckley published her autobiography Behind the Scenes, Or Thirty Years a Slave and Four Years in the White House (in German: Behind the Scenes, Or thirty years a slave and four years in the White House ). Elizabeth Keckley lost a lot of money in Mary Lincoln's unsuccessful attempt to sell her wardrobe. During this time she had to close her shop in order to be able to support the first lady. In her tight financial situation, Lincoln was unable to pay her compensation for her services and Keckley was forced to "toil with the needle by day and write by night." In addition to the story of her origins in slavery, the book also covered Keckley's life with the Lincoln family, particularly her friend Mary Lincoln, whose motivation for selling her wardrobe she tried to explain.

It is controversial whether Keckley actually wrote the book himself or dictated her memories. According to a witness, Keckley is said to have told James Redpath her story and he formulated it, giving her the finished texts for inspection. However, there is no doubt that Keckley's narrative is authentic, as most of the events can be found in other sources. According to his own information, Keckley tried to win sympathy for Mary Lincoln and her worsened living conditions with the publication of the book. She also tried to financially support Mary Lincoln with the proceeds. Keckley had supported her efforts to sell her wardrobe and was keen to restore her own reputation as well. However, James Redpath broke his promise to keep Mary Lincoln's letters confidential and published them in the appendix to the book. It is unclear whether he acted knowingly or out of incompetence.

In any case, the autobiography caused a scandal. The former first lady viewed the publication of her letters as a breach of trust and exposure and her son, Robert Todd Lincoln , tried to prevent the book from being published. Although the book did not have a large circulation or circulation, it was mentioned in many American newspapers. The New York Commercial Advertiser described it as a “literary clap of thunder” with terrifying information about the White House. Critics have called Keckley a "treacherous creature" indulged in "backstairs gossip". Keckley's attempt to make money from the book and allegations that she violated the rules governing interaction between black and white women are cited as possible reasons for this hostility. The publication cost her many customers and friendship with Mary Lincoln.

The last few years

Elizabeth Keckley about 1890

After her autobiography was published, Keckley tried to resume business in Columbia District, but her popularity had suffered badly. For this reason, she lived very withdrawn, which is why only a few facts are known about her last years. For example, she made a blanket around 1870, supposedly from scraps of fabric from Mary Lincoln's clothes. In 1880, she ran a newspaper ad in the People's Advocate in Washington, DC, looking for three young women whom she wanted to train as tailors within six months.

Despite the scandal, Keckley still had friends and admirers. She was invited to the Esther couple's wedding and gave the bride a pair of earrings that had once belonged to Mary Lincoln as a gift. She was also still a member of the Fifteenth Street Presbytherian Church and the clergyman Dr. Francis Grimke said that little girls came “only to catch a glimpse of them when they came in. Her beautiful figure, her graceful movements, everything about her seemed perfect. "

In 1892, Keckley was hired to head the Domestic Arts Department at Wilberforce University . For this purpose she moved to Xenia , where she taught dressmaking. In 1893 she was responsible for the university 's exhibition at the World's Columbian Exposition , where u. a. Clothing made by her students and a pincushion made by her were displayed. How long she lived in Ohio is unclear. Some sources said it stayed there until around 1898. According to others, after a stroke she was forced to quit after just under two years. After a brief stay in Philadelphia, she finally returned to Washington, DC. She spent her last years in the Home for Destitute Colored Women and Children , in German 'Home for destitute colored women and children', in whose founding she was instrumental. Her only public appearances during this time were attending church services and weekly carriage rides. She may have been living solely on her survivor's pension, which was twelve dollars a month, during this period. Anna Eliza Williams, an employee of the home, asked her about her book and if she could see it. Keckley replied "that her copy was lost" and that "the book caused her a great deal of suffering and cost her many friends." She was also bitter that she received "not a single dollar" for the book. In an interview with the Minneapolis Register on July 6, 1901, Keckley said of her book: “They printed many things that shouldn't be printed; many things that caused suffering because they were not right. ”The break with Mary Lincoln occupied her for the rest of her life and until the very end a photo of the first lady hung in her room. She told friends in her late years that Mary Lincoln eventually forgave her, although there is no historical evidence for this.

Elizabeth Keckley died in her sleep on May 26, 1907. She was buried in Harmony Cemetery.

progeny

Due to sexual exploitation by Alexander Kirkland, Keckley had a son:

The marriage to James Keckley remained childless.

Modern representations

Elizabeth Keckley is the protagonist of the novels Mrs. Keckley Sends Her Regards by Tim Jorgenson (2007) and Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker by Jennifer Chiaverini (2013).

In Steven Spielberg's film Lincoln played Gloria Reuben Elizabeth Keckley.

Appreciations

2019 it was included in the anthology New Daughters of Africa by Margaret Busby added.

expenditure

Behind the Scenes (1868)
  • Behind the scenes. Or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. GW Carleton Co. Publishers, New York 1868, online version on The Project Gutenberg.
  • Behind the scenes. Or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. Foreword by Henry Louis Gates . Introduction James Olney. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988 ( reprography , the text of the original has 371 pages with appendix)
  • Behind the Scenes or, Thirty years a slave, and Four Years in the White House. Edited and commented on by Frances Smith Foster. RRDonnelly, Chicago, 1998. Paperback University of Illinois Press, 2001, ISBN 0-252-07020-8 .
  • Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. In: William L. Andrews (Ed.): Slave narratives after slavery . Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-517942-2 , pp. 9-130.

literature

  • Jennifer Fleischner: Objects of Mourning in Elizabeth Keckley's "Behind the Scenes". In: Jennifer Fleischner: Mastering slavery: memory, family, and identity in women's slave narratives . New York Univ. Press, New York 1996, ISBN 0-8147-2630-5 , pp. 93-132.
  • Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckley: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. Broadway Books, 2003, ISBN 0-7679-0259-9 .
  • Susan S. Williams: Reclaiming Authorship. Literary Women in America, 1850-1900. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia 2006, ISBN 0-8122-3942-3 .
  • Jill Jepson: Women's concerns: twelve women entrepreneurs of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries . Lang, New York 2009, pp. 115-164.
  • Jean Fagan Yellin, Cynthia D. Bond: The pen is ours: a listing of writings by and about African-American women before 1910 with secondary bibliography to the present . (= The Schomburg library of nineteenth-century black women writers). Oxford Univ. Press, New York 2009, ISBN 978-0-19-506203-8 , pp. 118-120.

Web links

Commons : Elizabeth Keckley  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, sheet 3 of the photo block between p. 180 and 181
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l Gertrude Woodruff Marlowe: Keckley, Elizabeth Hobbs. In: American National Biography Online. Oxford University Press, 2000. ( online edition , accessed July 20, 2015)
  3. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 40.
  4. ↑ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes. 1868, p. 8.
  5. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 78.
  6. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 258.
  7. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 85.
  8. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 16.
  9. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 131.
  10. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 142.
  11. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 304.
  12. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 20.
  13. ^ Frances Smith Foster: Historical Introduction . In: Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 2001, p. Xxxi
  14. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 20 f .: “ The Anglo-Saxon blood as well as the African flowed in his veins; the two currents commingled — one singing of freedom, the other silent and sullen with generations of despair. [...] Must the life-current of one race bind the other race in chains as strong and enduring as if there had been no Anglo-Saxon taint? By the laws of God and nature, as interpreted by man, one-half of my boy was free, and why should not this fair birthright of freedom remove the curse from the other half — raise it into the bright, joyous sunshine of liberty? I could not answer these questions of my heart that almost maddened me, and I learned to regard human philosophy with distrust. ”
  15. ^ A b c Frances Smith Foster: Historical Introduction . In: Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 2001, p. Xxxii
  16. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 210.
  17. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 207.
  18. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 68: “ it would be more consistent with their dignity to send for me, and let me come to them, instead of their coming to me. ”
  19. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 291.
  20. ↑ Online currency converter at measuringworth.com, accessed August 5, 2015
  21. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 263.
  22. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 89.
  23. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 280.
  24. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 69: “ I shall cherish it as a precious memento of the second inauguration of the man who has done so much for my race. He has been a Jehovah to my people — has lifted them out of bondage, and directed their footsteps from darkness into light. I shall keep the glove, and hand it down to posterity. ”
  25. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 282.
  26. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 313.
  27. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 295.
  28. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 310.
  29. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 311.
  30. ^ Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 1868, p. 146.
  31. ^ Susan S. Williams: Reclaiming Authorship. Literary Women in America, 1850-1900. 2006, ISBN 0-8122-3942-3 , p. 135.
  32. ^ Susan S. Williams: Reclaiming Authorship. Literary Women in America, 1850-1900. 2006, ISBN 0-8122-3942-3 , p. 124.
  33. ^ A b c Susan S. Williams: Reclaiming Authorship. Literary Women in America, 1850-1900. 2006, ISBN 0-8122-3942-3 , p. 137.
  34. ^ A b Frances Smith Foster: Historical Introduction . In: Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 2001, p. Xxxix
  35. ↑ a b c d Frances Smith Foster: Historical Introduction . In: Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 2001, p. Xi
  36. ^ A b Frances Smith Foster: Historical Introduction . In: Elizabeth Keckley: Behind the Scenes or, Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House. 2001, p. Xliii
  37. ↑ Jennifer Fleischner: Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship between a First Lady and a Former Slave. 2003, p. 324.
personal data
SURNAME Keckley, Elizabeth
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Hobbs, Elizabeth; Hobbs Keckley, Elizabeth; Garland, Lizzie
BRIEF DESCRIPTION African American milliner and author
DATE OF BIRTH February 1818
PLACE OF BIRTH Dinwiddie Court House, Virginia
DATE OF DEATH May 26, 1907
Place of death Washington, DC