The letters of Anna Calhoun Clemson, written to family and friends, and dating from 1833, her sixteenth year, to 1873, two years before her death, span the tumultuous years of the Antebellum, Civil War, and Reconstruction South. With few breaks in continuity, they record the daily activities, joys, and tragedies experienced by Anna, the Calhoun and Clemson families, their relatives and friends throughout a period of great historical significance. All aspects of life are recorded with candor and poignancy as Anna moves from girlhood exuberance through the momentous changes of married life and childbearing years, to the resignation of midlife, the deaths of parents, siblings, and ultimately, the loss of all of her four children. / As the daughter of southern statesman John C. Calhoun and wife of Philadelphian Thomas G. Clemson, who served six years as Charge d'Affaires to Belgium, Anna writes vividly of life in Up Country South Carolina, the political scene in Washington, D.C., and of international affairs from Brussels. Following the Clemsons' return to the United States in 1851, and their subsequent purchase of a farm near Bladensburg, Maryland, Anna's letters give eloquent evidence in the approaching war years of diverging interests and the pull of family loyalties on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line. Letters of Anna's last decade deal with the hardships of war and the return to South Carolina, where her final years were spent in community service and in trying to unravel tangled family estates. / The value of this collection of 272 letters as a primary source for the life of a woman of Southern planter family background is enhanced by additional insights into the boarding house lifestyle of Congressional families in Washington, political battles at state and national levels, the concerns of a rapidly expanding nation, and diplomatic relations with Europe. Seen through the eyes of a woman of a politically involved family and encompassing pre- to post-Civil War years, this collection offers a singularly consistent viewpoint and adds significantly to the documentation of southern family life and women's studies. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-12, Section: A, page: 4610. / Major Professor: Elisabeth Muhlenfeld. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1993.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_77064 |
| Contributors | Sublette, Julia Wright., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 924 p. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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