A Very Special Lady

We know very little about Elizabeth Monroe, wife of James, the 5th President of the United States, because James so bereft when she died, burned all of her letters.

I always thought Dolly Madison was our only other regal First Lady next to Jacqueline Kennedy, but after reading…

The Last Founding Father, by Harlow Giles Unger, about her amazing husband, I see it was Mrs. Monroe.

Beautiful, cultured, turning the White House into a Show Place in 1817 the way Jackie did in 1961.

Who knew?

But the story that stays with me is what she did before that when George Washington appointed her husband, Minister to France in 1794.

It was during the horrific Reign of Terror when members of the French aristocracy were arrested then executed without trial or jury.

Even just the reading of it is chilling, making me think of what’s happening now, how arbitrarily lives our being ruined upon rumor more than proven truth, but back to a more chivalrous time.

Adrienne de Lafayette, wife of the Marquis de Lafayette, one of our Revolutionary War heroes, and her whole family were arrested and jailed, her grandmother, mother and sister, all sent to the guillotine, Adrienne next in line, until Elizabeth became determined to save her.

She’d brazenly show up in front of the jail in her unmistakable coach, arms filled with food since the conditions for prisoners were famously bad.

The French, who respected the Monroes, got embarrassed that this elegant American came daily to see her friend, finally releasing Adrienne to save face.

I can’t say enough how this story moves me, the courage during a time when all bets were off humanity wise. They could have arrested Mrs. Monroe, throwing her in the next cell.

Yet the lady she was, still prevailed.

Elizabeth Monroe died September 23, 1830 at age 62.

Her husband, so grief-stricken, passed away less than a year later.

How’s that for a legacy?

SB