Am I a "Janeite" Now?

Romances are not my genre of choice, but I truly enjoyed Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. The writing, while clearly in typical nineteenth-century style, was not bogged down with description like many books of that era--or even some romance novels of today. I found the characters engaging and especially enjoyed the sassy protagonist, Elizabeth Bennet.

Elizabeth and her four sisters are anxiously looking for advantageous marriages to prevent the poverty they face at their father’s death. Having no male heirs, the family estate will be inherited by a distant cousin.

The story revolves around the complications of the Bennet household that includes a detached dad, a mother with the sensibilities of a fifteen-year-old, and five young women engaged in a myriad of flirtations and romantic entanglements. Elizabeth is the most intelligent of the daughters and more adverse to an unhappy marriage than a reduced station in life, proven by her refusal to marry the cousin in question.

Elizabeth meets Mr. Darby, the close friend of her sister, Jane's, beau, and immediately finds him detestable. She is appalled when he also requests her hand in marriage and, in no uncertain terms, tells him exactly how she feels about him. Not your usual demure ingenue. By the next morning, however, she makes discoveries that shake her formidable self-confidence to the core. A tumble of events follows that kept me glued to the book until the last word.

The story takes place amid the conventions and hierarchy of the nineteenth-century English gentry which fascinated, yet confused me. Published in 1812, Austen assumes these practices and class distinctions are common knowledge, but to me, they are quite foreign.

However, due to the author’s delightful writing style, colorful characters, and intriguing setting, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and plan to add Sense and Sensibility to my reading list. So include me on the long list of Jane Austen fans. I am now a "Janeite."

Making Sweetgrass Baskets



Miss Margaret's sweetgrass baskets

Last month I gave myself a birthday gift--sweetgrass basketmaking lessons. To me, this is the best kind of research there is. Hands-on!

I am very interested in the rice culture of colonial South Carolina. I hope for it to play an important role in one of my books. While my husband attended a professional conference in the Georgetown, South Carolina area, I toured an old rice plantation, Hopsewee.

I will write more on the plantation itself soon. While I was on the website investigating what they had to offer, however, I noted they offered the basketmaking class. I promptly emailed them and signed up.

Miss Margaret

On a very soggy May 9^th, after touring the plantation, I met Miss Margaret outside their tea room where she had surrounded herself with her works of art. This craft was brought to the Charleston area about 300 years ago by West African slaves, and the methods and designs have changed very little since then. Miss Margaret informed me that some within her community were unhappy about these lessons to outsiders, but my participation was purely for fun and curiosity.

I was the only student so I got the best possible attention. The baskets are made from a local reed called sweetgrass which has the most wonderful natural scent. Apparently it is quite hard to come by these days, as I was informed by my tutor. “I don’t know who would sell it to you,” she said.

Again, not to worry. If I get very ambitious, pine straw is also used and we have a glut of that in my town. The bands that weave the grasses together are made from strips of palmetto fronds, which are specially treated to keep them flexible. That secret is also safe; I don’t know how to do it.

Miss Margaret started a basket for me before I arrived. “I don’t teach people how to start ’em,” she told me. I really don’t know what the community is worried about. She obviously left out plenty of crucial information.

The tool I used

I watched closely as Miss Margaret worked. We used a simple tool made from the handle of a spoon which had been rounded and smoothed by one of her family members. With this, I eventually learned to work the grass and bind the rows together.

Miss Margaret is seventy-five years old and has worked this art all her life. Although I am basically a shy introvert, I felt immediately comfortable with her and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Her personality was delightful.

I’m not sure how she felt about me as a student, however. When learning, I like to repeat the instructions given in my own words to be sure I understand. On a couple of occasions, while I did that, she leaned forward and said, “LISTEN to me!” and repeated her instructions more slowly. Hmm.

Finally, she said, “You’re a school teacher, right?”

“Right.”

“You ask an awful lot of questions,” she said flatly. I don’t think it was a compliment.

Well, within two hours I made myself a little basket to collect--whatever. I had a fun time learning something most people don’t know and met a perfectly charming person while doing so. On top of that, I have a very cool conversation piece in my den.

Happy birthday to me!

My masterpiece!

Another Roadblock, Another Lead

It’s been eating at me. Am I a descendant of Adam Bingaman and his consort, Mary Ellen Williams? I love to watch Finding Your Roots on PBS and wondered if matching a DNA test with a known descendant was possible. Like I’ve got that kind of money.

There are many people who list my known ancestor, Frances Bingaman Pryor, as one of the couple’s children, but more academic investigations do not. So I decided that if it could be verified chronologically, I would make the leap of faith that we are descended from her.

According to census records from England in 1861 and 1871, Frances was born in Mississippi around 1826. Her sister, Cordelia Bingaman, lived with her in England and died in New Jersey at the age of 63. I found her obituary in the old Red Bank Register of 1891. Therefore, she was born around 1828.

But when was Mary Ellen Williams born?

Looking for evidence of Cordelia’s earlier life, I discovered that both her name and Mary Ellen’s were listed on the New Orleans Register of Free People of Color. This information has been bound in a book published by Le Comité des Archives de la Louisiane. I had to have a copy.

When it arrived in the mail, I boldly ripped open the envelope. The answers to my questions lay inside. I flipped to page 126 and there it was.

Mary Ellen Williams registered as a free person of color in April of 1857 following an act of the legislature allowing her move from Natchez. This I knew from previous investigations where her protector, Adam Bingaman, had appealed to his legislative cronies to act on Mary Ellen’s behalf. At that time she was thirty-eight years old.

That puts her year of birth at 1819. She would have been seven years old when Frances was born. Mary Ellen Williams is NOT my ancestor.

HOWEVER, Cordelia Bingaman is also named in the register. To my surprise, she was listed in 1857 as the three-year-old daughter of Amelia Bingaman. This was not my great-great aunt, Cordelia. But it says that her mother, Amelia, was born in Natchez in 1827. Could she have been another sister to Frances and Cordelia? Did she name her daughter after her own sister?

On Ancestry.com, a descendant of Amelia Bingaman lists her mother as the child of Adam L. Bingaman and a woman named Millie. Could Millie also be the mother of Frances?

Stay tuned as I delve into this possible link.

"The Feast of All Saints"

While Ann Rice can be credited for starting our modern fascination with vampires* (The Vampire Chronicles), her second novel, The Feast of All Saints, is a study in the 1840’s New Orleans world of the gens de couleur libres, or free people of color. As I have noted in earlier posts, the system of plaçage played a huge role in the lives of these people, a life I believe my ancestors knew well.

Rice’s website describes her book as “a painfully historically rich and accurate novel that delicately and clearly draws patterns of irony and injustice together through complex family relationships and social structures.” In 2001, it was made into a mini-series with an all-star cast which Rice claims is the most faithful adaptation of her work. See the trailer below:

Watching this movie added another layer to my understanding of the privileges and deprivations imposed on those then called “colored.” Amazingly, the mini-series has been divided into twenty-one segments and posted on YouTube, but for a less chopped-up version, we rented from Netflix. Either way, it’s a fascinating scrutiny of this long-ago way of life.

*These days we are inundated with vampires. Hollywood has even turned Abraham Lincoln into a “vampire slayer”! (Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter) Is there no end?

Benjamin January, Detective

“A lush and haunting novel of a city steeped in decadent pleasures...and of a man, proud and defiant, caught in a web of murder and betrayal.”

So begins Amazon.com’s book description of A Free Man of Color, the first in the Benjamin January mystery series.

Like millions of others, I love a good mystery. But what sets this series apart is where it is set--in New Orleans of the 1830s when the transition from a Spanish/French culture to an American one was just beginning. The protagonist is also unusual. Benjamin Janvier/January is a man of mixed heritage, but free. His mother was a mulatto slave, freed to become the placé e (consort) of her master and she took her slave son, Ben, with her. The boy grew to be educated in Paris, as was the custom for young free men of color, where he became a trained surgeon as well as an accomplished musician.

Life circumstances, including saving his own skin, led him to also become an amateur detective. You see, the murder in this story was that of a young, ravishing octoroon during the Bal de Cordon Bleu, the Octoroon Ball where placé es were presented.

Now you see my interest in this book. If you have read my posts (go to Labels in sidebar, click "placage") regarding my family history, you will know that I suspect my ancestors have been part of the tradition known as plaç age. One way to research a lifestyle is through fiction, thereby utilizing the research of someone else. Truth be told, doesn’t all research depend on the knowledge and discoveries of someone else?

I'm reading this one now.

Of course, I do not take the customs and lifeways of novels as facts. But they are a jumping-off point to verify such things on my own. For instance, author Barbara Hambly has the Octoroon Ball held a mere passageway from a corresponding ball for legitimate wives, daughters, and nieces. This is fascinating and amazingly bold of these husbands and brothers, but I have yet to find confirmation of this practice from another source. It may just create great story tension--which it does when a plantation mistress, the former student of January, sneaks into the Octoroon Ball in disguise moments before the murder takes place.

If this period of history and the very unique racial hierarchy of New Orleans interest you--and you love a good murder mystery--I highly recommend this book. There are at least eleven books in the series and I am reading the second now. I will tell you that the beginning is a bit of a struggle to keep straight with several characters having confusing French names. But stick with it; it soon becomes clear and exciting.

With the search into my past, I feel like I’ve discovered a whole new world I had never heard of before. Research boring? I don’t think so.

"I went to Manderley again..."

I first read Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier in the eighth grade and loved it for its romance, but more for its darkness and mystery. Now, about forty-six (yikes) years later, I loved it again, but obviously with a new view.

This English romantic suspense written in the 1930s features a protagonist whose first name is never revealed. Du Maurier later stated she just couldn't think of one. However, the very young lady’s companion falls into company with the older, more cultured Maximillian de Winter, master of the country estate, Manderley. The two meet in the south of France where he is recovering from the tragic death of his wife, Rebecca.

They fall in love, marry, and return to the beautiful, yet oppressive manor house. There, when compared to the fabulous Rebecca, the new Mrs. de Winter falls painfully short in the eyes of the servants, friends, and family of her new husband. She finds the memory of her “perfect” predecessor an overwhelming obstacle to happiness. And then things go bad.

The second Mrs. de Winter is meek, unsure, and eager to please--a good description of my eighth-grade self. She is not beautiful or classy like Rebecca had been; it seems she has little fashion sense or charm of any kind. Again, a good description of me at thirteen. I could feel her humiliation at each faux pas and snide remark about her hair, her skirts, even her reticence to offer opinions.

Now, closing in on sixty, I read the book from my post-menopausal perch and mentally urged the character to speak up, ask questions, talk to the more friendly characters, wishing on her a confidence I only learned over years. Yet, I fully empathized with the girl and pulled for her every step of the way.

Another difference is the lifetime of experiences that helped me comprehend the complications and deep personal risks for the players. My goofy little grade-eight self had no reference for such emotions--except fear and humiliation. But the story grabbed both “me’s” with equal passion.

Rebecca, it seems, has the greatest trait of a classic story: it holds up over decades. Here is a book I loved as much at thirteen as fifty-nine, albeit for different reasons. It has a depth that appeals to many aspects of the reader and never disappoints. I cannot recommend this book more strongly.

Who's Your Daddy?

In 1869, the Supreme Court of Louisiana published its recent findings, including Case No. 1639, St. Felix Casanave, Administrator, v. Adam L. Bingaman. To understand the premise of this case, please read the post below or click here. Otherwise, suffice it to say that Adam Bingaman and his consort, Mary Ellen Williams, may well be my ancestors.

I don’t know if these two guys hated each other or were just greedy; either is possible. Casanave was unofficially Bingaman’s son-in-law. I found a letter from 1860 written by Mary Ellen Williams to inform her friend, as she says, “of the marriage of my daughter, Marie Sophie Charlotte Bingaman to St. Felix Cazanave” in the St. Louis Cathedral on April 30^th of that year. Yet, Charlotte’s obituary lists her by her maiden name and as Casanave’s consort. Casanave was mulatto like her, so I’m confused.

Either way, on July 12, 1867, following the drowning of his brother-in-law, James, Casanave put through the paperwork to be named administrator of the boy’s considerable estate (again, see the previous post).

On the 9^th of July, three days before, Bingaman had filed a claim that he was the boy’s natural father and sole heir. Court records state that ol’ Adam had formally recognized his mixed-race children in July of 1865. To do that, one needed to make a formal statement before a notary public and two witnesses. The lower courts recognized this as legal and named Bingaman as the heir.

This seems to have incensed Casanave, who took the case to this higher court. Quoting the court’s decision, “The grounds upon which the plaintiff chiefly relies are: First, that the defendant was not the father of J. A. Williams; second, defendant could not legally acknowledge him” because Louisiana laws forbid a white man from “legitimating his colored children.” Casanave claimed that Bingaman’s profession of fatherhood came after years of public denials and it was “evidently made in the exclusive interest of himself, and was therefore inadmissible without additional proofs…”

This is where it gets sticky. Further research took me to the New Orleans’s newspaper, The Times-Picayune, which printed the obituary of Casanave’s wife/consort, Charlotte, under the name Bingaman, taken from the man he claimed was NOT the father of her brother. Also, I was stunned to discover Charlotte was already dead before her brother’s tragic accident, and Casanave had remarried two days after James died, merely two months after Charlotte’s death. I smell greed.

Whatever the case, the court didn’t give much weight to any denials of paternity Bingaman might have uttered. They probably made a few such denials themselves. To the point that it was illegal to do so, they claimed the law only forbid such recognitions when the children were deemed “adulterous and incestuous bastards.” Harsh. Since no incest had occurred and Bingaman was not married at the time of their conception (his wife was deceased), the judges saw no impediment to his declaration of fatherhood.

They did make clear that “illegitimate children who have not been legally acknowledged, are allowed to prove their paternal descent provided they be free and white; provided also, that free illegitimate children of color may also be allowed to prove their descent from a father of color only…”

We can’t have a darker version of the master knocking on the plantation door, crying, “Papa!” now, can we? But since this was a white guy claiming his child of color, and no wife existed to be disgraced, it was okay.

Chalk another one up to the Good Ol’ Boy System.