Edward William Johnston: The Pierre Toussaint Connection

Thanks to Arthur Jones' marvelous  Pierre Toussaint: A Biography (Doubleday, 2003), the Pierre Toussaint-Edward William Johnston connection via his wife, Estelle Villagrand Johnston, is becoming clearer to me. Toussaint was friends with her, her sister B. D. Villagrand and with her father, Jerome Villagrand (see Jones, Pierre Toussaint, pages 14, 166, 212, 288, 296 and 298).

Another perspective is given on the disastrous attempts to sustain a school for girls, first at Liberty, Virginia, and then at the Roanoke Female Seminary at Botetourt Springs, Virginia (sometimes called Roanoke Academy), on the grounds formerly owned by Charles Johnston and now Hollins University.  Edward William Johnston and his wife Estelle, after visiting New York City, had by 1839 relocated from Columbia, South Carolina, and attempted to coordinate a teaching program with Jane Wood Johnston (Edward's younger sister) and her husband Harvey Mitchell (sometimes spelled Michel), an artist. Their students included Eliza Maria Johnston and Nicketti Floyd.

From every perspective, things went wrong with the operation. Edward William Johnston wrote to Letitia Preston Floyd, Nicketti's mother, on August 26, 1839: "Changes in my arrangements, which have diminished my expected resources, threaten me with a serious want of money." (Trigg-Floyd Collection, Special Collections, John Cook Wyllie Library, The University of Virginia's College at Wise -- formerly Clinch Valley College -- Wise, Virginia.) 

In Pierre Toussaint, Arthur Jones quotes Estelle Villagrand Johnston [misspelled as Johnson] in a letter to Toussaint. In it, she explains that her brother-in-law (i.e. Harvey Mitchell), "a wondering artist, committed the school without their knowledge to a $1,000 debt. 'This is the cause of our ruin.'"  The letter continues: "Pray for us my friend, for there is nothing more efficacious than the  prayers of the good." (Jones, Pierre Toussaint, page 298).

Estelle's version dovetails with her husband's letter to their nephew, John Preston Johnston, then starting at West Point, dated November 10, 1839: it's was Harvey Mitchell's fault, and his sister Jane's. To make matters worse, they'd even attempted to start up a rival school. (Robert Morton Hughes Collection, Special Collections, Old Dominion University Library, Norfolk, Virginia).

Joseph Eggleston Johnston visited in November, and according to Estelle's correspondence with Toussaint as related by Arthur Jones, there were attempts to secure Edward William Johnston a teaching position at the University of Virginia as a way out of the Botetourt Springs mess. (See Jones, Pierre Toussaint, page 298).

However, up in snow-bound West Point, John Preston Johnston took another view entirely, heavily influenced by his sister Eliza's perspective. If anyone was at fault for the failed schools, it was Estelle!  "[O]ur noble 'Madame Estelle Antonie de la Costar' . . . has rendered herself not able and distinguished in all that Country by her unmistakable fondness for the 'Water of Life,'" he wrote to William Radford, another uncle, on January 31, 1840. "This then is the secret of Uncle Edward's losing all his scholars," he continued. "I always knew and always said, even while in Liberty, that the cursed old Hag would ruin him yet. T'would be a blessing to the World if she could be secretly poisoned, a thing, by the way I, would not hesitate to do 'pro bono publico.' . . . It is entirely  distressing to think that so excellent a man as Uncle Edward must always be clogged by such a 'Witch of Hell' and all his fortunes ruined on her account." (Robert Morton Hughes Collection, Special Collections, Old Dominion University Library, Norfolk, Virginia).

So, according to Estelle Villagrand and Edward William Johnston, the fault belonged to Harvey and Jane Mitchell, and according to Eliza and John Preston Johnston, it was all Estelle's fault. In any case, Valley Union Seminary came into being in 1842 under entirely different management after the collapse of Roanoke Female Seminary, evolving into Hollins Institute in the 1850s, Hollins College in the early 20th century and eventually, Hollins University.      

For more on the context of the initial saga, please see also Erik Donald France, Joseph E. Johnston and the Family List, UMI #9997263 (Temple University, 2001). Hopefully, more will be revealed by further collective research.