Many thanks to William Myers, Mary Davy, Sally Young and Sue Davis for their ongoing research collaboration; specifically to William for providing a scan of the original document, and in turn many thanks to Peter Binckley and Patricia D'Arcy "Trish" Binckley (1951-2007), at the source.]
At the end [in the middle] of the Civil War, grandfather's health having failed, he bought a place on the Eastern Shore of Virginia, a mile or so from Eastville. They moved there, hoping the country air would benefit him. Mother had married, and she and Father [John Milton Binckley -- P.D.B.] took The Cottage.
My grandparents loved the Eastern Shore, Some fine old families there, typical of the best traditions of Virginia. However, the region seems to have had its little peculiarities, too as I've heard Mother relate. The inhabitants seem to have been a leisurely sort of folk. The gentlemen went fox hunting in buggies, with their feet hoisted on the dashboard and the reins wrapped around their feet. (I've often wondered if they ever got a fox. Perhaps the hounds took care of that --unless they were as leisurely as the hunters. But maybe the fox was leisurely, too.)
Two of the prominent families of the countryside were named, respectively, Crenshaw and Granger. And the Crenshaws spelled their name G-r-a-n-g-e-r and the Granger spelled their name C-r-e-n-s-h-a-w. Then, at the livery stable at Eastville, there was a hostler who did not want to be a man. He wore a skirt and a sunbonnet. (The only man I ever heard of in my life who wanted to be a woman. Perhaps the only man in history who ever did.) And there was a judge who had a pet goose. The goose went to court with him every day and sat on the bench with him.
General Benjamin Butler was in charge of the Eastern Shore when my grandparents lived there. He seems to have been a good deal of a bully. When he had been in command in New Orleans during the war, he had ordered the women of the city to remain indoors. And he gave orders to his soldiers that if they saw any white woman abroad they could treat her as a woman of the streets. Southern women never forgot or forgave that as long as they lived. Throughout the South he was commonly called Beast Butler. Also Spoons Butler, from his well-known proclivity for looting silver which caught his fancy in the Southern mansions he and his soldiers occupied. While on the Eastern Shore he amused himself by concocting elaborate oaths of [allegiance] to the Union, which swore not to give any food, shelter, or help of any kind to Confederate soldiers, etc. He tried to get the women of that section to sign these iniquitous documents, threatening that if they did not do so he would send them to Cobb's Island. For weeks they had trunks packed. I don't know if General Butler would have gone so far as to actually send them there, At any rate he did not.
Father ardently believed in the preservation of the Union, but his sympathies were all with the South. His mother [Charlotte Stocker -- P.D.B.] was a Marylander and a red-hot rebel. He had a Government [position] in Washington, Judge of Referred Claims. Later he became Assistant Attorney General, and for months Acting Attorney General during the latter's long illness.
Mother's brother, Uncle Willie, had come home ill. He had been captured early in the war, and had spent several years in a Northern prison camp, where he had contracted malaria.
By this time, carpetbaggers were swarming all over the South. Two of them, a father and a raw-boned old maid daughter (as Aunt Sue described her) took possession of grandfather's house and, assisted by some roving soldiers, drove the family out. Grandfather was elderly and feeble, and Uncle Willie sick in bed, so they put up little resistance. The family took refuge in the barn, where they lived for a week. Mother had gone there for the birth of my brother Harvey. [1865 -- P.D.B.] In those days, an accouchement invariably took place at home. Nobody ever dreamed of going to a hospital. It was either at the wife's home or, in the case of a young wife, at her mother's. So Mother and the new baby lived in the barn, too. When the news reached Father in Washington, he was furiously angry. He was not old and feeble, or sick in bed. He was young, healthy, over six feet and powerfully built. He rushed to Eastville and when he got to the gate of the house, he pulled up a gatepost as he passed through and bettered in the door. The carpetbaggers fled.
Grandmother was a woman of great coolness and presence of mind. One evening Grandfather and the other men had gone to Eastville to a political meeting. At this very inappropriate time the house took fire -- presumably a spark from the chimney set the roof afire. By the time it was discovered, the attic was all ablaze. The only man on the place was the lame gardener. The only water was in the well outside. The house could not be saved. Nor could the attic be entered. Grandmother began at the top floor, had the women pull the sheets off the beds, put all the small things in them, tie them up and carry them downstairs, while the men, helped by some of the women servants, carried down the furniture. Each floor was stripped in this way. When the men got home about midnight, the house was in ashes, but everything in it was out on the lawn. The trunks and chests in the attic were lost, of course; they could not be reached. In later years, when Grandmother would mention some heirloom I had never seen, and I'd ask "Where is it now?" it was always "Oh, burned up in that fire."
[Ellen/Nellie/Nella Fontaine Binckley (September 1, 1860-April 27, 1951). Family names and dates were whimsically tweaked by their owners during their lifetime, adding mystery and sometimes causing confusion. For Binckley's "Artist's Life," I'm opting for the full artist's signature name, Nella Fontaine Binckley.
Harvey Mitchell/Michel (1799-1866).
Jane Johnston Mitchell/Michel (1811-1892).
Mother = Mary Louisa/Louise Mitchell/Michel Binckley (1838-1930).Sue Henry Mitchell/Michel (September 15, 1845-March 15, 1940).
William Manning "Willie" Mitchell/Michel (1839-1908).
Benjamin Butler = Benjamin Franklin Butler (1818-1893).
Cobb's Island = a barrier island, now uninhabited.
John Milton Binckley (circa 1831-1878).
Charlotte Stocker Binckley (1788-1877).
Harvey = Harvey Mitchell Binckley (December 10, 1864-1928).]
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