Friday, March 16, 2018

Nella Fontaine Binckley: "Odds and Ends from an Artist's Life," Chapter VII, Part 1

[Nella Fontaine Binckley, "Odds and Ends from an Artist's Life," Chapter VII, part 1. From a transcription annotated by Patricia D'Arcy Binckley of typewritten original, February 25, 2005. Original "written some time after 1941 by Nellie F. Binckley, 1860-1950 or 51." Notes in brackets are mine, unless followed by the initials "P.D.B." Occasionally, additional paragraph breaks inserted for easier reading. 

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.]


That summer [1883, Harvey Michel had died by now -- M.J.B.] Mother decided to go to California. Harvey had gone to Cuba with a surveying party, as he was learning to be a civil engineer. I was extremely anxious to go to New York to study art and was saving every cent I could for that, so I was staying in New York[?] They went to Bellevue for a farewell visit and I went with them. It was good to see them all again. Aunt Charlotte and the beloved Wingfields. And the blessed Peaks, as beautiful as I remembered them. I recall Aunt Charlotte saying once that during the Civil War there had been a great comet and that it stood right between the Peaks like a flaming sword.

One day, old Uncle Harrison, Grandfather's body servant, appeared at the house. He had heard that Mother was going to California and had come all the way from Wheatley [Wheatly] to sat goodbye to Miss Lou. He was now ninety-six and said he knew he would never see her again. He was a striking looking old man. His skin was a pale yellow and his features straight and regular. He was the grandson of an African king, of a different tribe from the ones from which the slave traders usually took their victims. 

He had a mass of straight hair, now snowy white. I made a small sketch of him in oils as he sat on the porch. He stayed all day, of course, and then one from his family took him home. None of his various descendants had ever been able to get him to admit that he was free. Before the Civil War slaves were occasionally freed as a reward for some outstanding service. But the freed slave usually lost caste among the others. He no longer had a "family" to be proud of and boast about. The other darkies looked down on him. Darkies loved aristocrats, and regarded with contempt what they called "po' white trash." They were inordinately proud of their "families" -- their wealth, their social position -- the latter considered far more important than money. When any of Uncle Harrison's  kin reminded him he was really free, he'd retort scornfully that it'd take more'n a passel of Yankees to make a free nigger out'n him!

Apropos of that word, we children had been brought up to never use the word nigger. That was vulgar; that was for poor whites. We should say darkies. In their presence we should always say colored people. [T]he word negro was used only in very formal speech.

The day after Uncle Harrison's visit, some of the darkies about the place brought in a possum they had caught the night before and showed it to us. They'd put it on the rail of the porch and it sat there with its smooth tail wrapped tightly around the rail. I made a sketch of it. I never saw an opossum before. It made no effort to run away, knowing (poor little beast) that it was hopeless. I am afraid the darkies had him for supper that night.

Among Mother's goodbye trips was one to Cousin Ned Dillon in Rockbridge County. There has been a lot in the newspapers not long before about an English earl (or maybe it was a Scottish earl, I don't remember now) who had died, and those in succession had died before him, he being very old. His solicitors had found the next of kin in the United States, as a branch of the family had settled there years before. But the American heir had no desire to become a belted earl. His name had not been given. Mother happened to mention this in conversation with Cousin Ned. He remarked "The fact is, Lou, I'm the earl of so and so (I've forgotten the name). But I don't want to leave Virginia and go over there to live. Hang the earldom."

Aunt Charlotte had bought a small house in Salem, a little town not far from Bedford, for Grandmother [Charlotte' stepmother -- M.J.B.] to live in and wanted her to settle down. Aunt Charlotte had lived in one place -- in face one house -- all her life. It was hard for her to understand Grandmother's easy mobility, her facile flitting from one city to another with complete nonchalance. Aunt Sue's sister-in-law, Mrs. Deyerly and her husband lived there, and the Griffins, the family of Aunt Charlotte's mother. We all knew the town well. So Grandmother and Aunt Sue had gone there to live. Of course Mother and the rest of us had gone there to visit.  

[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.

Grandmother = Jane Johnston Mitchell/Michel (1811-1892).
Mother = Mary Louisa Mitchell/Michel Binckley (1838-1930).
Harvey Mitchell/Michel (1799-1866).
Harvey Mitchell Binckley (1864-1928).

Uncle Harrison = former slave, freed by Harvey Mitchell/Michel before the American Civil War. In the 1870 Federal Census, there is a Harrison Mitchell (aka Coles) residing in Bedford/Liberty, born circa 1790, listed as "black."

Aunt Charlotte = Charlotte Elizabeth Griffin Mitchell/Michel (1829-1921).
Ned Dillon = Colonel Edward Dillon (1835-1897), a son of Mary Morris Johnston Dillon Cunningham (1810-1884) and grandson of Charles Johnston (1769-1833) and Elizabeth "Eliza" Prentiss "Betsey" Steptoe Johnston (1783-1820). 

Aunt Sue = Sue Henry Mitchell/Michel Taliaferro (1845-1940); William Meade Taliaferro (1840-1913), had married Sue on October 16, 1867. He was apparently lost to "nostalgia," shell shock, post traumatic stress, war wounds, alcohol and other comorbidities, eventually committing suicide at the Camp Lee Soldier's Home in Richmond. 

Mrs. Deyerly [Dyerly] = not sure who this is.]

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