Mary Louisa Michel Binckley Memoir, 1906 (and 1899): Part III

Martha Washington Inn, formerly College, formerly Preston House, in Abingdon, Virginia, 2006 (Wiki Commons)

[Mary Louisa/Louise Mitchell/Michel Binckley Memoir, 1906 (and 1899), Part III. 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 scans of the original documents, and in turn many thanks to Peter Johnston Binckley and Patricia D'Arcy "Trish" Binckley (1951-2007), at the source.]

The old Preston place (now Martha Washington College) was a fine old mansion, and Amy often took me there to see cousin Preston, a most dignified and stately woman, then long a widow with many grown children. Among them were Mrs. Carrington, Mrs. John B. Floyd, and Eliza who married my uncle Charles, & was cousin Eliza Hughes mother. 

Also Wm. C. Preston the brilliant orator & public man who lived many years in South Carolina. He was devoted to my parents. Mother, as a young girl, spent her winters with him in Columbia, S.C.  

Grandfather took mother from Abingdon in a carriage & 4 horses thro' North Carolina down to Columbia every fall. It took weeks to go. Cousin William had no children, and he and his wife urged my parents to give me to them for adoption. They refused, and some years afterwards Cousin W. adopted one of Mrs. Carrington's sons (the Carringtons had always tried to keep him from adopting me) and the son, strangely enough was a lover of mine when I was seventeen and he twenty. He died at twenty-two -- a dear, lovely boy.

The old Preston house when she lived was a stately home, whose great shade trees, green lawns and flowerbeds were fit setting for a house of simple elegance, where life trod with cultured steps, where old-fashioned formality was tempered by genial hospitality while good-breeding and scholarship was the rule, not the exception.

Life was simple, excitements few. Amusements rather prim but the self-control which was the ruling principle among the gentry, kept up a serene atmosphere morally, while physical existence was made quietly comfortable by such trained servants as the world will never know again. "Perfect serving" is said to be "the soul of living." If that is so, our ancestors ought to have had more than their share of soul. 

I have tried hard to think of that time without the usual inclination to glorify the past which one of my age is liable to do. But it us hard to look back when one is so weary, and not wish for what seems to have been so restful. Such a state of affairs could not naturally last, and yet if the war had not come, I am sure the South would have kept its tranquil ways intact for many years.

In the North, a hard climate, greater population and lack of servants combined to urge human beings on to invention, competition & progress. Whether the world is more comfortable in consequence, is an open question. One that the young cannot answer because they know nothing of anything else but this rush of the moderns.

The middle aged are too breathlessly busy to consider such things, and the old are too predjudiced [prejudiced]. My firm belief in equilibrium makes me hope that even my children may live to see some quietness come over the spirit of this tormented earth. 

Cousin Preston's house was then the handsomest in Abingdon, but there were many other substantial homes of brick and stone which still stand. But they were simply built -- no modern conveniences, and so lacking in  most of the comforts now universal, that I doubt if even I would enjoy going back to them. When my little red morocco shoes carried me down those old streets, there was not a bathroom in the country, not a bit of the necessity we call plumbing, no gas, no furnaces or stoves. 

Candles were the only light, and how eyes held out to do all that fine stitchery, I cannot imagine. The candles were of three qualities. Imported wax was the best and very expensive -- home-made wax and tallow was next, but most universal was common tallow made by each family for its own use. I used to long wildly to be allowed to hold one end of the candle mold as the hot grease was poured in, and never lost the thrill of interest over the transformation, when after a cold night, the mold was brought in, and long white candles came out where that sizzling stuff went in.    

[Mary Louisa/Louise Mitchell/Michel Binckley (1838-1930).
First memories are of "Lilliput" See 1841 letter from Jane (Mother), link here.  This part refers entirely to the Preston residence.
Mother = Jane Mary Wood Johnston Mitchell/Michel (1811-1892).
Amy = enslaved servant. There are two Amys listed in the estate (dated 1832) of Peter Johnston, Jr. (1753-1831), and we may suppose that this Amy is one of them. Link here.
Preston = Sarah "Sally" Buchanan Campbell Preston (1778-1846), widow of Francis Smith Preston (1765-1836).
Mrs. Carrington = Elizabeth "Eliza" Henry Preston Carrington (1796-1877), married to Edward Codrington Carrington (1790-1855).
Mrs. John B. Floyd = Sarah "Sally" Buchanan Preston Floyd (1802-1879), wife of John Buchanan Floyd (1806-1863).
Eliza Madison Preston (circa 1803-1828) was actually the older Sally's niece, not daughter. Her parents were John Preston (1764-1827) and Mary Winston Radford Preston (1781-1810). 
Charles = Charles Clement Johnston (1795-1832).
Eliza = Eliza Mary Johnston Hughes (1825-1909), who married Robert William Hughes (1821-1901) in 1850.
W. C. Preston and wife = William Campbell Preston (1794-1860) and Louisa Penelope Davis Preston (1805-1853). 
Grandfather = Peter Johnston, Jr. (1763-1831). 
The son = probably William Campbell Preston Carrington (1836-1863), who was killed at the Battle of Champion Hill, Mississippi at age 27. His romance with Mary Louisa would have been in or around 1855 or 1856.]